Chapter 25

TWENTY-FIVE

RUTH

I wove between the trees as fast as my little bunny feet could carry me. Now that it was daytime, the sunlight that managed to squeeze through the thick canopy of trees lit my path well enough, though it wasn't much help. I had no idea where I was going. It didn't matter. All I could think about was putting as much distance between me and my new mate as possible.

What had I done?

Allowing a werewolf to claim me had seemed like the only way to guarantee the safest escape possible. It had felt right for reasons that went beyond survival.

I stopped dead in my tracks when the breeze carried a new scent—the masculine fragrance of pine and smoke. Every hair on my tiny bunny body stood when I felt the scar on my throat throb.

I could feel his approach like a narcotic in my blood. The bastard was tailing me.

My heart raced as I lurched back into full speed, the cold knife of betrayal stabbing my lungs with every frantic breath I took.

I bet this whole thing was just a sick game to him. This had to have been his plan the entire time: give me hope of escape only to hunt me down.

He'd told me I wasn't like his other hunting trophies… Another lie.

I felt so fucking stupid. I'd actually started to form feelings for the fucker. Deep, complicated feelings that would sit with me forever. Feelings I couldn't shake even now, knowing what he did to my sister.

The mark on my throat blazed hotter the closer he came. Two instincts waged war inside me. A rabbit's instinct to run from the predator and the instinct to turn around and submit to my mate.

The snag of a branch had my beady eyes darting off my path ahead. I regretted looking. My thundering pulse nearly stopped when I registered two glowing eyes exploding from the bushes at my side. The pale-furred monster lunged, his jaws closing around my tiny body.

Teeth glinting, hot breath ruffled my fur and strings of saliva flecked my coat.

Before he could crush me in his maw, I shifted back to my human form and jerked my body away, rolling onto the forest floor. Twigs and stones sliced my skin, and the wolf behind me let loose a low growl the moment the scent of my blood hit the air.

"Fuck, you smell so goddamn good, Little Bunny."

"Get away from me!" I lurched to my feet and started to run, but he was too quick. He lunged again, and his giant arms ensnared my waist, taking us both to the ground.

The moment I was in his arms, an intense heat burst beneath my skin, sinking between my thighs. His claw-tipped paws clamped down on my hips, and he pulled me back.

"No!" My hands raked at the ground, dirt lodging beneath my nails as I tried to scramble away. "You said you'd let me go. That was the deal!"

"My human made you that deal. I'd never promise anything so stupid." His dark chuckle was all gravel. He rose on his knees as he positioned me so I was on all fours and draped his hulking form over my slight frame. "Now that you wear my mark, there's no escaping me."

"I'm not your prey!" I gasped against him. "You said so yourself."

His wet nose brushed the shell of my ear, making my skin prickle. "You're the one who wanted to play a game of wolf and rabbit, Little One."

He lifted one paw from my hip, trailing it up the curve of my waist and gripped my breast possessively. He plucked at the piercing hard enough to leave me gasping.

"I don't want this. I don't want you."

"Liar," he huffed, calling me out. "My mate's sweet cunt is dripping for me, begging for me to take it. Even if it wasn't, I can feel your emotions. Your resentment is threaded tight with lust."

He slid his tongue along the column of my neck and lapped gently at the mating mark on my throat.

The monster's fever-hot breath washed down my neck, and his dark and wild scent clotted my lungs. The feel of his soft fur against my naked skin was like a shock to my senses.

Despite how much my mind was against him, my body didn't care. These things just made my pussy wetter.

With his knee, he nudged my thighs apart, and his paw on my hip slipped around to cup the most intimate part of me.

I wanted to scream, but no sound came out.

My eyes shuttered as a wave of lust and hatred crashed through me.

"Mmm. You're so slick for me." His deep timbre was so utterly inhuman, which sunk straight between my legs, making me soaked and leaking enough arousal to dribble down my thighs onto the dirt. "You're the sweetest thing I've ever tasted."

His fingers slid through my folds, fat beads of arousal rolling down my thighs. I tried to clamp my legs shut, but he pushed them wider, and as he held me open by force, I realized I was only getting wetter. Shame radiated through me, making me burn hot.

I had no right to enjoy this. And I did. He knew it, too; he felt everything I did.

He knew just how drunk I was on this fucked-up dynamic we'd forged on that Easter night from Hell.

He pulled his fingers away from my center, placed his palm between my shoulder blades—his fingers still sticky with me—and pushed me down so my belly was flush with the ground. A few breaths later, warm beads of moisture peppered my backside, and I glanced over my shoulder.

The huge, furry beast was fully erect, the bright red glistening cock leaking copious amounts of pre-cum from the slit of his tapered tip. His hips canted forward so it dribbled onto my bare ass cheeks. When he caught me looking at him, he gripped his girth and gave it a few strokes.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't breed you right here in the dirt, Little Bunny."

There were a hundred reasons, and for some stupid one, I couldn't voice any of them. My mind said "no" while every other part of my body screamed "fuck yes."

The mere thought of him sinking into me, filling me with his cum, and the chance of his pack stumbling across us—seeing that he'd claimed the enemy for his mate—had me heating, fresh pheromones leaking from me.

And just like that, I was in heat all over again.

No. Oh gods, no!

This wasn't supposed to happen so soon, not after he'd fucked and marked me. And out here in the open, of all places.

My uterus clearly didn't give a shit. It cared about him and nothing else. The ultimate betrayal my body could've made.

Carver swore. "I said give me a good reason not to breed you. If I don't fill you up now, my pack might catch your scent, even with my mark."

A shiver shot through me, cold and warm at the same time. I could barely function with the pressure of my polarizing instincts trying to cleave me in half.

I wanted to kill him, even ifit meant going down together.

I tried to scream, and immediately, his paw snaked around my throat, squeezing with enough force to leave me teetering on the edge of consciousness. "Don't you dare. They'll try to take you from me." His voice turned dark and deadly. "I'll spill pack blood if any of them so much as look at you."

The ability to breathe was beyond me, but now it had nothing to do with his hold on my throat. "Y–you don't get to pretend you care about me. I'm not b–buying any more of your lies. I know what you did to my sister."