Pawn Among Wolves Ch. 06

It all took seconds. Damn. This new guy was powerful.

An unwanted shimmer of pleasure trembled across Gemma's skin, and she growled quietly at herself while she hauled herself back onto her knees. She sat back on her heels facing the newcomer, shuddering as she glowered, and met his jet-black, glittering hot gaze defiantly.

"I don't want you either," she bit out carefully.

The eyes seemed to brighten, fire burning higher and his ears twitched briefly to attention. Then his head lowered to rest sunk between his shoulders, nose reaching toward her as he sniffed delicately, his ears folded back along his head. Eyes gleaming, he began slowly, meaningfully, to trot toward her.

Heat coursed searingly through Gemma, making her shudder and her eyes lose focus at the deluge of lust evoked by that slow strut. Here finally was a wolf to be reckoned with. Her blood was singing. Her mind was raging no, but she had a hollow feeling in her stomach - she knew she couldn't fight both of them this time - both him and herself.

"No!" The despairing call in Gemma's mind echoed from the lithe, slight figure of a young woman who streaked into the clearing and fell to her knees beside the advancing wolf, heedless of her own danger as she slid urgent hands into his silky ruff and tugged his head around to face hers, staring into that black gaze, her own eyes pleading. The wolf growled ferociously, frustratedly, but she ignored the deadly, bared teeth inches from her face, staring into his eyes, and the tall wolf begrudgingly allowed her to tug him to a halt.

"Don't. Oh don't, please. No. You said no. Please," the dark-skinned girl begged him softly.

A shudder shook the tense figure of the mocha wolf and he closed his eyes, shaking his head violently, pushing his nose in to snuffle the girl's neck. The serenely beautiful Asian-Indian features of the newcomer lifted to Gemma and she glared at her across one powerful furred shoulder, furious accusation seething in her tear-bright eyes.

"What kind of idiot are you, challenging an Alpha, for God's sake? Or do you want him to take you up on it?" she accused.

Gemma sank further back on her heels and just stared at the Indian girl, nonplussed. The ramped-up fear and arousal from that prowling approach was still shuddering in her veins, making her sway slightly. Dimly, she felt surprised that she could still be surprised.

The wolf shimmered and abruptly, Marsh surged to his feet in front of the lithe, dusky-skinned woman, his hand caressing briefly over her sleek black hair in wordless thanks. He was clad in black suit trousers and an expensive white sweat-soaked shirt, and looked a lot more battered than last time Gemma had seen him. He ran a tired hand through his chocolate brown locks as he sighed and squeezed the bridge of his nose, trembling lightly.

"And if you don't want me to take you up on it, then I suggest you don't trail your enticing mating doft through my bedroom." His rebuke was hot, growling with terse emphasis.

Gemma was still gaping, disbelieving, and the clearing echoed with crashes of silent, growing feeling for a few moments as she absorbed the accusation, before fury brought her surging to her own feet.

"If anyone - like your wife , or your men, had told me what was going on, then I wouldn't have done so," she bit back, starting to stomp toward him in her anger. The Alpha flung up an urgent hand, palm out towards her to halt her advance, shaking his head swiftly as he shuddered and retreated a step.

"No. No closer," he bit out. "I can just about control it with the wind at this angle and you at that distance, but don't push it, girl." The words were growled with a heated edge. Gemma caught a hint of the dark, bewitching musk that had drawn her unthinkingly down the sidestreet in Sidville, and shuddered, her own eyes glazing over as she backed off three hurried steps before stumbling and landing on her arse. She clenched her fingers into the grass to hold herself as the want battered at her.

That had been him? Marsh?

A little twinge of regret ghosted through her mind. She stomped on it, fury spiking.

Marsh shuddered, murmuring, "Damn!" as the increased heat of her aroused doft reached him, and the dark, slight woman stepped forward and twined an arm around his waist, leaning into him as though offering support, while he dropped his head and scented deeply of her black hair.

Gemma gaped at him from her position on the floor. The pull ached through her, blood screeching to touch him, to get closer, much closer, but the feelings didn't govern her mindlessly as they had earlier, and she just sat shuddering on the forest floor, nails clawed into the earth beside her to hold herself from inching towards him. She kept diving into images of Mac to pull herself back from the brink - she had six months of them to hold the lust for this Alpha at bay - and Marsh had said that he could control it so she could, too. Wait a sec.

Was Marsh really intending to control it?

She squeaked. It was meant to be a coherent question, but her throat was too parched, mind too flabbergasted, with thoughts tumbling in disjointed sentences even in her head. Evidently the tall, lean man understood her though, and answered.

"Mac broke through my hunt-focus two hours ago by ceding from the Aster alliance," the Aster Warlord growled the words softly, a pained shadow fleeting across his face. "It is insane - but he is furious at my damn bitch for setting you up like this." Something dangerous flickered behind the brown-flecked black eyes, and his quiet tone was packed with intense, buried feeling as he continued, "I cannot afford - none of us here in the Central Ranges - including the MacKeld pack - can afford not to hold together at the moment while Tzo is advancing. We need him." A dark, frustrated pause, and Marsh sighed, "I need him. Enough that yes, I'll make sure nothing - untoward - happens to his inconvenient human, to the best of my ability."

Gemma could see Marsh shuddering lightly as he closed his eyes against the internal battle with his lust, dipping his head to again scent the hair of the woman leaning lightly against him.

Inconvenient human? She guessed that was accurate, from Marsh's point of view.

"Moreover," he glanced down at the girl who had her arm around his waist, a teasing light softening the proud glitter of his gaze, the shiver in his frame lessening slightly, "As Jasmine points out, rape carries the death penalty among us also, and you didn't appear to be about to melt and lift tail to that puppy, no matter how hard he was trying to subdue you. You evidently aren't fully a wereem no matter how strong your doft, and human girls must be different."

Damn right.

Their eyes met across the open space, and Gemma felt a shimmer of lust feather back up her spine at the power of that gaze, a teasing bud of moisture escaping between her thighs. Dammit.

A speculative gleam came into those soft brown-speckled black orbs, glowing with heat, and Marsh brightened, smiling slowly across at her with a wicked little tilt to the corner of his mouth. "Of course, if you decide that you prefer another - contender, then Mac'll just have to - um - gracefully bow out." He raised an expressive dark eyebrow and spread his hands to her, a silent invitation.

Gemma shuddered, and this time it was her turn to shake her head briskly, an attempt to shake him out of it. She took careful, shallow breaths but when she opened her mouth her tongue seemed to tingle with the taste of his musk. She knew why Marsh had spread his arms, teasing his hot scent to shimmer through the air. Damn musk. Damn, damn achingly enticing, rich, strong, increasingly siren-sweet scent. Her body swayed and she shook under the slam of anger rising in response to the cresting lust. She shook her head violently and snorted, trying to breathe him away. Hold it. Think of Mac.

Mac.

Mac had sent this powerful Alpha a challenge - an ultimatum. For her. To protect her, his inconvenient human. As Marsh said, she could say yes if she wanted. Or no. Mac had given her back her choice - as far as the damn call in her blood would let her choose. The physical superiority of the wolves was no longer an issue. She had the choice, whether to mate one of them or not. If she could only control herself.

The knowledge was purring through her veins and reminding her who she really, rationally, did want. Mac was so worth the fierce struggle to ignore that damned enticing musk teasing her nostrils. Damn damn damn. She pulled her control together, shakily strapping it back over the tattered gaps.

"Then I'm safe?" Her voice was gruff with compressed tears, ignoring the invitation. Mac. Again.

The powerful, attractive Alpha facing her quirked a little surprised smile, and rolled his hips suggestively, a disappointed mock pout curling one corner of his mouth even as his eyes brightened further at the challenge she presented, burning. Gemma held her breath as the musk rolled in her direction, scowling at him. She stuck her tongue out - he deserved it. He shuddered, his smile twisted, and he sighed, smile breaking into an appreciative grin as he hugged the girl he was embracing to him.

"Damn. You really are something, little manu."

The Indian girl's lips twitched, a teasing sparkle in the beautiful dark eyes as she turned them up to the Alpha, and she murmured something that made him slant a sarcastic eye back down at her before he turned to Gemma again.

"Are you safe?" he continued. "Well, I have found, subdued and sent home all the Marsh wolves who were too - excited - to listen to an order, yes," he spoke softly in a grave voice, although his gaze was teasing, heated, as it roamed acquisitively over Gemma's petite, curvaceous form while he spoke. Wolf relationships were weird - he was still hugging the other girl to him and she leaned her slight, graceful figure peacefully against his powerful frame, perfectly still.

"If you could let Mac know this, I would appreciate it. He is too angry to listen to me right now," Marsh added.

Gemma's belly pulsed with liquid fire, a sudden cresting surge of sweet delight - yup - still protecting her. Even at this distance. Her lips curled into a soft smile. Overprotective idiot. She was getting used to it. She knew who she wanted to - subdue her , and she shuddered at the thought, the heated images flickering through her mind, raising her pulse to an erratic dance as a pulse of liquid heat surged between her thighs.

Submission. Gemma's eyes flickered to where the tan wolf had disappeared, remembering the clarity of that act of wolf submission. She shuddered to a different shiver. Marsh only just caught them all - that was close.

The chocolate brown eyes had followed hers, and the wolf frowned slightly, his expression serious as he turned back to meet her gaze. He abruptly let go of the woman - Jasmine? - and began to gently back off toward the surrounding pines, "Yes - however, you may be safe from the Marsh pack but that was one of Vanilchov's. He scented you in the nearby town when you were being arrested and set up his little ambush."

How did Marsh know this? It was eerie, how much the wolves knew about her movements. Like, how had Mac known that Nick was reading her IM?

"As an Alpha, I'm perfectly entitled to challenge him for a mate, even on his own range as we now are, but I can't take you with me without - giving in to my urges," He halted briefly and closed his eyes, then reopened them on raging black fire, wordlessly calling to her, as he continued, "which are getting stronger as I've mentioned Mac to you again and you're obviously reacting to that, and you smell damn attractive."

She shuddered, and blushed, more heat pulsing between her thighs.

Marsh stepped back soundlessly, trembling lightly, into the dappled shadow of the trees and halted, quirking an eyebrow at her in a last burning, enticing question. She shook her head stubbornly. He scowled.

"That pup'll have let his Alpha know about this by now," the Alpha continued, "and Vanil, who is not one to miss out on an opportunity to piss off Mac, is probably already on his way here with the intent of subduing you himself. You sparked his interest too, when you faced down Lou at the university."

What? Not another?

"So I have - we have brought you some assistance," he corrected himself, with a flicker of a glance at the woman, who was smiling serenely at him. "A thank-you for stopping that biker shooting Mike, little manu - I am grateful, even if the idiot almost deserved to be shot for behaving like a rabid wolf on a public highway."

The slight, dark beauty strode back to the tall, beautifully moulded male, briefly touching him on the shoulder in acknowledgement and farewell, before she turned her jet black eyes, now sparkling with pleasurable anticipation, to meet Gemma's.

"Also in apology and slight atonement for the actions of Madam Marsh," Marsh finished gruffly, an echo of anger reflecting deep in his voice. Then the man shimmered into the powerful wolf and flashed off into the forest in one seamless, graceful blur of movement.

Well. Mind whirling with the overload of suitor information, Gemma stood mute, heart racing, facing the dark young woman and the spot where Marsh had just disappeared. Someone else was chasing her now? Wasn't Vanil the platinum-blond muscled one who'd been spitting into Mac's face? It figured.

And assistance? In what?

The smooth black hair framed a perfectly oval, young, beautiful brown face; the short nose was wrinkled into mischief and her bow mouth curved in a friendly smile. This time.

"Glad to meet you, Dr. Smith, I'm Jasmine. I teach sjeste lust control and rut evasion at the Academy." The girl said this airily, easily. It was as if she'd never snapped Gemma's nose off three minutes ago.

Sjeste? Rut evasion? queried a corner of Gemma's mind, faintly. She felt stunned, unable to move her brain past the safe - not safe - safe - treadmill that her world seemed to whirl her through at the moment. And there was the distracting, disappointed whine in her blood at the disappearance of Marsh. At least she'd felt safe with him around. More than just safe. Hot. Damn hot.

Get here, Mac.

The woman's mouth tilted in a light, teasing smile and one eyebrow lifted in light sarcasm. "Let's just see what I can teach a human in the few short hours until your Alpha turns up."

Her Alpha.

Jasmine seemed nice, Gemma thought cautiously. Who was she? What was she to Marsh? And what could she teach a human that would work against wolves? She smiled tentatively back, but wasn't sure about this girl yet. Or other things.

"Evasion? You mean female wolves hate the rut too?" she queried.

The black brows twitched together in evident astonishment. "Sjeste hate the rut? No!" Jasmine smiled again, hot, naughty memories behind the eyes, "But the longer you evade the chase, the more heated the mating. Making stronger cubs."

A flash of memory of - heated - Mac seared through Gemma's veins and she closed her eyes as a wash of colour flared across her skin. Maybe she'd run when he got here. Oh yeah. Yum yum yum.

Like it'd do her any good.

Like she really wanted it to. Hah.

Trembling lightly, she heard a brisk sniff and opened her eyes to see Jasmine standing tautly erect, her nose in the air, turning her head slightly to scent the light breeze, an intent look in her black eyes.

"We need to get moving. I can scent a distant cheesemoulder on your trail - he'll be a good dreg of a nose-led idiot to teach you your first tactics on."

What?

The Indian girl smiled gleefully, "You wait - you'll be able to lead him around in circles, I promise. If you're clever, only those who can still think can catch you. And that takes a good, strong wolf. Especially with a doft as tight as yours - I've never seen Dad have to struggle that hard to keep control."

Dad?

Gemma bristled warily.

Marsh seemed OK - if what he said was true. And he had subdued that tan wolf. And left.

But if Marsh was the girl's Dad, then wouldn't Madam be..?

Jasmine saw the coldness growing in Gemma's eyes, and her own black brows twitched together in sudden anger, sparkles firing in the black as she made a short, violently negative movement with one hand.

"No way. She's not my mother. Stepmom is what you humans would call it, I guess." There was a quiet seething in her tone, "And I would guarantee that Dad's finally going to boot her for this - inciting conflict among the allies in the middle of a war. Stupid, self-centred Louse. She is an absolutely bone, a led-by-the-pussy bitch, and he may love fucking her, but this is way over the line. She just finds it impossible to believe that anything could be more important than her own perfection and sex," Jasmine was breathing harshly, angrily, as she gasped out the heated words. Then abruptly her brown face lit with delight, "And god did you drive her up the wall, facing her down in front of four Alphas." The girl ended her little rant on a high note. But she was still breathing hard.

"Guess you hate people thinking you're related, right?" Gemma murmured, a provocative sparkle in her eyes. The question set her companion off again.

"Have you eyes, manu? My Dad's human side is Caucasian - you think I'd get this exquisite skin tone if the Louse was my mother?" Jasmine stopped abruptly and twitched her nose in the air, tensing slightly to alert, adding with a soft growl, "Please pick your feet up, Dr. Smith - time to fuddle the brain of the already rut-fuddled wolf approaching."

OK. This was beginning to sound like it might be fun. And she could feel herself warming to Jasmine every time the younger girl referred to Madam as the Louse.

"Right. Call me Gemma."

Almost like fun. Pick up your feet. Gemma sighed and limped wincingly slowly toward the trees. Ow. Ow. Ow.

Jasmine stilled her own effortless, smooth gait and looked at Gemma. Then she echoed the sigh, wrinkling her nose, and waved the shorter girl slightly to her left.

"There's a stream that way. If you wash your feet, I'll heal them for you. Eugh. But I'll have to shift. No way am I licking your toes in human form."

Gemma wrinkled her nose back, and found that they were grinning at each other, her heart lightening as they crossed into the shade of the trees. A companion.

"Have you ever thought of seeing anyone about your weird foot-licking fetish?" she asked.

"Watch it, little manu," retorted the slender girl to her right. "I can find other ways of improving your pace."

Fuddling the wolf was fun.

There was a playful little smile on her face as Gemma leaned back against the trunk and watched from her perch high in the branches, grinning as the creature below them began to weave desperately around the deep pool where her trail disappeared. The drum of demanding heat in her blood had been soothed again by the effort of forcing herself to think with focus when setting up the misleading trail, and Jasmine had explained that this was a common beneficial side effect.

The wolf abruptly dashed off downstream, nose to the ground, frantically searching for a new scent, careering splashily from bank to bank of the narrow, flowing stream. He called triumphantly, a crooning kind of howl echoing back from around the second bend when he found the scent of the handprint she'd left on the rock midstream down there. Gemma sighed happily as she watched the ruffled fur disappearing into the green dappled shade as the wolf set off at full sprint following the water away from them.