Red and her Wolf Ch. 12

"Yeah," he says dryly. "The reason why you've been having them is because you've been invading my headspace at night. Ninety nine percent of people can't do that."

I clear my throat, voice strained. "So all of that...stuff we did." I cautiously glance over at the waitress, now occupied with refilling the coffee machines. "It's real?"

"It's real in the dreamworld." Kade plucks the cherry from my melting shake. Slips the fruit between his teeth with knowing eyes.

"I had no idea I could do that." I nervously chew my thumbnail. "I have zero memories of trying to enter your dreams either."

"It's a subconscious thing," Kade explains. "But it's a signifier of something deeper. You proved that when you destroyed Asher's mind control in only a handful of minutes. That's not easy shit, you know. You're able to infiltrate people's heads, shift energy."

My mind can barely begin to absorb all this. I feel like any second a TV crew is going to burst through the door and tell me this was all a big, elaborate prank. "Right..." I gulp down more syrupy cream. "What do you call that?"

"A witch."

"What..."

"Specifically, a mind witch. It's very latent, but you just need to practice."

This is too much. There's only so many curveballs I can take."The altar in your room. Are you...?"

"Yup," he nods. "Half witch. Half wolf."

"That's actually pretty cool."

"It's not as cool as you'd think." He drains the rest of his coffee. As if summoned, the waitress returns to fill his cup, all blushes and subtle smiles. So much for not being eye-catching: an impossible feat when he's involved. I roll my eyes when she departs with extra sway in her hips, though Kade seems oblivious.

"And what kind of witch are you?" I reach across the table to steal Kade's cup for a swig. Return it to him, making sure our fingers brush.

"I dabble in everything." He softens, knuckles stroking the back of my hand. "Never had one ability that stood out more than the rest. Average at most aspects of the craft."

"I don't think you're as average as you say you are. You seem above average at most things to me." I shrug. "Except at social skills."

Kade smirks in response.

"What about your brother?" I continue.

"He's a mind witch too. It's his specialty."

Not surprising considering how easily he hoodwinked me. "So, this gang that you're involved with are witches and wolves?"

"No. Asher is the only witch in the Brethren currently. The problem is that a group of shifters with a half-witch leader are far more powerful than they ever were as just shifters. He's given Brethren a leg up that's considerable."

"Were you in the Brethren?" I try to imagine Kade transforming right in front of me. A wealth of coarse hair sprouting on his hands, up his toned arms. His face shapeshifting into a long snout-

"Yes." Kade's voice scrapes with a shade of guilt. "I never killed any humans though." A pause. "Not directly."

That not directly makes my stomach roil."When were you in Brethren? For how long?"

"Since I was sixteen to about twenty-eight."

My eyes widen. "That's a long time."

"I know."

"What do you even do together?"

"I'm not sure what Brethren did exactly before witchcraft got involved, but a lot of ceremonies and rituals..." He drifts off. Eyes drop to his coffee cup, forehead creasing. "A lot of...hunting for sacrifices. Accumulating wealth. Fucking with other shifter clans. Looking back, it was just a way to puff egos up. There was little rhyme or reason besides making us feel important. No point to any of it. Just riding high on our supposed power, especially when Asher became leader."

"So Asher wants you to be in Brethren again? Is that why he followed you?"

"He's always had a weird negative obsession with me. Maybe when I'm not around to treat like garbage, life just ain't as fun." Kade puffs out an exhale before meeting my gaze. "To be honest, I think he's just bored. And when Asher is bored he does despicable shit. Just because he can."

"So Brethren are basically just the Mafia with magic and wolfmen."

Kade takes a few seconds to consider before shrugging."That's a fair analogy."

The waitress returns with the cheque. Kade slaps down a ten dollar bill and we make our way back to our motel room.

"So if Kade's not your real name....then Black isn't actually your last name either, right?" I follow after Kade into our room.

"When I tell you what my last name actually is you're gonna laugh."

"What is it?"

He locks the door behind him."Wolfe."

I do laugh, and we both exchange smiles. And when I see that rare wide grin on his face I could honestly reach over and hug the life out of him. "You're cute, Mr. Wolfe."

Kade's smile fades into something unreadable. He crosses the room to zip open his luggage. "Help me put these around the room." He hands me a bundle of small ward bags. "Every corner needs one."

A sharp shock blasts up my fingertips. "Woah!" The energy courses up my limbs, makes sparks explode in my retinas. "There's no way just anyone could make these. They're like little packs of lightning."

"Practice running energy for a few days and you'd realize how easy it is." Kade leans down to pet Snuggles, currently curled up on the corner of his mattress.

Kade and I take separate sides of the room, setting a ward in each corner. When finished, I retreat to the bathroom to get ready for bed.

Or rather, get ready to try and seduce Kade.

Looking at myself in the mirror is a trip. My hair is a complete disaster, as is my makeup. What was once immaculate eyeliner has deteriorated into a panda-eyed mess. After brushing out the birds nest, I smear pigment off me until only clean, freckled skin remains. I decide to go for a natural look: tinted moisturizer, clear mascara and pale pink gloss. Thankfully, I'm already red-cheeked from the rush of going through with this so no blush is necessary.

Then I unzip. Pull the front of my dress down, cringing at the splotchy-scarlet beginnings of a bruise above my right nipple. I try to cover it with concealer but it somehow only makes it look worse.

I glance at the lingerie in my suitcase, wondering if I can really go through with wearing it. It would be a first. I bought the scandalous number as an impulse buy after my last breakup and never touched it again. I've never worn lingerie for a man before, let alone while on the run and still recovering from the last guy who fondled me.

But I might never see Kade again. Desperate times call for desperate measures, as they say.

My dress falls to the floor. Soon my breasts are put on full, brazen display by the plum-coloured lace bustier. My ass barely covered by the near see-through panties. I'm already wet from imagining Kade's reaction when he sees me. I blow out a nervous exhale before slipping into my white cloth bathrobe.

I walk out of the bathroom, steps slow. Heart hammering behind my ribcage. I turn the corner to find Kade sitting at the edge of his bed. Loading a gun.

"Uh..." I swallow, hand frozen on the wall next to me. "Whatcha got there, neighbor?"

He looks up with a brief flicker down my bare legs and feet. "Might come in handy later." He stretches to set the revolver down on the bedside table, steel gleaming beneath gauzy lamplight.

"Isn't this guy like an immortal?" I spin the tie of my robe with casual flair, sitting on my own mattress. Springs creak under me. Sweat beading between my breasts.

"He's hard to kill, but he's not immortal." Kade leans on an elbow, scanning me with an energy I can't quite interpret. Something between hunger and suspicion. "You've just got to get him at the right time."

"Which is?"

"When he's turned. Either way, it'll slow him down."

"That makes sense." I toy with a strand of my hair, crossing my legs, one toe pointed towards him.

Kade's lips clamp tight as he gives me dubious side-eye. "What are you up to, Red?"

"Nothing."

"You're all...gussied up."

So much for my natural look. "I've been 'gussied up' all night."

"Then you got gussied up again."

"You're unusually perceptive. Yet also... totally clueless." Really, though. Two beds? I still can't get over it.

"Oh, I am, am I?" He sits upright, swings his long jean-clad legs around to the floor. Boots and leather jacket and perma-scowl still on. Combined with his loaded gun and my lack of clothing under this robe, I feel far too soft and feminine in comparison. A perfumed offering to some brutal warlord. "I just want to know the rules for this little game you're playing."

I sigh, deciding to give up the act right there in a blaze of abandon. I open my bathrobe, eyes on the floor. When I glance up, Kade looks winded.

"It was supposed to be a surprise," I say softly.

"Well..." He runs a hand through his hair on a ragged breath. "You win, gorgeous." For the first time tonight his gaze steadies on my breasts, seconds longer than respectful before snapping back to my face. "I thought you wanted me to stay away from you."

"That was before everything that happened tonight." I open my robe further and it cascades down my arms. Feeling emboldened by his obvious want, I run light fingers down the curve of my half-exposed breast. "I trust you now."

"Maybe you shouldn't." His voice is smoky, hazed over with desire.

"Why not?"

"I don't even trust myself." He lowers to his knees on the floor. Slowly closes the short space between us until his hands are pressed into the bedspread on either side of me. His lean, leather-clad body against my knees, his face close enough to kiss me.

"Why not?" I repeat with a whisper. Spellbound by his steel and smoke voice, his forest-spice scent. His body heat drawing me in for comfort.

"Don't you think what I am, what I've done, is reason enough?" He kisses the center of my chest and I can barely restrain a groan at the sizzling contact.

"No. I don't."

Another kiss, lower this time. "If we do this..." He bites the lace edge of one bustier cup. Pulls before letting it snap back. "You know it can only be a one time thing, right?"

I do, but having him say that directly to me cuts more than I anticipated. "I know."

"You deserve something real, Red. Something that's gonna last. This? It ain't it."

"You said that whatever we have isn't going to end so easy." My voice sounds more childlike, more sad than I want it to.

"That was before everything that happened tonight. And it's definitely not easy." He skims his hard palms up my bare thighs. His fingers stop right at the edge of my panties. "I don't wanna be an asshole to you again. If I fuck you and leave, I'm gonna feel like one."

"Then don't leave."

"I have to."

I give him my steadiest gaze, my tone unwavering. "I don't want to go my whole life wondering what it would have been like to feel you inside of me."

His self-restraint shatters. His mouth meets mine, famished. One palm cupping the back of my neck, the other finding the zipper against my spine.

The bustier falls. Exposes my sensitive flesh to his hands and eyes and mouth. Technicolor fireworks spark under my skin.

Then his eyes catch the poorly covered bruise near my nipple. "What's this?" He cups my breast with a concerned tone. His thumb smooths away concealer to reveal deeper color.

"Your brother's handiwork."

A sharp exhale. "I'll kill him for that." Heat transforms into potent agitation. "I didn't realize he...shit, I'm sorry." He kisses the darkening spot. Licks the flat of his tongue up the sore flesh before taking my nipple in his mouth for a quick suck. A heady combo of care and lust.

"It's okay." I gasp as the suction increases. "It doesn't hurt that much."

He pulls away from my nipple with a wet pop. "It's fucking hurting me looking at it." He licks the bruise again. Reminds me of the night that he kissed my cuts better on his front porch. Left me with fully healed skin in the morning. "This is my fault."

"It could have been worse." His backtracking on his prior stubbornness has me gloating inside. Just a little. "This is as far as he got."

"I shouldn't have assumed you wouldn't listen to me."

"I was being pretty headstrong with you," I admit. "There's a good chance I wouldn't have."

He shoots me a wicked look as he removes his jacket, pulls off his shirt. Displaying his muscular, working man's arms. The hard, masculine planes of his torso. Encouraging me to gawk. "Maybe next time you're being headstrong I'll just kidnap you for your own good." He kisses me filthy-smooth, deep, pushing me back into the mattress. "But something tells me you might like that too much."

He's right. That concept shouldn't turn me on as much as it does. Even more wetness slicks between my legs at the idea of Kade throwing me over his shoulder, tying me up and punishing me with rough pleasure.

The even deeper truth is that I wish he'd kidnap me now. Take me away with him to the Deep South, far away from this nightmare.

I'm pressed into the middle of the bed, Kade's weight and height an overwhelming contrast against my smaller self. The way we fit together is a relief. I can't get enough: my legs wrapping around his waist, my fingers embedding into his hot skin, his coarse head of hair. Primal. A natural magnetic force that needs fulfillment.

Kissing him is even more divine. Familiar now, but the textures and sensations are only lusher, sweeter, sexier. Nothing about this feels like novelty, or simply the rush of something new. I know in my gut that every kiss with Kade could only get better and better.

Too bad this will be the last time I'll ever get the opportunity.

Kade's lips trail warm down my breast, my belly. Tongue flicking to taste the skin between my navel and the satin edge of my underwear. He slips off my panties, my hips rising for him so he can smooth them down to my ankles, his breath lilting at the small thatch of red hair on my mound.

His thumb strokes through the short curls, slides down the seam of my wet center as his eyes lock with mine. "Can't wait to finally taste you," he murmurs, his mouth hovering over my clit. "For real this time."

And dear God, is it ever real. He spreads my legs. Hikes them over his wide shoulders before planting an open-mouthed kiss on my vulva. The groan stripped from his throat vibrates against my flesh, urges me on. Helps me sink into feeling as wet heat swirls around my clit, curls inside my pussy before sucking on my nub again. Soft, then increasingly hard, until my ass lifts off the bed from the jolting pleasure.

"Kade, wow, I-" My legs are already starting to tremble, inner walls twitching. I plunge my fingers into Kade's hair, gripping for the slightest semblance of control. "That's mmh- intense."

As if to show that he's only getting started, Kade's hand pushes down on my pelvis, forcing my bottom flat on the mattress. No writhing away from the building sensation. Especially as a calloused finger enters me. Caresses me in a come-hither motion from within, followed by another finger. Sucking, fucking me.

No dream could be better than this. The real thing is pure heaven.

Pressure and pleasure unfurl until I finally burst into molten waves of energy. My grip tightens in Kade's hair, my thighs shaking against the sturdy plank of his shoulders. Oh god, yes, yes, yes. The frantic sounds coming out of my mouth are probably far too loud for the danger we're in. Kade seems to enjoy overstimulating me to the point of agony: pushed to the breaking point, panting and pawing at his back, whimpering for mercy.

When he finally comes up for air, it's only with more fire where that came from. "Good enough for you, beautiful?" He crawls over me, laying his weight flush against me, slightly crushing as he steals another slow-burn kiss. His hard cock digging into my belly, begging for release. "I could do that all night, I swear to God. Just say the word."

I shake my head. "Fuck me." I squeeze him closer, entrapping his waist with my legs. "I want you to fuck me so, so bad." His jeans are slightly rough against my soft wetness. Inadvertently rubbing my clit. Desire burns again, a steady-growing simmer. "I brought condoms."

Kade shifts on his elbows to look straight down at me, humor in his gaze. "You were really looking to get laid tonight, huh?" His mouth finds a delicate spot near my earlobe, illicits a lazy shiver.

"Yeah." I grin back. Technically, I've had them stowed in my purse for a year. "Something wrong with that?"

"Nah." He presses his mouth to mine, sucks my bottom lip with a gentle tug. "I brought some too."

And it's a good thing he did, because from the heavy bulge pushing insistently against my stomach now, I'm not sure mine would fit him.

A moment later he's ripping the foil with his teeth, jeans off, cock twitching. Laying on the bed next to me as he rolls the rubber on. I caress his inner thighs, gently stroke his sack.

It's all very traditional, yet somehow not at all. I keep my legs wide open for him as he gradually presses himself inside of me. The stretch a mix of slight discomfort and relief, the ache within me finally being touched, sated. When he's at the hilt he stills for a moment. Letting me accommodate him before his hips move, beginning a steady, focused rhythm. Nearly pulling all the way out only to fill me right up. Slow and hard. Grinding balls deep into me to make me gasp.

For a moment I honestly do feel like I'm dreaming again. Literally swept up into a fantasy where wolves and magic and hot sex feature. But no, this is all too sharp, too unbearably intimate. His mouth angling against my ear to mutter dirty-sweet nothings. His body blanketing mine, no mercy as he begins to pick up the pace.

One hand digs underneath me to grab my ass as he fucks me. The headboard smashing into the wall behind my head isn't enough to drown out the obscene sounds of being pounded. Nor is it enough to smother the guttural moans coming out of my mouth, foreign to me with how unhinged they sound.

I'm still floating from my previous orgasm, limbs weak, drained of tension. All I can do is open up and take it. And I do, with complete awe of the man on top of me. Every movement he makes, stoking that inner flame, the beginnings of another climax making it's way around again. Surprising to me because I've never come from a dick before. Only fingers and tongues.

But I'm getting close. Oh-so-close.

Closer.

Closer.

Gone.

My fingernails bite deep enough into his shoulders to leave crescent moons. I spasm around his cock hard enough to make his groan shudder against my throat. My eyes roll towards the ceiling but instead of stucco all I see is stars. The sounds of wet fucking bounce off the walls, getting even raunchier as I gush and gush.

Then he lets go too. Plowing me hard enough to break me. A huge beast of a man crushing me into the mattress, taking his pleasure. Sating my deep-held need to experience him releasing inside of me.

The afterglow is just as high-quality as the sex. Spiralling rapture. And as we lay there twined and drifting, I have an out-of-nowhere thought: that I wish he didn't wear a condom, that I want to feel him fill me up for real. That I wouldn't even mind if he knocked me up.

I pause, panicking.

Shit. Do I have some freaky breeding kink now? I mentally shake myself. Immediately try to cancel the thought. But I know it'll remain a fantasy, specifically for this man. It's flat-out scary, especially knowing his stance on us. He's made it perfectly clear that he doesn't want to commit to me.

So this is just sex. Which...is fine, right?

Right?

Again, I try to push away the thought. Thinking is not helping.

Just enjoy the moment, Em.

Then Kade moves on top of me. Presses a kiss against my neck, my chin, my mouth. Giving me a lush sweep of tongue as he slowly pulls out, a squeezing fit because I'm still clenched up from my orgasm. He gets up with a reluctant sigh, tossing the condom.