* * *
That wasn’t like me. I didn’t know why I’d done that. That was all I could think as I ran, tripping through the woods, putting as much distance between me and Hudson as I possibly could.
Honestly, I didn’t have a lot of sex. There wasn’t much time for it when I was working. I couldn’t be distracted by things like that. And I didn’t really have space for a relationship in my life. Not to mention the fact that I was a werewolf, and the lupine virus was sexually transmittable. Condoms helped to stop its spread, but they weren’t a hundred percent, and it just seemed irresponsible to get into a relationship with someone. The more often we had sex, the more likely it would be that he’d actually become a werewolf, and I didn’t want to let that happen.
Sure, I was trying to seduce Kale, but that was for work, and besides, he was already a werewolf.
But, you know, it was odd, because Kale wasn’t at all the kind of person I’d picture as a werewolf. He was smooth and lean and cold—more like a shark than a wolf. But Hudson, with all his thick muscles and his hairy body and the way he smelled—Oh God, why am I turned on by the scent of motor oil?—he seemed like a wolf.
I didn’t have sex often, and when I did, it was a casual, quick thing. I generally hooked up with guys I took home from bars. I’d sleep with them, take my pleasure, and then kick them out before morning. It was the way I did things. It was safer that way. For everyone. And it was easier too.
But this was different. It was different mostly because…
Because when I took those guys home from bars, I was in control. I was calling the shots. And whatever had just happened with Hudson, well that hadn’t been control. I didn’t know what it had been.
Amazing.
Wrong. Distracting. Stupid. Insane.
Suddenly, I emerged out of the woods, and—as if I’d been dropped down by divine intervention—I was in the back of the grocery store that I’d seen earlier. The one that was within a mile of Kale’s house.
This was what I was supposed to be doing. Finding stuff out from Kale. Stealing his damned necklace. Once that was done, I’d get out of this town, and then I’d never see Hudson again.
Oh. That thought made me pretty sad.
Damn it.
It took all of my mental facilities to navigate the grocery store, and I was glad of the distraction. I hadn’t decided what kind of meal I would make for Kale, so I had to figure that out on the fly. I decided that I’d go simple. Chicken breast, rice pilaf, and sauteed vegetables. For good measure, I selected a nice wine as well.
By the time I walked all the way back to Kale’s house, I was exhausted, sweaty, and gross. I stripped off my clothes to take a shower. When I did so, my phone fell out of my pocket. I picked it up and realized it had somehow gotten turned to silent. There were four missed calls from Hudson.
Hudson. I flashed on his mouth against my breasts, sucking my nipple between his lips.
My finger strayed up my body, to touch myself where he’d touched me.
I didn’t turn the ringer back on. But I did have a, er, very satisfying shower.
After the shower, I barely had enough time to get the meal cooked before Kale got home, so I was too busy to think about Hudson, or to think about anything except trying to make sure I cooked everything perfectly.
I was actually usually pretty good with food, so I was feeling fairly confident in my creation. At the very least, Kale would have to be grateful. Maybe he’d even smile.
I set the table in Kale’s kitchen and plated up the food. It looked and smelled delicious. I poured us both wine and loaded the dishes I’d used while cooking into the dishwasher. I was just finishing up as Kale came inside the front door.
He smelled the food, and he came directly into the kitchen. He took everything in. “What’s this?”
I clasped my hands together. “Well, I wanted to do something nice for you. After all, you’ve been so kind to me, letting me stay here and all.”
He nodded once, expressionless. “It looks good.” And then he disappeared out of the kitchen.
I wanted to pull my hair out. The man was maddening. How could he just run off like that?
But it turned out he’d only gone to change out of his work clothes, as he reappeared in the kitchen in a few minutes in jeans and a t-shirt.
Together, we sat down at the table, and I waited for him to take the first bite.
He did.
I watched him chew and swallow. He considered. “This is tasty.”
Perfect. “Thanks,” I said. I’d hoped he’d say something like that. “An old boyfriend taught me to cook, actually.” Then I made a show of ducking my head down and looking really sad. “Oh, but I actually don’t like to talk about that.”
Kale shoveled food into his mouth.
I waited for him to ask me why I didn’t like to talk about my ex, but he didn’t. Of course. He wasn’t the least bit interested in anything I had to say.
I went on as if he’d asked. “It’s only that he, well, passed away. It was sudden. He was killed in a mugging in the city. One minute, he was around, and the next not so much. It’s still hard for me to even believe.”
He looked up at me sharply. He swallowed.
We stared at each other for several seconds, Kale looking stricken, me holding my fake sad look.
“I’m, uh, very sorry that happened to you,” he said finally, and, for the first time, I heard something like genuine emotion in his voice.
Yes! Score! It was all I could do not to do a little victory dance in my chair. Instead, I was supposed to be sad, so I just turned back to my plate. “Well, it happened to him, not me.”
“When someone dies, it happens to their loved ones.” He set down his fork. “Sometimes I think it’s tougher for those of us left behind. We don’t know what happens to the dead. For all we know, they’re in paradise. At worst, I suppose they cease to exist. Either way, they aren’t feeling pain.”
Wow. That was the most he’d ever said to me. Maybe Kale was such a robot because he was still grieving for his girlfriend. It had been nearly a year since her passing, but he obviously hadn’t moved on.
I felt a rush of sympathy for him, real sympathy, and that was strange, because I was just trying to manipulate him so that I could steal from him. I reached over and put my hand on top of his. “Sounds like you speak from experience.”
He started to pull his hand away, but then he didn’t. He looked down at our hands together, my touching him, and he let out a shaky breath. “Yes, I lost someone too.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Do you want to talk about it?”
He raised his gaze to mine. And then his eyes went lower, for the first time, settling on my cleavage. All I’d brought with me were sexy outfits, considering my original plan was to seduce him. I knew a low-cut shirt wasn’t completely appropriate for this kind of dinner, but I hadn’t had any other options.
“I loved her. She died. That’s really all there is to say about it,” he told my breasts. And then he turned back to his rice.
Oh, fuck no, I was not going to let him close up again. This was the most progress that I’d made since getting here. “You must miss her.”
He shrugged. “Could you pass me the salt?”
I hadn’t put salt out on the table. My food was perfectly seasoned. I felt annoyed. “It’s over on the counter.”
He turned and saw it. “So it is.” And then he smiled at me, but it was a strange sort of smile, just a sardonic twist of his mouth. “Do you think you could get it for me?”
I was annoyed with him for changing the subject, but I couldn’t be rude to him when I was trying to butter him up. So, I scooted my chair out and went over to the counter. I had just got my fingers clasped around the salt, when I felt him behind me.
He pressed the length of his body against mine, his fingers digging into the flesh of my hips, pulling my ass tight against him. His breath at my ear, tickling my skin as he whispered, “What are yo
u doing to me?”
It was the same thing Hudson had said, and it made my heart stop beating for a second. I stiffened there in his arms.
He was still talking. “You think I haven’t noticed it. The way you dress, the way you talk to me, the way you keep arching your back and pushing out your assets. But I’m not made of stone.” His fingers trailed up over my hip to my waist, sending tiny little thrills through my body.
Well. I guessed I hadn’t done as bad a job at seducing him as I thought. This was what I had wanted all along. I needed to go with it. But I still felt stiff and confused. This had come out of nowhere.
I tried to turn in his arms, to face him.
He held me in place. “You want this, don’t you?”
“Yes,” I gasped. Of course I did. At least, I had to make him believe I did.
His fingers strayed to the button on my pants, and he popped it open. He undid my zipper as well.
I tried to turn again. I couldn’t touch him this way. I couldn’t kiss him.
But he wouldn’t let me. “No,” he murmured, his mouth against my neck, “I want you like this. Put your hands flat on the counter.”
My heart pounded. Oh, so, it was going to be like that, was it? Well, I suppose that I shouldn’t expect anything different from someone like Kale, someone so coiffed and controlled. He’d want control of everything, including sex. The only problem was that I didn’t like being out of control. It made me feel terrified, because it reminded me of the wolf that lived in my body, the coiled-up monster that would turn me into a killer. I had to be in control.
All my instincts screamed at me to get away from him. Elbow him in the face, knee him in the groin. Run, they shrieked.
But I had a job to do, and I couldn’t screw it up. I could do this.
I put my hands on the counter.
“Very good,” he purred. He peeled my pants and my panties over my hips, exposing my ass, but not taking them all the way off. My pants were tight enough that they didn’t fall down. He sucked in a breath when he saw me. His fingers traced the curve of my backside, then trailed lower, to the place where my legs met.
I gasped in spite of myself. His touch was gentle and arousing. I shut my eyes.
He prodded his way further forward. “You’re wet,” he breathed.
I swallowed.
One of his fingers found my clitoris. His thumb nudged his way inside me. He began to stroke me in both places.
I let out an involuntary noise, something unbridled. I’d never felt anything quite like that before. His strokes were smooth and soft, just the right amount of pressure. He glided over my sensitive skin, and he was driving me out of my mind. My legs shook, and I needed my hands on the counter to keep my balance.
He made a soft noise of satisfaction, nuzzling my neck and shoulder. And he kept up his slow, torturously sweet strokes.
I writhed against him. I couldn’t keep my hips from moving.
He clasped his other hand firmly around my waist, keeping me in place.
And I struggled against him. My breath was coming in gasps now, and tiny beads of sweat were popping out against my skin. I was coming undone. It felt so good that I didn’t care how I moved or what I sounded like.
“That’s good,” he said in a soothing voice. “Go ahead and let it go. Come for me.”
I was going to, that was the hell of it. It wasn’t usually this easy for me to reach orgasm, but there was something about the way he was touching me, and something about the fact that I couldn’t see him. With him at my back, it was almost as if he was a fantasy lover, something I’d dreamed up, and it meant that my body was reacting as easily as it did to my own ministrations.
His finger began to make tiny circles around my clit.
And that sent me over the edge of the precipice.
I tumbled down, free falling in an air current of pleasure, which doubled on itself with every foot that I fell, hurtling to a fever pitch, so, so good—
And then I hit the ground with a ecstatic clench. I bounced there. Each time I hit the ground, I clenched.
Over and over again, I convulsed against his fingers.
“That’s right,” he whispered into my ear. “Just like that.”
I moaned.
He pushed my pants further down, all the way to my ankles. “Step out of these,” he instructed. “Just one leg.”
I did it. I was still lost in the aftershocks of my orgasm.
His thumb slid out of me, his finger retreated from my clitoris.
I sighed, half in relief at a break from the assault and half in disappointment.
He ran his hands over me, cupping my breasts through my shirt, then over my bare ass and legs. He caressed my thighs and calves. “Don’t move,” he said in a dark voice.
And he was gone.
I didn’t move for several seconds, and then… slowly, I turned my head. The kitchen was empty.
But I heard his footsteps approaching.
I turned back around right away. I was struck by the fact that I was half-naked and vulnerable here, all alone.
But he was back with me soon, his hands on my body again, his voice low and rumbling. “Mmm… I like walking into the room and seeing you ready for me like this.”
My clit throbbed. I liked being ready for him. In the span of a few minutes, he’d turned me from being frightened and unsure of this set-up to completely submitting to it, enjoying it. He had magic fingers, I decided.
I could hear him behind me, the sound of his zipper coming undone, a condom wrapper tearing.
He was touching my thighs again, caressing them as he urged them apart. He stroked my pussy again. “So wet for me,” he sighed.
And then he was pressing into me, and I was split open and filled.
I gasped.
He grunted. He pushed me down against the counter, my cheek against the cool surface. He seized my hips. And then he took me.
He jammed in and out of me, quick like a piston.
If I hadn’t been so wet, it would have been uncomfortable, but he slid in and out of me easily.
He was rigid and massive, stretching me as he drove himself into me. I was inundated with sensation, with the knowledge that his cock was inside me, that we were joined together.
He dug his fingers into my skin and fucked me hard and fast, groaning softly every few minutes.
I tried to move with him, but he was going too fast, and I was pinned in place by his strong grasp. He was having his way with me, and I couldn’t stop it. I was completely in his thrall. As much as I’d been frightened of the thought of it, it was arousing me now. I liked the way his thick cock felt, piercing me deep inside, battering me as we panted together.
I shut my eyes, savoring it. I could almost come again if he just—
And then he was done. He plunged deep into me and stopped moving. I could feel him twitching against the walls of my sex.
For several seconds, he held me like that, and he buried his face in my hair, sighing out his pleasure.
But then he extricated himself from me, and he wasn’t touching me anymore. I heard him crossing the room, probably to throw away the condom. I heard him zipping up. He came back to me and patted my bare ass. “That was great. Let’s finish dinner.”
Slowly, I straightened. I felt confused. How could he simply go back to dinner after that?
He was back at the table, cutting his chicken.
I tried to think of something to say. I couldn’t. With shaking hands, I pulled my clothes back on. He’d made me putty in his hands, completely overtaken me, made me want him, and now it was like it had never even happened.
He took his phone out of his pocket and started scrolling over the screen.
I wanted to punch him.
Job, Piper. He’s a job, I reminded myself. I sat down across the table from him and took a sip of my wine.