Chapter 23
CADE
“Mmm,” she said. Then she pulled my head down and kissed me, sliding her tongue into my mouth. Which made my already-hard dick ache to take solace in her body.
But it was getting to be a pattern. Bring up the subject of shifting, and my lovely wife turned into a seductress whom I couldn’t resist. It was ironic. Usually I was the one who resorted to sex as a way to distance a lover who talked too much or prodded me to “express my feelings.” Now she was pulling the same old routine on me.
And who was I to turn down the delights of sex? But seriously, she was getting too damn good at this.
Usually a weekend run with my pack calms any violence or aggression I’ve built up during the mundane and often irritating daily grind. Although I hadn’t planned on doing it today, when the suggestion had come, it had seemed natural to me and to everyone else in the pack.
Except to Jess.
I’d been wed to this woman for a little more than two weeks now, and seen her human body from every side and angle. I’d fucked her countless times. I’d felt her come on my tongue, my finger, my cock. I’d conquered her and mastered her body in just about every way. But despite all that, she still wasn’t letting me in. She remained elusive. Mysterious. Silent with her secrets.
It was starting to piss me off.
I’d cut her some slack because, as she’d told my pack mates, she was grieving for her grandfather. Hell, I’d been grieving for him, too. I knew you couldn’t put a time limit on grief, but that crap about Scottish mourning customs preventing her from shifting? I knew it was bullshit.
Not a bad excuse to come up with on the spur of the moment. I think even my mom believed it.
I didn’t blame her for declining Suzanne’s suggestion. I’m not sure how Suzanne had hit on that as a way to snipe at Jess, but she was an old pro at sniffing out vulnerability. She hadn’t been fooled by Jess’ excuse, either, and if I knew Suzanne, she’d find a way to exploit the matter again. Or Brandon would. I didn’t trust either one of them.
Before that happened, dammit, I wanted to know what was going on with my wife.
I needed to know why a shifter wouldn’t shift.
So while I explored her curves and valleys with my fingertips, I plotted. She curled and arched beneath my hands. When I arrowed down to the soft, dense curls at the apex of her thighs, I found her wet and yielding. I parted the folds and teased her a bit, approaching and retreating, enjoying the way her pelvis tilted up and strained, seeking my touch.
She was always so passionate. I loved it. Given that I was hard for her most of the time, I reveled in her responsiveness. The way she sighed and arched her hips made my dick throb with the anticipation of ramming her.
I slid my index finger into her pussy. Feeling the way her sheath closed around my flesh almost sent me over the edge. She was so hot, so tight. I added my middle finger and scissored them inside her until she gasped and shuddered. She lifted her hips up to invite me deeper. I obliged.
I kept my thumb on the surface, teasing her clit while she ground her body against my hand. Bucking, she cried out as I increased the stimulation. I wanted her to come, but I also wanted to control her orgasm. Make her beg for it. I knew myself well—I could be cruel that way.
Just thinking about it turned me even harder.
I moved down so I could add some tongue action. When the tip of my tongue circled her clit, she squirmed delightfully. I licked and sucked until she was thrashing violently.
"Not yet,” I commanded.
She made a strangled sound that sounded like a combination of a gasp and a laugh. "Why not?”
I used my fingers to drive her even higher. "I’m the alpha, remember? Your alpha. I want your obedience in this, if in nothing else in our lives."
"Damn,” she said, squirming.
My cock was rigid now. I needed to fuck her.
“I could tell you to ask nicely, my wife, and to say please.”
“Please!”
I brushed her clit gently and watched her thrash. Then I rubbed it more firmly while my fingers drove roughly inside her. “But there’s something else I want you to do before I let you come.”
Her eyes snapped open and her writhing ceased. “Don’t you dare.”
Yeah, I was getting to know her—despite herself—and she was getting to know me. “You think you know what I’m going to say?”
“You’re going to use this moment to demand answers to your stupid questions.” Her voice was rough from her own churning desire. “We’ve talked about it before. I’m not comfortable shifting. Can’t we just leave it at that?”
“Not anymore.” I lifted my hand away from her. “You’re the alpha’s mate. When we’re with the pack, it’s not just you and me anymore. It’s a larger entity, and I have a responsibility to them.”
Her legs thrashed in frustration. “I’m your wife, not your mate. Your forced marriage bride. Your soon to be ex-wife.”
I ran my fingers along her leg from her knee to her thigh bone. Tiny sparks of light burned along the path of my finger. “This says you’re my mate.”
She scoffed. “The static electricity? I thought you didn’t believe in that sevmelle nonsense?”
I’d thought I didn’t either.
“Anyway, you don’t need me to shift. There was nothing in my grandfather’s will that said I had to be your wolfish mate as well as your human mate. That’s not what I agreed to.”
I growled, feeling my wolf itching to emerge and prove her wrong. I liked that she was strong and sassy and that she took no shit from me. I also liked that when we were in bed together, I could make her set aside that sass and submit to me. She was delicious in that sense—all spit and fire until she got caught in her own flames. In the fever of desire, she’d do just about anything I asked of her.
But not this?
I didn’t really care about what the pack thought. That was my excuse, just as her Scottish mourning period had been hers. What I cared about was breaking down the walls she’d erected to keep me out.
“It’s not enough, babe.”
“What’s not enough?”
“What you’re giving me. I need more. I want to be inside you. I’ll crack you open if that’s what it takes. Like this.”
I rolled atop her and slid between her thighs. I thrust into her as smoothly as I could. I felt the walls of her pussy clamp down on me. She tried to resist, but tightening her body against me just heightened her desire. I could feel it happen. She melted around me and sighed. Then her hips rocked and she thrust back to meet me.
“You’re such a jerk,” she said as she matched me grind for grind. “I thought you were stopping, just to torture me.”
I laughed low. “I love torturing you. Erotically, that is.” I pulled on her hair and positioned her jaw. My mouth sealed hers and my tongue echoed my cock in syncopated rhythm. Her mouth melted, too. Holding her was like trying to harness a flame.
I drove harder into her. “You feel so good. So wet and smooth.” My fingers played more roughly on her nipples and she mewed softly in pleasure. My cock began a steady thrusting motion. She circled her hips and clenched me, drawing me deeper.
“I knew you would feel perfect. I knew my cock inside you would feel like coming home. Especially here, in my own bedroom.”
She giggled and said, “To me it feels like you’re filling me up.”
“I am. Always.” I pinched her gorgeous breasts a little harder. “Does it hurt, baby?”
She moaned and dug her fingernails into my ass. “Hurts so good.”
That was pretty much all it took. She stiffened and cried out, bursting for me. Her pussy pulsed violently, squeezing me so hard my cock jerked nearly to the point of exploding. I needed the same thing she was experiencing, so I sped up my rhythm until my body snatched control from my mind.
I was so hot for her that I exploded in climax after only a few more pumps.
She fell back on the pillows, breathing hard and letting out little gasps as the contractions rolled through her entire body.
I leaned over and kissed her mouth. "You're beautiful when you come, Jess. Actually, you’re beautiful all the time.”
Her fingers trailed down my spine and settled on my ass. Her touch felt warm. It gave me tiny shocks on the surface of my skin. Good shocks, though. If I could see her hand, I knew it would be glowing with light.
That static electricity thing was getting stronger between us every day.
“But?” she asked lazily.
“But what?”
“It sounds as if there was more. Something about cracking me open?”
“Yeah, well.”
I meant to do that, all right. I just had to be smart about it.