Page 49 of The Mating Game
“You’re being smug.”
“Of course I am,” he sayssmugly. “I’m currently undefeated.”
“One more time,” I urge.
His head tilts to look at the sky, noting the same sinking sun I just did. “It will be dark soon.”
“You scared, Grandpa?”
“Of you?” He takes a step closer, imposing his full height on me, which is easy, since his wolf is so much larger than mine. “Hardly.”
“Then I suggest you run,” I all but purr, unsure where the sound comes from.
The thrill of the chase has my blood pumping harder, and I can feel a frenetic energy in my limbs urging me to move, togo, and I’m determined to make full use of it.
Hunter stares down at me for a moment more, then surprises me by leaning in close to press his snout right under my ear. I can feel his breath puffing against my fur as he inhales deeply, and when he pulls away, I can feel my legs get shakier.
“Your scent is off,” he says.
“Stop making excuses.”
“I’m not making excuses, I’m saying that your scent is—”
I can’t ignore the urge to move any longer, taking off at a full sprint as I bound away from him and call out, “Fine,youcan chasemethis time then!”
I revel in the icy wind that rushes past me as I move as fast as I’m able, the powdery white that kicks up all around me feelingrightsomehow. Have I ever felt as free as I do right now?
I can hear Hunter behind me, hear him howl his acceptance of my challenge as I continue to run from him, and I can almost sense the way he follows after me. It’s like a disruption in the air, a ripple in the current of my surroundings. Like an old instinct of giving chase, of beinghunted.
There’s nothing like it, really.
It doesn’t hit me that I feel strange until I’m weaving between the trees to try to outmaneuver him, but when it does, it spreads like wildfire. I can feel a sort of boiling in my blood, one that makes me hot all over despite the wintery wonderland I’m currently traipsing through. Strangely, it makes me sink deeper into instinct, makes me feel more like a wolf than a person for a handful of moments.
I don’t know what to make of it, but I find that Ilikeit. I like it very much.
Hunter is so close behind that I can practically hear his heartbeat—no, literally, I canhearhis heartbeat—but the thought of being captured by him doesn’t upset me, oddly enough. No, as the urges and the heat inside me grow, I find that Iwanthim to catch me. I want him to take me to the ground and prove that he’s stronger, that he’sfaster—I want him to—
I yelp when a heavy mass collides with me, the force of it so strong that a sharp tingling sensation spreads through my body, so forceful it feels as if my skin begins to fizz. I roll instinctively against the force of the blow, snarling as a heavy weight moves with me until it settles beneath me.
It takes longer than it should, I think, for me to realize that something is different—my heart is beating so fast in my chest andin my ears that I don’t notice it at first. That I’m looking down at a very human, verynakedHunter currently cradled between my equally human thighs.
I pant as I stare down at him, taking note of his enlarged pupils, his heaving chest—realizing that this urgency I’m feeling…I don’t think it’s only me. Not if the way Hunter is looking at me is any indication.
“You caught me,” I rasp.
I watch his throat bob with a swallow. “I didn’t mean to…pummel you like that. You just—you smell so—”
And for reasons unknown to me, my very being seems to hinge on the end of that sentence.
“I smell so…?”
“You smell like youneedme.”
And it doesn’t occur to me until the words leave his mouth that Imight. Because all at once—between the urgency and the overwhelming sensation of being completely free for maybe the first time in my entire life—I realize that the throbbing in my skin is evenworsebetween my legs.
I recognize it for what it is—it’s the same sensation that had me begging him to touch me only days ago—but with the way my body is keyed up from our afternoon, I’m more in tune with it this time. It feels less like a siege of my body and more like the way I’ve been feeling all afternoon. Likelettinggo.
And all at once, I forget why I protested Hunter’s attempt to help in the first place.
