Page 6 of Undesired Mate

6

CLARA

Funny. I told myself while I was lying here alone that I wanted him to come back. I didn’t want to feel helpless like this. I was afraid he had no plan to return for me, that I would rot and die tied to this bed.

So I should be glad when I hear his footsteps outside the bedroom. I can’t see him. There shouldn’t be any way for me to know it’s him… but I do. I feel it. And now, I wish he wasn’t here. I want more time.

It doesn’t matter what I want. The door opens, but he doesn’t come into the room right away. His tall, broad frame fills the doorway—my mouth goes dry, and my heart takes off racing. I can hear it pounding in my ears, but what’s even louder is Levi’s ragged breathing. His hands curl into fists and remind me of the damage he could do if he felt like it. He could hurt me badly. I’m so tired of being hurt. Tears clog my throat, hot and angry.

I wish that was my only problem. There’s also the aching, throbbing pain between my legs. It’s like it doesn’t matter what is going on in my head and my heart. My body wants what it wants. It wants him, desperately, no matter how scared I am of the light glowing behind his eyes.

His breath comes in sharp gasps that get louder the closer he comes to the bed. “You’re going to do something for me,” he grunts, his chest and his shoulders rising and falling faster. He hardly sounds like himself anymore. It’s like he’s an animal, like his wolf is close to bursting out. “You’re not going to deny me, because right now, I am at the edge of self-control. Don’t test me.”

I guess I should be happy he’s fighting against whatever it is his wolf is telling him to do, but all I can focus on, all I can see, is the enormous bulge jutting out in front of him. A reminder of what he’s already done to me—and what I want him to do. A rush of warmth flows from me as my pussy gets ready for whatever is about to happen. I’m caught between wanting it, craving it, and wishing he had never come back because he looks like he’s ready to kill somebody.

“What is it you want?” I whisper when it’s obvious he’s waiting for a response. I can’t keep my voice from shaking, but is it with fear or excitement? Could it be both?

“Why did your pack shun you?”

My heart drops. “I told you. I can’t?—”

“You’re going to tell me!” His face contorts, and I swear his skin starts to ripple like the surface of a lake when something drops into it. Every hair on my body lifts, but there’s nowhere I can go, nothing I can do. I’m trapped.

“I can’t! I’m sorry, but I can’t.”

“What are you not understanding?” He lunges, and I can’t help gasping as he looms over me, one huge hand on either side of my head. His face fills my field of vision—there is nothing in the world but him, his face and his body, his scent, and his nearness. Nearness that makes me rub my legs together, desperate to ease the pain as my clit swells and throbs, as my pussy flutters, desperate to have him inside. It’s like I’ve lost control of myself.

“Either you tell me what I need to know,” he pants, “or I find some way to work out this feeling I have. I know you feel it, too. So it’s up to you. You can make it easy, or you can end up wishing you had.”

But I can’t. I just can’t. And the worst part is, I sort of want to know what he’s going to do. My nipples are rock hard, begging to be touched, making me whimper when his chest brushes them. It’s like my body is on fire and there’s no way to put it out.

Well, there might be one way to put it out, but it’s not going to happen.

“Have it your way.” Before I know it, he has me flipped around until I’m on my stomach, with one of his hands pressed against the small of my back. “Remember, it didn’t have to be this way,” he growls.

When I hear a zipper being lowered, I realize what he’s going to do. And as much as part of me wants it—so much, it’s like my pussy is a river—the rest of me knows it’s going to hurt. He’s so big.

He lifts up my shirt and cool air touches my ass cheeks before something wide and thick slides through my slit. A moan comes out of me, muffled by the pillow under my face. Every stroke through my wetness makes my body sing until I’m lifting my ass to offer it to him instead of fighting to make him stop.

“That’s right. Just relax. Breathe.” His thumb circles my puckered hole, and I push back against it, desperate to ease the tension and the heat, ready to give him anything so long as he gives me a little relief.

Once my juices have been smeared around to make it easier, he places himself against my asshole. “Just need to take the edge off,” he mutters through clenched teeth before pushing forward.

Bright, searing pain makes the world go white, and I scream into the pillow, but that doesn’t stop him from going deeper, groaning helplessly with every inch as he fills me up. I’m so full, caught between pain and surprising, all-consuming pleasure.

“Such a tight little asshole,” he grunts, pushing against my back with his hand, pressing me to the bed so he can move in and out. It’s so good, I don’t know what to do. Tears fill my eyes, even as I cry out with pleasure. Every stroke takes me closer to the edge as something builds in me, something so big I’m a little scared.

“That’s right and… stay like that… take my cock…” Faster he moves, faster, and there’s nothing I can do but give in to all of the unbelievable pleasure that’s left behind once the pain goes away.

Finally, he slams into me, almost howling when he comes, and the sound pushes me over the edge until all I can do is scream into the pillow, until my voice breaks and I’m totally lost, shattering around him. He fills me, then leaves, and I feel shaky and empty, but also strangely happy. Almost proud of myself for taking him that way and pleasing him.

I’m too out of it to notice when he returns and unties me, but I’m grateful to have my arms free. “I already know a lot of things,” he tells me with a grunt, getting off the bed. Now I can breathe without his hand on my back. I barely notice him wiping up the mess he left on my skin and the bed. I’m too overwhelmed.

But I come out of it, and now his words sink in. “How do you know? What do you know?” And why couldn’t he just tell me that in the first place?

“They came for you. They wanted to take you back with them.”

Just like that, I forget all about what just happened. Now that I can move, I grab my pants from the floor, pull them on, and roll over carefully—I’m going to be sore for a while, I bet. There’s no way of reading the expression he wears. His energy has calmed big time, but there has to be a lot going through his head.

“You must be hungry. Come on,” he says, walking out of the bedroom. It’s like he’s determined to leave me hanging. “I’ll pour some cereal.”

A hundred questions race through my head, but somehow, I know he’s not going to tell me what happened until he’s ready. All I can do is sit down on the couch and go through déjà vu when I accept a bowl of cereal before he sits down with one of his own. It’s a lot bigger than mine, I notice, and I have to wonder how much food he goes through.

Sinking the spoon into the bowl, he says, “They told me your mother is a witch.”

I almost choke on a mouthful of sugary cereal when he just throws that out with no warning. “Who told you?” I ask once my throat is clear.

“Shane.” He says it with a deep, ominous growl.

Shane. The thought of him is almost enough to take away my appetite, but my body needs food.

He sounds kind of matter-of-fact about it. I can’t get a feeling for what he thinks. I wish he would tell me, but he’s too busy shoveling spoonful after spoonful in his mouth like he’s never eaten before. Like he worked up an appetite in the bedroom.

There is no avoiding the pain in my chest as I’m forced to look back on everything that’s gone wrong in my life. “He was telling the truth. My mom is a witch. I can’t shift.”

“If your father was a shifter, you should be able to?—”

“I’m really glad things make sense to you, but not everything is cut and dry the way you think.” I have to force myself through eating now, even though I was hungry before we started this conversation.

With another growl, he says, “You might want to watch your attitude.”

“This is hard for me to talk about. My whole life, I’ve been ashamed,” I admit. “My mother hates me.”

“Come on. It can’t be?—”

“She hates me,” I insist, because it’s the truth. “My parents weren’t in a relationship. I don’t even know who my father is, and every time my mother has ever looked at me, she has had to remember what they did to her.”

He drops the spoon into the bowl, staring at me now. Like maybe he’s actually listening. “What did they do?”

“They… raped her. She was raped by a gang of shifters. There’s no way of knowing which of them was my father. That’s all I am to her. A reminder of what they did.” I feel so dirty, admitting it. The kind of filth that can’t be washed away. The kind that stays with you always. I’ve carried it everywhere I go, all my life.

“You want to know why I can’t shift? Because she put a curse on me,” I tell him, and I watch his features squeeze together like he’s in pain at the idea. Finally, somebody gets it. “Because she hates what I represent. I’ve never had a real home. I’ve never had a real family.”

“So you found the pack and tried to join them?”

My head bobs as a bitter taste fills my mouth. How stupid could I have been? “Yeah, for some reason, I thought it would be that easy. I don’t know what I was thinking. I didn’t know any better. When I turned eighteen, I left home, and I tried to join up with the first pack I found. At first, everything was fine—I guess they could sense what I am, like I wasn’t lying. They didn’t even know I was part witch.”

He sets the bowl on the table and turns to me, sighing. “How long did it take them to find out you can’t shift?”

There’s relief in not having to explain every little bit of the most embarrassing memories of my life—and the most terrifying. “Not long. A few days. They were going out on a hunt, and I made all these excuses for why I couldn’t, but there were no more excuses to give them.”

I can hear their taunts and jeers, their curses. I feel their spit on my skin. “They told me to leave. They didn’t give me anything to eat or to bring with me. I just had to go. I asked where, and they said they didn’t care, so long as they never saw me again. Otherwise…” There’s a lump in my throat that I have to swallow back. “Otherwise, they would’ve killed me right away, so I told them to let me go off on my own. I figured I could at least try to survive, and if I couldn’t, I could go to sleep one night and not wake up, and that would be fine. What else did I have to live for, right?”

Now it’s out. All of my shame. It’s out and there’s no taking it back. I only wish I understood the almost chaotic energy wrapped around him. The uncertainty swirling in his blue eyes. I only wish I knew what he’s thinking.

And what he’s going to do because of it.