Page 15 of His Whispered Witch (Witches and Shifters: Scott Pack #6)

I s he? Penelope asked herself. Is he safe? Is he in control? Is this going to be the thing that pushes him over the edge?

Was he being serious about the witches he grew up with, who could join magics even though they shared no blood? He said witches and wolves together were stronger than anything in the world. Had his aunt really put up a system of wards herself?

The idea was insane. In her coven, even with thirteen witches pulling maximum power, they could barely keep the smallest circle around their land, but some woman had done it alone? That was what a wolf had brought her?

The other question that occurred to her was: Am I? Am I crazy? In denial? Using him?

This couldn’t be a forever thing, could it? That was impossible. For one, she would definitely lose her home again. She couldn’t stay in Silver Spring with a werewolf. They’d have to flee. To where?

Could she live a life on the run? Because it wouldn’t just be the Griffin coven. Her own family would never speak to her again. Not that they did now...

Why was she even contemplating this? She’d met him a week ago and kissed him five minutes ago. Okay, by now it was probably ten. Neither of them seemed to be in any hurry to get to the main event.

Because this was so good.

She could feel the weight of his focus on every move of their lips. She’d never kissed a man who paid this close attention to her, who was just happy to be kissing her. She had a feeling that if she walked away now, he’d be nothing but happy.

Was she contemplating doing this? With a werewolf?

Ninety-five percent of her body was raring to go, completely on board with the idea, even as five percent of her brain screamed at the top of its lungs that she had gone off the deep end a while ago.

As soon as she learned what he was in her office, she should have run screaming from the room and let the twins deal with him. Instead, she’d heard him out, come to his land, and come to his land again—even when she found a snake in there and he lost control and shifted.

Now she was here again. She thought she’d come to help him with an impersonal job to get a snake and a wolf to live together with a human.

Instead, she jumped his bones.

What was she thinking?

She was thinking that nothing had ever felt this good in her life.

She was thinking about the asshole they wanted her to marry, a man twice her age with a permanent perspiration mustache beading on his lip, and how he reached out without her permission to run his hand through her hair and tell her how much he liked it.

He’d asked her no questions. He didn’t give a shit about her, just about having her.

And her hair.

She’d gone home, shaved her head, and run.

Now, feeling Asher’s hands on the short stubble was doing things to her skin that she didn’t think she’d ever recover from. He touched her with reverence and care, as if every inch of her was a gift he’d never be able to stop touching.

She never wanted him to stop. Things were rarely this simple or this good, and she was ruining it, wondering what it meant and when it would be over. She decided to stop panicking about it.

His hands moved from her head to massage her neck, and she felt the deep muscles in her spine relax even as goosebumps raced over her skin. He rolled to her side, his hands skating to the hem of her shirt as he whispered, “Off?”

She nodded enthusiastically and sat up a little so he could pull it over her head; the sparkles scraped along her skin in stark contrast to the smooth warmth of his fingertips.

She pulled her bra over her head too, unwilling to fight with the clasp and lay back as his lips returned, this time to the corner of her jaw and down her neck.

He was using his tongue as often as his lips, trailing a wet path from her ear to the tip of her shoulder, and that combination of heat and wet and soft skin in the cold air left her gasping.

He kissed across her chest and then down her breastbone, so his head was buried between her breasts. He seemed to breathe the scent of her deep into his lungs.

She carded her hands through his longer hair, hoping her touch did the same thing to him as his did to her. She thought so; he was shuddering beside her. He hadn’t even taken off a stitch of clothing, and yet she was already completely overwhelmed.

She wanted to ask him to go further or faster, but she also didn’t want to break the spell.

His lips on her skin were the most intense thing she’d felt with any partner.

Before, foreplay was rushed and impatient, a reluctant gift partners dangled before her so they could get to the main event as fast as possible.

He moved, and she felt suction at the tip of her breast and shouted in surprise.

He didn’t stop or even hesitate; she felt his lips curve into a smile against her skin as he suckled her nipple and bit down gently, sending spikes of sensation spiraling between her legs.

She gasped as his fingers found her other nipple, and he began to play her like a musical instrument with teeth and lips and tongue and fingernails.

The different sensations and temperatures short-circuited her brain completely as his free hand massaged the rest of her, providing long sweeping counterpoints to the sharp sensations in her chest. He just kept going, almost on the point of too much but not quite.

She didn’t know what to do with her hands.

One was still buried in his hair, holding on for dear life, and the other gripped his shoulder like she could hold him down.

Deliberately, she relaxed her hands and stroked him.

She wanted to give to this man, to pour into him all the pleasure he was lavishing on her, but even as she tried to move her hand and get a fistful of shirt to pull off, he reached and trapped her arms by her sides.

Then he switched breasts. The cold air against wet skin made her groan again, and she gave up trying to reciprocate.

As he sucked her other nipple deep into his mouth, almost engulfing the whole of her breast in exquisite suction, she gave up worrying about him at all and just babbled in gratitude as she felt his free hand at the snap of her jeans.

Quickly, she helped him shove them down.

His hand slid into her underwear to play in perfect concert with his lips.

Her awareness narrowed to three points that seemed to be connected in a way she’d never experienced before.

Pleasure ricocheted between her core and her breasts to pool somewhere behind her belly button.

Her brain didn’t seem to be able to construct a coherent story of what was happening to her at all.

From one moment to the next, he varied his touch and pressure from swirling fingers to deep strokes to the slightest tease at her entrance.

Without warning, everything peaked as he scraped his fingernails over sensitive flesh and bit down harder than before. The three points became a blaze, and she ricocheted over the edge in a shouting, gasping orgasm.

Suddenly, he was shuddering beside her, his hands and mouth still, and she realized she could feel him in his jeans pulsing.

“Sorry!” he gasped. He was lying fully clothed beside her, and they’d been making out like teenagers—if a teenager had the skill of Casanova.

“Did you just…” she couldn’t keep from asking.

“That was so perfect.”

She couldn’t decide whether she was flattered or frustrated. She wanted more, but he’d come just from looking at her. Who did that?

“It’s been a while,” he mumbled.

What man admitted that?

“Define a while…”

“I was a wolf for five years.”

She buttoned her jeans, feeling self-conscious as she turned onto her side to face him. His lips were red and swollen, and his eyes looked peaceful, even as he dropped casual, horrifying truth bombs. She knew he’d been trapped as a wolf. She hadn’t thought through everything that meant.

He cupped her cheek and ran his thumb over her eyebrow, blocking her vision. She laid her hand along the back of his, startled at the rough texture there.

She pulled his hand down in front of her face and saw the crisscrossing line of scars covering his hands.

She had never seen him this close without a long-sleeved shirt, and as she unbuttoned the cuff, he stiffened but did not stop her. She pulled the sleeve up to see scars covering almost all of his forearm.

“What did this?”

“The wolf. Or the snake? It’s all a little fuzzy.”

“That means you did this to yourself?”

He grunted. “Is it self-harm when there are three people involved?”

She ran her hands over the scars. They were long healed and even a witch with healing magic couldn’t do anything about them now, but she wished that was her talent. She wished she could take them away.

Gently, he pulled his arm out of her grasp and wrapped it around her back to scoot them together.

She burrowed into his chest, her face against his pecs, and she breathed in the scent of man and, weirdly, baking bread and caramel.

“We’re going to figure this out,” she whispered.

“Are we?” he asked, which she felt more than heard in the rumble of his chest.

“Yeah, three-way marriage counseling for predators.”

He chuckled, and she felt his gut spasm and selfishly wanted to see all of him, but he didn’t seem to be in a hurry to speed things along.

“Other dire wolves don’t seem to have the problems I do. So we have to conclude the problem is me.”

She pulled her head away so she could meet his eyes. “Have you talked to their wolves? Because I can’t imagine any wolf would be fine with any of this.”

“I mean, our wolves do talk. This is just our lives. It’s not like we’re sitting around going, you know what would be great? If we didn’t have venomous teeth. That would be a pretty pointless conversation.”