Page 16 of Pack Witch
My wolf snarled, and I lost control. But thank the moon, not entirely. I kept my wolf from rising to mark her, but the climax would not be stopped.
“My love,” I cried out. “Mate.” The sensations began at the base of my spine, radiating through every part of me as she lifted her hips and I filled her. It was almost painful, as if I’d been waiting not minutes but decades for my peak. Of course, I had been. Being with Zinnia was exactly what I’d been missing for almost half my life.
I folded her into my arms and held her, still inside her, as she shuddered. Why was she still shaking?
My wolf whimpered silently. Was she trembling with pleasure, or with something else?
“Was it…?” I wasn’t sure what I was asking. Slowly, on sharp, silent feet, the pain began to return, my own skin beginning to burn and itch once more.
I ignored it. I could live with my own pain as I had for years. I couldn’t bear the idea that she was hurting, not now. Not for a second.
“It was, Julian,” she whispered, her voice strained. “It was everything.” I held her as she began to cry, trying to believe her as she assured me she was just overcome with emotion.
It should have felt like bliss, like the beginning of something new and lovely. But as the moonlight faded and the night grew darker and her quiet sobbing never stopped, my heart filled withan emotion I’d almost never experienced, even in my decades as a warrior.
Fear.
Chapter 9
Zinnia
I’d never done it myself, but I’d read stories about the awkwardness of waking up in the arms of a new lover. Ida had brought books to my cabin for years. She’d noticed I read the romances more than once and started bringing more of those over time. I had boxes of paperbacks under my bed, ones she claimed were too dog-eared to be of use in the Alpha’s library.
I’d longed for the things I’d read in those books, though, even the morning afters. And when I woke in the clearing, my wound healed more than enough to rise and return to the cabin, I realized I’d looked forward to the awkwardness of meeting a lover’s eyes after making love. Maybe even falling back into his arms.
But Julian was gone.What an asshole.
A storm of emotions swept through me: anger, hurt, disappointment, regret, even shame. I’d imagined waking in a tangle of arms and legs, kissing with morning breath, seeing his body in the sunlight.
I glanced down at my own body, the age spots and wrinkles even more pronounced, for some reason. Maybe the love bites and beard burn made them stand out more?
“What an absolute piece of shit,” I said out loud. I wasn’t some great beauty; I never had been. But was I really so unappealing that he’d felt he needed to leave without a word?
Why should it matter so much? I’d been alone for every morning of my life, since I’d left my sister and my own small pack. I was used to it, so there was no reason for the tears now stinging the backs of my eyes.
When I sniffled, a squirrel from the closest aspen scampered down and ran up my bare legs, chittered, then lifted its ears and fled. I turned my head to see what had scared her and heard someone stumbling through the woods.
“Julian?”
He answered from behind me, not from the woods. “I’m insulted. That much noise, it must be a herd of elks.”
I twisted around, shocked. Where had he been hiding? He was a massive male, but he obviously moved like a ghost.
His hungry gaze slid down my naked form as he kneeled beside me, just before a familiar piece of calico fabric appeared over my head. “Arms up, love, unless you want my boys to lose their eyes.”
“Lose their eyes?” I sputtered as he lifted my arm and threaded it through the sleeve of my oldest, most threadbare house dress, the one I sometimes used to make a nest for wounded rabbits or chipmunks. It still smelled slightly of rodents, though the last time I’d seen it, it had been in a clean laundry basket inside my cabin.
I struggled as he tried to put my head through the neck hole, swatting his hands away as I heard the voices of the boys and Ida becoming clearer. Suddenly, I didn’t care what I was wearing: I just needed something to cover the evidence of last night.
Ida sounded farther away, but her voice sailed clearly through the woods. “Boys, stop dragging your feet. You know what you have to do.”
“Probably die with my head tore clean off,” one of the boys moaned. Bo, I remembered. His name was Bo. “I almost killed his woman. You know what he taught us about hurtin’ females.”
“He ain’t gonna kill ya, Bo. Grandma Ida says she lived, and all ya gotta do is make sure you offer resolution,” the other one replied, just as I managed to get the old dress on.
Julian stood next to me in his clothing, though the shirt was torn open to reveal his muscled chest, which was a true distraction. He glowered in the direction of the two young males who were bumbling through the woods, a little too close to the place where a skunk had made her den.
“Resolution?” I murmured.
