Howl (Lost Moon: Unravelling Monsters Universe #2)

Chapter 13

13

brONTE

W e wake some time in the night, finding each other beneath the blankets, still half asleep but alert enough for my legs to open, for his lips to find mine, and for his hands to grip me, hard and desperate.

“ West, ” I whisper, my open mouth pressed to his neck as his thick cock nearly splits me in two. Inch by inch he pushes into me, pulling back slowly only to repeat the motion. “Oh fuck , honey,” I moan, the endearment spilling from me without thought, the night and the suddenness of this intimacy peeling back layers of me that I’m not quite ready to reveal.

“So fucking wet for me. Fuck, you feel too good.”

We kiss passionately, tongues licking, teeth nipping, lips latching to suck. He’s on top of me now, a solid weight that presses me into the mattress, and I love it. He’s going to leave marks on my neck , I think as he bites at me again before he kisses his way down to my breasts, long tongue unfurling to lick stripes across my nipples.

I moan and lift my hips, my hand between us, touching my clit. He stops to watch, eyes luminous in the moonlight shining through the window, fascinated by the way I pleasure myself. “Come on my cock,” he whispers, his hips rocking ever so slightly, as if he can’t help himself. “That’s it sweetheart, fuck yourself on me.”

I do just that, eyes wide open, gasping, breath seizing as I come, never breaking away from his gaze. He closes the gap between us with a growl and a bruising kiss, and I growl too, dragging my nails down his back just to hear him say “ Ffffuck, Bronte, ” again in that deep voice of his.

“Fuck me hard and fucking come ,” I beg, my arms around his neck as I cling on for dear life. He rails me hard and fast, knot battering my entrance again and again, and as much as I love soft sex there’s something about the quick and rough variety that makes me feel alive .

I can tell he’s close. “Knot me,” I encourage, and he groans into my mouth as he thrusts hard, knot pushing into place, stretching and stuffing me full, his hips stuttering until his knot is fully engorged and can no longer move. The tug of our tie prolongs my own orgasm, a pulsing beat that matches each hot spurt of his cum, filling me, filling me, filling me. “ Yes , give me a baby,” I find myself whispering and he groans again, coming more, until he is empty and I am so fucking full. There is so much uncertainty but we are building a future together among it all, creating this new life, the magic of fate all around us, binding us together, urging us to bite.

Soon.

I love the weight of him on top of me, pressing me into the mattress. He is as deep within me as possible and yet it’s not enough. I want this man inside my soul. I want to keep a part of him with me always.

My teeth ache with the urge to claim him, but I’m scared. Wait for the moon has always been the standard advice, and I don’t trust myself enough to get it right outside of that small window. I’m not a shifter, and knowing West has made it abundantly clear where the limits of my own body lie. My wolf is so trapped compared to his.

I squeak as West wraps his limbs around me tight, rolling us, his knot pulling at my cunt, a delicious edge of pleasure and pain coursing through me as we are flipped until I’m lying atop him. “You know I’m happy to be underneath,” I say, resting my head beside his. His amused rumble is all I get in reply.

It was a long day, and injuries like West’s are tiring on the body. We may have slept a little already, but it doesn’t surprise me when his eyes close and his breath evens out quickly. I’m usually the one that falls asleep first — if my three days of data can be accurately relied on — but it makes sense that he can’t stay awake. The quickened healing — thanks to my magic — is still healing , and that sort of recovery exhausts a person.

I sigh, limbs growing heavy, eyes closing, happy and sated and feeling very pleased with myself that I get to sleep around West’s knot again. I am a little cumslut, I tell myself, giggling loud enough to make West grumble in his sleep.

There is nothing more comfortable than this, and —

— the awful, falling sensation makes me cry out, my voice echoing as I shut my eyes against the blinding light. Heart-racing, I grab hold of the old wooden rail on instinct, steadying myself on the steep stairwell that hugs the side of the cliff face.

The sunlight is warm on my skin, the scent of salt and seaweed so familiar. Home. I know where I am immediately without even needing to open my eyes — I’ve been here a thousand times before, on Lykia, in the small cove beneath the castle, the sound of the waves a song that speaks to my heart. The breeze is cool, and when I squint into the bright light, I can tell that it’s winter by the way the sun sits at a lower angle in the cloudless sky. There’s nothing quite like the ocean around Lykia and all her neighbouring islands. Bright blue water — teal in the shallow of the bays when viewed from a distance and crystal clear up close — it is beautiful.

And there’s a man swimming in it now. West.

I stand frozen half way down the flight of a hundred-odd stone stairs. They terrify all visitors who don’t realise they’re fortified by magic in the same way that everything in this place is. It’s not the height or the sheer drop that has me frozen, but the sight of my mate, wading out of the water directly below, his body still tanned and heavily muscled, but somehow different. Weathered and strong, that’s how he looks.

It’s the hair, I realise, more grey than brown, and the addition of darkish stubble that makes him look not only older, but more rugged. Salt and pepper, a silver fox… all the words come to mind, jumbling in my head as I stand stock still, in awe of him, this god of a man. He walks nude through the shallows, staring up at me, rivulets of water running down his skin. That gold stare of his still as intense as ever, the deeper lines on his face accentuating his features.

He is so incredibly handsome.

Guards from House Maheras stand on the far cliff. I’m vaguely aware of them and the way they hold their sniper weapons as if my husband is a threat and not a guest, but it’s West that keeps my attention as I descend the rest of the way. There’s a towel covered in West’s scent here, draped over a pile of driftwood, and I snag it as I pass by, crossing the pebbled beach to reach him.

Mate, my wolf reminds me, as if I could ever forget, and I’m suddenly so aware of the scar on my shoulder — West’s bite! — and the way the skin there pricks with anticipation.

Up close, I feel almost shy as I hand the towel to him wordlessly. He scrubs himself dry, his eyes on me, while I do my best to keep myself from staring at the hair on his chest and the thickness of his flaccid cock.

“You’re so handsome.” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop and think that this is probably a strange thing to say to a man that has been my mate for goddess-knows how many years, but then again, is it? The corner of his mouth curls upwards in response, the lines around his eyes crinkling in a smile, but there’s something in his expression that is deep and thoughtful as he throws the towel over his shoulder.

“Come here,” he says, holding out his hand to me, and I take it, allowing him to tug me forward and wrap his arm around me, until I’m pressed flush against his front. He’s warm and solid and smells of the ocean, and when he strokes his hand through my hair and down my neck I close my eyes and lose all train of thought about why we might be in Lykia, where our children could be at this point in time, and how old West really is — because he could be mid-fifties or closer to a hundred, with the way wolves age.

West’s cock is growing hard, trapped between our bodies, and I can feel how wet I am. Is this wrong? When I told West that he’d fingered me in a vision he’d been turned on rather than upset — after all, it makes little sense to be jealous of yourself. It’s the future me that is here now, and I’m just experiencing things through her.

That’s what I tell myself, but when I open my eyes West is staring at me in a way that makes me think he sees me.

“What’s going on in your world at the moment?” he asks. My mouth falls open, and before I can reply I am ripped away, falling, tumbling back into my body and —

I gasp, heart beating wildly in my chest, my body tense. West is lying under me, face slack with sleep, not a grey hair in sight, and his knot still lodged firmly within my cunt. We’re in the cabin, the smell of wood and forest and many, many shifters in the air.

“Holy fuck,” I whisper, laying my head down beside his, my lips pressed to his neck. He knew. Somehow he knew what was going on.

It takes forever to fall back asleep.