Page 53 of Happily Undead in Dark River

“That is not our way, well not just yet,” Brody said softly. He looked down at the men with sad eyes. “Do any of you want to speak in your own defense?” Clint spat in the direction of Brody’s bare feet. My sad Alpha curled his shoulders infinitesimally, and it was only because I was beside him that I even noticed.

“Will anyone speak for them?” His eyes found a woman in the crowd, one clutching tightly to Lulu’s hand, fear and hope warring in her eyes. But she didn’t speak. Brody nodded. “So be it. You are all sentenced to banishment. You will be warded from the Pack lands of your ancestors, gelded so that you may never breed your own pack.”

Tex audibly swallowed behind me. “Did he just say gelded? As in neutered?” he whispered to Judge, and even I felt pale. That seemed like an intimate kind of punishment.

Nell nodded, “It will be done, Alpha.” Ghost stepped forward, along with a couple of other huge guys who I assumed must be protectors too, and they roughly pulled the traitors to their feet.

Brody turned and grabbed my waist, walking me away a little bit. “Go home, Red. Sleep. Catch up with your other men. I’ll be here for a while and you still need to feed and rest.” He kissed my temple and I let my head lean into him. I wanted to support him, but I felt tired to my very bones. Every part of me ached from the sun, my eyes felt like they’d been flash-fried and then stuck back in my skull and I just wanted to curl up in someone's arms and let them take care of me.

Nico touched the tips of his fingers to where my hair was missing. Oh shit. I’d forgotten about my hair. It was a testament to my life that no one had mentioned the fact that I was channeling Sinead O’Connor 'til now. “It’ll grow back. I think.”

He nodded, seemingly unperturbed that I was rocking basically a five o’clock shadow on my head. It made me love him a little more. It made me love them all a little bit more. “I have to stay and try to smooth over this fiasco from the Vampires' point of view. It helps that their Alpha loves you, but the Elders hold a lot of sway and are far more traditional than your lover,” Nico said softly, and I nodded. I grabbed his fingers and gave them a light squeeze. I bowed respectfully to the Elders and walked out of the crowd with my head held high, each and every single person in town watching me as I left.

When I was finally out of the eyesight of the crowd, I let the tension ease from my body. I shuffled slowly back up the slight incline back toward Brody’s temporary house. Walker wrapped his fingers in mine, and Judge had his arm around Tex’s shoulders. He leaned over and kissed Tex’s temple tenderly, then turned to me. He leaned in, brushing his lips against mine, before biting the swell of my bottom lip hard.

“Enough already, Rainey Day. No more of this dying thing. I can’t stand it anymore.” He looked past me to Walker. “I have to go and play Deputy Doofus for one more day, but then I’m handing this fucking badge back and spending a week between our girl's thighs. No arguments.”

I laughed even as heat rushed to the apex of my aforementioned thighs. He was so damn handsome, I kind of wanted to strip off his clothes and take him on the footpath. Gravel rash and all.

Walker nodded, giving Judge a crooked smile. Who knew that he would take his deputation so seriously? God knows, he hated commitment, but he seemed to be changing his ways. “Thanks, Judge,” Walker said quietly, and I could tell that he really meant it. Judge had stepped up, and I couldn’t love him more than I did at that moment.

His face lifted into that crooked grin that made my heart flutter. “You owe me one, and I intend to collect.”

He turned to leave, and I stilled him with my hand on his arm. “How did you get through the wards anyway?”

Judge’s face shut down. “Miranda.”

I knew it had to have been the Witch Miranda. Gah, she was like the ghost of Christmas past that kept coming back over and over again. “What did she want in return?”

He shook his head. “She cursed me to love someone more than I love myself. I told her it was too late. I already did.” Then he winked and he was gone.

Tex let out a soft sigh. I echoed it. Walker just shook his head. “Smooth bastard. Let’s go, Raine. I need to have my arms around you as soon as possible.”

As we got closer to Brody’s house, Tex lifted his arm to look at his invisible watch that he wouldn’t be able to see anyway because he was freaking blind. “Oh, would you look at the time? I forgot I have to, uh go to my, uh Shifter training classes.”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Shifter training class? Seriously?” Tex just grinned, flashing me shiny white teeth. “Uh-huh. Have fun, you two.”

With that, he walked away back down the hill, whistling happily like we hadn’t just all almost died. I shook my head at his retreating back. I looked up at Walker and grinned. “And then there were two?”

He smoldered down at me, then I was scooped up into his arms and he was running at the speed of light towards the spare room in Brody’s temporary house. I didn’t know if it was luck or his vampire senses that led him to a room that was currently unoccupied, but he’d known. He kicked the door to the bedroom shut behind us, spinning me and slammed me into the wall beside it. His mouth was everywhere suddenly, sucking, teasing, devouring me. I sucked in a panting breath as I tried to sort through the sensations. His eyes glowed that luminescent green as he tore off Colton’s shirt. Whoops. I’d get him a new one.

He took my nipple into his mouth, sucking hard, nipping at it like he was a starving man before moving onto the next one. My fingers pressed into his shoulders as I held on for the ride, my legs holding him tightly to me.

“I don’t want to wait for the perfect time. You are perfect, Raine. Perfect for me. Anything we do will always be perfect, even when we aren’t. I love you, Raine Baxter. I loved you the moment you stumbled into that diner looking like a hot mess.”

His hands found their way into my panties, finding my clit and brushing his thumb against it. “Yes,” I breathed as my body jolted against his palm. “I love you too. Please,” I whimpered as he slid a finger inside me, stroking my core. He pushed another finger inside me and I moved against his hand, matching his thrusting rhythm as his mouth found mine again and his lips punished mine with a brutal, desperate kiss.

He spun me around, falling onto the bed behind us, his body caging me in. He tore off my underwear, tossing them over his shoulder as he traced all the curves of my body like a blind man. His tongue followed the path of his fingers. He tasted every square inch of me with a manic intensity. “I need you, Walker,” I panted as his mouth found my clit and nipped it gently. I bucked off the bed toward his face, then he grabbed me beneath my hips and devoured my core. He alternated between sliding his tongue in and out of me and swirling it around my clit until I was whimpering. “I wanted to take this slow and easy. I wanted to worship you as you deserve, but I can’t, Raine. I just can’t. I need you too much,” he said, his voice pained as he thrust his hips against my leg and I felt the very hard results of that need.

I was panting with need. “We’ve waited long enough. Hurry up and make love to me already,” I sounded grumpy and needy, and it made the bastard grin. He stripped off his clothes, throwing them in the direction of mine until he was naked and glorious in front of me. Jesus. He was so damn radiantly hot. Broad shoulders, a wide, muscular chest, that tapered down into washboard abs and a narrow waist. He was like every teenage dirty dream I’d ever had. He slid his body up mine until he could taste my lips again.

“Walker,” I whispered pleadingly between the teasing kisses he was bestowing on my face. Fortunately, it was only his kisses that were teasing as the crown of his cock found my core and he slid home in one, long, hard thrust. I keened a noise that probably wasn’t overly human as he slid back out and slammed himself home again.

“Fuck, Raine,” he gritted out. “You feel like heaven.”

I grinned as he swore, and I dragged his head down so I could take his full lower lip into my mouth. I scraped my fangs, cutting it up and we both moaned as I pulled the abused flesh into my mouth, sucking hard. We moved together in a rhythm so perfect, a rhythm that could only be created by the two of us, together in this moment, and honestly, I wanted to cry. Instead, I screamed as he shifted one of my legs to his shoulder, folding me in half like a fucking sweater and reaching places that made my eyes roll back in my head, all without breaking our kiss. My body cradled his like we were made to fit together, and I scraped my nails down his back until it broke the skin, making him grunt louder and pound harder. Oh, my sexy, sexy Sheriff liked it a little bit rough? I filed that away for a time when he wasn’t hitting just the perfect spot that made me scream as I came all over his cock.

But Walker wasn’t done, and I should have known he had the self-control of a monk. He pulled out briefly, flipping me onto my stomach and slipping a hand under my hips to pull me higher, then he slid back into me, barely losing his rhythm. I whimpered as he hit all new places, his fingers moving from my hip to my clit as he drove me into the ball of his hand with hard thrusts. Like he had played with my body a million times before, he worked the orgasm out of me. Then finally, he thrust in harder and harder, until he was roaring his own release, biting down on my neck as he came. The feel of his fangs sliding into my flesh had me coming again.

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