Bite: A Shifters of Theria Novel (28 page)

“Ya what?” Freddie finally says. Only his lips move. The rest of him remains still.

I try to speak, forcing my rigid jaw to move. I stutter. “I don’t want you to.” My voice is deflated and defeated like a surrender, or an admission of guilt.

“Why?” He says it slowly, probably still unsure if he heard me properly.

I tell him the truth. “I don’t know.” I’m frozen, my eyes locked with his. I want to look away, but even my eyeballs have been overwhelmed by rigour. I search my brain for the real answer to his question—the answer to my own question: why the hell did I just say that? Because you don’t trust him, I tell myself. Because you think he’s lying, he’s actually ditching his family and he’s not really a martyr. If he leaves, he lives. He’s a liar—that’s it—he’s lying about leaving.

The thought fails to comfort me because I don’t believe it. I believe Freddie. I believe he really is going to turn himself into Pesconi, fully aware of the consequences.

“Is this one of your dumb little mind games?” he asks.

“No.”

He stares at me, waiting for my explanation. Still, I have none. “Well, then what? Did ya just have a stroke or somethin’? Ya know, that might explain a lot.” He backs up his insult with a grin.

I can feel my eyebrows involuntarily drop into a scowl. “No, I did not just have a stroke,” I say.

He reaches for the handle again, giving it another swift tug. I hold the door closed. He spins to me, his face reddening with frustration. “Then what? Out with it, already.” He pushes my hand off the door.

I swat his hand away and plant my palm back against the door. “Because I love you.” I say in the tone I’d reserved for ‘don’t touch me!’ If not for his owl-eyed face, I wouldn’t have known that I didn’t say ‘don’t touch me.’

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

LOVE IS A FUNNY WORD

Maybe I did have a stroke. I wish I’d had have a stroke. At least that would explain some things. “I mean,” I say, hoping more of an excuse follows, but none does.

“Ya love me?” he asks before he starts laughing.

My face is hot, probably dark red. “Get over yourself,” I say.

He laughs for an entire painful minute. He tries to speak a few times, but interrupts himself with waves of laughter. “No offence, darlin’, but you’re not really my type.” The remark angers me for all the wrong reasons.

“Bullshit. I’m your type, and you know it.” I can feel my eyebrows scowling again.

“I don’t think so. But talk about a nice send-off,” he says. “Now can ya let me leave?”

“I’m not opening this door until you—” I cut myself off, finally gathering an ounce of control over my rampant mouth.

“Until I what?” His dumb smirk badly wants me to finish my sentence. It grows with every second I don’t answer.

I can’t stand to watch it grow any larger. “Until you admit that you love me, too.”

He laughs again. “You’re a lunatic. You’re actually a ravin’ lunatic.”

“Just admit it.”

“There’s nothin’ to admit.” He looks back down at the door handle, giving it another tug.

“Bullshit.” If he wanted to open that door, he would have already. He’s not only strong enough to open the door, but also to send me flying across the room doing so. His little pansy attempts are cute, but they aren’t fooling me.

“Move aside, Olivia,” he says.

I press my back against the door. “If you want to go, then move me.”

I stare into his eyes and watch him sigh and roll his eyes. He takes a step towards the door, towards me. He reaches for the door handle but I cover it with my hand. His eyes drift up and meet mine for a quick second before they dart back down to the door handle. “Olivia, c’mon.”

I fight through the lump in my throat and say, “Move me.”

After another long sigh, he places his hands on my hips. My heart flutters. He gently lifts me from the ground and he moves me out of his way. He turns back to the door and the lump in my throat sinks into my stomach. I’m such an idiot. Why did I set myself up for this? A pain swells in the center of my chest—in my heart.

But why? Why Freddie, of all people? After everything he’s done to me and all the mean things he’s said to me, why did my heart skip a beat for him?

Because he’s a good guy. Sure, he’s a prick, he’s rude, he’s got a big fat ego, and a vulgar sense of humour. But everything he did, he did for his family and friends. And we’re no different. He steals from the rich; I steal from the rich. He fixes fights; I push counterfeit Gucci. He sold me to gangsters; I sold his whole caravan to gangsters. He has the balls to stand up to the people that try to screw him over: to Carmine Pesconi, to Hannibal Hugo, to Giles—to me. That, we don’t have in common.

He turns back to me and sighs. “Don’t do that,” he says.

“Do what?” My voice is raspy, torn, and ripped apart.

“Stand there all sad lookin’.” He lets his shoulders sink low.

“Why do you care?” I bite down on my tongue in a useless attempt to keep my tears back.

“I don’t.”

“Great. So why are you standing there like an idiot?” I want him to leave so I can cry, alone.

“‘Cause,” he says, then pauses. “I dunno. I don’t want ya to be all sad ‘cause of me.”

“Get over yourself. I’m not sad because of you.” I’m not sure who I’m trying to convince.

“Ya just suddenly remember your dead dog or somethin’?” He’s not dead yet.

“Bye, Freddie.” I can’t hold the tears back much longer.

He drops his duffle bag, shrugs his shoulders, and rolls his eyes. “For fuck sakes,” he says, exhaling, stepping towards me. Within inches of my face, he stops, placing his hand under my chin and tilting my head up. What is he doing? What kind of joke am I about to be the punch line in? He sighs again, shaking his head as if he’s being forced into doing something against his will. He kisses me. The moment only lasts a couple of seconds.

“There. Happy?” he asks, raising his eyebrows. He waits for a response.

Happy? Happy about some pathetic pity kiss? I’d be happier if he broke my nose and punched me in the gut. “What the fuck was that?” I ask.

“I kissed you.” His brow remains raised, still waiting for a specific response—what that response is, I don’t know. It’s the same look my mother used to make when I was a toddler, expected to remember the ‘magic words’ before getting any desert.

“I noticed. Why?”

“I dunno,” he says.

“I used to think you were an asshole; now I just think you have mental problems.”

He laughs and shakes his head. “Man, you’re a bitch.”

“And you’re a dumb prick.”

He looks into my eyes again. I want to slap his face. I should slap his face. Unfortunately, I don’t. Instead, we kiss, pulled together like two powerful magnets. For once, my brain takes the back seat and stops trying to convince me to hate him, to find him repulsive. I know I should, but I don’t and I’m through hating myself for it.

No, he’s not the thick, manly man I always saw myself with. He doesn’t have a beard, he doesn’t go into the woods to catch his own dinner, or chop down trees to build his own house. Yes, few to none of his tattoos have any meaning whatsoever, and they all make him look like an arrogant piece of crap, and he’s lousy with foreplay, rushing through it to get to the action. But fuck it; I love him more than I hate him. I don’t even like foreplay.

His hands are quick to locate my butt and my tits, and he’s not shy to firmly squeeze either. “Take it easy,” I say, breaking away from our kiss.

His grin doubles in size and he squeezes my ass harder. I forgot I need to be careful with my words around him. “You like it,” he says with a scoff.

If that’s how he wants to play, that’s how we’ll play. I grab his dick and give it a firm squeeze. His eyes widen and his grip loosens on my ass. My plan works—and backfires at the same time; in my hand, I feel him throbbing, growing. What was I thinking? Of course the pervert would be into this.

With a shove, I’m on my back, on the bed. Before he climbs over me, his shirt is on the floor, his pants are around his knees, and the only thing between me and his expanding bulge is a thin piece of clover-patterned fabric.

He pounces and lands accurately in straddling position. His agility is impressive, reminding me he isn’t human, but therian—part animal. As it occurs to me, I start to notice more animal-like behaviour: the strangely wild way he hunches over my body as he kisses my neck, the way his body jolts whenever I move or make a sound, and the aggressive way he strips the clothes off of my body, leaving me naked.

I ask him what he shifts into. His brow lowers and he smiles, as if to say ‘are you serious?’ “A timber wolf.” He turns his arm and shows me his wolf-paw tattoo. “Thing about wolves is, you never see ‘em comin’.” He grins and then sinks back down.

He keeps his face down as he descends the length of my body, like a hound tracking its prey, following a scent. He stops at one of my tits and wraps his lips around my nipple. Sucking, pulling, playfully biting, he gets carried away quickly.

“Ow,” I mutter, and he hears me. He looks up with a grin and then inhales, as if to consume my escaped expression of pain like it’s a powerful stimulant. Still curled over me, his chest expands, his ears perk up, and his muscles flex. If he had any hair on his body, it would be fanned up along his spine.

His grin, among other things, continues to grow as he looks down my body. He bites his lip. If he were in animal form, I would be covered in drool right now. If he were in animal form, I would probably think he’s asking for a belly rub, now that he’s rolled over onto his back with his knees up. In one swift motion, he slips off his boxer shorts. I don’t think it’s his belly he wants me to rub.

He looks at me and raises his eyebrows before motioning me to admire his cock. I don’t need to look down at it, I can see the beast just fine through my peripheral vision, nestled in the dip between his abs. “That dick isn’t suckin’ itself, darlin’.” He winks before motioning his head towards his cock again.

Darling… He’s lucky I don’t bite his dick off. I sit up on my knees and turn towards his member. Something tells me Freddie always got what he wanted as a child. He still gets everything he wants as an adult. Whenever he says jump, Mel asks ‘how high?’ Maybe if more people said no to Freddie, he wouldn’t be such an ass. I run the tip of my finger from the base to the tip of his cock. Maybe the first step towards taming the gypsy fighter is a good “No.”

“What?” he says, his grin now crooked and his brow pinched and lowered.

“I said, no.” I smile, pulling my teasing finger away. He’s slow to understand; the ‘no’ bounces around his head but his brain doesn’t know what to do with it, like a calculator trying to divide by zero. His slow reaction gives me ample time to swing one of my legs over him, straddling his chest, not his hips. I inch my knees forward, towards his face. He stares up at me, his expression still pinched. His lips part and his eyes slowly scan my body. I watch his pupils expand as he clues in.

I can’t help myself. “That pussy’s not going to eat itself out.” I grin and wink, doing my best Freddie imitation.

Gripping the top of the headboard, I glide my pelvis over his face in a long sweeping motion, teasing his lips with mine. As his hands secure around my hips, I hear him laugh. He pulls me down and I clutch his head between my thighs. Then, his tongue…

I’m surprised when he starts slow, with long, gentle strokes. That’s not like him. He usually forgoes the foreplay, dives straight in. He navigates me with expert precision, using the tip of his tongue to draw shapes and patterns, adding and withholding pressure in seemingly complex sequence. With nothing but some paint and his tongue, he could give Rembrandt a run for his money. Where did he learn to move his tongue like this—scratch that—I don’t want to know. Each lick sparks an elated pulse in my body. Each pulse lingers and never fades, spiralling through my body before returning to my pussy and joining the others, building, strengthening into something staggering, overwhelming. My eyes close.