23. Alban
Alban
“What now?” Leora asked.
What now? Such an innocent question. I had to restrain myself from tossing her to her knees and answering it with the plunge of my cock.
“I’m not going to make it to a bedroom,” I choked out. This was both a confession and a fact. “We’ll have to complete the cycle, as your sister called it, here.”
Fear stuttered across her face, but then she said, “I’ll ready myself,” with a resolute nod.
She stood, taking away her body, leaving me bereft. But I didn’t grab for her. I watched her like a hungry beggar outside a glass window as she pulled off her boots and unfastened her skirt. Then hesitated before carefully removing everything below her waist, including her cotton undies.
The scent of her heat, unfettered by clothes, nearly undid me. I scraped my nails into the floor to remind myself of my promise. I couldn’t lunge at her. Couldn’t risk hurting her with the things my wolf wanted to do.
I made myself stay right where I was and continue to watch as she lay down on the floor. Flat on her back.
“I’m sorry I don’t have covers for us to lay beneath,” she said. “But I’m ready now.”
She placed her hands at her sides and looked straight up at the ceiling. Like a corpse on Shetland.
What in the entire hell?
I had no desire to bring the tadger into our impending heat sex, but I had to ask, “Leora, is that how he taught you to receive a male?”
A fretful look dropped on her face, and she sat up on her forearms. “Oh no! Am I doing this all wrong? The thing is, I was wolf-mated, so I’ve never actually ah …”
She wagged her two index fingers in a way that I suppose could have been translated as “sex” if you’d never actually had it or even seen it before.
Which apparently, Leora hadn’t done—at least not in human form.
I would be her first. A primitive emotion sparked in my chest, along with a clear and direct order. “Do nae cock this up.”
Nae, I wouldn’t cock it up. With that mission firmly in mind, I stood up—as smoothly as a male could with an iron rod tenting his kilt.
Then I took a seat on the closest reading sofa and said, “Leora.”
“Yes?” Her voice quaked with nerves, the same as it had in the kitchen the last morning we were alone together.
Except this time, when she answered me, another wave of heat erupted from her, the scent as noisy as an air-raid siren.
Hard, feral lust surged through my body, cranking my fingers into claws that I dug into the sofa’s upholstery.
“Come here,” I commanded her, my voice gruff with restraint. “Retake your seat in my lap.”
“Oh … okay.” She picked herself up off the floor and came to an awkward stand.
There was nothing else in this world. Nothing but this she-wolf mattered. And all my focus zeroed in on her as she took the same position in my lap. This time with her knees cushioned on either side of my waist.
“Wh-what now?” she asked again.
I raked my eyes down to the ribbon blouse I’d given her—the one I now wanted to tear off her body for daring to hide my she-wolf from me. But no, I have to remain in control.
“Unbutton that shirt for me,” I told her instead. “Show me the gorgeous breasts I’ve been dreaming about touching ever since you transformed from a wolf into a luscious female in my bed.”
She blinked. “You thought I was luscious that night? Not a total annoyance?”
The time for holding my cards close to my chest was over—had been over since the moment she said, I choose you, Alban Scotswolf.
“I wish I had thought you annoying, even for a second, but nae …” I confessed to her my entire truth. “I’ve been obsessed with you from first sight. I kent you were mine. I kent it from the first moment. Before you’d even opened your beautiful eyes.”
Speaking of … that gorgeous brown gaze of hers softened, even as she came up with an excuse for my response. “You’re probably overaffected by the heat smell. I’ve heard it can do that to males. But, um … Okay … I’ll …”
She began to tentatively unbutton her blouse, and I didn’t bother to correct her about her heat addling my brain. She’d find out how serious I was about my long pent-up desire for her soon enough.
Meanwhile, I cupped my hands around her lush bottom, and I vowed to keep them there until she was fully naked—no matter how long it took. My eyes zeroed in on the work of her lovely fingers undoing the buttons beneath the blouse’s ribbon. They were moving too slow, but also too fast.
I wanted to savor every single moment of this. I wanted to tear the clothes from her body. It felt as if she was baiting me—I’d lose all control of my wolf if she kept this up. But I held my breath as I watched her, and I never wanted to let it out. The anticipation felt too glorious.
Would it always be this way with her? I wondered. A constant tug in either direction between my better human and my base wolf. I supposed I’d have an entire lifetime to find out.
That thought provided me with the patience I needed to let her finish her assigned task. I even managed to just watch her struggle with her bra before she slowly removed it to free her heavy light-brown breasts.
I’d seen them before. Could have sketched them from the memory of her sitting up in my bed without notice of the covers dropping away. The image had seared itself into my brain.
But her breasts were different now, swollen with their dark brown nipples sticking out. Begging me to touch.
How could I not heed their call?
I raised both hands to palm her breasts and query, “Exactly how innocent are you? How much do you ken?”
“Wha-what do m-mean?” she asked—tried to ask. She hiccupped and gasped, barely getting words out. Probably because of the mean bastard rolling the dark nipples of her breasts over the pads of his thumbs while waiting for his answer.
But I kept it up, savoring her reaction to my touch. Wouldn’t have thought it was possible, but feck, if I didn’t grow harder. Every word, every blink, every breath made my cock drip for her.
But not yet, wolf … not yet. First, we needed to have this conversation.
“Do you ken this isn’t your Wolfennite village?” I scraped my mouth over her neck and let myself have a taste—just enough to keep my wolf down as I informed her. “There will be no half-measures with me, Leora. If we do this—if you allow my claim, let me heat you, then you become mine. Forever.”
She shivered. From my mouth on her neck or the words I’d whispered into her skin—I couldn’t be sure. Either way, I needed her to answer me. “Tell me you ken.”
Her body trembled in my arms, and I feared I’d gone too far—that my demands would bring her back to her senses, make her choose another. But then she gasped out, “I understand. Just … Alban … Alban …?”
The question had no finish. Yet, I understood exactly what she was asking of me.
“I ken you have a need, mo ghràidh, and I vow to you I will satisfy it. But …” I slipped my hands from her breasts to her waist to inform her, “You are in my land now. I cannae put my bairn into your belly until you bind yourself to me, in my language, as is the tradition between a wolf and his mate. So, repeat after me …”
I gave her the short string of Gaelic that would formally make her mine.
“Bind myself to you?” Instead of repeating my words verbatim, she pulled back. Wariness broke through the glaze of heat lust in her eyes. “Is this like the helpmate honor rules—something I don’t know I’m agreeing to until I regret it?”
I hated the way her body tensed and the new shadow of doubt in her gaze.
“Nae, nothing like that.” I cupped her cheeks again. “It translates to ‘You. You and no other for the rest of our lives. I am your she-wolf.’”
She continued to eye me with the same suspicious cast, and my stomach tightened. My she-wolf didn’t want to say the words. She didn’t want to abide by our most sacred tradition.
I'll confess, the realization threw me. This was the last thing I would have expected from my nearly-always compliant Leora.
An easy solution came immediately to mind. I could have let her heat seal the deal for me.
A wave or two of it without relief would have her saying whatever I wanted her to in Gaelic or whatever language I chose.
But nae … I didn’t want us to begin that way. What if I …
I turned a new idea over in my mind, one that had never ever occurred to me before. What if I—well—not exactly abandoned tradition—but negotiated around it? Just this one time.
“How about if we both say the words? You can even make the vow in English if you don’t trust my translation. We can both say it. To each other. You can become my she-wolf, and I can become your male.”
I was not at all in the habit of being what Queen Tara kept calling “flexible around these seriously antiquated laws.” But I let out a breath, liking the way this solution felt in my body. In my soul.
But Leora studied me with a sharp look that reminded me a little too much of her sister, before answering, “Du. Du und keinanner Wolf für unsere ganse Lewen. Ich bin deine Wolfin.”
It took me a moment to figure out she’d said the words back to me in Wolfennite German—a language I couldn’t even remotely comprehend.
And … it didn’t matter, I realized with a start. I hadn’t trusted Gail when she insisted there’d been no one else in Glasgow, but I trusted Leora. With my vow. With my heart. She’d chosen me when she could have chosen anyone else, and I believe that was because she kent—kent like I kent …
“You,” I told her in Gaelic. “You and no other for the rest of our lives. I am your wolf.”
I didn’t comprehend any version of German, and she didn’t comprehend any version of Gaelic, but our formal vows vibrated in the air between us, and we both fully understood the words we’d spoken to each other loud and clear.
“Kiss me,” I commanded, my voice courser than sandpaper.
There was no hesitation this time. No doubt in her lovely brown eyes. My shy she-wolf surged forward and pressed her mouth into mine for a sweet kiss—and immediately got devoured.