“I have no idea, Lex. Truthfully, I’m scared to death.”
He led her back to the couch and sat down, pulling her into his lap. “Beautiful, there’s nothing to be scared of. Your wolf is already there, you can feel it. You’ll just sort of let her take over for a while. You won’t do anything you don’t want to do. It’s not like you’ll be a different person.”
“Lex, I’m going to be a werewolf. No offense, but that in and of itself is something I don’t want to do. And if turning into a fucking wolf from a human isn’t becoming a different person, I don’t know what is.”
He looked puzzled, then annoyed and finally resigned. “Okay, all of those things are accurate to a certain extent. But the fact is that you are already a werewolf and what I meant was that your values and your mind and heart won’t change when you’re in wolf form.”
“If you say so.”
“I do. And you’ll see tomorrow night.” He kissed the top of her head. “For now, I need to make some discreet calls. I think Jack Reed and Warren Pellini are the J. R. and W. P. noted in Carter’s files. Jack is the Alpha of the Rogues and Warren is the Second in the mob.”
She stood up, throwing her hands in the air. “This situation gets more jacked up every minute.” Nina left the room grumbling to herself about werewolf godfathers and Rogues.
Chapter Nine
Nina’s eyes fluttered open to focus on Lex’s face right above her own, looking intently down at her.
She smiled. “Hey.”
He leaned down and kissed her. It was slow at first, drawing her into his web. He wooed her lips with his own. He tasted her, sipped her with the barest of pressure. Her eyelids slowly closed as she let him take her wherever he was going.
Her hands slid up the warm, hard line of his torso, up the rippled muscle of his back. He was hers, she felt that particularly strongly at that moment. In fact, despite her extreme discomfort at moments over her predicament and her feelings about the way she was changed, she hadn’t doubted him or what they were to each other for some time. That surety was calming, comforting, it anchored her in much the way Cade did. Gave her security.
When the hot wet of his tongue scalded her lips she opened her mouth to his, opening herself to him, giving herself to him. His taste shot through her system, filling her senses, intoxicating her.
The sensual slide of flesh on flesh as she arched beneath him, as her tongue slid along his, of his hair through her fingers—delighted her.
The kiss deepened, the pressure of his lips became firmer, more insistent as the edge of his teeth caught her lip. She was swept away by the intensity of his passion and could do little more than cling to him as he devoured her.
Her skin tingled and her bones ached so that she arched hard with it, a surprised cry coming from deep within her stomach.
He pulled back from the kiss and looked down at her. Staring up into his eyes, she fell into his gaze. There she saw his wolf and knew that the feelings she’d just experienced was her own wolf clawing to the surface.
She sighed with that knowledge, with the feeling of her wolf rolling within her skin, reaching out to Lex’s. A low growl trickled from his lips and she blinked up into his face. There was no fear, only recognition of that more feral nature, of what was now the other half of her being, and it matched his—this man who loomed over her so strong and intense. Yet she felt no threat from him.
“Lex,” she murmured and blinked slowly as her body adjusted to the dual-natured feeling, of forest and loam, of city and sidewalk, of two legs and four, of flesh and fur. It was like looking through the bottom of a very thick glass and seeing things in multiples.
“Beautiful, can you feel it?” His teeth were white and sharp against the olive of his complexion. He was so incredibly handsome at that moment, so compelling to her, the lure of his sexuality, of his very being tugged at her. It almost felt as if it was happing to someone else and she was watching it on screen as she reached out and slid her palm around his neck, pulling him down to her.
“Yes, I can feel it. I can feel her inside of me.”
“Are you scared?” This was whispered, his lips the barest distance from hers.
“No. I want you, Lex. Make me yours.”
“You already are, Nina. Before you even laid eyes on me.” His words halted as his lips were on hers again and his hands were alive over her body. He touched her with wonder, with reverence and awe and she pressed into him, not able to get enough of him, wanting him so much she was sure she’d die of it.
His lips moved to the sensitive spot below her ear and she arched back, baring her neck to him, understanding the relevance of that act more now than ever. He bit the tendon there where neck meets shoulder and she shuddered as pleasure roiled through her body.
Her nails dug into the hard muscle at his shoulders as wordless sounds of pleasure slid from her mouth.
His tongue blazed a scalding trail down the hollow of her throat to find a nipple. He flicked it with the tip over and over until she was begging him for more, begging him to take her, to make love to her, to possess her as deeply as he could.
He responded, sucking the nipple deep into his mouth, teeth grazing it. One of his hands slid down her stomach and over the flesh of her mound and between her thighs. They both gasped when his fingertips found her pussy, hot and wet and ready for him. Two fingers thrust into her and his thumb found her clit, swollen and hard, slippery and sensitive.
The walls of her pussy clutched at his fingers as she hooked her calf around his ass, opening herself up to his touch.
“More. Please, Lex. More,” she gasped out.
“Okay, beautiful.” He moved down then, tongue licking over the flesh of her stomach, over that very sensitive crease where thigh met body.
When he pulled his hand away she cried out at his absence only to moan in pleasure as his mouth closed over her.
The intensity of that feeling—of the wet of his mouth meeting the wet of her pussy, of the sinuous slide of his tongue as it slid through the folds of her body that way, tasting her like she was the best thing on earth—made her entire body tremble.
She could feel the scalding heat of her own honey as he drew a thumb through it and slid it down to the sensitive flesh of her rear passage. She stiffened and he looked up at her.
“I mean to have all of you. You told me to make you mine, Nina. You are mine. Your pleasure is my job. Give yourself to me, beautiful. Trust me.”
She nodded and her head fell back as he took a long lick, the flat of his tongue applying hard pressure over her clit. The spark of orgasm began to heat her body, seep into her.
While he suckled her clit, teasing the underside with the tip of his tongue, his thumb pressed into her ass. He stroked it gently into her until she began to relax and accept the new sensations he delivered.
His teeth abraded her clit gently but firmly and orgasm slammed through her, poured into her cells until they all exploded as endorphins surged through her body. Stars burst onto her eyelids as her skin tingled and heated. Her bones, once achy, now felt nearly fluid as her back arched, and she couldn’t help but scream out his name.
She was still lost in the swirl of pleasure when he moved up and entered her, his cock sliding into her body, her flesh parting like a molten curtain around his.
“Damn, you’re so hot. So tight and wet. You feel so good I may die from it,” he murmured as he bent and licked the sweat from her collarbone.
Her body slid beneath his, the sweat of their exertion easing the friction. She was past words by that point. The wolf inside her was pushing her to submit to him and she couldn’t argue. All she wanted was for him to make love to her. All she craved was the weight of his body on her own, the slide of his cock deep within her. The scent of his heated flesh rode her in much the same way he did. She was utterly drowning in sensation. Drowning in Lex.
His pupils were so large they made his eyes look black. His wolf was there, just inside him, and for a brief moment
she felt her own wolf rush up and stroke against his and they both gasped and then moaned at the pleasure.
Over and over his cock slid deep within her body. There were no coherent words, just her moans and sobs for more and his growls and gasps. The wet collision of bodies was the only other sound in the room.
It felt like being pulled into a vortex, the only thing holding her in place, keeping her from being swept away entirely, was the way his cock pinned her to this reality. Her heart beat with his, her lungs breathed with his, their scents mingled and became one.
It built and built, the tension tightened, the web of desire, of lust and love and longing—of belonging—built until it burst over them both as he shouted her name, his body emptying into hers in pulse after pulse.
A feedback loop of sensation was created and orgasm spread over them both in wave after wave over what seemed like minutes until he collapsed with a long sigh just next to her, chest heaving, cock still buried within her.
* * * * *
Some point later she awoke again and sighed with satisfaction. His head was on her chest, ear over her heart. The sight made her ache with tenderness for him. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt tenderness and tears began to come then.
He looked up with a start, worry on his face. “Nina? Honey? Did I hurt you?”
She shook her head, reaching out to trace a fingertip over his lips. “No. Just the opposite. You healed me. I’ve never, ever, felt that way before. Thank you.”
If Lex Warden hadn’t already adored the prickly woman in his arms, he would have fallen right then at the expression of her feelings in such an open way. She’d been so closed up that he didn’t know what to do with the rush of awe and admiration he felt for her.
“Nina, I’ve never felt that way before either. That was… I don’t even have the words to describe what it felt like to make love to you just now. The way our wolves touched and reacted… I love you, beautiful.”
More tears came then. Resigned, Lex accepted it because women always seemed to do the opposite of what he expected. They cried at the oddest moments, but he knew these tears were a gift from her heart. That she trusted him with her barest emotions.
“It wasn’t like this for you with all the wolves that you’ve been with?”
“No. Even so close to a full moon, my wolf has never surfaced like that. When I awoke and saw you there I just wanted to look at you for hours. When I was inside you, when I was tasting you—it was everything. It was all I ever wanted. You fulfill me in a way I never even knew I needed.”
She smiled up at him and had reached to pull him back to her when his phone began to ring.
She groaned and he growled but moved to pick it up anyway. He still had a job to do but if it wasn’t life or death, he’d kill whoever it was calling him.
Nina watched him and heard the caller on the other end. She got up and quickly headed into the shower and was moving out of the way by the time he walked in.
“You heard?” His face was grim as he stood under the spray and she toweled off quickly.
“Yes. Lex, what does this mean?”
“I don’t know but I’m afraid it doesn’t bode well for us. Stoner is involved now and we’ll have to talk to him about the situation. He’s going to meet me at the hospital in an hour.”
“Okay, I’ll get dressed and meet you downstairs.”
“Nina, it’s too close to the full moon. Stay here.” He stepped out of the shower and clenched his teeth when he saw that she’d already left the room.
She was downstairs waiting near the doors to the garage when he came down some short minutes later.
“Nina, it’s too close…”
“Don’t waste your breath, Scooby. I’m coming. I already spoke to Cade, he said I won’t be in danger of changing until at least eight tonight. As it’s just now nine in the morning, I’m just fine.”
Lex spun and saw his brother leaning against the doorway to the living room.
“What? She asked! I didn’t know she was trying to make some end run around you until she said, ‘HA!’ and stomped in here to wait for you.”
“Don’t look so pleased, Cade. You are so going to get yours when your mate comes around.”
“Shut up and be thankful. Now go on and give me a full report when you get it.”
Lex inclined his head for a moment and looked to Nina. “You see, I told him he needs to stay here and he does. He’s an alpha. You don’t have that excuse and you don’t listen worth a damn.”
Nina rolled her eyes. “Are you done Professor Mc Lecture? Because time’s a wastin’ while you’re going all stern on me.” She turned and walked out. Lex sent a one fingered salute to his brother over his shoulder as he followed in her wake.
He gave the signal to two of his men to keep an eye on the house, and Megan hopped into the backseat to ride to the hospital with them.
* * * * *
Once they parked, Lex did a quick visual sweep and opened the door, holding down the locks on Nina’s side until he’d taken a quick but deep scent of the air around the car. No other wolves had been there and other than the cops, there was no scent of gun oil, metal from weapons or gunpowder. He nodded at Megan and released the locks and Nina got out.
She walked to his side and he was relieved to see how aware she was of her surroundings and how close she stayed to him. Far enough from his right arm for him to be able to draw quickly but close enough to him to push her wherever he needed to if he had to keep her safe.
“I’ll do the talking.”
“Okay. I’ll just stand in the background and look pretty, shall I?” She arched a brow at him.
“Must you always be so argumentative?”
“Must you be a furry fascist? Jeez! Look, furbutt, I am not a moron. I’ve been tap dancing around cops for a very long time, thank you very much. Now shut up and pull that stick out of your ass, why don’t you?”
Megan studiously looked at the entrance doors.
“You know, you seriously try my patience. When you talk to me like that in front of my men, it’s bad for morale.”
“Lex, she’s your sister. She knows you’re a control freak. I bet you were a control freak at six years old, too. But she’d take a bullet for you in a heartbeat. That’s morale. Now, shall we continue to argue or go in and talk to Stoner?” She did make a mental note to cut back on being sassy to him in front of the non-family members of the Pack, though. He was right that it would be bad for morale if she did it.
He heaved a sigh and growled his assent. She grinned in triumph and he shook his head as they walked inside together.
The special unit for humans infected by the lycanthropy virus was on the top floor of the hospital and had special secured entrances. Lex was familiar with the unit as he was the Pack’s liaison to the human authorities if and when a human was infected, whether intentionally or not.
He turned to explain it to Nina and saw the tightness of her lips. “Do you want to wait outside? Nothing is going to hurt you in here, the security is really first-rate and I’m with you.”
“I know what it’s like in here.”
It struck him then that she’d been there when Gabriel had been infected some years before by a member of Cascadia Pack. He wondered for a brief moment why he hadn’t seen her, but if she’d been wearing that schoolmarm disguise and he’d been there on Pack business, he probably looked right past her.
He squeezed her hand and kissed her fingertips and she gave him a small smile.
They saw Detective Stoner standing in the hallway near the nurses’ station. He looked tired.
“Mr. Warden. Ms. Reyes.” He nodded at them and then at Megan. He held out a hand to point them down the hall. “He’s in a room down here. One of your doctors is with him now with a human doctor.”
Lex gave a short nod and they walked down the quiet hallway to the last room on the right and entered.
The memories of Gabriel’s near-death experience there flooded Nin
a and her heart squeezed in her chest as she saw the man in the bed. But this man had no visible bandages. His face was slightly bruised but it was fading.
Dr. Molinari looked up and inclined her head to them both in much the same way Lex had done to Cade earlier.
She shook her head and they all walked into the room next door and closed it behind them.
“The man has no external scratches or bites. He has two needle marks on his inner arm. He tests positive for the lycanthropy virus.” The other doctor, Nina assumed the human doctor, told them.
Lex looked to Dr. Molinari, who nodded surreptitiously.
“You want to tell me how this could be?” Detective Stoner asked. “I thought the victim had to be bitten. That there was something in the saliva and the adrenaline that created the right environment for the virus to take hold. We’ve been told that humans, even if stuck with a needle that had been in a werewolf or had werewolf blood on it, wouldn’t change. Are you telling me they lied to us? That you lied to us?”
Lex sighed. “No. Not exactly. If you went into that room and the doctor took blood from him and injected it straight into you, you wouldn’t be infected. The virus has to have the right circumstances to grow and infect the DNA of a human host.
“But late last year our scientists were able to manipulate the virus. This was to create a vaccine or antibody so that if a human was infected without his or her permission they could receive the treatment and halt the transformation.
“In order to do this, they created a live virus that could, if injected directly, infect the host without a bite or saliva or adrenaline. Up until now, it was theoretical that it would work.”
“Are you telling me that this man was experimented on? Does the human government know about this?” Stoner thundered.
Lex’s eyes flashed angrily. “No! We would not do such a thing. Has he been questioned? What happened?”
“He’s been dosed with a very heavy narcotic. He appears to have been a street person. He hasn’t regained consciousness for very long. There are issues of malnourishment and some exposure-related problems. He was quite bruised up when we found him late last night. He said wolves got him, which is why we brought him here and tested him. But the bruises have been healing and we can’t find any trauma sites that are consistent with an attack. I suppose now we know why. I’m guessing that the reasons the needle marks haven’t healed as quick as the other trauma stems from the interaction of the virus,” the human doctor stated.