Chapter 14
Clara burst from the house to run into the night. The full moon hung heavy in the sky. Its energy sizzled along her skin and quickened her heart, while its light cast bright mercury over the landscape. The illumination revealed the drive and beyond that, the thick forest.
Her heart seized at the choice she had to make. The known path that would leave her exposed, or the wood with its shelter—and mysteries.
She hesitated for a moment. Then she veered into the forest, plunging headlong into its depths.
Low-hanging branches plucked at her clothes and brushed over her face, while bracken grasped at her skirts like elven fingers seeking to drag her down into their underground kingdom. The dense woods permitted only scraps of light to pierce its canopy, illuminating her way in patches.
Where she was going, she’d no notion. Only that she had to get away.
From the violence she’d just witnessed. From the transformations that should have been impossible, and yet were real.
She had to flee Des, and Gideon, and, most of all, the hot, wild part of herself that saw them in their new forms, and desired.
She ran with her arms stretched out to hold back boughs.
Yet, even with the moonlight, she couldn’t make sense of what was ahead.
She yelped as her foot caught in a twisting root, and she stumbled, dropping to the ground in a flurry of petticoats.
The heels of her hands broke her fall. Stones and twigs bit into her palms, and she brushed them off as she struggled back to her feet, not bothering to clean her dusty skirts.
The vast forest was endless around her. Nocturnal birds cried out and took flight as she crashed gracelessly through the wood, and animals scurried away.
She knew nothing of how to survive in such a place, and she stopped long enough to turn in a circle, seeking some direction, some way toward safety.
Sounds rose behind her. Twigs snapping, and footfalls, light but purposeful.
Des.
The fine hairs covering her body rose, and her skin went tight and sensitive. The moonlight was sultry on her flesh, her breasts grew heavy, while a slick, hot wetness gathered between her legs.
He deliberately made noise, alerting her to his presence. Letting her know that he pursued her, chased her farther into the darkness.
Heart pounding, breath coming in excited pants, she sped deeper into the forest. He kept distance between them, always letting her stay ahead of him, yet his presence remained large and hot behind her.
She chanced a look over her shoulder. Des was a blur in the shadows, his eyes glowing brightly, his movements sleek. It was beautiful to see him run, both human and animal, intent on hunting her. The look in his eyes was predatory—and something else, something carnal and erotic.
He would catch her. It wasn’t a matter of if, but when.
Beneath her bodice, her nipples tightened.
Ahead, she caught the glint of moonlight on water.
She rushed forward and slid down the embankment of a creek before plunging into the water.
A gasp left her lips at the coldness of the stream, yet she forged onward, the water surging around her waist, until she reached the other bank.
She grabbed handfuls of grass and reeds to pull herself up.
Once her feet touched dry land, she was off again, running.
She stumbled into the center of a clearing, and stopped. Turning, she faced the direction she’d just come from and waited. Her dress clung to her, yet she barely felt the chill. All she sensed now was a powerful heat radiating from deep within her, roused by the chase, attuned to Des.
A moment later, he appeared at the edge of the glade. Water dripped from his fur, now cleansed of blood. He moved into the moonlight, revealing that the wound on his shoulder had already begun to heal.
Here, in the forest, away from the tight confines of her home, he stood tall, powerful.
His physique was sharply defined, broad pectorals and the ridges of his abdomen visible even beneath his dark fur, and his limbs were hewn and thickly muscled.
His wolfish head was proud and handsome, eyes aglow, mouth stretched to reveal long teeth. All his attention centered on her.
He took a step toward her, and that’s when she saw it.
His cock.
Dear God. It was…enormous. She’d thought him big as a human man, but now, Lord in Heaven, she couldn’t begin to fathom how anyone could possess such a tremendous…thing.
It was thick. Veined and red, his cock curved up, nearly reaching his navel. The head was wide, gleaming, and already fluid leaked from the slit in a copious, steady stream.
The chase had aroused him, as much as it had stirred her. And at the sight of him, so engorged, so ready to mate—with her—Clara’s hands itched to touch him, and her body ached with a potent emptiness longing to be filled.
“You can’t run far enough,” Des growled in his wolfish voice. “I’ll always catch you.”
“Perhaps,” she said, breathless, “I want to be caught.”
“Then…” He took another step, shortening the distance between them. “You’re not afraid? Or disgusted?”
“Oh, no.” She moved to stand only a foot away from him. The heat of his body penetrated hers, chasing away any remaining chill. She had to tip her head back to look into his eyes. “I think you’re stunning. In every form you possess.”
He gave a deep rumble.
“May I touch you?” she asked softly.
“I need you to.”
His rumble turned into a full growl when she laid her hand upon his stomach.
His fur was both coarse and silken, and it clung to all the beautiful shapes of his body.
She glided her hand up and down his torso to learn all of his textures, the hardness of his muscles and the velvet of his fur.
Strength and potency emanated from him, a wild and unchecked power that made her lightheaded.
“You’re like a being from one of my stories,” she murmured. “Better. Because you’re real.”
“And you aren’t frightened. After what you’ve seen me become. After what you know I can do.” These were statements, not questions, and yet there was a thread of uncertainty beneath.
“That’s what makes you even more incredible.” She was entranced, letting her hands roam over his body and through his fur. “That you are so many astonishing things, ferocious things, and yet…with me…you are gentle.”
“There’s nothing gentle about what I want from you.” He captured her hand as it skimmed over his chest, pressing it tightly to where his heart thundered.
“Then,” she said, nuzzling her face in his pelt, “do them.”
Suddenly, she was swept up in his arms. He held her easily, and he laid her down onto the dew-covered grass.
His hands were all over her, tracing down her throat, palming her breasts through her bodice, gathering her skirts.
He was careful with his claws, though he scraped them deliciously across her neck and over the flesh of her upper chest, summoning shivers of sensation.
He loomed over her, massive, and blocked out her view of the clearing.
He settled between her legs, stretched wide to accommodate his size. All she could see and know was Des, this strange and wondrous form of his, and the world spun around her.
He bent down to tongue her throat. She arched up into the rough texture. His breath was hot on her as his muzzle moved along her body, then went lower. He shoved up her skirts so that they bunched at her waist, uncovering her sex. He growled again.
“The sight of your cunt,” he grated, then pressed his muzzle to her mound. “The scent. You want me, want what I can give you.”
“You’ve known,” she realized, even as she writhed beneath the feel of him grazing her sex. “All along. You could smell how my body responded to you.”
If wolves could smile, Des did. His eyes were bright. “Sparrow, you’ve wanted me to fuck you from the moment you first saw me.”
A hectic flush coursed through her cheeks. “Should I be ashamed? Arthur—”
“The hell with Arthur,” Des snarled. “He’s dead. This is for us.”
Whatever concerns she might have felt for what she should and shouldn’t feel vanished the moment his coarse tongue lapped at her sex.
All thought, all logic or notions of propriety, they all burned away as Des licked her.
His tongue was large, and long, and its roughness abraded her delectably.
He licked her entrance and her clitoris at the same time.
“Oh, God.” She writhed and shook as Des devoured her cunt.
The more he licked her, the more her body grew enflamed, until she was mad with need. Her nipples were taut and throbbing as they pressed against the inside of her bodice. Her thighs were wet, both from him and her own arousal.
Mindful of his claws, he pressed his thumb to her opening as he sucked her clitoris.
She screamed her release into the night, a long, pained keen of pleasure. Another scream tore from her as he continued to pleasure her mercilessly, and again.
For all her climaxes, she was afire, needing…
“More,” she moaned. “Please, Des. More.”
He snarled, rearing up, and gripped her left thigh, spreading her open. With his other hand, he grabbed his cock. In his own large hand, it still appeared gargantuan. Despite the haze of desire, worry flared within her.
“I’m not very big,” she admitted, “and you…are.”
“I’ve made you ready.” His deep voice was all command and confidence. “You’ll take me.”
He lined up the head of his cock with her entrance.
The mere touch of his skin against hers made her moan, and when he slid into her, inch by inch, she cried out.
He slowly filled her, stretching her to her limit.
Never would she have thought she could take him within her, yet her body wanted him, growing supple to accept every part.
Impossibly, he sank all the way in to the hilt. She panted and gasped, pinned into place by his heat and size. She was speared, filled to her limit.
“Yes, sparrow,” he rumbled. “So good for me.”
He held himself still for a moment, as though giving her time to learn what it was to be full of him. Through half-lowered lids, she watched the play of tortured ecstasy on his lupine face, his teeth bared, his eyes brilliant.
How long he would have stayed like that, motionless, she’d no idea. But her body had other notions, and she found herself shifting, moving, working herself on his cock to assuage the blazing need building within her. Within her passage, his broad head slid over her swollen spot.
“More,” she heard herself begging again. “Des. Please.”
He snarled, and began to thrust in earnest. Deep, heavy strokes that rocked her into the earth.
Both of his hands gripped her thighs to hold her completely open to him.
She grew wetter and wetter, feverish with desire, until he stroked one thumb over her clitoris.
Her release struck her in a torrent of pleasure.
Shifting, he angled his body so that he ground against her bud. With each thrust, he pounded against her, and she came once again. Light sparked behind her eyes, moonlight and glory, as she cried out into the night.
He suddenly pulled from her, and she moaned in protest. But then she found herself swept up in his arms, carried across the clearing, until they reached a large fallen oak. The trunk was wide, nearly reaching Des’s thighs.
He draped her over the log and gathered her skirts.
Face down, she realized she was utterly exposed to him, lewd and unashamed with her arse and cunt in full view.
His hands curved around her hips to angle her where he needed her, his claws lightly biting into her flesh in a way that made her shiver.
She felt, once more, his cock lining up with her opening.
“Yes?” he rasped.
“Yes,” she breathed out.
He plowed into her with one hard, demanding thrust. A sound leapt from her, pleasure and pain intermingled, and she gripped the rough wood of the oak beneath her for stability.
He fucked her. Hard. Her whole body shook from the force of his thrusts, and her eyes rolled back as wave after wave of pleasure barreled through her. He moved a hand over her belly and then lower to stroke her clitoris, his touch decidedly forceful, holding nothing back.
Her climax leveled her. There was nothing left of her as it tore through her in waves of expanding fire.
Des let out a roar as his body stiffened. She felt his climax, his seed filling her hotly.
And then…something swelled inside her. The base of his cock thickened, knotted. They were locked together. She’d never been stretched so wide.
She came again.
Des draped over her, his body heaving, his breath hot against the back of her neck. For long moments, they were like that, held in place by the knot at the base of his still-hard cock, their rough breaths intermingling in the stillness of night.
Finally, the knot lessened in size, until he could pull from her. His seed seeped from her in thick currents, coating her sex and dripping down her thighs. She shivered in pleasure at the sensation.
He lowered her skirts, turned her over gently, and nuzzled at her neck.
“Such a beautiful sparrow,” he rumbled against her flesh. “Perfect, perfect woman.”
Her eyes grew hot.
“Did I do anything to hurt you?” Concern tightened his voice as he brushed his fingers carefully over her face, streaking tears across her cheeks. “Do you regret this? With me…a beast?”
“There’s nothing I regret.” She cupped her hand around his muzzle. “It was, as you said, perfect. You are perfect.”
He made a sound that was a mixture of happiness and pain. “Never thought of myself that way. So few do.”
“But you are.”
“I’ve haven’t done that with anybody in this form,” he admitted. “Couldn’t ever trust anyone that much.”
Her eyes went wide. What that meant went straight to the heart of her. She brimmed with its significance. “I’m honored.”
He gathered her close, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her face into his fur.
They held each other in this way for long moments, and then he scooped her up in his arms and carried her to the center of the clearing.
He laid her down on soft grass before curling his massive body around her.
She didn’t feel the dampness of her clothing, or the chill of night.
All she felt was the heat of him, the solidness and strength.
“I have so many questions,” she murmured. Drowsiness stole over her, her body limp in the aftermath of countless climaxes.
“By and by, they’ll be answered,” he said throatily. “For now, sparrow, sleep.”
As she lay with him, her drowsy mind drifted, and it was as though she could see herself. A woman who had fled into the forest, now curled up with a wolf in the glen, their bodies lax after decimating pleasure. All the while, the full moon shone down on them.
And then, she slept.