Chapter Eight
Crowbar
We ended up at Spencer’s apartment with the Chinese takeout I’d picked up on our way here. I kicked the door shut behind me with my boot and watched Spencer’s shoulders drop half an inch. The tension he’d been carrying seemed to loosen now that he was home.
A groan came from the dog. Gunner was exhausted, flopping down as soon as we cleared the doorway. Hardwood, not carpet. Spencer’s apartment didn’t mess around with comfort. Another ten seconds and Gunner rolled onto her back, four paws up with zero shame.
Spencer was hovering near the kitchen, glancing around as if seeing the place through my lens.
I surveyed the space. A studio apartment.
The kitchenette flowed into the living room area that flowed into a corner with a platform bed.
The mismatched pillows were piled high, and under them was a blue blanket.
The living area took up most of the square footage.
Every inch pulled double duty. A small scuffed-up couch with a side table that was actually a milk crate.
Against one wall stood a bookshelf overloaded with battered paperbacks, cookbooks, and a line of Star Wars action figures posed on the top shelf like they were security.
It wasn’t fancy but felt lived-in, cozy even.
“You can set the food on the counter,” he said, already moving toward the kitchen. “I’ll grab plates.”
“Styrofoam works.”
“Styrofoam is for heathens who don’t respect the meal.” He was pulling plates down from the cabinet with his good arm, the sling pinned against his side. “We’re eating like civilized people.”
I set the bags on the counter and leaned against it, watching him navigate his kitchen one-handed. Despite the injury, my mate moved around the kitchen with ease. He reached for forks without looking then grabbed napkins from a drawer that stuck until he hip-checked it open.
The apartment smelled like vanilla and something that had probably come out of the oven in the last day or two. A cooling rack sat on the stove with crumbs underneath the wire and, beside it, a mixing bowl that had traces of batter crusted around the rim.
“You baked recently,” I commented.
He glanced at the stove. “I can’t stop. Send help or more flour.”
Stress. That was what Spencer had said. Stress baking. That didn’t sit well with me. My mate shouldn’t have to turn his kitchen into a bakery just to cope.
Spencer brought the plates over and started unpacking containers. Lo mein, orange chicken, fried rice, egg rolls. Enough food for four people, which meant leftovers for him later. I’d ordered extra on purpose.
“We’re eating on the couch,” he announced. “The table’s covered in fabric samples for a project I’ve been trying to finish for months.”
Grabbing my plate, I followed him to the couch and dropped onto the cushion beside him. Gunner lifted her head from the floor, assessed whether food was worth the effort, and decided it wasn’t. She went back to sleep with a sigh that sounded almost human.
Spencer tucked one leg under himself and balanced his plate on his knee, stabbing a piece of chicken with his fork. The first bite made him close his eyes and make a sound that went straight to my cock.
“Good?” I asked.
“It’s perfect. I’m in love with this chicken. We’re getting married. You’re invited, and Noodles is the maid of honor.”
“She’d eat the groom.”
“She’d earn it.” He took another bite, chewing slowly, and some of the tension in his jaw finally released. The food was helping. Or the apartment. Or maybe it was me, though I wasn’t arrogant enough to assume.
I ate my food and watched him steal a piece from my plate when he thought I wasn’t looking. He was quick about it, fork darting in like a bird going for crumbs, but I’d clocked the movement before his fork left my plate.
“You’ve got your own food.” A much smaller portion than mine. But I was a big guy with an even bigger appetite.
“Yours tastes better,” Spencer whined.
God, he was fucking adorable. “We’re eating the same thing.”
“Weird how food tastes better when it’s stolen. You ever notice that?” He swiped another piece of chicken, grinning at me with his mouth full, green eyes filled with triumph.
“Just take it.” I slid my plate closer to him.
“No. The theft is part of the experience. You’re ruining my joy.”
“You’re a menace.”
“You’re obsessed with this menace.” He said it like a joke, but his gaze flicked to mine, waiting to see if I would contradict him.
Werewolf packs, rejected mates, and a second chance that was never part of the plan.
There are more stories like that on Lokepub.
“Can’t argue with the truth.”
His fork paused halfway to his mouth, color creeping up his jaw, spreading toward his ears. He ate the noodles but was no longer staring at me.
We ate in comfortable silence for a minute. Somewhere outside, a car honked. On the floor, Gunner was snoring.
Spencer leaned forward to set his plate on the milk crate, and I caught the small flinch. His arm was bothering him more than he was admitting.
“When’s the last time you took the ibuprofen?” I asked.
“This morning.”
“It’s been eight hours.”
“Has it?” He glanced at the clock on the microwave. “Time flies when you’re being nursed back to health by a man who crawls around engines.”
“Take the pills, Spencer.”
“Bossy.” But he was already standing, moving toward the kitchen. He grabbed the bottle from the counter, shook two pills into his palm, and swallowed them dry.
“Water,” I said.
He filled a glass and drank half of it, maintaining eye contact the entire time like he was proving a point. When he set the glass down, there was a smear of orange sauce at the corner of his mouth.
Pushing to my feet, I walked toward him. His eyes grew wide as I approached, back pressed against the counter. His breathing became shallow, the fingers on his good hand curling around the counter’s edge.
I swiped my thumb across the corner of his mouth, catching the sauce. His breath hitched. The sound was small, but I heard it. So had my wolf.
“Sauce,” I said.
“Thanks,” he whispered.
“Welcome.” I was close enough that I could see those teasing freckles, see the way his pupils had blown wide, and see the pulse beating at the base of his throat.
“Crowbar.” My name in his mouth sounded surreal.
Slowly, I leaned in, giving him time to pull back, to laugh it off, or to turn it into another joke. His gaze dropped to my mouth then back up, a look of raw need reflecting in his eyes.
I cradled his jaw, my thumb tracing his smooth skin, careful of his arm as I took a step closer, possessing my lips to his in a slow-burning kiss. I nipped and sucked at his bottom lip, coaxing them apart, and swept my tongue inside.
My hand slid to the back of his skull, my fingers threading through his hair. He made another sound, softer, and melted against me. The kiss turned slower, deeper, tongues moving in a rhythm that had my cock pressing against my jeans.
Spencer fisted my shirt, pulling me to him, making needy little noises that were unraveling me.
I braced a hand on the counter beside his hip and angled my head, deepening the kiss. He was eager, kissing back, just as hungry as I was.
My lips kissed and nipped a path along his jaw, tongue flicking over his Adam’s apple.
“Your mouth is…” Spencer groaned. “Forgot what I was going to say.”
“Careful, babe,” I said against his throat. “Trying not to fuck you senseless right now.”
He gasped then groaned, his fingers curling tighter in my shirt.
My other hand found his waist. I yanked him to my chest. He moaned.
“Like that?”
“About to come in my khakis.” Snaking his hand around my nape, he licked greedily at my mouth, one leg hitching at hip. I felt his hard cock against my thigh, grinding into my leg.
“Rather you come in my mouth, sweetheart.” I nipped his ear. “But you gotta beg for it.”
Spencer shoved against my chest, and I immediately released him, wondering if I’d gone too far. Some males weren’t into filth, preferring to keep things vanilla.
Grabbing my hand, he dragged me from the kitchen, a huge grin on my face.
“Think you’re running this?”
“Just getting to the main course sooner.” He pulled me straight toward his bed, and I let him. There was something hot about a pint-sized guy manhandling me. It was a fucking turn-on and had my dick hard and aching.
As soon as we reached the platform, I wrapped an arm around his waist, hauled him off his feet, and dropped him onto the bed. But I slipped my hand under his sling, preventing his arm from hitting the mattress.
“You tell me the minute that arms starts hurting. Understood?” I rested my hands on my hips, waiting.
“And if I don’t?” he teased.
Lowering to a crouch, I looked him in the eye. “I ain’t fuckin’ around with your recovery, Indoors. As fired up as I am, your recovery is more important to me. Got that?”
“Yes.”
There was a catch in his voice. He wasn’t used to being taken care of. He was about to get used to it.
I worked the button of his khakis open then the zipper. He lifted his hips without me asking, and I pulled the fabric down to his knees, taking his boxers with the pants.
His cock was flushed and leaking, curving up toward his stomach. I wrapped one hand around the base, and his whole body jerked.
“Beg me.”
“Crowbar.” My name was a plea.
“My name sounds good on your lips, but not what I’m looking for.” I leaned in and licked a stripe up the underside, base to tip. The taste of him flooded my mouth, salt and skin and want. His thighs trembled on either side of my shoulders. “Beg me to suck you off.”
Spencer’s eyes had gone wild, desperate. “Put your goddamn mouth on my cock and don’t stop until I’m coming down your throat, pookie…please,” he demanded but softened the ending.
“Call me that again.”
“Pookie.”
My thumb traced the jut of his hipbone. He was all angles and compact lines, built narrow but strong. I leaned forward and pressed my mouth to his stomach. Spencer’s breath stuttered, and his hand tightened on my shoulder.
I kissed lower, following the trail of hair. Spencer’s hips jerked forward, and I steadied him, holding him in place while I licked around the head. He made a sound that was half gasp, half moan, and his fingers found my hair, tangling in it.
I took his cock into my mouth slowly, letting him feel every inch of the slide. I wasn’t going to rush a fucking minute with my mate.
Spencer’s legs jerked again. “Oh god. ’S good. So good.”
His hips bucked, and I pressed one hand flat against his stomach, holding him down.
He tasted clean, like salt and skin, and amazing. I took him deeper, hollowing my cheeks, and Spencer made a sound like he’d been punched. His hand fisted in my hair, not pulling, just holding on.
“Oh god.” The words came out broken. “Oh god, that’s—you’re—”
I pulled back and sucked at the head, tongue working the slit. Spencer’s thighs trembled, and his breathing had gone ragged. I looked up at him, and his eyes were squeezed shut, his mouth open, lost in it.
“Look at me,” I said around his dick.
His eyes met mine and held.
“Watch me suck you off.”
I hummed around him, and the vibration made him choke on whatever he’d been about to say. His head fell back, exposing the long line of his throat, and I watched him fall apart underneath me.
He was vocal. Every touch, every movement of my tongue drew sounds out of him that he didn’t seem aware he was making. Small gasps, broken syllables, my name said like a prayer.
I worked his cock with my mouth and my hand, finding the rhythm that made his breathing go choppy. His fingers tightened in my hair, and his thighs were shaking now, trembling with the effort of holding still.
“I’m—” His voice broke. “Close, I’m—”
My mouth took him to the brink then backed off until he was begging me to put him out of his misery. He gripped the bedding in a stranglehold, head rocking back and forth.
“Crowbar!” His cock pulsed between my lips, cum shooting down my throat. I swallowed every last drop, groaning at how good he tasted.
I could devour my little human all day and never grow tired of his pretty cock between my lips.
Spencer slumped against the bed, breathing heavily. But I reared back, releasing my throbbing erection. “Suck me off, baby. I’m so damn close.”
My hand gripped his good one, and I pulled him toward me. He engulfed my dick, sucking hard enough to make me curse. I shouted his name, fucking his mouth in short bursts. My climax shattered me, making me snarl.
Holy hell. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d come so fucking hard. Felt like I could easily take a six-hour nap.
“Damn,” he said, breathing like he’d run a marathon. “Holy…damn.”
I collapsed next to him, staring up at the ceiling. Then I heard a tiny snore and thought it was Gunner. Despite the loud noises, she was still knocked out. But the sound wasn’t coming from her.
Turning my head, I grinned. Spencer was out cold, his good arm tossed over his forehead. Even my wolf was curled up, content as fuck. My mate and my pup knew I would protect them.
Best damn feeling in the world.