Page 10 of Red (Everdark Tales #1)

Morning light gives me the opportunity to finally admire her wholly—up close and uninterrupted.

She’s so soft everywhere I’m firm, curved in all the right places for my oversized hands to grab onto. My senses are encapsulated with her sleeping body by my side. The warmth of her. The intoxicating scent of her. The feeling of her smooth skin against my fur. The memory of her sweet taste still present on my tongue.

Mine.

Not much in my life had any meaning for me before her, and I find it hard to believe she trusted me enough to doze off in my arms—the arms of a beast. Because I know I don’t deserve this. But since I’m already condemned in this world, I might as well enjoy it.

She is slightly twisted to the side with a top sheet kicked off. Her profile covered by her fiery curls almost entirely, arms tucked under the pillow, chest pressed against the mattress, one leg bent up.

I’ve fantasized about this exact moment for such a long time, creating obsessive scenarios in my head, and now I can’t stop touching her. I’m not in full control anymore—not after the things I’ve done to her already…

Learning each tiny fraction of her, I lovingly caress her voluptuous figure everywhere within my reach, never getting enough. Tasting the freckled skin on her shoulder, I run my palm from her knee over the thigh onto her shapely ass, pushed up against my groin. Kneading her flesh more sensually, I feel how my hard cock begins to throb once again.

I was able to take a nap during the night, too comfortable to resist when holding her body so close next to mine, although my erection hasn’t subdued. The need to mate is constantly trying to overpower me, and it’s not getting any easier with our current proximity.

Her pelvis shifts under my touch, opening her up more, and my hand slides down between her cheeks to her bare sex.

Fuck, she’s so wet!

I grunt and my eyes roll to the back of my head at the sheer feeling. I spread her lips with my fingers, very carefully not to catch her most delicate skin on my claws, and I rub her tiny clit, adoring how she quietly moans and wiggles her hips, responding to me even in her sleep.

I miss my human anatomy right about now, and that isn’t something I think about often. But I so badly want to be able to shove my fingers deep inside her core and feel her stretch around them.

I can please her with my tongue, however.

Kneeling at her behind, I gently nudge her thigh to turn Julia onto her tummy, pulling her legs even further apart. She has the most perfect pussy, I swear. Plump and pink, glistening with her juices, always ready to be eaten.

I lower my head and press my snout to her sex, inhaling that mouthwatering scent of her. I begin to work my tongue on her clit, making her body jerk with each lap, before pushing it into her tight, soaked hole.

Her breathing hitches and I know she woke up. “Alex,” she purrs sleepily, arching her back in search for more sensation, and my name has never sounded more attractive.

“Barely awake, yet so greedy already.”

“Oh, please, don’t stop!”

“Yes, ma’am.” Palming both her buttocks, I spread her out, as I return to teasing her.

She slurs some profanities into the pillow, still a bit drowsy, as she moves her hand to the back and fists the fur on my nape.

I gently press the pad of my thumb against her other little hole, waiting for her reaction. She moans louder, which gives me a green light, and my tongue slides up through her slit all the way onto her tight ring. I start slowly, only rimming it, but I myself get greedy fast—she tastes just as good here. And while I tongue her, she seems to enjoy it as much as I do, crying out in pleasure.

I’ll claim that flawless ass, too.

My balls draw up with the thought of it as a sorry groan escapes me. And I desperately need a relief.

“Be very still,” I tell her as I position myself above her, keeping majority of my body weight on my forearms. It’s somewhat risky, but I can’t help it; I want to feel her on me.

Moving carefully, I hump between her slick pussy lips while she moans like crazy, and I feel her juices rush down her thighs. The leaking tip of my cock hits her swollen clit with each thrust, smearing my precum and giving more ease to my glides. The noise our bodies create together is quite obscene, and I fucking love it.

“Do you hear how wet your cunt is for me?”

She bucks against me, cursing inaudibly.

I straighten on my knees and place my right hand between her shoulder blades, pressing her down. And my left goes onto her hip as I lift her ass up in the air, giving myself a better angle.

“Hold on, baby,” I tell her before I begin to rut like an animal that I am, panting.

The bed frame shakes under my sheer force, scraping the hardwood floor below. Her hands push against the tufted headboard to keep her steady, as I up the speed. We then hear some cracking sounds that we both ignore. Before the mattress collapses on the floor. It’s thick enough and the platform is—or was—low to the ground anyway, so nothing major happens.

But I still halt my movements to check on her. “You okay?”

“Yes, just keep going!” she whimpers, and I know she’s close so I renew the rhythm.

She comes only a moment later, crying out my name. I follow right after, spilling my pent up seed against her contracting pussy, watching how it drips on the sheets below.

I lean on her back and nuzzle on the side of her neck. “Good morning, darling.”

Her body is still trembling beneath me. Her fingers trace down the veins on my forearms before her palms cover my hands on the pillow and she interlocks our fingers together.

My heart expands twice its size in my chest because of the way she accepts me in this form. I feel embarrassed I ever doubted she would.

“That was fantastic,” she mutters, turning her face to peek at me.

“Yeah?” I taste the skin along her exposed now throat. “I can wake you up like this every day.”

“That sounds amazing.” She next adds with a giggle, “But you now owe me a new bed frame together with that mattress topper.”

We won’t be staying here long enough for you to need it.

I don’t tell her that—yet. The moment is too blissful for me to want it to end.

Instead, I put some more weight on top of her as I whisper into her ear, “Your dollhouse furniture is not compatible with my body, tiny human.”

She curses again, pushing her hips against my groin and finding me erect. “How are you still so hard?”

“Honey, I don’t get tired. We can go all day if you wish.”

“But don’t you have to… like, regenerate or something?”

“Well, not really. Only the tie can give a full satisfaction of release.” I swallow a groan at the thought of my cock swelling inside her, locking us together.

She stills. “You mean your knot? In me?”

“Oh yes. You will take it like a good girl,” I realize I say it out loud, but it’s too late to take it back. I’m not sure if I even want to.

She is quiet. And I prepare for her outburst, which never comes. “Um, are you not receiving pleasure?” That’s what worries her.

“Of course I am,” I assure her. “But it works a bit different for me than a man.”

She writhes so I give her some room to turn around and fully face me. As soon as she does, I’m left breathless at her beauty. Her hair as halo of red and orange flames dancing around her heart-shaped face with porcelain complexion, heavily speckled with darker freckles. Her eyes big and bold, gleaming like sapphire crystals. A cute button shaped nose and full rosy lips, the bottom one slightly more pouted.

How could one not go mad for this woman?

She looks down between us where my cock lays heavy, stretching from her mound to belly button. And I know she’s wondering how it will fit inside her.

Her eyes dart back to mine, half-lidded, as she throws her arms around my neck. “I want you.”

I die inside, hearing her say the words that I’ve dreamed of so compulsively. She wants me. Deemed a monster by her kind, stuck in a body somewhere between a man and a wolf, having the strength to obliterate her with only a single wrong move. And she wants me.

“Julia, I’m going to fuck you in ways you’ve never even dreamed of,” I rasp, forcing myself to deny her. “Not right now, though. It requires a great deal of willpower to be delicate for me, and I’m still learning how to be this close to you. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t hurt me.” She coaxes.

“Soon, precious.” I roll over onto my back.

She turns to her side after me. “How soon is soon?”

I laugh. “You are a horny little thing, aren’t you?”

Her face pinks up. “I actually have no idea what’s happening to me lately.”

“It’s me.”

“You’re doing this to me?” Her soft brows furrow.

“Not deliberately,” I clarify, not wanting to be perceived as an even bigger creep. “You are my mate as much as I am yours. Whenever I’m near, your body responds to me.”

“Oh.” She contemplates. “Wow, everything makes so much sense now.”

“It will be easier to control after our bond is complete.”

“Bond as in we fuck?”

“No, it’s much more than sex.”

“Okay.” Her skepticism is understandable yet bothers me just as much that she thinks this low of me. “So, I’m basically in heat is what you are saying?”

“It’ll get worse before it gets better.”

Red bites her bottom lip before she asks, “Is it the same for you?”

“Hard to say, but I suppose it’s similar.” I run my hand down through her ribs. “When I first tracked your smell I was uncontrollable. It’s the primal instinct, you see. With the prey drive follows as stalk, chase, kill. And with a mate, the latter changes to the need to breed.” I grab her waist and pull her nearer. “I know it’s not any excuse, but I couldn’t get too close to you right away because my desires would take over, and your safety was at risk. I had to wait until I was strong enough to trust myself around. So I kept my distance, yet it was impossible to leave you alone. Especially, since your fucking boyfriend was always around, testing my limits.”

“He isn’t my boyfriend, never was.” And he never will be. “We haven’t even done anything,” she explains like I didn’t already know.

“He wouldn’t be breathing right now if he touched you.”

Julia shivers. “That’s a little extreme, don’t you think?”

“You’re mine!” I growl, pads of my fingers dig into her hip as I press her body tightly to my mine.

She stares deeply into my eyes. “You want to breed me? Is that what being a mate is about?”

“Yes and no.”

“Can you elaborate?”

“Bonded mates share an unbreakable soul connection that forever links them together. The urge to procreate isn’t exclusive, although much stronger in such case. But I’m not in any rush. I just got you all to myself, and believe me when I say, I’m not ready to share you.”

She smiles at that, petting my head. “I’m on birth control.”

What a surprise awaits you, my dear.

“Hate to break it to you, but unless surgical, human contraception simply doesn’t work with my kind. And you certainly aren’t on any, either way.”

“No, I’m on a pill.”

“Julia, I can smell how fertile you are.”

“That’s impossible.” Her pupils dilate and she stills after she reaches to the nightstand.