Page 22 of Alpha Varsity (Wolf Ridge High #5)

Chapter Twenty-Two

A sher

Carlotta lit candles again. I picked up take-out containers from the deli for later. Right now I’m taking my time with her. I tied her spread eagle to the bed, and I’m kissing every inch of her pale skin.

She trembles beneath me, tugging at the bonds, shivering in response.

“You want my tongue here?” I nip her inner thigh, close to her sex.

“Yes.” She arches, sending her pebbled nipples toward the ceiling. I fondle one, brushing the pad of my finger over the tip as I flick my tongue closer to where she needs me. “Please,” she warbles.

“You’ll get your pleasure when I decide, sweetheart.” I remind her who’s in charge. Not because I still need to be but because she deserves to let go. To not have to worry about anything. To lie back and receive.

I’ll never forget what she did for me tonight. No one has ever stood up for me like that before and damn if I don’t want to be the male she thinks I am–a leader. Her protector. The alpha to a pack.

“This little body belongs to me now.” I brush my thumb over the seam of her pussy with a feather touch.

She bucks for more.

“I’m the guy who gets to give you pleasure. No one else.” I suddenly remember the events of this afternoon, which feel like a lifetime ago. “Who the fuck was that guy today, anyway?” I can’t help the growl of jealousy from lacing my voice.

“He was one of my roommates in Chicago. I used him for sex sometimes because I needed it, and it was convenient, but we were never even friends. He’s an asshole.”

“He came here for sex?” I try to keep my roar of anger out of my voice.

“You protected me,” Lotta soothes.

It works. My wolf settles, and logic returns to my brain. “You could’ve protected yourself, of course. I’m sorry I lost control like that.”

“No, it wasn’t your fault. The alpha is right. It was because you haven’t marked me. And because of what you learned this morning.”

Right. That. “I don’t want that to interfere with our night. But tomorrow, You’ll tell me what happened. Everything.”

“Okay. Of course, yes.”

I lift my head to meet her gaze. “Are you really mine? You want me to mark you?”

“Yes, Asher. When I thought you were going to be banished, I realized that I couldn’t stand that. I can’t be apart from you. You’re all that matters.”

I shake my head. “Not true. Your hopes and dreams matter, too. Your art. You wanted to leave Wolf Ridge. We can. I’ll go with you. Anywhere.”

Her lips part, but no words come out.

“Coach said I might have a shot at UCLA. Would Los Angeles have a better art scene?”

Her eyes shine. “Yes. Yes–that would be amazing.”

“Then we’ll make it happen.” I slide my hands under her ass and lift her core to my mouth. I lick into her, parting her sweet flesh, tracing the insides of her lips. I get my lips over her tiny clit and suck.

She comes immediately, tugging at the ropes I used to tie her. “Inside. Please. I need you inside me.”

I tsk. “I didn’t say you could come, beautiful. I think a little punishment is in order.”

“Oh, fate,” she moans. “Please, Asher. I need you so badly.”

I chuckle, her words making my entire being pulse with warmth and pleasure. “Not yet, beautiful. You’re going to take my dick in your gorgeous ass, my fingers in your sweet pussy, and my teeth in that delectable shoulder.”

She bucks some more, another little orgasm running through her.

“This body was made for me, wasn’t it?” I work on untying her wrists. “Hm?”

“You’re mine, too, Asher,” Lotta murmurs. There’s a sense of wonder on her face, like she just realized it.

“I am,” I agree as I untie her ankles. “I am your warrior. I will wage war on your behalf. I will level anyone who stands in your way.”

Lotta laughs. “I know you would. Even when you hated me, I knew you’d do anything for me.”

The smile falls away from my face, remembering all that hate I directed her way. I work to swallow. “I’m so sorry about that.”

“No, no. I realized this morning that we needed things to go the way they did. You needed to believe I’d wronged you because it made you tough and strong. It made you into the warrior you are. And I needed to run away from who I was and suppress my wolf, so she would come out through my paintings and show me my future. With you.” Hands now free, Lotta reaches for my face and holds it between her two hands. “You are my future, Asher. Don’t you see? There were no mistakes. Everything led us to now. To this moment. To whom we’ve become apart and together. Both of us needed to go into the crucible, so we’d arrive here.”

I smash my mouth over Lotta’s in a rough, passionate kiss. And now I’ve forgotten the nuanced sex I planned for us.

The need to claim her, to consummate us and this moment is too strong.

Before I know what I’m doing, I’ve pushed her onto her back on the bed, my hand cradled behind her head, my tongue exploring her mouth.

I knock her knees wide and find home, piercing her with a brutal thrust.

“Oh, fate, yes.” She throws her head back, rocking up to take me even deeper.

I don’t break the kiss. It’s like I’m trying to express the depth of my passion for her with every twist of my lips. Every thrust of my tongue. I want her more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life. I need to consume her. To marry her. To mark and mate her.

The bed slams against the wall with the force of my thrusts. The mattress bows and springs .

I grip the headboard with one hand and drive into her like our lives depend on it.

“Yes, yes!” Lotta cries.

“Yes.” I don’t recognize my own voice, it’s so deep and guttural.

There’s a moment when we transcend. I swear we dip into a space of no time and place. Of infinity. Of experiencing the fractals of every lifetime and dimension we’ve been mates.

There’s a roaring in my ears. Like rushing water or wind. I shout, but I can’t hear my voice over the noise.

All I know is I’m coming.

Lotta’s already there.

The moment expands and widens. It crystallizes.

Serum coats my teeth before they sink into her shoulder, forever embedding my scent in her skin.

We both orgasm again.

When I finally withdraw my teeth from her shoulder and lick the wounds closed, I murmur, “I love you, Lotta James.”

“I love you, Asher Martin. Forever and always.”

Lotta

“What happened here?” I ask in the shower the next morning, my fingertips tracing the jagged marks of a recent trauma.

I woke in Asher’s arms again–pure heaven, if shifters believed in heaven. We made love in the warm sheets, and I told him the story of what happened with his dad. It killed him, but he stayed present. Held me. Listened. Cried .

I promised I wasn’t traumatized. That my only trauma had ever been over hurting him.

Then he carried me here, to the shower, where we made love again. If this is my life now, I love it.

“What?” Asher looks down at his torso and swipes a hand over the healing wounds.

How did I not notice them last night? I was too swept away to even realize my mate was hurt.

“Oh. I got hit by a car yesterday.”

“Asher!”

“No, it was a good thing. I was out of my mind, running up through bear country. Getting hit on the highway knocked the sense back into me. That’s what made me realize I’d screwed up leaving you.”

The part of me that believed I had to muscle through life and do everything on my own relaxes even more. I’m still getting used to the idea that I’ll never be alone again. That someone will always have my back.

“I love you.” I can’t say the words enough. Every time I say them or hear them, a new wick is lit inside me. The flames grow stronger. Brighter.

Asher flashes me that dimpled smile that makes my knees weak as he loops an arm behind my back and pulls me up against him. “Say it again.”

“I love you.”

“One more time.”

“I love you.”

His kiss is soft and giving. “I want to turn the world inside out for you.”

The wings around my heart beat faster.

He turns off the water and pulls open the shower curtain. “And that starts with getting you to your job on time.” He grabs a towel from the rack and wraps me in it. “ And while I will hate pretending at school, I can’t fucking wait for every shifter in Wolf Ridge to know you belong to me.”

I laugh. “You’re crazy.”

“Yep. Crazy for you.”

Asher

There’s a fuck-ton of whispering about me when I walk into the school. Which makes sense because I’m sure the entire town heard by now that I threw a guy out of the art studio window.

I had to do the same sneak-of-shame out of Carlotta’s place and drive separately on my motorcycle, which I hated, but that doesn’t dampen my pride. I marked my mate. Lotta belongs to me in the eyes of the pack. Every shifter will know she’s been claimed.

Of course, no one can tell by my scent anything has changed.

Maybe they will by my swagger. By my smile. By the lift of my sternum and the openness of my chest.

My inner pack–Abe, J. J., Markley and Seb–is all over me, crowding around my locker.

“What the fuck, bro?” Abe gives me a friendly shove. “I literally lit up your phone last night. You couldn’t just text me back to let me know you’re still in the fucking pack?”

“Yeah, dude,” Seb says. “Asshole. We even went over to see your mom last night, and she didn’t know anything.”

Right. My poor mom. I did call her after the council meeting to give her the news, so she didn’t suffer all night like my friends.

“You no-showed to school and practice then drove up and threw a guy through a window yesterday. What is going on with you?” J. J. demands.

I grin. “Yeah, sorry. I was, uh, kinda busy.”

“Busy doing what?” Abe demands.

“Marking my mate.”

A slow smile spreads across Abe’s face. “No shit.”

“ What mate ?” J. J. demands. Abe obviously kept my secret, even after what happened yesterday.

“Carlotta James,” Abe can’t help himself now. He offers me a fist to bump.

“Hottie Lottie,” Markley says.

“Call her that again, and I’ll rip your tongue out,” I say, but I’m too happy to sound like I mean it.

The insane jealousy and possessiveness has been soothed by the knowledge that she’s mine now.

“What, it’s true. You’re lucky, bruh. So lucky. You found your fated mate. Both of you did. While still in high school. What are the fucking chances?” Markley says.

“One in a million.” Abe catches sight of his gorgeous mate walking down the hall, and his grin gets as cocky as mine. He fist-bumps me again. “Gotta go. Congratulations.”

“So you’re not banished or suspended?” J. J. asks when Abe leaves.

“Nope. Just ordered to mark her and keep it a secret from humans.”

“Lucky bastard.”

“Seriously. Lucky as fuck.” Markley sounds jealous. Finding your one true fated mate is something most of us are programmed to believe won’t happen for us. But maybe that’s just council propaganda to make us stay in Wolf Ridge and not go out searching.

Eric Damonella walks by, still wearing the useless cast I subjected him to. He casts me a quick, nervous glance .

“Hey, man,” I say, willing to be benevolent now that Lotta’s mine.

He stops, relief obvious in his shoulders. “Hey.”

“I’m not gonna apologize because I’m not sorry, but we’re cool. So long as you never look at or speak about my mate again.”

His eyes bulge. “Your mate?”

I nod, satisfaction ricocheting through my chest. “You heard me. Make sure everyone knows it. Anyone disrespects her, they die.”

He falls backward a step. “You got it, Asher. No problem.”

I grab my books for first period, and then the world goes slow-mo. A chica-bow-wow song plays in my head, and I stop to drink in the sight of my gorgeous mate walking down the hall, tossing her raven black hair over her shoulder and giving me a secret look.

Fuck. Me.

My life could not get any better.