21. Louise
I wake to a pang of aching tightness between my legs. Even though I can tell that there’s hunger for food, a palpable thirst after so much physical exertion into the wee hours of the morning—none of it seems to compare to the insatiable appetite for physical touch—to lock, to be knotted.
Then I smell the coffee, the cigarette smoke wafting through the parted bed sheet curtain of the nest, and poke my head out to see Frank, his body moving slowly and deliberately as he makes his way through Sen Seru, one of my personal favorite katas; his impeccable form, gilded with the golden light of the sunrise through the windows in a pair of Caz’s gray sweatpants —muscular chest and back traced with a litany of pale pink and lavender scars.
Even if I wasn’t in heat, I would find him desirable—right now? I’m ready to devour him, body and soul.
I slither from the bedclothes. At some point in the night, I must have shimmied into one of Sébastien’s t-shirts; the worn cotton barely covering my ass—so I’m not entirely nude when I emerge from the nest, just mostly.
Frank, it seems, is so deep in the meditative flow of the kata that he is executing he doesn’t even notice me as I float into the edges of his peripheral vision.
I don’t know what possessed me. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I never got a chance to “exchange blows” with Frank before we began the uneasy truce that connects us now.
Maybe it’s the delirium of the heat that sets me in motion; desperate to turn this alpha’s attention back to me and my need for his knot.
The Kata, or sequence of steps and actions that flow together to create almost a dance of defensive and combative moves—has a corresponding bunkai, or ‘disassembly’ of corresponding moves used to illustrate the practical application of the techniques exemplified by the kata.
Anyone who knows one will surely know the other—like a duet, two sides of the same coin.
Like a snake, I coil in on myself, tracking Frank’s progress, aware that he is about to step into a horse stance to demonstrate a double overhanded block.
I grab a wooden rolling pin from the counter in lieu of one of the short wooden hand-staffs I would use at my local dojo, and launch into action—bringing the wooden staff down from overhead, just as I would if we had started the sequence together from the very beginning.
On pure instinct, he moves like water—his hands turning me and my fake weapon away with a single circular block, one hand using my entire body weight and momentum to move me easily to one side, like a boulder breaking the current in a stream.
I can tell from the way his brows lift, his lips parting slightly—that he hadn’t even seen I was awake until I was about to strike from above with the rolling pin.
Though we’ve never spoken about our mutual love of martial arts, or anything else for that matter—this series of actions creates a deeper exchange than we ever could have had in words about the subject.
I’m done playing to the script of the bunkai, though. Deep inside me there is a hunger, and what I crave—only Frank can give me.
I follow the arc of my body until it appears I’m about to dive into the floor, before rebounding on Frank with a blistering back fan kick he barely has enough time to catch; his crossed wrists pinning my ankle a few inches away from his face.
“Frisky,” he growls, his eyes lazily falling from my captive kick to the exposed apex of my thighs; slick already running down the inside of my thighs as I grin ravenously back at him.
He pushes my foot away, and I have to be quick about getting my balance back, because Frank is on me, a punch coming hard and fast at my gut.
I mirror his earlier circular block, my hand turning lazily in the air like a wet, limpid washcloth—my hand closing around his wrist like an iron manacle as I pull his arm down—guiding him past me as I pinwheel in the opposite direction as if we were swing dance partners.
I’ve only just spun back around, expecting to see Frank stumbling through—completing the motion of a stumble, but he only dips unsteadily toward the floor for a second before righting himself—spinning back around with his own powerful crescent kick; this time bound directly for my face.
He’s far too strong for me to catch his foot before it crashes into my jaw, like he caught mine earlier; so I drop to the ground and sweep his supporting leg out from beneath him—or at least I think I’ve managed to until I watch him plant one hand on the floor and cartwheel out of the way—nearly kicking over into Quentin’s hastily assembled nest.
I somersault backward, rolling up onto my feet from a low tuck—Frank already rushing at me—fists raised, a snarl of a smile showcasing all those pearly sharp teeth.
In front of the heavy oak door to the hunting cabin, I straighten to standing—but I’ve miscalculated Frank’s raw speed. I hesitate for only a second—the sparkle of sweat on his sculpted form, his scent—heady styrax, sweet cedar, sharp gun powder, softening my stance.
Frank seems to process my lapse in defenses just before he slams into me—his fists morphing into open palms that close around my wrists and pin them to the solid wood door behind me just above my head—his body pinning me to the unyielding oak.
Our mouths tear at one another—careful never to introduce that edge of teeth that would betray a bonding bite; my body doing its best to rise off the door and grind against his—but Frank gives me no quarter—my breasts pressing against the hard planes of his glistening chest through the thin cotton t-shirt, his knee rising between my thighs.
“Well, well, well,” he growls, practically seating me on his thigh as he holds me pinned and whining against the door. “You’re pretty good for someone only thinking with their joy buzzer,” Frank rumbles—sensation singing through me as the gray cotton creates delicious friction.
“Would you rather me whine and beg for you to ‘ make love to me ’?” I tease, my teeth clicking together as I kittenishly bite the air between our lips—willing him to put his mouth on mine again, but he uses a good portion of his waning resolve to resist.
“Sweetheart, the kinds of things you and I will do…” he sighs dreamily, one hand reaching for something as the other keeps my wrists pinioned over my head, the thigh of his sweats nearly soaked through with my slick.
“It’ll be one hell of a ride, but I’m not sure any of it can be called love.
” Those eyes, focused—dangerous; his lips turned up in that glass-shard thin smirk as I hear the telltale jingle of a brass belt buckle; Frank’s fingers closing around the black leather left hastily atop his abandoned jeans on the back of a nearby chair.
I could fight him if I wanted to—but I don’t want to.
It’s been so long since I’ve had a real alpha during a heat—not since… a time I’m not going to revisit right now.
Thankfully, before I can sink beneath the quicksands of time, Frank brings me back to the immediacy of the moment; turning over the strip of well worn black leather and brass in his single hand until it resembles a sloppy figure eight with a long tail.
“Smart ass sigma thinks she’s going to get one up on me,” he scoffs a laugh—slipping the improvised set of handcuffs onto my wrists , opening the door only a sliver before slamming the tail of the belt into the space between the top of the slab of oak and the door jamb; my bound wrists forcing me up onto the balls of my feet.
“If I wasn’t so fucking helpless for your knot, I would have had you.” A cruel laugh escapes me, and it isn’t ego or a goad; it’s the truth. Frank may be big and he may be strong—but he’s slow too. Both Sébastien and Q may lack his brute strength, but make up for it with their speed and agility.
Frank must know I’m right too, because he doesn’t argue with me directly—just lets out a low snicker as he lifts the hem of the t-shirt slowly, first exposing my pussy as I grind helplessly on his rock hard quads—then the hard pink peaks of my nipples ; the soft worn cotton resting atop my upturned breasts as he dips his head to suck gently at the sensitive rosy point of one nipple, his teeth tenderly closing to gently pull at blushing buds of stiff flesh.
Words escape me as Frank’s lips move lower, his scruffy raven beard grazing the soft skin between my breasts and belly, his hands gripping the bracket curve of my pelvis as he works downward onto his knees.
My eyelids flutter and I feel myself nearly topple off of my tip-toes as Frank eases onto his knees in front of me—my lack of balance ultimately made obsolete by my leather bonds, which keep me suspended somewhere between dangling and flat-footed on the swept board floors of the hunting cabin.
One of Frank’s hands slips down the curve of my right hip to the outside of my upper thigh while the knuckles of his other hand graze the inside of my left thigh, moving from my slick pussy toward the backside of my left knee.
“Let’s see if I don’t have you doing some of that begging and whining,” He challenges, lifting my left knee.
I stifle a surprised yelp as he hooks my knee over his shoulder—my lower leg instinctively tensing against his upper back—drawing my pelvis toward his face in the same fluid motion, my right toes barely making contact with the floor as he creates a partial floating suspension between my captive wrists and Frank, my true anchor to the floor.
“You’re not going anywhere, Sweetheart,” he growls, his long, flat tongue lapping at my dripping pussy, my throbbing clit.
“Fuck,” I hiss, a tiny upward squeak getting the best of me as he runs the tip of his tongue from the center of my trembling petals up to the most sensitive pearl of nerves—willing my eyes not to screw shut as he makes a tracery of ever-tightening concentric circles, flicking that magic 2 O’clock spot with the point of that clever tongue.