Chapter 5

Chapter

Five

A fter arriving at Travis and Skylar's loft, Travis cooked dinner while Skylar showed Kat around. Later, Skylar and Travis drove Kat to the Gautier townhouse in the French Quarter. Following Skylar's instructions, Kat set the alarm and went upstairs to the room she planned to use for the weekend. And just in case she wanted to go anywhere, Skylar had shown her where the keys to the family's city vehicles were kept.

Kat still felt restless and hoped a shower would wash away the agitation that still remained from MawMaw Chantal's words. She removed her clothes and stepped into the bath. Taking an elastic band off her wrist, she bent over at the waist and brushed her hair over her head, fastening it with the band. She turned on the shower until it was running hot and fast, and steam filled the beautifully done room.

She'd briefly considered running a hot bath in the antique slipper tub but had decided the cascading heat from the shower would do more to loosen her tight muscles. She stepped into the enclosure, closed her eyes, and sighed. Heaven.

After washing the day's travel from her body, she realized she didn't just need relaxation, she needed relief. Kat leaned against the back wall of the shower, letting her hands drift down her body and skim her curves. She imagined her hands belonged to a man. She tried to tell herself that they belonged to a fictional dream man, or even the guy with whom she'd last had sex, but she knew she was fooling herself.

When she saw Jed Steele standing in the vineyard, all of her old feelings and fantasies about the boy she had watched grow into an arresting alpha wolf flooded back. An alpha wolf he most assuredly was now, which was good. He would be looking to mate with a she-wolf who could rise to the occasion and be a great mistress—like the Madonna. The Madonna hadn't been raised to be mistress—she hadn't even been born a she-wolf. But Jed would need a cultured woman, with refined tastes who hadn't had to work for a living. Kat looked at her hands—they were rough. Her nails were short and most of the time had dirt underneath them. She came from solid, working stock, and she was proud of it.

She crisscrossed her hands over her body and brought them up to cup her breasts, flicking her nipples with her thumbs before rolling them in her fingers. It was easy to almost his feel his mouth closing over the sensitized tips to suckle and nip. Kat liked a hint of pain with her pleasure.

Continuing to play with one areola and pebbled tip, she allowed the other hand to glide down her body to find her clit. God, that felt good. Circling the swollen nub, her fingers gradually made their way down to her pussy. She made note of the fact that even though she was aroused, using her own hands was nowhere near as pleasurable as a man's. But as there was no man in the shower, or even the townhouse, with her, she would have to make do.

Kat slid two fingers past the opening to her core and stroked, curling them upward to caress that sweet spot at the top of her sheath. Her breathing began to get thready. The faster she rubbed, the more intense her anticipation as she felt her climax approaching quickly. She added a third finger, plunging deep as she pressed down on her clit, sending her senses reeling as pleasure suffused her system with the same intensity as the water cascading over her body.

She allowed her breathing and her pulse to resume their normal rate and rhythm before turning the water to a more tepid temperature for a final rinse. Kat stepped out of the shower, dried off, and put on her robe. After disengaging the alarm, she stepped out onto the balcony overlooking the beautiful old neighborhood. Kat smiled. Old was a relative term. In America this townhouse was considered old; in Italy it would be almost new.

Not feeling any more relaxed, she retreated from the balcony, reset the alarm, and trotted down the stairs and into the kitchen, looking for the wine collection. Kat grinned as she noticed a great many of the bottles were from La Fortezza. Ah, Carmigano! Excellent. The ruby-red wine with a ripe fruit character to finish was one of her favorites, and its origins could be traced back to the 14 th century.

She poured herself a large glass and wandered through the townhouse—bored and edgy. She knew her sleep cycle was off and while the orgasm she had given herself in the shower had alleviated one need, it had awakened another.

Wolf-shifters were raised not to believe that the full-moon had any more of a call to them than it did to their human friends. But Kat did not subscribe to that notion. She had long ago noticed that the natural rhythms of her body were geared to the lunar cycle, and she always planned accordingly. She ran back upstairs and opened her tablet, looking for parks or green spaces that did not close when the sun went down. Finding one, she got dressed, borrowed one of the townhouse's vehicles, and drove to the park.

It wasn't deserted, which was good, but fortunately she found a parking space away from the other cars. She pulled into a spot, glad to have a street light overhead. The SUV she'd borrowed would keep her hidden while shifted to and from her wolfen state. Removing her clothes, she placed them inside the vehicle, locked it, and hid the key in some nearby foliage.

She slowly closed her eyes, stilled her mind, and called forth her wolf, who seemed all too happy to be released in this new place. She felt the shimmer surround her as her body morphed seamlessly from human to wolf. Kat breathed in the smells of her new surroundings, shaking herself before bounding off into the vegetation toward a path that ran along the top of a ridge.

Navigating the uneven terrain was more of a challenge than she'd thought it would be. She had run the vineyards of Tuscany from the time she was a small child. Other times she'd run with her friends; most often that had occurred on a pack's estate and so the ground was relatively groomed. But Louisiana was damp, even though there had been no rain and none was predicted. The air was close and made running more difficult.

Kat made it to the well-worn path and began to gallop along at a more sedate and even pace, working her major muscle groups as she did. She thought about how Stephanie had extolled Luna de Lobo's grounds—from the private beach to the vineyards and pastures. She'd told Kat that often the wolves played down on the beach, splashing and cavorting among the waves until they fell exhausted on the beach just to lie in the sun. Kat smiled to herself; she could get used to that.

She stood at the top of a cliff and looked out over the Gulf of Mexico. It might be hot and damp here, but the view was spectacular. Unexpectedly, the hackles all along her back began to raise slowly. Kat glanced around and could see nothing that could have engaged her wolf's instinctive warning system. Not knowing from which direction the threat was coming, Kat crouched low near the edge of the cliff, hiding among the bushes.

She focused intently with her hearing and eyesight and found nothing, but still her hackles were raised. A disturbance in the air caught her attention as a large, black, gaseous mass ascended from below the rim. Before she could leap out of its way, the cloud descended all around her, enveloping her in an inky shadow.

Kat tried not to panic, but the feeling was almost overwhelming. Her heart felt like it could barely beat as tendrils of the fog wrapped its gnarled fingers around her chest, squeezing it hard enough that she feared her ribs would break. Her lungs couldn't expand properly, and it seemed as though all the air had been wrung from them. Kat was hot, exhausted, dying. She used the last ounce of her strength to force her chest to expand, allowing her lungs to draw in whatever oxygen they could find within the dark mist. As if her nostrils were the drain of a sink with the stopper swiftly removed, the haze swirled into fine funnels of darkness and invaded her body.

When the dank air around her cleared, Kat gasped in desperation. The fist that had been clenched around her body seemed to release its icy grasp of death and she could finally breathe. Her heart returned to its normal rhythm. She tried to stand, but the effort was too great, and she staggered only a few steps before falling.

She rested and tried again. This time moving seemed to be easier. There was no way she could run, but she was hopeful that she had enough energy to take a more direct way back to her vehicle, shift, get dressed, and then lock herself in. It took a few moments for her to get her bearings, but she half-walked, half-crawled back to the parked SUV, found the keys, and made sure she could not be seen.

Kat tried to still her mind, but the same feeling of disorientation she'd experienced that last day in Tuscany rolled over her again like a wave washing up on the shore. She shook her head, trying to clear it—big mistake. The urge to retch was almost impossible to ignore. She managed to suppress her rising anxiety and closed her eyes to try and find a calm place in which to ask her wolf to recede. Finally, she felt the shimmer surround her, but it felt as though it was rejecting her. She focused all her abilities on completing the metamorphization and was elated when she opened her eyes to see she was human once more.

Kat opened the door to the SUV, found her clothes, and managed to shimmy into them without having to get to her feet. Once dressed, she clawed her way up the door frame until she was standing and managed to crawl into the driver's seat before closing and locking the door. Exhausted, she leaned back and closed her eyes for a moment… and was gone.

Tap—tap—tap… The sound barely penetrated her brain, but it was loud enough to cause her eyes to flutter open.

"You okay, miss? The park's closing," said a fresh-faced young man.

Kat's eyes were riveted to the pulse beating in his neck. It wasn't something a normal human would notice, but for a hungry predator, it was all too visible. Kat licked her lips.

"Ma'am? Have you been drinking?"

Kat rolled down the window and gave him a bright smile. "Not at all. I flew in from Tuscany earlier. I wanted a little fresh air and to stretch my legs, but I fear the walk to the top of the ridge combined with jet lag did me in. I took a little nap and I'm fine now. Would you like me to take a field sobriety test or blow into one of those little gizmos?"

She realized that she was feeling better than she had since she'd left the villa.

The young man chuckled. "No, ma'am. You don't appear to be inebriated and those drinking or doing drugs don't volunteer for sobriety tests."

"I can understand how it might have looked to you, but I assure you I'm feeling fine. The townhouse I'm staying at is in the French Quarter and that's where I'm headed now."

"As long as you promise to take it easy and go straight home, I'll just wish you a good evening. But if you don't feel up to it, I can get you a ride home, free of charge."

"No, I promise. I feel fine. In fact, I haven't felt this good in a very long time."

"All right then," he said stepping back. He smiled at her and walked away.

Feed me. Feed me. Feed me.

The words reverberated through her brain. She could hear her own pulse and the rhythm of her heart. With one last longing look at the young man's carotid artery, she started up the SUV, pulled out of the parking space, and headed back to the Gautier residence in the Quarter.

Over and over in her head, she could still hear the refrain.

Feed me. Feed me. Feed me.