Chapter 16

Chapter Sixteen

RELIC

She blinked up at me before she looked away. “I’ve never kissed anyone before.”

My beast snarled, and the growl that left me was deep and rolled through the room.

Her gaze sliced back to me. “You like that?”

“The beast in me likes it very much. I know it’s fucked, but I like that those lips are mine and only mine. No one else gets to know how they feel or how they taste but me.” There’d been no holding those words in, I hadn’t even tried.

Fern was mine, and the sooner she started to figure it out, the better. That new bit of information wasn’t going to help me keep my shit together though, not when my cock was hard as fuck, and the beast craved so fucking much more. Yeah, I wanted to flip her over, tug her ass in the air, and mark her while I worked my cock inside her and claimed what was mine. But Fern wasn’t there yet. She had no idea what we were to each other, and I didn’t know how to tell my skittish female without freaking her out.

She licked her lips. “Well, while we’re talking about firsts, I’ve never had an orgasm like that, uh … last one either,” she said. “I’ve only ever touched … you know, the outside.”

My cock throbbed harder, the beast pushing more fiercely against the surface. “You’ve never fucked yourself with your fingers, Tink?”

She shook her head.

“Why?”

“I just … don’t,” she said.

She was hiding something from me.

“So, a few firsts tonight then, sweetness?”

“Yes.”

I pressed a soft kiss to her cheek, then her lips, and thank fuck, she let me. They were dark, fuller than usual from feeding and kissing, and utterly irresistible. “How do you feel after feeding?”

“I’ve never felt this good in my life.” Her eyes widened and dipped to my throat, then back up. “Are you okay? I didn’t take too much?”

Her eyes were bright, her skin glowing. It shouldn’t be possible, but somehow, she looked even more beautiful now than before.

I grinned. “You feeding from me had the same effect as a mosquito bite.”

She didn’t smile back; there was alarm in her eyes. “I couldn’t stop, Relic.” She almost whispered it, like it was a terrible confession she was afraid to speak out loud. “I didn’t want to. All I cared about was satisfying my hunger. Not everyone I feed from is going to be able to regenerate like you or be as strong. I need to learn to control myself when I feed.”

I resisted the snarl at the mere thought of her feeding from anyone else.

I cupped her jaw, running my thumb over her lower lip, brushing over one of those sharp little fangs. “That’s not something you’ll ever have to worry about, Fern, because I’m the only male, the only being, you will ever feed from.”

She huffed out a laugh. “You can’t say that. Neither of us knows what’s going to happen in the future.”

I had to bite my tongue. She was still jumpy as hell and still hiding so much from me. Telling her now that she was my mate might send her running, and with someone out there wanting to hurt her, I couldn’t risk it.

“I’m immortal. I’m not going anywhere. We’re tied to each other through our deal. You’ve got an endless blood supply, is all I’m saying.”

She gave me an odd look. “Well, thanks for the offer. I appreciate it, but I guess I need to be ready for any eventuality.”

I lifted my chin and again bit down my snarl.

Her hand slid up my arm and over my shoulder.

That simple touch had my heart banging harder and goose bumps rising all over me, and the pain in my chest, in my gut, intensified. My feelings for Fern were manifesting in a physical way. War had described it to us once. How it’d felt when he slowly gained his emotions. He’d said it hurt, made him nauseous, and that he had to fight the urge not to do a lot of seriously fucked-up things. Like, for example, right then, I wanted to lick her from head to foot, rub up on her until she was thoroughly marked with my scent, and then lock her in my den until she begged me to mate her.

The beast in me thought that was an excellent idea from start to finish, but Lucifer had made us more than just animals, and I knew that Fern wouldn’t be down for that. No, locking her in here would piss her off and scare her. Then she’d never beg me to fuck her ever again. Was that love? Was I in love with her? I had no idea. I did know that I’d never felt this way before, and it hurt and felt good at the same time, like pleasure and comfort and touch all rolled into one.

“What are these?” she asked, tracing her fingers over the ink on my shoulder.

“Protection runes.” I couldn’t take my eyes off her lips when she spoke. Fuck, they were pretty.

“Protection from what?”

Her tongue darted out a second time, moistening her lower lip, and again, I leaned in and kissed her softly because I couldn’t not. That mouth was fucking mine, and like the last time, she let me.

“From possession. Evil spirits are drawn to us because we make good vessels. We’re touched by Lucifer, Hell-born, and”—I stopped myself before I said soulless —“strong. A couple of our brothers were possessed a while back when War mated Willow, so we got these.”

“Holy shit,” she said, still tracing them, making me tingle all over, “that’s terrifying.”

“We lost one of our brothers, and another chose to remain in Hell after he lost his mate and unborn pup.” It had been years, and Maddox still hadn’t once returned to the surface.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know what it’s like to lose someone you love …”

She stopped herself, like she often did, but if I wanted her to keep opening up to me, I had to keep asking the questions.

“Who’d you lose, baby?”

She breathed deeply, and I could see her thinking about it, deciding if she should share.

“My mom,” she finally said.

Her gaze grew distant as she shut whatever she was feeling down, and the pain in my chest intensified because I knew that talking about her mother hurt her. But again, I had to keep up that pressure, gently pushing.

“I’m sorry you had to go through that, Tink. How did she die?”

Her throat worked. “She was murdered by a monster when I was seven.”

I froze. “A monster?”

“Yes.”

“You see it happen?”

She nodded.

“Fern—”

“Do you have a mother?” she asked.

I wanted to ask her more, but this time, I let her change the subject. The more time that passed, the more she was letting me in. She’d tell me the rest of that story—I just needed to wait it out.

“Lothar’s my sire, but I never knew my mother.”

She frowned. “What happened?”

I shrugged. “No one’s ever really told me much about her except that she was a demon. I was the first hound born naturally, well, not created by Lucifer directly, anyway. The first and only born without my parents being mated. His handmaids looked after me when I was a pup, and when I was old enough to train, I joined my brothers.”

“So, you’re half demon.”

“That’s not really how it works with hounds. Male offspring are always hounds; female pups always take after their mothers.”

She studied me. “So, Warrick’s daughter is a witch? She won’t be able to shift into a hound?”

“That’s right.”

And only the males of our young were granted immortality—unless our mates were already immortal, of course. If not? We were forced to watch our females age and die. It was fucked up, and Warrick had been in talks with Lucifer about it. Since Lucifer had granted Willow and any pups they have immortality, War wanted that for the rest of us, but Lucifer was resistant for some fucked-up reason.

“That’s kind of crazy.” Her finger did the tracing-my-ink thing again. “What about Lothar? Is he a good dad?”

“Loth and I, we’ve never had that kind of relationship. He’s a brother to me, like the rest.” Though, for some reason, talking about it now caused a weird feeling in my chest, one I’d never had before.

“Do you love him?” she asked.

“Until a hound mates, we’re only capable of feeling loyalty, anger, and lust. We experience pleasure, but love isn’t something we’re capable of feeling or returning. So, no, but I would die for him, and he, for me.”

Her finger drifted down to trace the hound that stood above the words Devil Dogs MC inked on my chest. “Sounds like love to me,” she said softly.

“I wouldn’t know.” And without thinking, I did the same, except instead of ink, I traced over a scar on her forearm. “How did you get this?”

Her entire body stilled, and she pulled her arm away, shoving it under the covers. “I don’t remember.”

Again, she was obviously lying. My female was covered in scars—so fucking many—and every time I saw them, thought about them, I wanted to tear someone to shreds, to snuff out their worthless life, except there was no enemy to turn my rage on. There was no one to kill. Someone had hurt her though—the marks on her skin were definitely not from some accident. The one beside the scar I’d just pointed out looked like a fucking burn. Those scars shouldn’t even be possible.

“I think I’ll go to sleep now,” she said.

She rolled away, effectively shutting any more questions down, and something thumped on the floor. The vibrator.

Fern stilled, staring down at it, and then she turned to me, cheeks dark pink. “Where did you get that from?” Her eyes filled with alarm. “Have you used that thing on other females?”

“No—”

“Then where did you get it?” she demanded.

“I messaged Rome and got him to pick it up while I waited outside the room last night.”

The blood drained from her face. “You got one of your brothers to get it? You told him about me, about what I did, you—”

“No, Fern, I’d never fucking do that. I won’t ever talk about you that way. Nothing we do, that you do, will ever leave this room—you hear me?”

She was shaking her head. “You must’ve told him something. He went sex-toy shopping for you … for me, for fuck’s sake.”

She was moving away from me, and I grabbed her around the waist and hauled her back before she jumped out of bed and tried to run away.

“What you need to understand, Fern, is the kind of males we are, the way our emotions are, we do not fucking judge. That’s a human emotion. I told you we crave touch, that we need it and the pleasure it gives us, but you’ve also seen how big I am. Yes, hounds like to fuck, but not all females, especially human, can fuck with a male our size. So, we get them off in other ways. We use our fingers, our mouths, and sometimes, we use toys. Rome does not give a fuck we used a vibrator; he’s used them with females. He owed me a favor, and I called it in, so I didn’t have to leave you. Now, the next time you need to get off, you won’t fucking hurt yourself. That was what I was thinking, and Rome didn’t think any-fucking-thing at all.”

She was quiet for several seconds, her mind ticking. She’d at least stopped trying to pull away from me. “What about you?”

“What about me?”

“If you’re using your fingers and mouth or whatever to get them off, what do you get?” she asked, surprising me.

I couldn’t be honest about what we were to each other, but everything else that came out of my mouth was going to be the truth. “Sometimes, all we want is to feel another being close, so we’re not always looking for sex. But if a female is into it, and we’re too big for her to fuck, she can use her hands or her mouth on us as well.”

Those gorgeous peridot eyes searched my face, looking for something—I didn’t fucking know what. “So, before, when I drank from you, when you laid close to me and watched me, did you just do that because you wanted to feel close to someone?”

“No. I wanted to feel close to you.”

Thankfully, she hadn’t left me to guess what she was thinking this time.

“But you don’t want me … that way? You don’t want me to use my hands or my mouth on you? You don’t want that from me?”

Her eyes went blank again, and I could literally see her pulling away, just not physically this time.

No way did I want her thinking that shit. “You felt how much I wanted you, Fern. You were fucking grinding on it, baby. I want you in every way there is. Never think otherwise.”

“Are you still … is your …”

“Am I still hard as fuck for you?” I rasped.

“Yes.”

I’d been keeping my hips back so I didn’t freak her out. “Yes.”

Her fingers brushed my stomach, and I hissed. She paused and tried to pull her hand away, but I covered it and put it back. She searched my eyes, and then, finally, she slid her hand lower. I stayed perfectly still while my female explored me. If that was what she needed, I would fucking breathe through it while she checked that I was telling her the truth. Why she had any doubt, I had no fucking idea. Her fingers grazed the head of my cock, and I fucking held my breath. She stayed on the outside of my underwear, and when she gripped my shaft through the fabric, I groaned low—there was no way I could hold it in.

She looked up at me as she curled her fingers around me more firmly. “It’s like hot steel.”

“You did that. You made me this way.”

“I did?”

She was serious—it was written all over her face.

“Fuck yes. How can you doubt it?”

“I guess I don’t have much experience with this kind of thing.”

“You a virgin, Fern?”

She paled again. “No, I just haven’t had a chance to, um … touch a male this way.”

I had questions, a fucking lot of them, but I swallowed them down. “You can touch me all you like, sweetness.” I was close to hyperventilating and passing the fuck out, but I’d told her she could do whatever she wanted with me, and I’d meant it.

She slid her hand all the way down to the base of my cock and back, squeezing and testing its firmness. “So, what happens if a hound finds his mate but can never have sex with her? That must happen, right? With your size?”

I curled my fingers into tight fists. “That’s never happened. We always fit together; we were made to fit together. Mates are made for each other in every way. We might have to work up to it, but to make our mate ours in truth, we need to claim them, mark them.”

“Do you think you have a mate out there?” she asked, her stare sliding from mine as she fucking finally slipped her hand inside my boxer briefs.

A breath shuddered from me as her hand touched my bare cock. “Yes.”

“Do you want that? Do you want a mate? Do you want kids?”

I hooked her around the back of the neck and drew her closer. “I do.”

She stroked me, and I growled low.

“Does that feel good?”

“Never felt anything as good as your hand on me, Tink.”

Fern shoved down the covers so she could watch what she was doing to me. I was already close to coming, which meant my cock was darker and covered in bulging veins. It was also thickening.

Her gaze darted up to me. “What’s happening?”

I tried to regain control, but I was fucking drunk on her touch, on the pleasure she was giving me, and rolled to my back so she could work me faster.

“Use both hands, baby.” I needed to thrust. If I didn’t get to move soon, I’d fucking lose it.

She nodded and did as I’d said, and as soon as she had a tight grip on me, I lifted my hips, thrusting up, and groaned.

“You’re getting bigger, Relic,” she said huskily.

I gasped in a breath, trying to hold what was going to happen back, but with her taste, her scent branded on me, with my female right there beside me—sated from coming and feeding from my vein—the beast and my body were convinced it was time to mate, and there was no holding the transformation back.

Oh, fuck .

Heat coiled in my gut and burned through my veins, throbbing wildly along my shaft. I was fucking rutting into her delicate hands, lost to it, to her. Panting, I looked down past my now tight-as-fuck abs, so tight that they were almost cramping. It was happening; I was growing longer and thicker; the veins pulsing so fucking heavily now along the shaft while the head grew darker.

“Relic?”

“It’s … it’s okay,” I gasped out.

I couldn’t tell her that this only happened when we were with our mates. That, in six hundred years, this was the first time this had ever happened to me because she was touching my cock, and my body had convinced itself I was inside her, claiming her. I couldn’t tell her this only happened when we fucked our fated mates, so we were interlocked, so I’d be planted as deep as I could get, so I could pump her full of my seed and make sure she got every fucking drop.

Fern moved closer, biting her lip, eyes wide, watching, watching my cock, and she was turned the fuck on. Not scared. Thank fuck. Not fucking scared.

The beast roared, and I snapped, my control disintegrating.

Rearing up, I shoved her back and straddled her smaller body so I was up on my knees. I had to be in this position—the beast demanded it.

“Grip it tight,” I growled out.

She did, looking up at me—not with fear, but with hungry eyes—as I gripped the headboard and fucked her fists. My balls throbbed, and my cock jerked hard. Shoving up her shirt, I angled my cock down and came all over her stomach with a low groan, emptying myself until I was fucking spent.

Panting, I looked down at her. She was panting as well, watching me. Not afraid though. I didn’t sense any fear at all. I stayed where I was, feeling fucking feral as I ran my hand over her stomach, then higher under her shirt, over her tits, smearing her scarred skin with my seed, my scent, marking her the only way I could for now. The beast purred.

“What are you doing?” she whispered.

“Marking you. No one will dare touch you now. They’ll know who you sleep beside, who will fuck them up if they dare try and hurt you,” I said, telling her in the only way I could right then that she was mine.

My brothers, any fucking shifter or demon, that got near her, would scent me on her skin, and they’d know she was under my protection. Pleasure filled me now, but for another reason. I wanted everyone to know she was mine. Now, there would be no mistake.

“And you want that? You want everyone to know … think I’m yours?”

I leaned in and kissed her, hard and deep, a claiming on its own. “You are, Fern. You are mine.”

“Because of our deal?” she asked, her voice husky.

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t lie, and I couldn’t tell her the truth either, so I rolled onto the mattress beside her and pulled her into my arms. “Sleep now, Tink.”

She was quiet for several minutes. “Relic?”

“Night, sweetness.”

Another pause.

“Night, Relic.”