Page 30 of Never Submit (Bad Wolves #2)

Chapter 30

Torin

F ucking Ren.

With the wedding nearly on me, she’s the only thing I think about. Consuming me. She makes me think of sex, of what-if scenarios that can never be. She’s in the middle of every bit of bedlam we experience in this camp and my beta is furious with me because of her.

Because of me .

It’s my fault. Of course it’s my fault.

I stalk over to the cabin’s small window and stare out at the lake. I miss the city, my building. I miss my office, my desk, and the power I felt there.

I don’t belong here.

Circumstances dictate sacrifices be made, but even sending Noble and Dax out to hunt for Andras brought us up short. It’s as if every step I take ends up being the wrong one.

The door clicks and it’s loud as a shotgun.

It’s her, Ren. I know it before I even turn around. Her intoxicating scent—her presence—leaks into the space and invades my senses .

I’m at the edge of everything, the pressure on my control threatening to burst. All because of her. Having issues holding back my urges is a complication I’ve never had before.

And I hate her for it.

The need goes against my wants. It dissolves common sense like spun sugar in the rain. The deep calling of blood, speaking directly to the beast within me.

I know exactly what she’s been doing. My wolf rises immediately.

I refuse to be stripped down to animalistic demands. What happened with me, her, and Noble in the billiard room had been a mistake. A crack in my resolve.

It won’t happen again.

“Go away, Ms. Wexler,” I say without turning. “You don’t belong in my office.”

There’s a moment’s silence, and fuck me, but I smell her arousal, too. Something not quite satiated yet.

It winds around me, down into me, and stirs things I don’t want stirred.

I’m not a slave to the wolf. I prefer the finer things, not the rutting and the baser ways of what I am. I’m more than that. And she?—

She’s a pain in my goddamn ass.

She pokes me, she taunts, and she has no idea of what I’m capable of. No fucking idea at all.

Today is not the day for this.

“Ms. Wexler?” she asks. “You’re still pretending your cock wasn’t in my mouth a few days ago?”

The tease in her voice is like nails down my back, sliding along my flesh, digging in just enough to make said cock start to harden.

If it was a matter of screwing her and being done with it, I would.

Catarina might not even care if I take on a mistress, but it’s not that simple with Ren, not anymore. There’s more now. She’s been claimed as part of both the Steel Claws and the Grey Valley wolves. If I go down this path and?—

No. Let the others worry about her.

For me, the only reason she’s still here is because of the Moonstone…and Noble.

I straighten fully, shaking myself. I have my own things to accomplish that have nothing to do with old ways or silly things like mate bonds. I seem to be the only one with a clear vision of how to take on Andras. And that means combining forces with the Briar pack and marrying Catarina.

I grit my teeth to get myself back under control. Finally, I turn to face Ren.

The woman will be my demise, I’m sure of it.

Wearing her signature red hoodie over a loose fitting knee-length dress, the getup shows a lot more of her slender legs. She looks…exposed.

The sight makes my mouth dry and my cock swell more.

“Not the most appropriate attire for winter, don’t you think?” I say.

She shrugs. “Yeah, well, Mathis suggested a dress would be easier when I shift into my wolf. Less clothes to remove. He’s right.”

Yeah, for shifting. I’m sure that’s why Mathis suggested it.

I growl. “Why are you bothering me?”

She growls right back at me before catching herself. Her eyes go wide and she says, “I…I want to talk to you.”

“About? ”

“The wedding.”

I pause. Then straighten until my spine threatens to snap. “What about it, Ms. Wexler?”

She narrows her eyes at my formality, like when we first met at Rudy’s Bar. It’s just another thing I use to push her away. We both know it.

The air in the office becomes hot and thick. “You aren’t really going to go through with it, are you?” she blurts out.

She takes a step toward me, catches herself again, then finds her resolve. Her shoulders thrust back and she stares in a pretty damn good imitation of, well, me.

“Get out,” I snap. “Do as you’re told, Ms. Wexler, and leave me alone. I’m busy.”

“Busy ignoring your feelings,” she says. “ Torin .”

I won’t back down, despise my wolf rising to the surface, prepared to exert my will over her. “You’ll call me fucking sir if you want to talk to me, and I’ll call you Ms. Wexler.”

“I’m not your employee,” she snaps back.

“You wouldn’t make it past your first day if you were.”

My heart leaps into my throat. It's a mistake to engage with her. Yet here we stand, and I’m too powerless to kick her out the door.

“There’s a thing, Torin, simmering between us. I know you feel it.” Then she slips her gaze over me. “Or maybe you don’t. Your name really doesn’t suit you. It belongs to a wild man, not a buttoned-up throwback.”

A lead weight drops through my chest. “I’m not a throwback. I just like women who do as they’re told. And you don’t fit the bill.”

“Like Catarina?”

Fucking Ren. She’s pushing me towards the edge.

“Not you,” I repeat, pulling in a deep breath to calm myself, but I instantly regret it because the air is just full of her scent. I tighten my jaw against it.

“Fine. Sir. If you say so.”

The fucking mocking gets to me, and like a damn idiot, I stalk over to her and take her by her hair, pulling her head back. Her cheeks flush, and she looks at me like she can’t wait to have me.

It grabs me, that look, strokes over my libido, jerks it right off. Using my grip on her to bring her in closer to me, I say, “Stop playing with fire.”

“Then stop letting it get to you.”

Her words slide through my senses, and my own squelched response burns the back of my tongue.

I let her go, pushing her from me, and she stumbles.

I head toward the cabin’s small wooden desk. My laptop computer’s shut, and I pick it up, shoving it into the nearby leather satchel. If Ren won’t leave, then I’ll go out—to a bar, to a hotel, anywhere but here.

“Really, sir ? Is that all you’ve got?”

There’s something in how she twists the word that scrapes those nails over me again, only this time it’s along the growing rigidity of my cock.

“You don’t want to know what I’ve got,” I reply scathingly. My posture goes tight. “You don’t know what I like or what I’m into.”

Again comes her slight intake of breath, as if I’ve hurt her. It’s only because I’m not crumbling in front of her like the others. She’s got Mathis and Noble eating out of the palm of her hand. Hell, even Dax is becoming a love-sick puppy when it comes to this poisonous woman.

Not me.

I refuse to bow or break.

“That’s not nice, sir . Then again, sir , you’re old- fashioned. Boring. You wear nice suits, but all those buttons…” She trails off, waiting for me to parry.

“All those buttons, what?” I’m taking her bait. We both know it.

I give her my back again, and she moves around me, touching everything. Picking up my things and putting them down.

“I thought you wore them to hide a wild wolf, but instead they just cover up the staid shifter.”

Staid. Boring. Old-fashioned. Those are words I’d use to describe Mathis, not me.

Yet my jaw clenches and a part of me knows Ren has it right.

Maybe I should teach her a lesson. She wants to play with fire? I’ll give her an inferno.

I turn. She’s not looking at me; she’s holding one of the books left behind on the shelves. But slowly, she raises her head.

“So you think just because I don’t fall at your feet I’m staid?” I ask slowly.

She shrugs, a perpetual brat. “If the tie fits.”

And I hear it. Loud. In my head, the snap—and my body floods with a savage energy.

“That’s ‘if the tie fits, sir’ ,” I reprimand, but my voice is full of iron will, and Ren goes utterly still.

Her eyes are big, her hair tousled, and her skin flushed. Just because I’m not interested in having her, beyond perhaps a stress relieving fuck, she needs to learn I’m not to be messed with.

She needs to understand just how fucking dangerous I am, and know her place in this pack. I’m the alpha for a reason.

“Want to know why I wear suits, beyond liking them?” I ask, my voice controlled.

Her lashes flutter. “Yes.”

“Yes, sir,” I correct her. “I wear them to remind myself to keep the beast in. The buttons stop me from ripping out throats. Are you offering me yours?” I purposely sniff and lower my face, level with her delicate neck. “Or something far more delicious?”

She half takes a step towards me but stops herself, biting her lip. “I?—”

“Let’s test it, shall we?” Stop, please . But the sensation in my cock drowns out the softer voice of logic.

“Test what?” she asks.

“You. You address me as sir when we’re together. Without insolence, without jest, and because you know your place when you happen to be in a room with me. You got that, Ms. Wexler?”

“Maybe.” Ren tilts her head to mirror me. “Sir.”

I smile, showing teeth. That’s more like it. The energy crackles between us as I crook a finger. “Come here.”

She’s about to take a step and I shake my head with a tsk. “No. Properly. Correctly.”

“I don’t?—”

“On your hands and knees.”

Ren’s eyes bulge. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me.” Oh, I’m enjoying this. “Hands and knees, Ms. Wexler. Now.”

Still, she hesitates, so I let a rough, threatening growl rumble in my throat. Her wolf must recognize the alpha within me in some way, because she drops to the floor and blinks in surprise, like she’s not sure how she got down there in the first place.

“Perfect.”

This is a sight for the ages. Renee in a sundress and hoodie, glaring up at me, her pretty mouth swollen and her cheeks colored.

“Can I get up now?” she asks.

“Sir.”

She grimaces, grumbling under her breath, then says, “ Sir .”

“No, Ms. Wexler. Crawl.” I perch on the edge of my desk, my arms crossed over my chest.

“Fuck you. I’m not crawling!”

“You’re going to crawl, or you’re going to learn the consequences of not obeying me.”

She doesn’t move. I practically read every thought, written on her face. She thinks I’m a sadist. That I’m screwing with her for no reason. Yet she wants to please me on some level.

“You either crawl to me or I’ll come to you,” I warn. “And believe me when I tell you, you don’t want that. Clear?”

Her cheeks are bright red, and there’s fire in her gaze when she lifts it. “Yes, sir.”

I wait until she’s a few paces nearer and clear my throat to grab her attention. “When you look at me, Ms. Wexler, it’s with longing and subservience. Not ire.” Does she even know? “So either eyes down or on me. But choose carefully. Because I will punish you.”

It may be unfair to punish her for my shortcomings. But there is only her and me and this moment.

A ripple runs through her and she drops her gaze, crawling across the floor. Her humiliation is thick in the air. Yet she reaches me and raises her eyes and they’re full of lust.

As I expected.

“Ms. Wexler, I think you need my cock in your mouth again. I have somewhere to be soon, so let’s see if you can get me off before I have to leave.”

Torin, stop . I say my own name in my head as a threat. There’s no stopping. There’s nowhere I have to be, but the throb and pull of blood between us is strong, too strong to ignore.

I don’t know if I can stop this now.

Her breath hitches as she reaches up for my fly. Her eyes are bright with something…triumph?

I’m aching, so fucking hard I can barely contain myself. And when she pulls me free, her fingers on my dick only fuel the flames. Make me harder. The need is savage and overwhelming in me.

Then her tongue touches me, and I just about lose my mind.

Pure electric desire shoots right down my spine and to my balls that she’s massaging with soft fingers.

“Hands off, Ms. Wexler,” I say as calmly as I can manage. My voice comes out strangled nevertheless. “Work me with your mouth and tongue.”

I’m making this harder on her than I might have for anyone else. Ren isn’t just anyone .

She slides up and down on my cock, her lips stretching around me, and she gags every time she takes me deep.

Oh, fuck, the way the back of her throat convulses on my tip is orgasmic, and I let her go as far as she can. Bobbing up and down, her tongue working me, her mouth sucking.

I need more. So much more . I need everything she’s willing to give me until there’s no distinguishing between her and me.

I grab her head and push her down so my cock enters her throat, and I hammer at her for a few strokes. It’s good. So good. Better than it was in the game room. My balls are high and tight, my cock straining for release in her, down her throat.

The thing is…if I’m fucking her for the last time, the only time, I don’t want to come down her throat. I want to come up her cunt. See if it’s as tight as I think it is no matter who else is screwing her.

Ren’s choking, struggling, and I hold her there for one beat, two. Then I pull her off, and she collapses, gasping, with drool pooling on the floor.

“You didn’t come,” she sputters indignantly. Like I’m somehow to blame for it.

“You didn’t say sir .” I laugh and the sound is shaky. Unhinged. My tie is too fucking tight and I yank at it. “Now up.”

She blinks, tears in her greedy eyes as her gaze locks on my saliva-slicked cock.

“I’m up here, Ms. Wexler. Are you a savage?” I smile again and I’m completely unleashed as I toss the tie aside.

She just doesn’t realize the kind of monster I am. I like to use discipline, control, and domination, not just on myself but on my partners. Not Catarina.

If I had handcuffs in here, Ren would be stripped back and locked up so I could have an all access pass to devour her.

If I were a different man. If the situation changed.

Instead, I stand and shove a few things to the side of the desk and nod at it. “Get the fuck up there.”

She pushes up to her feet, wobbling, and I absorb her struggle. The hate and the lust, the humiliation and the need. It’s a beautiful combination.

I want to take Noble’s scent off of her and replace it with my own. The alpha dominating the beta .

“Panties off, Ms. Wexler.”

“Torin—”

“It’s sir . Panties off. On the fucking desk. Don’t make me repeat myself.”

She stares at me in challenge. “I’m not wearing any.”

Oh, fuck me. That’s so much better. To know she’s dripping wetness down her bare thighs.

I slowly work my cock harder than normal to stave off the orgasm, to taunt myself. Around her? That’s easy.

And that fucking dress. I hate to admit it, but it’s probably the smartest thing Mathis has ever suggested. I’d thank him if I were a better person.

But no. I’ll erase his scent off of her, too. For as long as we have, Ren will smell like me. She’ll have my seed inside of her.

The thought thrills me. “I’ve changed my mind, Ms. Wexler. Dress up, lean over the desk. Ass high.”

She does as asked, halfway because it suits her, and I run a hand over her smooth, pale ass. It’s perfect and round and begging to be marked by me. Then I raise my hand and slap her buttocks, hard. She shrieks.

She has no fucking idea what she’s started, or what she’s getting herself into.

I do it again, loving the resulting red mark, the print of my hand, and the heat radiating from it.

“Fuck! Torin!” she gasps, peering at me from over her shoulder.

Her hair falls in a wave around her pretty face and she licks her lips.

I spank her again. The sound ricochets over my senses and when she groans, my cock jolts. “Never forget to call me sir . Got that?”

She whimpers but the mocking lilt beneath the sound threatens to undo me. “Yes, sir . ”

Like she’s just playing along because she likes the pain and the chastisement. I wouldn’t put it past her. I do it again and again and again.

“ Fuck , fuck you, Tor—Sir?—”

I smooth over the marks. “Good girl.”

I drop my hand lower and slip it between her thighs, running a finger through the wetness and the different heat I find here. Her lips are so soft, I groan. A man can get used to it.

I push her further down and part her thighs, stepping between them as I shove two fingers into her pussy. I nearly swallow my fucking tongue. Even recently fucked, she’s still tight. Pulsing and milking my fingers.

I’ve lost my battle. I know that.

Call me pathetic, weak, dodgy, or staid or whatever the hell she insulted me with earlier. I just need to be inside her. Now .

I pump my fingers into Ren until she moans and rocks back on me.

“Please, sir,” she whispers.

Goddess, I could get used to this.

“I get to choose when,” I grunt, working us both in tandem. “You’re nothing but the vessel for my pleasure, Ms. Wexler. Do you understand?”

Who am I really reminding? Which one of us needs it more?

“Yes, sir.”

“If I want to fuck your ass, you’ll say yes. If I choose to have you crawl around naked all day long, ass up in case I need relief, you will. If I tell you to get under the desk and suck my cock, you’ll be there. Got it?”

Empty threats, when it all boils down. I’ll be a married man soon .

I pull my fingers out to line my aching cock up with her pussy, and then I push into her savagely. Ruthlessly. Ren’s gasp is music, the way she grips me unfettered pleasure.

I surge home and stay there, sheathed in her heat until she cries out.

I bottom out and she struggles to push back, to raise up. I take her hands and twist them behind her back. Then, with one hand holding her, the other on the corner of the desk, I thrust.

I take her with deep and punishing strokes, the kind that slam us both into the desk.

“Too much!” she gasps. “Sir! Too much!”

I can’t stop. She wanted to see my animal, she pushed me to this point, and now it’s been unleashed. And Ren…it’s a homecoming with each slam into her. It’s like her pussy’s made for me.

I take her hard and fast until her protests turn into low moans of “Yes, sir,” falling over and over. I should have kissed her. Should have thrust my tongue in her mouth and fucked her that way, too.

But a kiss is dangerous. So much more dangerous than this is. Right now, I’m struggling to hold back from coming too quickly.

She seems to be getting tighter, like her body’s milking me, clinging. With every withdrawal, I can feel her gripping my cock, and every thrust back into her is accompanied by a low, guttural groan.

Ren spasms and as she comes, her body goes wetter and tighter. Fuck, it’s too much.

She feels too fucking good. I grit my teeth and continue to stroke into her, over and over, harder and harder, until the desk skids across the floor.

Ren howls out, “Sir!” and this time, the power of her orgasm shakes through her entire body until she spasms hard on me. Triggering an answering reaction.

A buzzing warmth spreads through me, riding alongside the euphoria of my climax and sending me into a tailspin. My vision blurs, my heart pounding, and my wolf surges to the forefront.

A goddamn mate bond?

My wolf wants to claim Ren as its mate.

Ren must feel it too because she glances back at me, her eyes glowing gold with the call of her own animal.

No.

No. No. No. No .

I can’t. We can’t.

The base of my cock swells into a knot, and I pull out before it links us, throwing away every call to accept what’s happening between us. A sharp pain lances my chest, but I can’t control the pleasure of the orgasm.

I come. Hard. Ropes of hot cum paint her bare ass all over the red marks from my hand.

I twitch, the orgasm seeming to last forever. But even in the moment of euphoria, it feels like something was stolen from me. Something beautiful and precious.

I couldn’t do it, no matter how badly I wanted to. My knot would have connected us for a few minutes–just long enough to make me change my mind.

I rejected the mate bond.

When I’m done, I take a shaky breath and straighten, steeling myself again, drawing on the mask of control. I tuck myself back into my pants. I’ve got to get the fuck out of here. Away from her.

Ren’s staring at me, her eyes dull and full of confusion and hurt. “Torin?”

My voice is shaky. “Get out. Now. ”

She reels, half sprawled on the desk, half off, turning herself around. And she looks at me like I just slapped her in the face.

“ Now , Ms. Wexler,” I bark.

“Tor—”

“Go.”

She’s looking at me like I stole something from her because in reality…I did.

She has to leave. Or do I?

Moving back to the window, I stare outside, forcing myself not to look at her again. I can’t.

To my relief, she doesn’t call out for me, and when I finally hear the cabin door open and close, I breathe a sigh of relief.

Pushing a hand through my hair, the truth of what just happened between us comes crashing down on me.

And I can’t handle it.

I have to go see Catarina. I have to explain to her… Or…I need to see her, talk to her, have her convince me she’s the right choice.

She has to be.

It’s the only way I’ll be able to save us all from Andras and make the Steel Claws the most powerful pack in the area once again. By this time tomorrow, I’ll be a married man, and I can put this whole Ren thing behind me.

I head out the door.