18. Ava #4
“Such a sweet girl,” he said, licking down my cheeks to my neck. I turned my head to give him more access, and when his teeth grazed over the place where my neck met my shoulder, the world shifted. My wolf reared up inside me, taking over any remaining sense.
Take. Take. Take.
Mine. Mine. Mine.
The magical tether to Poe inside my soul vibrated, humming with adrenaline. I couldn’t stop myself. I didn’t even try. I licked the column of Poe’s throat, compelled by his salty-sweet sweat and the steady beat of his heart. When I got to the place where his scent was the strongest, I struck.
I sank my teeth into his skin until it broke. I swallowed his blood and his magic. I let it fill me up, twisting with mine, coating my insides with him, him, him.
Poe reared back so hard, my teeth ripped out of his body, leaving a messy wound that dripped crimson onto my shoulder.
He blinked, frozen inside me. But that connection between us, that blinding thing that appeared when we first met, snapped into place like a rebounding rubber band.
I felt it. He felt it. And neither of us could deny it.
Our wolves spoke to each other, even if the humans couldn’t understand.
“Yes?” his asked.
“Yes,” mine replied.
It needed no more thought. Poe peeled his lips back over his fangs and plunged them into my neck, surging his cock deep inside me.
Everything went white. My vision blanked out.
I wrapped my legs around his hips, hooking my ankles at the base of his spine, and hugged my arms under his shoulders, pulling him closer.
His bonding scent flared, covering me in territorial protection. I was his. He was mine.
It didn’t make sense, but it didn’t have to.
Magic rampaged inside me, sparkling and golden and incendiary.
My climax poured out of me into him, and he reciprocated with his own, his knot expanding, holding him deep inside.
He kept thrusting in tiny movements, shooting the last of his release into my cunt.
He groaned, and I cried, hot tears spilling down my temples.
The space between us blurred, his darkness flooding all the cracks I’d left open.
I sensed his affection for me, a quiet devotion that had slowly built in a short amount of time.
His heartbreak and angst and utmost reverence for everything we’d created together.
Finally, his worshipful commitment to Lycan.
He loved my husband with every ounce of his being.
In the aftermath, he collapsed on top of me and licked the bite mark on my neck, softly lapping at it while I tended to the one on him. Our heartbeats synced, pounding through our ribs like they were trying to reach out to each other.
We didn’t say anything. Nothing needed to be said.
He rolled us so I was on top of him, his cock still buried deep inside, and I lay across his chest, staring up into his beautiful brown eyes. He brushed hair out of my face and kissed my forehead, but reality stealthily crept back in.
Objectively, I knew what we’d done couldn’t be taken back.
I’d marked him as mine. He’d marked me as his.
We didn’t belong to each other. If anything, we both belonged to Lycan—and what a strange, beautiful, tragic thing that was.
He didn’t want anything permanent between us, and yet, we’d created something irrevocable.
We’d have to tell him.
I waited for the dread to arrive. Braced for it.
It didn’t come. What came instead was worse, and much harder to explain.
I wanted to tell Lycan. I wanted to watch his face while he heard it.
I wanted him in the room when he found out, close enough that I could see the fury war with hunger in his eyes.
I couldn’t line that up with any version of guilt I’d ever felt before.
People who cheated hid it. Some deep-seated instinct told me not to, and not just because of remorse or shame. It said there was more between the three of us, and this was just the catalyst.
Poe licked his lips and started to say something, probably to bring us both back down to earth, but I put my fingers over his mouth to stop him.
“Not yet,” I said. “Just let us have this.”
He held me tighter, and I closed my eyes, memorizing everything about the moment. Our sweaty bodies. The euphoric ache in my neck. The warmth of his energy spinning in my soul. And somewhere in the haze, I fell asleep.
In these tender moments, my subconscious took advantage and ran recklessly through my imagination. The first nightmare appeared only a handful of times since my first scene with Lycan. But that night, my mind conjured up a new horror for me to dissect.
I stood in front of a fire, wearing nothing but a floor-length pale nightgown, heat licking my cheeks and wisping my hair around my face.
The witch chanted in a language I didn’t recognize and circled the flames, spilling herbs and salt as she danced.
There was no moon, and the woods seemed more sinister in the dark, as if they knew what was about to happen and they were trying to warn me.
I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t be doing this. But I didn’t have another choice. My hands clenched into fists, and my stomach churned with regret. Electricity zipped through the air, prompted by the witch’s words. Static on my tongue. Humming in my ears. Vibration on my skin.
“It’s starting,” the witch said, coming to stand in front of me. “I can’t stop it. All I can do is give it somewhere else to go.” She searched my face. “You’re sure?”
I hung my head. “I’m sure.”
With one final word, she pressed her hands to my chest and whispered in that same foreign tongue.
Fire rushed through my veins, branding my soul, and my lungs compressed, squeezing all the air out of my body.
I couldn’t move. I couldn’t think. All I could focus on was the pain, the sheer excruciating magic coating my molecules.
Something else gripped me, crawling out of the darkness with evil intent, cold and enormous, aimed at my children asleep in a house miles from here. I opened myself and let it in.
The change took me. My bones splintered and cracked.
My skin rippled and sagged off my body. My muscles contorted, and I fell to the ground, writhing with the unstoppable force.
This wasn’t like any change I’d ever experienced before.
It was more powerful, more harrowing, but perhaps that was because I knew there was no coming back.
This was it. This was my penance. This was what I had to do to protect them.
This was the cost.
It seemed to go on for eons, and when the witch stopped chanting, I rolled to my side and pushed onto four legs, taking in the world with my shifter eyes. I flicked my ears. I wagged my tail. I tested my walk.
“It’s done,” the witch said. “They are safe.”
I trotted away.
Smothering a scream, I sat up and clamped a hand over my mouth. I was still in the cabin, the blankets tangled around my legs, Poe staring up at me from his spot on my right.
“Are you okay?” he murmured.
I wiped the sweat from my face. “Yeah, it’s just…nightmares.”
“Nightmares?” His brows drew together. “About Evelyn?”
“No.” I forced back the all-consuming ache in my chest, this heavy grief that seemed to belong to me and yet…didn’t at the same time.
“Talk to me,” Poe said. “I can help.”
I didn’t think he could. I didn’t know how he could. I didn’t even know what they meant.
“It’s nothing. It’s the stress.”
I kept telling myself that, but after this one, it didn’t ring true anymore. Something else was going on, and the mystery around it rattled me. I didn’t own a nightgown like that. I’d never stood in front of a fire like that.
“We’ve been through a lot,” Poe said. “It’s probably your mind’s way of making sense of all this.”
“Yeah,” I said, lying down again, forcing myself to believe it. “Maybe.”