Chapter 14

Chapter

Fourteen

Sean nipped my lower lip and then sucked gently. I groaned because I knew how good that felt on other more sensitive places on my body. The man was an artist with his mouth.

He cupped my breast with his hand while he teased my nipple with the pad of his thumb. Each little stroke sent quivers through my body. He clearly enjoyed watching me shake with every touch. Come to think of it, he was an artist in a lot of ways.

When his lips and teeth replaced his thumb, my hips bucked against him. He chuckled low in his throat and looked up at me through his lashes. "Don't try to rush me, Miss Magic. Perfect breasts deserve worship. But I don't want you feeling too desperate. You can show me what you think I should do when I work my way down."

With his mouth still on my breast, he took my hand and guided it down over my abdomen, past my navel, and between my thighs. I gasped, my back arching as our entwined fingers slipped over my slick, delicate skin.

"My Alice," he murmured. "Open your legs and show me how you like me to touch you."

I spread my knees wide. He rested his hand on mine so he could feel every little quiver and every move I made while I pleasured myself. Mercilessly he licked, sucked, and teased my nipples until the ache of need spread through my whole body.

He surprised me by capturing my hand and taking my fingers into his mouth one by one so he could lick them clean. "You're gentle tonight," he said, placing my hand on my tummy. "Is that what you want from me? Gentleness?"

Ten minutes ago, I would have told him I wanted him to take charge and be rough. I liked pain with my pleasure, and I'd wanted handprints in all the places he was used to giving them to me and then a few new spots. As always, he would have been happy to oblige and then care for me tenderly after.

And I did still want that…or at least part of me did, and would have been very satisfied as a result. With Sean, I was never not satisfied—he made damn sure of that. But now that he was above me, looking into my eyes with that beautiful golden-brown gaze, I knew what I wanted more were soft touches and worship. He understood me and what I needed better than I knew myself sometimes.

"Yes, that's what I want," I said. "My heart hurts."

He scooped me up with one arm, moved us to the side of the bed, and settled us in with his feet on the floor and my knees astride his thighs. "Then let me try to make that hurt go away," he said, and pressed his lips to my chest over my heart. "I love you."

"I know."

He held himself steady as I lowered myself onto him slowly and gently.

The moment the heat and hardness of him pushed inside me, my head fell back and I let out a groan of pleasure and contentment. He let me take my time sliding down, his chest rumbling.

Even when he'd filled me all the way, he let me rest with my head on his chest, his arms around me holding tight while I reveled in his strength and love and the feeling of him so hot, so hard, so deep inside me. Our wolf amulets hummed on their chains, pressed between us as he stroked my back and inhaled my scent from the base of my neck at my shoulder.

I loved our farmhouse and the life we were building together, but the truth was, Sean was my home.

I used to think I would never love or be loved because it was too risky on so many levels. A year ago, before I'd met Malcolm and Sean, I'd still believed that, at least mostly. But there must have been chinks in my armor even then because I'd accepted Malcolm into my life and then Sean not long after. They'd had to work hard for that dubious privilege, but not too long before that, they would have had no chance at all. I had a long list of exes and would-be friends who could attest to that fact.

What a difference a year made.

The ache in my heart began to fade.

When I started to move, he let me set the pace, his hands under my thighs to guide and support me. I wrapped my arms around his neck and alternated between grinding on his lap and kissing him and sliding along his hard, hot length. He felt so good that I let out little cries that made his eyes glow golden.

Just before I came, I let some of my magic free to swirl around us in a gentle whirlwind of green and white with traces of blue, red, black, and gold.

"Beautiful," Sean murmured into my hair. "So beautiful. Come for me, love."

When I went over the edge, he slipped his hand between us to draw out my pleasure and make me shudder in his arms. I called his name again and again. My magic rolled through us in a second wave of pleasure that we shared. My head fell against his chest.

As I drifted, he eased me free of him, then drew me back toward the center of the bed, lay down behind me, and hooked my leg over his arm so he could slip into me again. Still gentle, he took control of our pace and his fingers played with me until I came again, this time with a wail.

"My beautiful Miss Magic," he said, his mouth on my ear. "Watch yourself take me. So deep, and so well."

I could barely lift my head from his chest. "So good, Mister Wolf. I feel so good."

He leaned over to take something from his nightstand, then maneuvered me onto my hands and knees. When I made a little complaining sound, he chuckled and kissed my back. "I did promise to make you blush," he said. "Don't think I've forgotten that just because we switched gears."

I wanted to know how he thought he'd make me blush while staying gentle, but decided I'd rather find out.

From behind me, I heard a soft sound, and then something buzzed. Before I had a chance to react, the buzzing moved between my legs. I nearly collapsed at the rush of pleasure. " Oh ."

Sean caressed my back and the curves of my backside. "More, Miss Magic?"

"More," I pleaded.

He didn't just turn up the vibrator—he moved it from sensitive place to sensitive place to make me writhe and clutch the bedding. Sometimes he replaced the tip of the vibrator with his tongue until I was reduced to a nearly incoherent, quivering mess.

But he didn't make me beg, and he didn't spank me, though the situation could have easily led in both those directions. Instead, he gently coaxed two more orgasms from me, each from a different place, and each so toe-curlingly good, until I collapsed to the bed, shaking and unable to move.

"You know, that was all very good, Mister Wolf, but I'm not blushing yet," I said when I could talk again.

His smile made heat roll through my entire body. "Oh, I know. That was the warm-up."

"The warm-up?" My eyes widened. "To what? "

He told me. And so help me, I blushed.

Chuckling, he lay down and drew me up his body until I straddled his face. "Remember, you can ask for mercy if you need it," he said, his eyes twinkling between my thighs. "I gave you a safety word."

"Yes you did." I gripped the headboard. "Shame I forgot it."

He laughed, and then he pulled me down onto his mouth. I let out a ragged cry.

Forget artist —he was a Michelangelo with his tongue, teeth, and lips. And he held me still with both hands on my hips so I couldn't move away, gentle but merciless in the way he wrenched moans and wails from me.

Then the vibrator turned on again. I moaned before it even touched me, anticipating how it would feel in combination with his tongue?—

—and then he slipped it into a spot I didn't anticipate, and I came so hard and so fast that my scream might have reached the neighbors' homes if I hadn't gotten in the habit of putting up a sub rosa ward around our room to keep our sex life private. Our houseguest—much less our neighbors—didn't need to hear any of this. And I would have ripped the headboard off the bed if I'd had werewolf strength.

As the aftershocks of that incredibly intense orgasm continued, Sean tossed the vibrator aside, rolled us over, settled my calves on his shoulders, and thrust deeply into me. Despite his obvious hunger, he held himself back, staying gentle even as his low growls let me know he was close to his own release.

I wanted his skin against mine now more than ever. I reached for him and he covered my body with his so I could wrap my trembling legs around his hips. He buried his face against my shoulder, his weight on one hand as he held me close with the other.

"Alice," he groaned into my ear, shudders wracking his whole body as he came in a series of hot pulses deep in my core. " Alice …"

The sound of my name on his lips and the way he moved against me gave me one final, soft release. I held him tightly with my arms and legs as we trembled together. There was nothing better than this. Nothing in the world .

He raised his head to meet my half-lidded gaze. "Marry me," he said roughly. "Be my mate."

I chuckled breathlessly. "I already said I would."

"Humor me." He rested his head on my chest. I held him close with my fingers in his hair. "I just need to hear you say it again," he murmured, his lips on my breast near one of the faint marks his teeth had made earlier. "Marry me, Alice."

To know this fierce man needed to hear me say I'd be his wife and mate because it gave him strength and comfort melted me. The way we could be vulnerable with each other without fear was more intimate than what we'd just enjoyed together. He was my port in the storm and I was his, in every sense of the word.

"I will," I said, stroking his hair. "There's nothing I want more."

I felt him smile. "Not even coffee or Carly's blueberry scones?"

"Um…"

It was his turn to laugh. "I won't force you to choose between your three great loves. I'm willing to share you with coffee and scones."

"Well, good, because honestly if not, that was going to be a deal-breaker for me."

Still chuckling, he kissed my shoulder and gave it a gentle wolfy bite. "Need me to carry you to the bathroom?"

"Mmm, in a minute." I rubbed my nose in his hair and he rumbled. His wolf always loved it when I did wolfy things. "Thanks for making good on your promise to make me blush. I need to dare you to do that again very soon."

"Yes, you do." He met my gaze with his own golden one and smiled wickedly. "Yes, you damn well do."

A crowd of thousands spills from the alleys and every home to jam the streets, their voices cheering. But the cheers are not joyful. They are triumphant. Violent. Frenzied .

This is vengeance, is it not? It is a massacre.

I am not one of the marked ones, but the crowd has tasted blood and the madness spreads. Women plead for mercy for themselves and their children and receive none. The rape and slaughter is a great black crashing thunderstorm and the streets run with blood in rivers like rain. I am horrified by the perversity of it all. The smell of viscera sickens me. I lick my lips to taste the rage.

Perhaps even I can still be surprised at what a man can do to another man. To a woman. To a child.

Through the screams, I hear another kind of sound. A dull thudding and skidding. A slap of flesh on stone. It comes into focus: a severed head tied to a dog's tail, dragging through the streets as the animal runs. Only scraps of flesh remain on the skull, but I believe this is a woman I know. She sold me figs in the market. I want to grieve but my sorrow will not come.

What rises instead is something like joy.

I do not want to feel joy at this. This is monstrous. But I love it, I think. I may borrow this from them for my future enemies. They call us monsters, but it is we who learn monstrous ways from them.

I kneel in the shadows and put my mouth to the blood that runs between the cobblestones. The night is cold, but the blood is warm. I sip from the stream and lave the stones with my tongue. Gods, it is such a vile and exquisite brew…

My stomach rebelled violently. Sickness and desperation sent me stumbling in the dark from our bed to the bathroom on rubbery legs.

I made it to the toilet just in time to fall hard on my knees and vomit. Hot tears ran down my face. I had no idea if I was crying from being sick, the pain of landing on the floor, the horror of the dream, or all three.

When that misery ended, I flushed the toilet one last time and lay on my side on the cool tile. Through the ringing in my ears, I heard water running in the sink. Sean knelt beside me and wiped my face with a cold washcloth. I hadn't seen any blood come out of my mouth, but the dream felt so real that I expected the cloth to come away smeared red. He gripped my hand in both of his and sat with me until the nausea faded and the room stopped spinning.

I forced myself upright to lean against the side of the tub. Sean handed me a towel to dry my face and a cup of water to rinse my mouth. I shook so badly that I could barely hold the cup. I swore I could still taste blood.

Sean set the cup on the side of the tub. "Alice, what is going on?"

"Another nightmare." I drew my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around my legs. "It was awful. And gross. Really, really gross."

"That's two nights in a row." He brushed hair back from my face. "This isn't like you at all."

"I know." I leaned against the warmth of his hand. "It's not enough my waking hours are full of problems. My subconscious has to get in on the act too and serve up nightmares. It's a bit rude, actually."

"Do you think you're okay to go back to bed?"

"I think so." I made a face. "After I brush my teeth."

He got me on my feet and stood beside me while I brushed and used mouthwash. By the time we got back to the bed, I'd stopped trembling.

I told Sean what I could remember about the dream, which wasn't much. "Do you think the gross part with the blood was my brain telling me I shouldn't be listening to what Moses has to say?" I asked when I finished. "Or that he's feeding me lies I don't want to hear?"

"Maybe," he hedged. "But what about the violence? You used the word ‘massacre.'"

"Moses is responsible for a lot of violence. So are the vamps. Both are on my mind. It fits."

"I suppose it does." He drew me close so my head rested on his chest. "So much for my new alpha power of banishing bad dreams."

"I knew that was too good to be true. Like healthy chocolate cake or timeshares. "

He chuckled and kissed my hair. "What can I do to help you sleep better? I thought the werewolf TLC would do the trick."

"Oh." I scowled. "So now you think you have a magical?—"

He shook with silent laughter. "Not magical per se," he assured me. "But you tell me I'm good at what I do. Plus, I like to think there's something to that sexual healing thing."

"I'm pretty sure there is, at least most of the time." I snuggled closer and closed my eyes. "Back to sleep now, I hope. We've got early meetings."

Even safe in Sean's arms, though, it took a very, very long time for me to fall asleep again. And when I did, I dreamed of blood.