Bound by Fate (Moon Bound Series Book 1) (5 page)

“
I’m not worried about my virtue,” he replied, not meeting her eyes.

“
Oh.” 
So that’s it,
she realized. 
He’s not comfortable sharing a bed with the outsider.  Fine, let him freeze then!

Immediately reading her expression, he stood and slowly came towards the bed.  “I said it wasn’t my virtue I was worried about.”

“I know,” she snapped.  “I heard you!”  She turned her back to him. 
Let him freeze,
she repeated. 
What an ass.

Dust rose, as the mattress shifted under his weight. 
I will not look at him.  I will not even speak to him.  Ass.

“
It’s not my virtue I’m worried about,” he repeated softly, his lips mere inches from the shell of her ear.  “It’s yours.”

Well if that didn’t just shut her up.  Her stomach roiled, and her eyes, like saucers, stared into the darkness.  She could feel him breathing on her shoulder, and damn if it wasn’t the most amazing sensation in the world right now.  What could she say?

The mattress shifted again as he made to stand up.  Beth’s hand shot out from under the blanket and grabbed his forearm.  “Stay,” she whispered.

“
Stay?”

“
Yes.”

“
You’re not worried I’ll…how did you put it...sully your virtue?”  He seemed to hold his breath.

“
I never claimed to be very virtuous, actually.”  Surely he could hear the tremor in her voice.  She heard the tremor in his as he whispered, “Little Wolf.”

Her heart in her throat, she turned her head a fraction – just enough to see his profile – and licked her lips.  He was going to kiss her.  She knew it.  She was not all innocence.  She’d kissed and been kissed before.  Almost all of the juveniles had experimented in one form or another as they grew up, but she’d never kissed him.  And he’d never kissed her. 

He propped himself up on his elbow and gazed at her, his eyes seeming to read every thought she had from her face.  He smiled.  She smiled.  She turned to face him a little more.  He smiled again.  She sighed.

“
What’s the matter, Little Wolf?”  His words ended on a catch, as if he had no breath left, or was afraid to breathe too deeply for fear of shattering this newfound alliance.

“
I’m not very patient,” she told him bravely, putting her hand behind his neck and pulling him closer.  “Not very patient at all.”

He stopped a hairs-breadth from her lips.  “It’s just a kiss,” he told her.  “We’re not doing anything wrong.”

“I know,” she said, and pulled him the rest of the distance.

It was explosive.  Amazing.  Torturous and blissful all in one.  He groaned against her lips and she drank it greedily.  As his tongue touched hers, she thought she’d do anything for the rest of the world to fade and leave them alone forever.  This moment, this kiss she could keep going forever.  She rolled over to face him completely, snuggling into him, surrounding herself in his scent.

He wrapped his arms around her waist and dragged her closer still, until she could feel that he was very happy to be there indeed.  She smiled against his lips and whispered, “is that a gun in your pocket or…”

“
Don’t have any pockets,” he told her huskily and she laughed.  The blanket was a poor substitute for self-control, however and soon they were so wrapped up in each other she could hardly tell where she ended and he began.

This is crazy!
she told herself.
I don’t even like him.  He’s too arrogant and self-assured and he’s an ass, and oh my God, I don’t want him to ever stop!

Beth shivered as he trailed kisses down her neck, nipping again at her throat and growling under his breath at the scents he found along the way.  She was seeing stars. 
I must be losing my damn mind.
  But it was too wonderful to stop.  His mouth wasn’t the only thing to wander, she realized as she felt a calloused hand skim her waist and slide down her thigh. 

She both wanted him to stop and to never stop in equal measures.  How was she to know what she wanted while he was kissing her like that?  She was about to spontaneously combust and enjoy doing it.  This was madness.  His fingers crept up her inner thigh and she panted, urging him on, and at the same time trying to find breath to put a stop to it.

“Gareth,” she groaned as his fingers found the little hollow at the top of her inner thigh.  She was close to something, but she had no idea what.  She just knew that if things didn’t stop – right now – then she’d have a lot of explaining to do in the morning when she returned as an un-sanctioned mated female. 

“
Little Wolf,” he whispered raggedly and her control split apart.  She bit his ear, nipped at his throat, raked his shoulder with her nails and kissed him furiously as his fingers once again climbed higher, the last leg of their journey completed as she cried out.  “Oh! Oh God, Gareth…oh…God…”

In the aftermath of her inner explosion she realized he had frozen and lifted her head from his chest.  Blinking, trying to see him in the darkness, all she could make out was his profile.  He was like a statue.  “Gareth?”

“So sorry Beth, I never meant things to go this far, I’m so sorry.”

He sounded broken.  She was just confused.  Hadn’t he enjoyed… Oh.  Oh God.  She’d thought he felt the same way about her.  She’d thought he’d really and truly wanted her.  But no, she was just an experiment, evidently. 

“I’m sorry, Little Wolf,” he whispered roughly again.

Pride taking over the pain she was feeling, she thrust back at him, “don’t worry about it Gareth, you’re not the first man to make me come apart in his arms, and I doubt you’ll be the last.”  It was all lies, but she was hoping he wouldn’t smell the lie on her scent.  Let him think he was one of many, that he didn’t matter.  She didn’t want him to know just how hurt she was.

With a ferocious snarl he leaped from the bed and shimmered so fast it looked painful.  As he curled up in the furthest corner of the dingy room, she leaned up on one elbow and casually raised an eyebrow.  “And there was me thinking you were too exhausted to shimmer.”  She shook her head disgusted.  “Can’t say I’m surprised by the lie.  But at least we don’t have to talk any more tonight.  Thanks to you, I’m feeling quite sleepy.  Goodnight Gareth, thanks for the fun.”

The first tear didn’t escape until her face was buried in the dusty mattress.  She fell asleep with wet eyes and a sore heart.  She felt like something in her was shattered.  Ass, she thought, slipping into sleep.
I guess werewolves do cry, after all.

Eventually the sun rose, bringing with it the end of their time together in the Den House. 
Good,
thought Beth as she glared at Gareth curled up in the corner.  Exactly as she had last seen him.  He hadn’t appeared to move at all during the night, his head buried in this tail, his breathing deep and even. 

Her hip cracked as she shifted to a sitting position and his eyes flew open, meeting her soft gaze in the twilight room.  Caught off guard, she hadn’t had time to settle a mask of indifference on her face, letting him see exactly how tired and worn she felt. 
Time for a little acting,
she decided, clearing her throat.  Gareth tensed as she stood up, letting the thin blanket drift to the floor.

As if I’m about to look for a repeat performance?
  Just thinking of what she had allowed to happen during the long night made her face flame and her mind buzz with unwelcome thoughts of his strong arms and hot kisses.  She shrugged them off, refolding the moldy blanket roughly.  Let him make of it what he wished.  She wasn’t even going to discuss it with him.  He was just another juvenile, really.  He needed to grow up.

She, on the other hand, felt as though she’d aged a decade in the few hours since his rebuff.  The soft whine brought her eyes back to his wolf face and she wondered if it was remorse she could see floating in his eyes.  No, she decided.  It was probably the fear of what she might let slip to her Den Father making him act like a chastised pup.  Whatever, she refused to let him ruffle her fur.

He rose swiftly and trotted to the door, no doubt wanting to be as far from the scene of the crime as possible, as quickly as possible.  Well, she did too, damn it.  Never before had she felt so stupid.  How could she have let him make such a fool of her?  Making a fool of people was her job.  She sniffed, deciding there were no words she needed to speak to him, and shimmered effortlessly.

Immediately his mind-voice assailed her. 
Time to go, Little Wolf.

Don’t you call me that, Guardian.  I am your charge and you will not address me in such a fashion.  I have a name.  Use it.

He looked at her sharply, ears flattening. 
And you will not address me in such a fashion, Beth,
he sent to her, not bothering to disguise his disgust. 
No matter what else, I am a Guardian, and I am entitled to respect.
  Ears still flat against his head, her Guardian trotted into the dense wood.

Sighing, Beth followed, thinking the next couple of hours were going to be very uncomfortable. 

Ouch.
  Her nose stung all of a sudden.  The sharp tang of a strange wolf rushing up her nostrils, sending fight or flight signals to her brain.  Gareth froze a moment later, hackles raising, and growled into the distance. 
What is it?
she asked him.

Tall Grass pack wolf,
was the swift reply. 
Do not stray, Beth.

I won’t,
she confirmed, already regretting her impulse that forced him to use her real name.  It was too much of a grown up thing, and this morning of all mornings, she wanted to remain a juvenile for a little longer.  Mating was just too complicated.

A rustling ahead, too far to be any immediate danger, alerted her to the location of the other wolf.  He raised his head from a thicket, blood glistening on his muzzle, licking his face.  He growled, hind legs tensing.  He was huge.  A rolling mass of hard-packed muscle, stalking across the small clearing they stood in, his massive red shoulders rising and falling with each step.  An old scar ran length-ways along his sleek side, and Beth would put good money on it being from another wolf.

Ten yards from Beth and Gareth, he came to a halt, shimmering within seconds to stand before them, as massive in human-form as he was in wolf-form, with the same scar running from his hip to his breastbone.  He snarled, as if not used to his human throat, and afforded them a view of his elongated canines. 
Doesn’t spend much time in human-form,
Gareth sent to her. 
Be very careful.  He could be a rogue.

She wondered why Gareth didn’t shimmer to speak with this Were.  The only reply she got from him when she pressed the matter was a warning growl. 
Oh for the love of…I’ll do it myself,
she decided.

Before her Guardian had an inkling of her hasty decision she shimmered, nodding slightly to the larger were.  “Greetings, stranger,” she said softly, her words carrying easily in the silence of dawn.  “We are of the Loam Floor pack.  Your scent marks you as Tall Grass pack.  May I ask why you have entered our territory?”

“Didn’t know,” he replied, shock evident on his face.  “Quarry ran here.  I chased.  Didn’t know you were here.”  Beth noticed a quick flash of guilt in his eyes.

What the hell did that mean?  “Pardon?”

“I mean,” he paused, considering.  “I didn’t know this was your territory.  Apologies, I did not mean to stray so far from my Den.”  His giant head swiveled to glare at Gareth.  “You want to tell your Bonded to stand down?”

Bonded?  Huh?
  She glanced at Gareth, who was still growling softly, hackles vibrating.
Oh, he meant Guardian.
  Strange, she’d never heard them be referred to as Bonded before.  “Gareth,” she whispered coaxingly, noting his stance, a fight seeming imminent.  Just what they needed right now.  The Tall Grass wolf could probably tear Gareth’s head off his shoulders and use it as a chew toy.

With obvious reluctance, Gareth’s hackles smoothed out and his ears perked up.  To look at him you wouldn’t guess he’d been ready to fight to the death seconds before.  “I will take my leave,” the giant Were rumbled in a deep bass like distant thunder.  Beth watched his powerful arms heave the carcass of the fox to settle it dangling over one shoulder as he stalked away, picking up speed as if wishing to be far from here.

“Well,” she whispered, glaring at Gareth.  “That went well.”

He stinks of lies,
her Guardian’s voice whispered through her mind as soon as she shimmered.

Why would he lie?
she replied. 
You think he was here on purpose?  A scouting mission, perhaps?

I don’t think so,
he told her. 
He was telling the truth when he said he hadn’t mean to wander here.  The lie only came into play after he said he didn’t know you were here.