Alistair (Golden Streak Series) (3 page)

“My mother said he’d be a good catch. I
never cared for him, but my mom liked him. I suppose I did, too, at first, and
when he hit me the first time, I should have known that he was going to
continue. Instead of calling off the wedding, I went ahead and married him,
thinking that I could simply leave if he ever did it again.” She laughed again.
“I tried to leave him a month after we were married. Fat lot of good that did
me. He’d backhanded me because I had said his tie didn’t match his shirt.”

“Christ.” Before he could talk himself
out of it, he went to the bed and sat down next to her. Pulling her into his arms
had been chancy, but when she didn’t fight him, he held her to his chest. He
could smell her fear and her resignation at the situation.

“After that, every day was a war. The
cook tried to defend me once, and he ended up in an accident on this way to
work one morning. He died three days later. Then the maid that helped me dress every
day had begged me to leave him, and she’d disappeared a few days later. She’d
seen all the bruises and had figured out what they meant, I suppose, and he
didn’t much care for anyone else knowing
his business,
as he called it. After
that, there was no more domestic help in the house. Not that it mattered. He
made me do it all anyway. But the violence got worse, and I could no longer
hide the truth from others, especially my mom.”

“Did he hurt her?” She nodded. “Is she
dead, too?” He wasn’t sure why he needed to know other than to see how far the
man would go to keep her in line. When she didn’t answer, he looked down at her
and realized she was asleep. Stress won out every time, and he knew it.

Alistair reached for Bronwyn.
“I need
your help. I hate to ask you this, but can you do me a huge favor?”

“I’m not sleeping with you. You’re a
nice man and all, but your mate is right there. Make love to her.”
She laughed.
“If
you want me to read her mind and find out some information, I’ve already gotten
about all I can from her. She’s led a very dangerous and oftentimes painful
life. And so you know now she’s in your arms because I put her there. You have
to get her to trust you, and I think you touching her gently is the only way.
Don’t fuck this up, or so help me, I’ll tear your balls off and feed them to
you.”

Laughing, he told her thanks, but he
wasn’t sure this was right. He wanted Allyson to trust him because she did
trust him, not because she’d been manipulated into doing so. He felt his own
eyes drift shut, and got up before she woke and found him in bed with her. He
had a feeling she’d not be too happy about it. He met his brother Brock and
Ryland downstairs in the kitchen. They were already reading the paper. Bronwyn
was making hot tea.

“She’s not married, either.” He looked
at her. “Allyson got a divorce from the abusive prick about two years ago when
she disappeared from the golden cage he keeps her in. The judge granted it on
the grounds of spousal abuse. Then he helped her run this time. She’s been about
half a step ahead of him since. She thinks her ex is telling most people that
she’s in an asylum since her mom passed away and that she’s resting. But
Allyson doesn’t think anyone believes him.”

“They know he’s been beating her.” Bronwyn
nodded, and then sat down a cup of tea in front of him. He just looked at it;
he hated hot tea. “Why the fuck didn’t any of them help her?”

“He’s a lawyer with a lot of pull and
heavy fists.” He looked up at Allyson when she spoke. He’d not heard her come
in the room. He got up, and she sat down. She was pale, and he pushed the cup
of tea at her and smiled at Bronwyn, who shrugged.

“So, he uses his supposed power to keep
you in line.” Allyson nodded at Brock. “A man, who instead of using love, uses
his fists to get what he wants. No doubt he is a bully in the courtroom, too. He
sounds like a real peach. I can’t wait to tangle with him.”

“You can’t. I mean, he’ll hurt you. Not
just with his fists, but….” She looked around the room, frowning. “Why are you
doing this? Why are you acting like you care one fig what happens to me? I’m
not in your social circles; not even Lance could be. You guys are rich beyond
anything he could ever be. Not to mention well respected. Lance hasn’t had
anyone respect him since he graduated from kindergarten. Maybe before that.”

“Having money does not give you a license
to hurt others. Nor does the lack of sense make it right.” Alistair leaned against
the counter and watched her. “You have no reason to trust us or even believe us,
but none of us will let anything happen to you. Not now.”

“Why not now?” It was a good question
but one he couldn’t answer for her; not with his family there. He nodded to his
brothers and sister as they got up to leave. Allyson sat very still as each of
them hugged her gently on their way out the door. She repeated her question
when the door closed.

“You have a right to know, and I want to
tell you, but I’ve never told anyone who didn’t have the least bit of knowledge
of what we were this before.” He took a deep breath. “I’m a weretiger. As are
the rest of my family. Bronwyn is a little more, but she can shift, too.”

She didn’t move or say anything, making
him nervous. He watched her closely for any signs of freaking out, and when she
stood up, so did he. She poured the last of her tea into the sink and turned to
leave the kitchen. She stopped at the door.

“If you didn’t want to tell me, that’s
fine, but making fun of me isn’t nice.” He was confused. “I don’t appreciate
you going through my things to find ways to put me down. I got enough of that
from Lance the entire time we were married. You could simply have said you
wanted to fuck me, but that outlandish story was cruel.”

He tried to think what was in her things
and went to the laundry room to find her bag after she left the room. Deep in
the bottom were five books, all of them about paranormal, and all of them
romance. Two of them were about cats: one a panther, the other a tiger. He put
them back on the bag and tried to think how to fix this. He picked up the books
again and went to find her. Proving to her what he’d said was true was going to
take a lot of trust. He just hoped she didn’t really have a gun on her.

By the time he got to the bedroom door,
he’d unbuttoned his shirt. He knocked sharply once, and when she didn’t answer,
he opened it anyway. She was putting her things into one of the empty bags that
had been in the trash can.

“Sit down, please.” She continued
pulling the small things out of the little drawer. “I would very much like it
if you would sit down. And whatever you do, don’t run. I like to chase things. It’s
in my nature, and if you run, I might hurt you.”

She snorted. “So much for you telling me
you won’t hurt me. Get out until I’m finished packing, and I want my other
things, too. I don’t care if they’re soaking wet.”

He pulled off his shirt and dropped it
on the floor. Then he toed off his shoes and unbuckled his belt. She turned to
watch him, and he could feel her fear. He knew that as soon as he shifted she
was going to run and he was going to chase her. That scared him and excited his
cat.

Pulling off his pants, but leaving his
boxers on, he let his cat take him. He moaned as he pulled him under and
welcomed the change from human to cat. He blinked several times to get her to
come into focus. She stood very still for several seconds before she screamed.

Then, like he knew she would, she ran.

Chapter 3

There was nowhere for her to go. She
pressed herself as tightly as she could against the wall and tried not to think
about what had just happened. When he moved toward her, she put up her hand,
not having a clue what the heck she was going to do to stop him from eating her
alive.

“Stay back.” He moved toward her. She
moved along the wall to get away from him. She could see the door and wondered
if she could make it when he growled. Her entire body felt it, and she had a
moment of wondering why it felt as if he’d stroked her.

The closer she got to the door the
closer he got to her. It wasn’t until he was only about two feet from her that she
realized how big he was. Not just big, but
fucking huge
. Nothing she’d
ever seen in the zoo or even on the television had come as close to how big he
was. When she touched the doorknob, he growled again, and she tore it open and
ran. As soon as she was down the long hallway and almost to the stairs she fell
forward with him at her back.

“Please don’t kill me. Please, don’t. Please.”
She tried to crawl away, but he held her down with his weight. She could hardly
breathe, much less move. When he licked along her bare shoulder, she shivered,
knowing that at any second he was going to bite her. When he licked her again,
she realized he was tasting her.

“Stop that right now.” She rolled over
and smacked him in the nose. “You’re licking me like I’m a tasty steak, and I’m
not.”

He snorted at her and laid his massive
head down on her chest. She tried to wiggle out from under him, but he lifted
his paws up and put them on either side of her. She was trapped.

She looked into his eyes and tried not
to think about this thing being a tiger. She was looking for Alistair. When he
blinked at her, she could have sworn he smiled, but his teeth were a little too
close and too large for her to think that’s what he was doing.

“Are you really a cat? I mean, I can see
that you are but… Are you going to eat me?” He stilled over her, and she had
the most erotic thought pop in her head. She squirmed to get out from under
him. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

The more she struggled, the more
thoughts popped into her head. She stopped and looked up at him. She had no
idea why, but she thought he was doing it.

“Can you read my mind?” He shook his head.
“But you can…according to the books I’ve read. I know that they’re just romance,
but you can speak to me through this link thing. Can you do that?”

He licked her again, and she had a
feeling he was trying to tell her something. She waited, trying to think what
had happened in the books. When it occurred to her, she looked at him wide-eyed.

“You can’t think you’re going to bite me,
right?” He nodded, and she felt faint. “You’ll take my arm off if you do that. I
don’t think…do you think you could become a man again. This is very one sided.”

She felt the tightening of the air around
them, and suddenly, Alistair was over her where the cat had been. She wasn’t
sure this was any better and told him so.

“For me it is.” He shifted his body, and
she felt him settle between her legs. She could also feel he was hard. Honestly,
she wasn’t sure if she wanted him to move off her or to do some of the things
she’d seen in her mind not a few minutes before.

“You have to get off me. This is very
uncomfortable.” He nuzzled against her neck, and she moaned. “You need to stop
that right now.”

“I will. But you brought up communication.
I can nip you here and you’ll be able to talk to me whenever you want.”

When he ran his tongue along her throat,
she could think of a great many things she wanted to say to him, and not many
of them were about communication. When he nipped gently at her throat, she
moaned and ran her fingers up the back of his neck to his hair. She jerked him
hard up and off her.

“Not nice, love. I was beginning to get
the taste of you in my mouth. By the way, you smell like sex.” She shivered at
his tone and his words, and pulled him up again when he started licking her
again. “You do know that I’m naked, don’t you? And every time you wiggle under
me, I’m getting harder. Very hard, in fact.”

That made her stop trying to move from
under him. He was naked, and now that he said it, she felt his hand move up her
thigh to her hip. He was going to touch her, and she couldn’t make herself
fight him. She wasn’t even sure that she wanted to any more.

“The thought of you laying here with
nothing but panties and my shirt on has me thinking all sorts of thoughts. Like
how wet are you? I can smell your arousal, and it’s calling to me. I would love
to slide into you. Take you slowly and hear you scream my name.” Her fingers
were no longer holding him back, and he seemed to know it as he moved back to
her throat, then her mouth. His mouth feathered over hers back and forth before
he suckled her lower lip into his mouth and nibbled on her.

Her mind was telling her to stop this
madness, that she couldn’t trust him, but her body was telling her to open her
thighs wider and let him take her. When his mouth moved down her throat to her
shoulder, he rolled his hips into her. When he rubbed his chin over her breast,
her breath caught, and she moaned, curling her fingers into his hair as he took
her nipple into his mouth. Then, he bit her.

“Please. You have to…I think.” Her body
was on fire, and he was the only thing that could put out the flame. He lifted
his head and watched her as he reached into the collar of the shirt she had on
and tore it down, exposing her breast for him. He lowered his head and suckled
on the hard tip, all the while watching her. And when he opened his mouth
wider, he took in as much flesh as he could. She rolled up her hips to meet his
thrusts.

“Come for me, Allyson. Come and let me
smell your scent.” He moved again and tore away her panties. She felt his naked
cock at her entrance and felt herself get wetter. She lifted her legs to wrap
around him as he slid into her. She cried out from the pleasure and begged for
more.

~~~

He’d only meant to tease her into a
climax, bring her to it, and then move away. But now that he was inside her,
all he could think to do was claim her, make her come with him as he bit her. He
rolled to his back and brought her with him, and she sat up over him. Reaching
up, he tore her shirt off completely and pulled her over him to show her how to
ride him.

Her body was beautiful. As he pulled her
hips forward, she moaned and began to do as he wanted to her to, her movement
making her breasts, full and tight, sway slightly. Sitting up, he took one into
his mouth while he toyed and played with the other. She was riding him harder,
faster now, and he rolled her to her back again and held her hands above her
head as he settled tightly inside of her.

“I want to mark you.” She nodded and begged
him to finish her. “When I bite you, you’ll be mine. Do you understand what
that means?”

“I don’t care. Please, you have to help
me come. I’m so close that I can’t think.” He moved into her deeper, knowing
that on some level what he was doing—what they were doing—was wrong, but this
cat wanted her, too.

When he let her arms go, she wrapped him
around him and pulled him tighter, his balls were so full and close to his body
that he knew the moment she had her release he was going to follow her. Licking
a path from her nipple to her throat, then to her shoulder, she tightened around
him, and he knew she was coming. When she screamed, her body gripping his, he
sank his canines into her heated flesh and let his body fill her.

Blood, heated from their lovemaking,
filled his mouth. He drank greedily from her wound as he came inside of her. She
cried out again when he drew hard on her, and when she came again, he licked
the wound closed and brought her to a third, then a fourth climax before he
fell on top of her. He rolled to his back and pulled her with him, his cock
still deep inside of her. Neither of them spoke, though he could feel her
emotions now. Her thoughts went from sated bliss to embarrassment to anger in a
few minutes. When she rolled off him, he let her go, knowing that she was going
to tear him apart if he tried to hold her.

She stood up and staggered slightly, but
before he could help her, she was pulling away. Grabbing up what was left of
the shirt she had on, she glared at him. Alistair stood up and watched her.

“You could at least cover up.” He looked
down at his body. His cock, still wet from her, stirred. “I’m not going to do
that with you again.”

He didn’t say anything, just glad that
she hadn’t claimed he’d forced her. When she went to the bedroom, he followed
her. She turned and started to say something, but he held up his hand.

“This is my room where my clothes are. Unless
you want me to be naked for this argument, I suggest you let me get dressed.” She
nodded, and he handed her a shirt and a pair of his boxers. She snatched them
from him, and he had to turn his back or laugh. Christ, she was beautiful all tousled
and pissed off like she was.

He pulled on a pair of his sweat pants,
not bothering with either boxers or a shirt. If he had his way, they’d get into
that bed she was currently sitting on and make love again. He watched her as
she sat there.

“You could have said no.” He shook his
head. “I think that would have been the right thing to do. Or I guess I could
have begged you less.”

“You could have, but I’m certainly not
going to complain.” She stood up and put her hand on her side where she’d been
shot. “Are you hurting? I’m sorry. I didn’t think about that when we were
making love.”

“I didn’t either, and for the record, we
didn’t make love. We had sex. Great sex, but there was no love involved.” He
couldn’t argue with that. They didn’t love each other, not yet at any rate. “I
have to… I’ve never come before.”

He stared at her for several seconds,
not believing what she’d said. “You mean you’ve never enjoyed sex with your
husband before? What a fool he was not to make sure you had your pleasure
before him.”

She laughed. “He said it was my fault. Of
course, I never believed him. But still it was…frustrating not to…. Is it
always like that with you?”

It was on the tip of his tongue to ask
her if she’d like to find out, but only shook his head. He knew she was hurting
and not just from the wound. What they had done was too quick even for his
kind. Alistair leaned forward in his chair and spoke to her softly.

“I never meant for that to happen. I
just wanted you to trust me.” She looked at him with a raised brow. “Okay, I
did want that to happen, but not now, not when you don’t trust me. I do want
you to know that when I shifted I did only want to show you that I wasn’t lying
to you.”

She nodded. “Are there more like you? I
mean, I guess your brothers are and your mom, but others? I read about wolves
and panthers, too. Are they…”

“Yes. The man who guards my brother’s
estate is a bear. There are several wolves that work for us in security as well
as other jobs. I think there is a panther, too, but I can’t remember if she’s
gone out on maternity leave or not yet.”

She stood and looked at him alarmed. “I’m
not on the pill any more. I mean…I can’t have your baby. I’m on the run too
much to…I can’t raise a baby like this. I just can’t.”

Alistair stood and walked to her. He
took her into his arms and tried not to let it bother him that she was so
stiff. He ran his fingers up and down her back as he tried to think how to tell
her she wasn’t going anywhere without pissing her off.

“I marked you, Allyson. As my mate, I
marked you not only with my sperm but with my bite. I can’t let you go, and I
won’t let him hurt you. Not ever, I swear to you.” She pulled back and looked
up at him. “I’m very possessive and you…please don’t take this the wrong way, but
you belong to me now and I can’t let you go.”

She pulled away. Although it hurt, he
let her. “I can’t stay here, Alistair. If I do when Lance comes here—and he
will—I won’t let him do to you what he’s done to so many others. He’s not a
nice person, and he won’t stop until he brings me home.”

“He will have to learn to live with
disappointment.” She laughed. “I’m serious. You’ll be safe here with us. No one
will be able to come here without our knowledge. Haven’t you read that we’re
the greatest trackers in the world?”

“Hum. I thought you said you were tiger,
not wolf.” It took him several seconds to realize she’d just teased him. And
when he went after her she turned and stumbled into the bed. He reached up to
the post closest to him and held it. It was either that or join her.

“You should know that I would like
nothing better than to make love to you again. I would love to spread your
thighs and drink from you. Having you come while I feast on you would make me
so hard that when I entered you you’d feel it to your throat.” He flared his nostrils.
“I can smell you. The sweet perfume of your arousal is making my tiger want to
taste you as well.”

She didn’t move when he let go of the
post and moved up behind her. She was on her hands and knees, and he wanted
more than anything to take her this way, press her into the mattress, and fill
her with his cock as he bit her. Rolling her to her side she moved to her back.