Chapter 17
Chapter
Seventeen
After Ryder left, Stella started going through the disguise Siren had provided for her.
She looked inside the shopping bag. A red mesh top was folded on top, and underneath sat a black pleather miniskirt, a black satin push-up bra, a cropped leather jacket, and a choker with a metal ring at the throat.
There was a platinum wig in a mid-length blunt cut in a satin bag.
The shoebox held a pair of stiletto ankle boots with chrome buckles, and the makeup case was loaded with items she’d never be brave enough to wear in her real life.
“I feel like I should try this all on to practice before tomorrow.”
“Good idea,” Blaze said.
Stella took everything to the bathroom and set it on the counter.
Siren had made her an instruction manual for the makeup look Mia was supposed to wear.
Stella opened the makeup case and started with foundation to cover her freckles.
Contour next. Shadow under her cheekbones, along the sides of her nose, at the edge of her jaw.
When she stepped back, the softness was gone, and her face had angles she’d never seen.
Eyeliner next. She’d done eyeliner before, but she’d never done a wing this sharp.
Then lashes. The glue smelled like rubber cement, and the first one went on crooked.
She peeled it off and started over. Then lipstick.
She painted her mouth red, blotted once, and applied again the way the card said.
She looked at her face. The freckles were gone. The cheekbones weren’t hers. The eyes looked enormous. Her mouth was deliberate, painted on, and finished.
She put on the bra. The cups lifted her breasts.
Her nipples hardened against the fabric just from the cold and the look of herself.
She thought about Blaze sitting on the bed in the next room and her nipples got harder.
She then stepped into the pleather skirt and pulled it up over her hips.
The hem hit the upper third of her thighs.
She pulled the mesh top over her head. Red, fine enough that the black bra showed through in full, the hem hitting just below her ribs. The skin of her stomach was bare from the bottom of the top to the waistband of the skirt.
The choker fastened at the back of her neck, and the metal ring settled in the hollow of her throat.
The hoop earrings slid in. Gold caught the light when she turned her head.
The boots were last. She stood up straight and looked in the mirror.
The heels added four inches and made her ass pop and her calves flex.
She braided her hair flat against her head and pinned it with the bobby pins, then fit the wig cap over the braid. The blunt platinum cut pulled her cheekbones forward and made her eyes look even bigger. The woman in the mirror was someone Stella didn’t recognize.
Stella opened the bathroom door and walked back into the hotel room. Blaze looked up from where he sat at the edge of the bed. The hard line of his mouth opened half an inch, his wolf came up behind his eyes, and his chest stopped moving.
The bond cranked open between them so hard that heat moved down her stomach and pooled wet between her legs. Her bear pushed against her chest and moaned. Blaze looked at her like he was going to lose his mind if she didn’t close the distance in the next ten seconds.
She walked toward him. The heels made her hips switch. She stopped two feet from Blaze and put one hand on her waist.
“Do I look like a fighter’s girlfriend?” She started to dance.
He didn’t answer, and his jaw tightened. His hands had gone tight on his thighs, and the cords of his forearms were standing out. She watched what her dancing did to his face. His pupils had blown wide, the blue bright. He was breathing through his mouth like he’d forgotten his nose worked.
Her bear was roaring. She felt herself getting wetter just from the dance. She walked the last few steps toward him, hips still rolling, and stopped between his knees. The smell of him hit her. Leather, lemongrass, the musk of his wolf underneath.
“Stella,” he said, low and rough.
She leaned down with her mouth close to his.
“Do you like it?”
His hands closed on her hips. The grip was firm, and his thumbs pressed into the bare strip of skin between the waistband of the skirt and the bottom of the mesh top.
She straightened, reached behind her, and opened the bra clasp.
She slid the straps down her arms under the top and pulled the bra out from underneath.
She dropped it on the bedspread beside him.
His breath caught and his eyes dropped. The mesh was fine enough that the shape of her was fully visible, and her nipples were tight against the red.
He brought one hand and palmed her breast through the mesh.
His thumb dragged across her nipple through the fabric. She gasped and climbed into his lap.
Her knees went down on either side of his hips.
The skirt rode up to her hipbones the moment she straddled him; the pleather bunched at her waist. The thin satin of her thong was the only thing between her wet pussy and the denim of his jeans.
She could feel the hard shape of him pressed against the seam between her legs.
She rolled her hips against him and moaned.
The ridge of his cock dragged against her clit, and she gasped.
Her bear pushed up under her skin so hard she felt it in her teeth.
He groaned low in his chest, his hands tightened on her waist, and his head tipped back.
His throat was exposed. She licked up the side of his neck to his jaw.
The taste of him was salt and skin, and his pulse hammered under her tongue.
“Stella,” he murmured.
She rolled her hips again, harder, and sucked his throat. The friction of his denim against her pussy was making her wetter, her panties were soaked through.
She threaded her fingers through his hair and brought his mouth up to hers. The kiss was hungry. Her tongue darted into his mouth, and he answered her with a sound that wasn’t quite human. The bond opened wide and hot, and her bear met his wolf in the space between them.
He pulled her flush against him. Her breasts pressed against his chest through the mesh.
He kissed her like he’d die without it. He stood up with both arms around her and laid her down on the bed.
He came over her, his weight pressing her into the mattress, and her bear rose under her skin in recognition.
He braced one hand by her head and looked down at her.
“I need you,” he growled into her ear.
He gripped the hem of the red mesh top and dragged it up over her head. His mouth went to her neck, then her collarbone, then the curve of her shoulder. His stubble dragged against her skin and left it stinging in the best way. His mouth was wet and hot, and the smell of him drove her mad.
He took one nipple in his mouth and sucked, and her back came off the mattress.
His tongue worked her, flat then pointed then flat, and his hand came up and rolled the other nipple between his thumb and forefinger in time with his mouth.
She groaned loudly, and he hummed against her skin, pleased with the sound.
He pulled off her nipple with a slow drag of his lips. The cold of the air on the wet skin he’d left made her gasp, and then his mouth was on the other nipple, his hand on the first.
He pressed his hard dick against her, and rough denim dragged across her clit through the thin satin panties.
He reached behind her and found the zipper of the skirt and dragged it down.
The pleather went slack at her waist. He hooked his thumbs in the waistband and worked it down her hips and her thighs in one motion and dropped it on the floor.
Blaze dragged his thumb up the length of the wet fabric between Stella’s legs.
She moaned and fisted the bedspread. He then hooked his fingers in the waistband of her thong and pulled it off her before moving down the bed and settling between her thighs.
He looked at her with wolfish blue eyes as he put his mouth on her pussy.
He gave her a long flat lick of his tongue that left her gasping.
The second stroke had her groaning his name.
He planted one forearm across her hips and held her down because he wasn’t going to let her rush him.
He was patient and focused, alternating between wide flat strokes with tight pointed ones at her clit.
When she started to climb, two fingers slid inside her.
She came so fast she didn’t see it coming and let out a long, broken wail. Her thighs clamped around his head and her hands fisted in his hair. When she stopped shaking, he kissed the inside of her thigh and the soft skin below her hipbone.
“Come here,” she said.
He moved up the bed over her, and she pulled him down to her by the collar of his T-shirt. When she kissed him, she tasted herself on his mouth. She grabbed the hem of his shirt and pushed it up. He pulled it off over his head and dropped it on the floor. Then she finally got a good look at him.
She’d seen the tattoos, the cut of his shoulders, the way his muscles moved under the fabric of his clothes.
She hadn’t yet seen the full sleeves of tattoos running unbroken across his chest and around onto his back.
Sak Yant work down his chest. Japanese script across his ribs.
A wolf in fine line work at the meat of his shoulder, hunting something off the edge of the design. Scars under the ink.
His body was lean and ripped. A hard cut of muscle ran down past his hips into the V that disappeared under the waist of his jeans. The bond was alive between them. She ran her hands over his pecs, and his heart hammered against her palms.
“Off,” she said, moving her hands down to his pants.
He worked the button and the zipper. She pushed up onto her elbow and helped him shove the jeans down his hips. He kicked them off the end of the bed along with his boxer briefs, and then he was naked over her.
He was thick and long and hard in a way that looked almost painful.
The head of him was flushed dark, and there was already wet at the tip.
She wrapped her hand around the base of his cock, and he hissed through his teeth.
His hips jerked forward into her grip. She stroked him, feeling the weight of him in her hand.
He was so hot. The skin was velvet over iron, and the wet at the tip slicked her palm. He let her work him for a few strokes.
“Stella.” His hand came down and caught her wrist. “I want to be inside you when I come.”
“Then get inside me.”
He reached over the side of the bed for the duffle and came back with a foil packet. She watched him roll the condom on. She was wet and ready, the bond alive between them. He braced one forearm beside her head. The blunt heat of him pressed at her entrance, and he pushed in slowly.
Her body opened around him, and her eyes rolled back. The stretch was enormous, and the mate bond amplified every nerve. He stopped halfway in and let her adjust, his arms shaking with the effort of holding back.
“Oh god,” she groaned.
He sank the rest of the way in. Her hips came off the mattress to meet him, and his forehead dropped to hers. Both of them stopped breathing for a beat.
He started to move, finding the rhythm. Her body knew what to do before her brain did, like they’d done this together in a life she couldn’t remember. Every thrust pulled the bond tighter, and every drag of him inside her sent heat up her spine.
She wrapped her legs around him, and the boots dug into the backs of his thighs.
He braced both forearms beside her head and changed position.
The new angle had his cock dragging against her g-spot, making her vision go white at the edges.
She gasped, and her nails dug into his back. He started to thrust harder.
“Don’t stop.”
He fucked her with steady hard strokes, and her breasts shook with the rhythm. He caught her thigh, hitched her leg higher, and sank deeper inside her. She felt the orgasm building from the bond, climbing up her spine, lighting every nerve in her body as it came.
He buried his face in the crook of her neck, his breath hot on her throat. His teeth grazed her skin, but he didn’t bite. The feeling of his teeth on her flesh made her pussy clench down hard on him. He groaned.
His weight on her chest, his hand gripping her thigh hard enough to bruise, the wet slap of him driving into her, the smell of sweat and sex and him, the bond beating between them like a third heartbeat.
She was climbing higher. Harder. She was so close.
He reached down between them, pressed his thumb to her clit, and worked it in time with his thrusts.
She came so hard her vision went black, her pussy squeezing his cock.
A long, ragged sound tore out of her chest. Her thighs clamped around his hips and her nails carved into his back.
He growled against her throat, the bond bright in her chest. He buried himself in her to the hilt and came.
His hips moved in short jerky motions. He held still inside her for several moments, his breath in her hair.
Finally, he rolled off her and got up to deal with the condom.
Blaze then got back into the bed and pulled the comforter up over both of them.
He settled on his back. She tucked herself against his side with her head on his chest, his arm around her.
The city hummed outside the window. A siren wailed a long way off, and a man laughed in the parking lot.
“Well,” she said. “At least we don’t have to fake the chemistry at the event tomorrow.”
He turned to her. The expression on his face was open and unguarded. The wolf was quiet behind his eyes.
“I wasn’t going to be faking it.”