Come Out Swinging (Reach for the Moon Book 2) Page 4

  I stopped him with a kiss, something he resisted for just a moment, then dove right into because he knew. When I kissed him like a woman drowning and he was all the oxygen I was going to get. When I clawed hopelessly at his shirt, the thin fabric too much of a barrier. When I pushed him down on the bed, forcing him to sit on one side. When I followed him down, straddling his thighs, pushing his head to one side and finding it, the thing that joined us. He groaned, his hands shooting up the back of my shirt when I fitted my mouth to the mating mark. I had nothing else to reassure him, convince him of what we both knew. My fangs slid down, his hands clamping down on my hips while his bucked upwards as I drew his scarred flesh into my mouth.

  Humans would never understand this, biting being either abhorrent or sexual, but for us, it was so much more. A mother wolf grabbed her pups with her teeth, carrying them by the scruff of their necks. Wolves nibbled at fleas, lashed out and bit, wrestled when young, gulped down food and ripped out the throats of prey. Our teeth were all an integral part of the way we negotiated the world. So when we bit someone, it carried meaning.

  It told the person we bit, I see you, I know what you are, who you are, who you’re connected to, and I accept you. I wed all that I am to all that you are. I knew he felt that when his arms went around me, when I pulled away and his lips found mine, when he rocked me against his body, sexual and emotional needs warring.

  “I just wanted you to know,” he croaked out finally. “I…”

  He gave up on words and just stared as I smoothed that unruly hair back from his face.

  “You’re my mate, Lorcan, mine. Is there something sweet thinking about you pining for me? Yes, of course there is.”

  “Pining?” He threw me down on the bed, covering me with his body moments later, but he was grinning when he did so. “I’d like to think I was waiting for the woman I knew was my mate in a very restrained and manly way.”

  “Restrained? You offered to go down on me under my father’s desk, in our first conversation.”

  “Mm… We could still try that, you know. Could be hot, the others watching you try to keep your cool as I—”

  “Hey, sorry to interrupt,” Zack said from the doorway. “But I think you’re gonna wanna see this.”

  I saw the fear in Lorcan’s, then Zack’s eyes, right when I was hoping to see something reassuring. Both men pulled away as I got off the bed. There was nothing welcoming in the office when I got in there either. The guys all stood around the laptop, staring at the screen before turning it around for me. I frowned as I peered at it, seeing picture after picture in a gallery on the screen, and it took a few looks to work out what was happening. I didn’t recognise the setting, but I worked out who one of the women was eventually. There was my cousin Selma, wrapped up tight in the embrace of several women.

  Chapter 6

  “Selma’s…gay?”

  “I’d say that’s why everyone’s been adamant about her not being a contender,” Declan said. “The guys’ gaydar was being tripped.”

  “She might be bisexual,” Zack said, moving in and rubbing his hand up and down my back. “But yeah, definitely that at least.”

  “If she was bi, we’d feel like there was some kind of potential,” Micah said. “I’ve never got anything from her. She’s always been polite, easy to get along with, but…”

  “But you felt no urge to get her naked.” I finished his sentence for him, drawing his focus, those grey eyes sliding slowly over me.

  “No, never. Some girls I’m attracted to, some I’m keen to pursue things, and some?” He walked closer with each description. “Some are like a flamethrower to my balls, forcing me up and out of whatever I’m doing to try and get her attention, even for a second.”

  He was close, so close now, I could be forgiven for reaching out and running my fingers down a strand of hair that had fallen free of his ponytail, couldn’t I? I could, I felt that strongly. He was mine, and as my eyes flicked around the room, they were mine. I could reach out and—

  “So why would your dad have pictures of his niece getting it on with a group of other girls?” Zack asked. “These are surveillance photos, all taken from the same angle, the same execution. They’ve been shot using a spy camera. If they were designed to titillate, they’d look a lot more porny. Someone paid someone to spy on your cousin. Why?”

  “Bridget was always clear that she wasn’t going to step up and take her spot in the line of succession, much to your aunt’s disgust,” Mason said. “We all knew if you didn’t come back, the heir designation wasn’t going to fall on her shoulders.”

  “Nor Selma, evidently. Though she wasn’t making that clear like Bridge was,” Declan said with a frown. “She was who we thought was going to be next.”

  “I need to see my cousin,” I said.

  “I’ll have her brought to the compound,” Mason said.

  “No, I need to see her.” They started to sputter about that, Mason more than anyone, but when I shook my head, Lorcan just smiled. “I want to turn up unannounced, see if I can get a read on her before she’s had a chance to put some walls up. Dad thought this was important enough to hide the images away. I need to know why.”

  “I’m not wearing a bulletproof vest.”

  I scowled at Mason, standing in the carpark with him, while he held the damn thing out to me with a determined gleam in his eyes.

  “You need protecting.”

  “Isn’t that what you guys are for? Isn’t that why all of you are insisting on going?”

  “Of course it is,” he replied, his arms dropping. “We’ll protect you from whatever is thrown at you. Paige…”

  I tensed a little when he moved forward. I’d spent so long holding myself away from him, it was hard to stop. He put a careful hand on my arm, stroking it.

  “Then keep me safe.” I closed his hands over the vest, pushing it back at him, and he just nodded in response.

  So there we were, all wedged into the car, the testosterone pumping through the cab as I sat jammed between Zack and Mason. I jumped when I felt Zack’s arm slide along the back of the seat, Declan catching my reaction with a smile, then turning the car over and getting us moving. Mason watched his brother as he leaned in, trailing his nose up my neck.

  “Zack…” I hissed.

  “Need you,” he rumbled. “The shower, it wasn’t enough. Need you, need your taste in my mouth, you squeezing my cock tight with that sweet little pussy of yours.”

  He was trying to pitch his voice low, just for me, but in a car full of wolf shifters, that wasn’t gonna happen. A series of shuffles and uncomfortable groans went through the cab as the streets of Lupindorf rushed past.

  “You’re tormenting them,” I said, turning to face him, but my eyes dropped instantly to his lips. “You’re tormenting me.”

  “Good,” he replied before shifting forward and kissing me. “Does it make you needy, desperate?”

  “Yes!” Micah snapped from the front seat. “Fuck, I’ve only had the one taste and it just makes me ache for more.”

  “You’re playing games again,” I said, my eyes narrowing down.

  He pulled me as close as he could within the constraints of the seat belt, his mouth hot and hungry on mine, consuming me until he drew away, and I just hovered there, wanting more.

  Which was the point, of course.

  “You need to let things develop at their own pace,” I reprimanded as a shit-eating grin spread across his face.

  “No,” he replied. “You’ve chosen, now you need to take. This is your pack. You’ll be stronger and better protected when you mark them. I’ll kiss you, touch you, work you up until you’re clawing everyone’s clothes off to get to them.”

  Micah turned around in his seat, eyeing the both of us with glowing eyes, looking like he wanted to do exactly as Zack said.

  “Stop trying to force things,” I snapped.

  “What am I forcing?”

  He turned me as far as he could so I looked at the rest
of the car. I saw Declan looking way too long at us in the rear vision mirror, Lorcan and Micah looking over at us from the front bench seat, but it was Mason who seemed the most affected.

  “If I asked Declan to pull over somewhere safe, what do you think would happen?” Zack asked me. The guys shifted in their seats as if to clue me in. “How long do you think those cute little panties would last?”

  “I’d pull them off with my teeth,” Micah growled out.

  “I’d chew a hole in the crotch to get to you,” Lorcan added.

  “Too time consuming,” Declan said, indicating for a second before pulling the car over roughly. He put the car in park and then turned around. “Paige and me, we were always having to be quick about fooling around before someone caught us at it.” He shot Mason a dark look. “You just pull her underwear to the side, push your fingers in, then your tongue. Get every fucking lick in you can, make her squirm, make her gush, then wrap your lips around her clit as it’s still twitching and ride her until she’s coming apart.”

  He shook his head as if to clear it, which seemed to break the heated spell his words had created, my body throbbing with the remembered echoes of that pleasure.

  “Then you can pull away, let her undies snap back into place, pat her skirt down, and no one’s the wiser.

  “I haven’t worn a skirt since year eleven,” I said, shaking my head. “I forgot about that. I couldn’t, after you. Feeling the fabric flow around my legs, it took me right back there and I couldn’t…”

  “You know I’m gonna wanna take you out, feed you that steak I promised, take you there wearing one of those cute little sundresses you used to wear and—”

  “I wouldn’t do any of that,” Mason said bluntly. “I want you the same way I always have, with everything I’ve got, but I’ll be damned if I make it some kind of furtive thing, no matter what games you’re playing, brother.” Mason’s eyes met Zack’s over my shoulder, holding them, but they came back to me quickly enough. “When it happens, when I’ve proven to you that I’m serious, when I make amends for all the shit I did, then I want all the fucking time in the world to acquaint myself with you. With every curve, every swell, every inch of a body that’s plagued my dreams and nightmares since you became an adult. I wouldn’t rush a fucking thing.”

  “Fucking Mase, always gotta top us,” Declan said with a snort, turning back to the wheel.

  “That’s why he’s the man,” Micah said with a grin and a chin tilt.

  “Did that achieve what you wanted? We’ve got a job to do today, and you just sidelined that,” I told Zack, but he just grinned remorselessly.

  “No, you sidelined us. I know why,” he replied, holding up a hand when I began to splutter. “You’re going to need to. Your dad…” He just paused, looked down at where our fingers were linked, then shook his head. “You’ve been betrayed by this fucking town in so many ways, but this is the worst, but I’m not gonna let you forget this, us. We work out what the hell happened, then we bury the past and move forward to the future, our future.”

  For a second, you could’ve heard a pin drop in the car, only the muffled sound of the street outside filtering through.

  “So is he always a pompous, overly controlling arse, or is this something that’s cropped up recently?” Lorcan drawled, softening his words with a wicked grin.

  “Definitely pompous arse,” Mason said with a sigh. “You should’ve seen him trying to arbitrate playground disputes. You’d have thought the prick was gonna run for parliament.”

  “Total arse,” I agreed with a grin, enjoying watching my mate lose just a little of his composure. “But what a splendid arse it is. Firm, biteable…”

  I leant in for a kiss, but he smacked his hand down on my hip, grabbing my glutes before bestowing one upon me.

  “I’ll give you biteable.”

  “Cool, so now that group sex is firmly back on the menu, we go to Selma’s, yeah?” Declan asked, turning the key in the ignition.

  “Group sex, one on one, or some tastefully orchestrated threesomes,” Zack whispered into my neck. “I have so many ideas.”

  “You’re having way too much fun with this,” I muttered back. “We aren’t sex dolls for you to play with.”

  “No, you’re so much better.” He pulled back, staring into my eyes so I could see everything he felt in those molten coffee dark eyes. “There’s love here, Paige. Lust and need and desire too, but that gets boring after a while. What we have here? This is a pack, something eternal that’ll last a lifetime, and it’s gonna make you fucking invincible. I just thank the goddess I get to play a part in it.”

  “An overly invested, totally overbearing part of it,” Lorcan snarked from the front seat.

  Chapter 7

  “Hey… Paige!” Bridget stood in her doorway looking stunned to see me, but she quickly rallied, moving to wrap me in a hug. “Shit, are you OK to hug? Should I…? Fuck, Mum said…”

  “I’m OK,” I said, completing the hug for her, and as I did so with my favourite cousin, I hoped like hell she had nothing to do with any of this. I felt like a prick listening in to her heart rate, her breathing, feeling for any tension in her body, but when she pulled back, looking me over closely, she just seemed like the same old Bridge.

  “And these…” She moved to one side, letting the guys come in, but when I went to join them, a hand shot out, grabbing me on the shoulder. “They’re yours, aren’t they?” she hissed.

  “Yeah, I—”

  “You did it! You crazy fucking bitch, you’re living the dream! We fantasised all those nights ago, about taking a harem from the enforcers.”

  “We did?”

  “All that taut delicious flesh, getting covered in lathers of soap in the showers?”

  “Ah, I’ve been in there and seen them do just that. It was fucking hot,” I replied.

  “Each body stronger and harder… Hang on, what?”

  My cousin’s focus was often fairly scattered except where it counted, and right now, it counted. I felt like I could hear her brain kicking into gear, putting what I just said together and all the implications therein.

  “So you got hit on the fucking head, ended up in hospital, where everyone was kept back by a positively savage Mason Klein, and you got to see that crew in the nick? Mum can get fucked, I’m moving into the estate today. I’ll pace around the kitchen in the middle of the night and be bait for anyone else who decides to come trawling through. Something, anything if it gets me that!”

  “You realise I could’ve died,” I said.

  “Quibbling, all of it. This, you’ll do this if you have any love for me.”

  “Bridge…” I grumbled when she finally let me in, the guys pacing around the lounge room she shared with Selma, inspecting things a little too closely to be passed off as casual interest. “I actually need to talk to Selma.”

  “Selma? What do you wanna talk to her for? A bunch of hot enforcers is no good to her.” I turned to see her face fall, her hand going to her mouth, but in typical Bridget form, she just shook it off. “Shit, I shouldn’t have said anything, but Mum’s been going on and on about it lately. Look, it’s irrelevant now, no matter what Mum thinks she’s planning. You’re here, you’ve made your choices, and damn fine choices they are.” Her eyes slid sideways to inspect my guys.

  “Bridge, focus. What do you mean Selma wouldn’t want the enforcers?”

  “Look, Mum’s got ambitions. She tried to push them on me, but you know how that works.” Her grin was bright and wide. “No one puts anything on me that I don’t want, and I don’t want to be heir. Shitty fucking system as far as I can see, but Selma? No such luck there.” My cousin shook her head. “She…she’s always toed the line for Mum, even as a baby. Mum would shoosh her when she was crying and she just would stop. Most unnatural bloody thing I’ve ever seen. As a kid, she did and said whatever Mum said, in all ways but one.” She let out a long sigh. “It’s not my place to say, but I’m assuming you’ve put two and two to
gether.”

  “Selma’s gay,” I said.

  “Yeah, and if I had to guess…” She looked around the room. “I think she might be like you, with the touch. These girls…they just…they go nuts for her in the same way the guys did for you at the town meeting. Not every girl, but damn, she must be able to go the growl like a goddamn demon, because they get crazy. Not here, not anywhere people will see. Whatever bullshit Mum has on her, she wouldn’t dare do that, but I’ve seen the emails, the texts, intercepted some of the calls.” She frowned slightly, shaking her head. “They sound desperate for her. But look, none of this shit matters. At some point, Mum’s gonna give up, and Selma will move out of here and settle down with a harem of her own.”

  My eyes narrowed as Bridget sighed, both of us considering her words.

  “Aunt Nance, she’s—”

  “Never gonna give up,” Bridget finished with a sigh. “Seems kinda cruel in a way that she wanted to be heir and was born second, while your mum didn’t want to be and was forced to.”

  “Mum didn’t want to be heir?”

  My cousin scratched at her head. “I forget you probably don’t know this shit, seeing as no one wanted to bring it up around you. Your mum tried to step down, let mine take her place. Probably what put the hunger in her for the role. Mum thought she was a contender.” She snorted. “Granddad Spehr said no though, made Mum promise to support the heir no matter what. So what did you want to talk to Selma about? She’d be at work right now, but she’ll be back around seven.”

  “Just needed to talk to her about the succession,” I lied. “I’m getting out of town as soon as Dad’s killer is dealt with. I need to see where her head’s at, though with what you’ve told me…”

  “Shouldn’t make a difference, should it?” Bridget’s mouth thinned down. “Like, it’s always been the female next in line making her choice from the locals as to who she’s made alpha. No reason why it couldn’t be a female alpha, or even the heir becoming the alpha.” She shook her head. “It won’t though, will it? They’ll just skip past her to Jade or one of the other girls.”