The Hunted (Sleeping With Monsters Book 2) (14 page)

He was here now and he needed
help. I latched onto that, and bent over to blow on the stove’s fire and add
more kindling, then ran with the kettle to the creek.

Maybe he’d just had
some really shitty wounds that’d bled a lot, like when you were a kid and you
scraped your knee -- it looked bad, but it wasn’t bad, you know? I could almost
convince myself of that, that the wounds I’d seen on him last night were part
of an awful dream, but then seeing him again – covered in blood, even if he
wasn’t still actively bleeding -- I was no stranger to violence, and I wasn’t
dumb. I put the kettle on the stove and tore a shirt of his into washcloth
portions and started to scrub him clean.

There were still wounds
underneath his assorted scabs. Whatever had attacked him – it’d tried to tear
him open. Like with teeth. Some of the family had fighting dogs – had they
thrown him into a pit to take his chances? But the jaw span – there were divots
on his arm that I could put my hand inside. A dog with a jaw wider than my palm
– my God.

I reached the end of what I
could do for his torso and his face, and he still hadn’t stirred. I bent down
and tugged his shoes off and wriggled him out of his pants, and then folded
them over his hips like a loincloth for propriety’s sake as I finished washing
the rest of him. He seemed to be sleeping more easily now – and wounds that I’d
washed once looked better when I looked at them again.

Only I knew it wasn’t my
makeshift washcloth doing that.

I stared at a laceration on
the inside of his upper arm, one of the many bites he’d received. I’d just
shoved the meat of it back where it’d belonged, a wedge of muscle and skin the
size of a silver dollar – and it was knitting back together, slowly. There were
scars, but the wounds themselves were closing like they’d never been there at
all. I leaned forward, determined to watch him healing in slow-motion like he
was a science experiment.

My necklace swung forward as I
did, free from my sweater after all my tossing and turning last night, and it
landed on his chest. A second later I heard a sizzling sound and saw black
streaks trailing away from it. The locket itself was teetering, as blisters
began beneath. He whined in his sleep, shuddering it away just as I snatched it
back up – it’d left a perfectly burned oval on him, a charred black spot over
his heart.

I looked from the locket –
unharmed – to him, with a scar the size of a thumbprint.

Whatever Max was…wasn’t
normal. But it didn’t change what he’d done, did it? He’d risked himself, for
me – for Vincent. I concentrated on that and finished washing him up, with my
locket hidden inside my sweater again.

Two hours later, all of his
lacerations looked closed. I’d washed most of the blood off. I set the washrag
aside and tried shaking his shoulders.

“Max. Max – wake up.”

His body lolled with the
motions, but didn’t move.

“Come on, Max. You’re healed
now, right?” I wondered if his mind was hurt in the fight, and if his body
could also heal that -- but he’d driven here, so he couldn’t have been that bad
off. “Max – hey –“ I put one thumb on an eye-lid and pulled up. The eye
underneath wasn’t blue – it was golden. I gasped.

Before I could pull my hand
away he moved faster than I could even see and bit me. Not hard, not yet – but
human teeth held onto the side of my hand, and when I tried to pull away they
bit harder.

“Max, it’s me, Sammy,
remember?” I said, my voice rising. “We’re friends, Max. You know me.” I didn’t
dare yank my hand back, I knew he could bite me faster than I could move.
Inside his mouth his tongue licked back and forth across my hand – and his eyes
opened as though he was awake, but they were still that golden-hue.

“Max –“ I said, breathing
hard, scared.

He sat up slowly and I moved
with him. It was like watching a horror movie where someone came back to life –
only Max hadn’t died, had he?

He freed my hand just as he
took my wrist, still keeping me close. He licked my palm and it would have
tickled under different, less ominous, circumstances. I tried to pull my hand
back – and he growled at me, a completely animal sound coming from this throat.
His naked chest rose and fell, and the loincloth I’d given him had fallen away
with his rising erection.

“What are you doing?” I
asked him, no longer expecting an answer. He pulled me close and one of his
hands reached up into my hair and pulled it down, forcing me to show him my
neck. He licked it like an animal would, broad strokes, tasting all of my skin,
sending shivers up and down my spine. It was a raw feeling – like he’d just let
himself go, and something
other
had taken over.

I knew what it was like
to feel like that – I longed for it, for the sensation of release, of giving
over to something else wild and implacable. His tongue ran up the underside of
my jaw and I tried to move, to catch his mouth in mine, but he pulled my hair
tighter, holding me back. I whined in complaint, and he growled me into
silence.

He pushed his face in
at the collar of my sweater, breathing deeply, rolling both of us back, until I
was pinned by him on the floor, him straddling me. His one hand kept my hair
tight while the other roamed my body, pulling the sweater away. I felt my
necklace skitter across my collarbone and thump onto the wooden floor behind
me, as his mouth came down to suck and bite, tasting me with almost more
pressure than I could bear. Without thinking, I reached up for his heavy cock
and felt him shudder as I took hold. I clawed my other hand down his back as
hard as I could, knowing I couldn’t hurt him, and heard him – whoever
he
was now -- rumble deep inside his chest.

He reached down between
my legs and pressed two fingers into me. I gasped and arched, still stroking
him as he brought his fingers to his mouth to taste them, his golden eyes on
mine. My breath panted in his time – I wanted more, now, I wanted to spread
myself wide for him, to let him take me animalistically, for us to rut like the
animals we were. An inhuman sound escaped my throat, a whine, begging,
pleading, as I pulled one more time on his cock, and -- he blinked, and his
eyes were blue, and full of surprise.

“Oh – Christ,” he
cursed, looking down at me – then he threw himself to one side, like I was a
grenade. “I’m so sorry – so so sorry –“ he crawled backwards, prior sureness
gone. “I didn’t -- are you okay?” he asked, eyes wide with panic.

I nodded, sitting up
and pushing my sweater down. “Yeah. You?”

“Yeah.” He nodded
repeatedly. “I think so,” he said, then passed out.  

Chapter Twelve

Sammy-smell-good

Yes.

Almost-alpha!

I know. Something had
changed in my wolf during our battle with Syd. We’d almost won, despite what’d
come after, and both of us knew it. We’d had a chance.

Healing!

Yes.

Sammy smells like
blood

Smells like
us

I know.

Close now, washing
-- like tongues lick.

I relaxed into her
ministrations, staying under the surface. The way she washed each part of me,
and her gasps of concern – how long had it been since anyone cared for me?

Want like food,
my wolf whined.
Need like fuck.

No.

Want. Want want want.

Wolves were supposed to always listen, when manskin
was out. But so close to the full moon and me being so weak
– No! –
I
protested, as my wolf took control of my body. I could only feel things through
its senses now.

Neck exposed. So
soft, so easy to hurt.

Salt of sweat tastes
sweet.

Scent of her like
musk -- push muzzle between her legs and l.i.c.k --need Sammy, want Sammy,
mount Sammy –

I could feel our cock,
hard and swollen, and if he used it on her like this – I fought through with
the last of my strength and took control again, banishing my wolf back inside
me.

I looked out our eyes
and saw her spread out beneath me, my hand tangled in her hair tight, feel her
hand on my cock, and smell her readiness in the air. “Christ –“ I leapt away
from her before I could do anything stupid.

“I’m so sorry.” How was
I going to explain that to her? In addition to everything else? “I didn’t – are
you okay?”

“Yeah. Are you?”

I nodded. And then my
eyelids felt heavy again and I was drawn back to sleep.

When I woke up, the sun was
low outside. I sat up. There was a coat on top of me, and the fire was still
stoked – but there were a line of traps between me and the side of the room
where Sam sat, watching me.

“So this is how it’s going to
be?” I couldn’t blame her. My damn wolf --

One of her eyebrows rose. “I
didn’t know who I’d get when you woke up – Dr. Jekyll, or Mr. Hyde.”

“You have no idea how sorry I
am about that.”

“Uh-huh,” she said. “Keep
talking.”

There was no way to hide from
it now, I owed her an explanation – forty of them.

“I’m a werewolf. I was hurt,
so my wolf took over for a bit there – it wanted to mount you. I’m completely
mortified.” I was careful to look at the traps near her feet instead of meeting
her eyes.

There was a long pause
before she asked, “Is that a compliment?”

I nodded. “I think so, at
least. He’s never come out like that before, with anyone. But I’ve never been
that hurt before, either.”

“What the hell hurt you?”

No reason to hold anything
back now. “Other weres. I went to a bar last night to get answers, and got into
trouble instead.” I finally dared to look up, and found her calmly watching me.
“You’re taking all this rather well.”

She licked her lips before
speaking. “Vincent had a tattoo of a wolf paw over his heart. When I asked him
about it, he’d only say that it was old. Between you and him and the burn my
silver locket gave you – “ she pointed at a scarred spot on my chest. “I kinda
figured it out. But I wanted you to be the one to say it first, because I knew
that it’d sound crazy.”

I nodded, because yeah, it
did. “I am so sorry –“

She swatted my apology away.
“You told him when you were with him, didn’t you.”

It wasn’t a question.

“He saw me heal one day, I had
to – it didn’t make him love me any less.” He didn’t think I was a monster –
even if I almost had been with her – I put my head in my hands.

“It’s okay. Honestly.”

Was it? My wolf could scent her
earlier – and I could smell her now. She’d been as eager as my wolf was – but
she didn’t know what she was getting into. It wasn’t safe. “When did he give
you the necklace?”

“When things started going
south. I couldn’t see it at the time, ‘cause we were in it, but –“ her hand
rested on the locket. “He told me never to open it, unless he’d died.”

“What was inside?” I was
momentarily jealous of her for still having some small piece of him.

She tilted her head, and her
hair swept over one shoulder. “Your phone number.”

I sat there stunned as she
stood and crossed over the room to me, stepping carefully over the traps to sit
down just out of arm’s reach, my sweater riding up her thighs. Vincent knew
this might happen, that she might need me -- and that I’d always be here
waiting for him. “Did you find anything out?”

“Syd was supposed to be
guarding him that night. He wasn’t there, and I’d bet money he tipped the
Caminos off –“

“Syd?” she asked, her voice
rising. “He’s a werewolf too?”

“The pack alpha.
Theoretically, my boss. What he says, goes.” I shook my head.

“He’s in the book.” She
flipped to his page instantly and handed it over to me. I scanned the page –
some of the dollar amounts on there were huge. And the list of names – I recognized
a few of them, from my time in the game. I had no doubt they were people that
Syd had murdered.

“Who else is in there?” Was I?

Sam frowned and flipped
through a few more pages. “Do you know JD, and Georgie?”

I slowly nodded. “How did you
know?”

“They’re all
dog-earred. Which I bet Vincent thought was hilarious when he was doing it.”
She gave me a sad half smile. “Was your whole pack in on it? I mean, he was
going to turn them in --”

“Along with half of the
rest of the family,” I said, trying to make apologies for my kind, while
putting a horrified hand to my mouth. I was the reason he’d died. Without me,
they never would have ingratiated themselves, they’d still be living from
season to season, off the land and construction jobs.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s all my fault,” I
said. “I’m the reason he’s gone.”

She tilted her head at
me. It was a gesture Vincent had made with me a thousand times, and seeing her
make it hurt me deep inside -- “How?” she asked.

I inhaled deeply. “It wasn’t
until I got involved with Vincent that Syd realized the weres could work for
the family. If I hadn’t been with him, Syd never would have taken my place.”

I waited for her to yell or
cry or go. I wouldn’t stop her – I had no hold on her, no matter how my wolf
felt. Instead she stared at me, quiet.

“One night, I did one of those
jealous things, and asked him about who he’d been with before me,” she said,
breaking the silence. “And he told me a story about you.”

“He…did?”

“He said there’d been someone
in his life who meant the world to him – and that lies had torn them apart. I’d
assumed it was a woman, and I never asked to hear the rest, I didn’t want to,
but –“

I swallowed, watching her.

“And he told me other stories,
too. About his bodyguard before Syd. How you saved his life, more than once. I
remember his face – it wasn’t the kind of face you made about someone like
Syd.” She snorted. “In retrospect, it was pretty clear he hated Syd – we both
did. He’s kind of an asshole.”