I’d felt like someone, something completely different when I yanked it up and over my head. I was brave, confident, able to face down his molten gaze and take it as my due. The questioning returned after he soaked up everything he could see in the moonlight, his hand reaching out to slide against my chest, pushing my bra strap down, trapping my arm, then his palm cupped around me.
We both gasped as one when he’d grazed my hard budded nipple, his eyes meeting mine, wavering, almost looking pained by what he felt. Perhaps it was the same knife sharp stab of need that slid through me, wanting everything he was doing and so much more. He’d pulled away, shedding his tank top and undoing my bra in a series of fumbling movements, then he pushed me back and covered his body with mine.
It wasn’t the first time I’d had sex. Like a lot of girls, I’d lost my virginity in a series of furtive fumbles after school one day in year ten to a boy I’d been seeing for a while. That and most times afterwards, it’d been fast, sometimes painful, and difficult to understand what the big deal was. But Jai… He touched my body with the same confidence he did everything, building a terrible pleasure inside me that I’d only managed to do on my own, then moving well beyond that. He swept me up in a flurry of touches and caresses, reading my moans and twitches and pushing me higher.
I’d watched the moon hanging above us in the night sky, the chatter around the bonfire a dim buzz in my ears as he settled between my legs. “Shan…” he’d whispered into my thigh, following it with kisses that kept going lower until…
My back bent like a bow as his tongue slid through me, parting me, brushing over my clit and making me want to scream for more. “Mm…” he purred, the vibrations rattling through me, and my legs splayed wider, not wanting to provide any impediment to his movements. “Sweet, Shan, so sweet…”
Jai always had a hunger for life, throwing himself into rugby games, pranks, and pack business with everything he had, so to be on the receiving end now to all that intensity was mind blowing. I was gabbling some incomprehensible noises as his fingers pushed into me, hooking up. “That’s it, Shan,” he crooned between long licks. “Come apart for me.”
By the time he’d slid up my body, a dark shadow promising a million honey sweet pleasures with that sickle smile of his, I’d been panting through one orgasm and ready for another. He’d made me feel so soft, wanton, my fingers roaming across his shoulders as he rolled the condom on and then into me.
It’d been a bit of a fight initially, to accept his size, but it’d been one I’d willingly lost, both of us sobbing when he finally buried himself deep.
“You OK?” he’d rasped out, his arms shaking.
I’d reached up and drew his lips down on mine by way of an answer, our movements starting small, then involving our whole bodies as he rocked into me. I was still so sensitive, every little action building a fire inside me that, at the time, was a little scary to experience. But he’d drawn me along, caged within his arms, until we both moved with a breath-stuttering synchronisation. Until it happened.
My cry, his howl, had announced to the world what we were up to.
At the time, I’d thought it meant a whole lot more, but when we finally came back to the bonfire and found Uncle Rob standing there, Jai had dropped my hand like a hot coal.
I came back to the present with an unpleasant snap, Jai’s presence by my side an oppressive one rather than enticing. He watched me edge away. I was trying for subtle, but there was no small detail missed by pack members. I swallowed and then looked up, facing him now with a much cooler gaze, I hoped.
“You said the alphas wanted to see me? What’s that about?”
Chapter 7
I stood in front of the pack, eyes downcast, Jai at my side.
“You asked me to bring Shannon to you,” he prompted.
I heard the shift of old bones in chairs, the tap of a cane in the dirt, the harrumph of old men clearing their throat. They kept us waiting, because they could, because it wasn’t us that controlled the flow of communication, and because it wasn’t yet the time. They operated on a temporal flow the rest of us couldn’t understand, that wasn’t confined by the ticking of clocks or the changing dates on calendars. They were eternal, knowing their sons and grandsons would step up and take their place when it was their time to pass on, so their patience was endless.
Unfortunately, mine wasn’t. I felt the warmth of Jai’s hand on my arm and wanted to shake it off, but didn’t dare. Instead, I just stood there, tolerating his presence and wondering what the fuck they wanted from me now.
“You’re Moira’s girl.”
What should have been a question came out like a statement, the voice deep, corded with age in the raspy tone.
“Yes, sir.”
“Sir?” A series of rusty laughs went around the group.
“I’m sorry,” I said hurriedly, trying to remember the proper honorific. How the hell had I forgotten all of this?
Because you haven’t been brought before them for years, I replied to my own thought. Because you thought this was over.
“It’s all right, girl,” the old man said. “I know your grandma raised you right. You have a look of her. Hair like sunlight.” My eyes flicked to where it hung in front of my eyes. “You’re going up to the bad place on the ridge tomorrow?”
“How did you—?” I snapped my lips shut. It was not my place to ask questions, confirmed by the chuckles that came from the pack. “My apologies, Alphas. Yes, we are due to go to the Capricorn Institute—” I flinched when I heard the sound of phlegm spat on the ground. “Tomorrow morning. Stuart’s team, we’ve been offered work there.”
“This is a bad business,” one said. “Bastards taking that place, slapping a nice façade on the cage that held too many of ours.”
“Why this town? Why there? Animal conservation? Pfft… There’s something else going on. What about you, young Jai? What did your crew find?” another said.
“We didn’t get far, Alphas. The security… That’s no zoo or rich man’s project. They had trained men, guard dogs…”
“Did they indeed?” I could almost hear the wheels spinning as they conferred amongst themselves. “You have asked to court this girl?”
What? My head almost jerked up, only habit keeping it down.
“Yes, Alphas.”
“Moira’s girl. Do you want this young fella buzzing around? We don’t let the pack pick outsiders for mates often. Young Rob pleaded your case to us.”
“I…”
I spoke because it was expected of me, because I knew better than to ignore a question from an alpha, but I struggled to form a response. What. The. Actual. Fuck. Pack be damned, I was having this out with Jai after this debacle was done.
“I’m sorry, Alphas. I haven’t had a chance to talk this over with Shannon yet. I…”
“So whaddya been doing, sniffing around her place every night then? She seen you in skin form?”
“Ah…yes, Alphas.”
“That was enough for my Gracey. Seen the old trouser snake and she…”