Chapter 31

Creed

Fuck. Bite. Claim.

I didn't want to simply slide my mate up and down my cock, even though her cunt felt like a slick little hand trying to wrap itself around me. I didn't want to only feel the head of my dick nudge her pearl with every stroke. Her coos of pleasure that came with each pass, I liked them just fine, but they made me wonder about what it would be like to have more. What would it be like if I cut her down from that rope, catching her before she fell, then forced her down to the ground? Head down, back arched, hips tilted up in presentation. What would it be like to kneel between those satin-smooth thighs and then rub the head of my cock against—

"You'll hurt her."

Silas was a thorn in my side as he appeared at my left, regarding everything that was happening like this was just any other day. He watched me snarl at him, the wolf letting him know that neither of us liked him near our mate, not right now. She was mine and I needed to claim her and—

"You'll hurt her, then if you claim her, you'll be bound to her for eternity." His lips thinned. "And she'll hate you for exactly that long."

No.

The wolf was definite about that. There was no reality he would accept where Jessalyn was in danger, or hurting, or… I swallowed hard, where she hated us. Our claws threatened to pierce her skin as our grip tightened, as if he was the one taking her away from me.

Not me.

"I need—" I started to say.

"I know."

That was the thing that saved him. Even though wolf shifters mated in packs, we experienced moments of extreme territorialism, but there was something in his eyes that made clear he understood the fight raging inside me. Twin impulses: to just take her, make her mine and damn the consequences; or to slow things down and do as the alphas had always instructed and put her first. Somehow, while he would never have a wolf, he knew that struggle. He nodded to me, then pulled away, that small distance helping, right up until he moved to stand in front of Jessalyn.

It should've been my hand sliding down her throat, thumbing her pulse before going to her hair and grabbing a handful of it to drag her lips down. It should've been my lips on hers, kissing her so slowly, so thoroughly it was as if he was learning the terrain of her with his mouth to memorise and store away for later. But she was mine—that throbbed hard and deep inside of me, a twin to the pulse in my balls.

My claws dimpled her flesh and that showed me I was losing control. Fear and desire, like the feeling of standing close to the edge of a cliff unsure of whether to step back or jump off, raged inside me, slowing my strokes. And then I just stood there holding Jessalyn but not knowing what to do.

"Does it feel good?" Silas asked her as he stared over her shoulder at me. "Do you like what your mate is doing to you?"

She couldn't answer in words, but the wolf and I didn't need them. We knew what that little moan meant, especially the edge to it. It was like catching a rabbit when you wanted to gorge yourself on deer. You had just enough to quiet the ache in your stomach, but what you really wanted was to be full to the point of bursting and the bone-deep satisfaction that came from it. But Silas evidently didn't know what her sounds meant because he pushed her to answer.

"Use your words."

"Need…"

I moved at her words, feeling how my shaft was so hard it wanted to snap back against my belly, feeling the tension that came from spearing it instead between her thighs and forcing it to drag roughly through her folds, feeling that slippery flesh part. But when I glided along part of her, I felt that indentation, and my cock caught there, wanting to push in, not brush past. She started to writhe as soon as she felt it.

"That…" She breathed the word out. "Need that! Creed—"

"Don't you fucking dare."

Arik. Alpha. The two parts of me gave him different names, but they meant the same thing. The only way a pack could work was if one member took the lead, showing the others the right way to go. He stared at me, making clear he was insisting on taking that role.

"She feels like fucking wet satin, doesn't she?"

I didn't even know what the hell satin was, but it was his tone, not his words, that convinced me. A painful awareness of how good she felt: that's what I got from his voice, coupled with a desire to feel it all over again. I nodded.

"Because she's hot, wet, and slick for you." He turned to watch Silas kissing Jessalyn. "And him. But all that will go away if you give into your instincts right now."

A low, rattling, threatening growl escaped my lips without any thought. Arik might be the alpha, but he didn't know everything. Humans made decisions based on what their brains came up with, not what their hearts knew to be true. Jessalyn was hot, wet, slick, and swollen. Every stroke of my cock made clear just how ready she was for me. She'd part around me, swallow me deep inside her, and then I'd—

"It'll hurt her." Silas pulled away, staring over Jessalyn's shoulder as Arik said the words. Her nipple popped free of Roan's lips, and he blinked, coming back to himself at the commander's words. "I'm not sure what it's like for female wolf shifters, but…"

"The first time for a human woman hurts like a bitch." Roan's eyebrows pulled down as the haze of lust gave way to a hotter, harsher red mist of anger. "You can't be her first. Her hymen doesn't have to tear, but it will with you." His brows creased. "You'll make her fucking bleed."

That was a slap to my face, forcing the wolf back and bringing the man forward. The one Jessalyn needed. My hands slid up, tracing the shape of her ribcage and torso as I tugged her closer and just held her. I closed my eyes and breathed her in, over and over, until I got myself under control.

"So how…?"

I didn't need to spell out my request because we all knew. They weren't wolf shifters, so it took them longer to put two and two together, but Jessalyn, she was our mate. Ours. So it made sense that whatever we did with her, we did together.

"What do you need, my sweet?" Silas asked her, kissing her to punctuate each word, sliding his fingertips down her throat.

"More," she cried out, writhing now, the red tide starting to rise. "More, I need more."

"Well, then, Princess, more is what you shall have."

The flash of his knife had me snarling, but it sliced through the rope, freeing Jessalyn, not hurting her. He never would be able to, I saw that in the way he lowered her arms slowly, rubbing the skin to make sure the blood flow was returning, kissing each tip of her fingers as he undid the binding at her wrists, then checking the colour for good circulation and the marks left there.

"All perfect," he said, shooting her a slow smile, one she returned. "Just like you. Do you trust us to satisfy your hungers?"

"Yes!"

She slid her hands around his neck and jerked his mouth down on hers. Whatever Silas had planned, it was set to one side as he pulled her from my grip and cradled her against him. He needed her just as much as I did, and the realisation came as a shock. Humans were so very good at hiding these things.

Right up until they broke and couldn't pretend any longer.

"You heard the lady." Silas pulled away to regard each one of us. Then Jessalyn's hands raked down his chest. His eyes widened, then became heavily lidded when she cupped the front of his breeches. "None of that, not right now. You've got me right on the edge from just holding you."

He pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead, then turned her around to face the three of us. Together, we'd endured a beating, faced down seemingly insurmountable odds, and defeated enemies on the battlefield. But all of that paled into insignificance. Nothing we had experienced would have more meaning than this.

"Hands around my neck," Silas said. "That's it, lass. That's it," he added when she did exactly as she was bid, rubbing up against him like a cat in heat.

And perhaps that fitted the state that all of us were in.

That wasn't enough for Silas. He hoisted her up into his arms, offering her up like the sweetest of treats, using his grip on her thighs to spread them wide. Her pink, glistening treasure made my mouth water and my cock throb with urgency. Somehow the princess didn't baulk at being offered to the lot of us in this manner. Instead, her eyes opened just a crack, daring us to come closer.

"Well, gentlemen," Silas said, "our mate needs satisfying. Are you up to the challenge?"

We all glanced at each other, and that same sense of camaraderie we'd carried with us everywhere made us grin like boys before we lunged forward.