Mated for Keeps Boxed Set: a BBW Werewolf Shifter Romance (The Lost River Pack) (7 page)

Dreamless sleep.

“Show her to her room.” Nico padded back around the couch and toward the door he’d come in by. “If you need anything in specific, Natalie, let us know.”

Clothes, mostly. Maybe her own toothbrush? Natalie wasn’t sure. She’d never really been allowed to ask for things. The Yellow Canyon Pack provided necessities to those who were useful.

What was she meant to do to be useful? How would she be expected to earn her keep?

“I’ll escort you to your door.” Ben offered her a hand. It hovered just inside her peripheral vision, large and steady. Palm up.

Natalie fought back a wave of panic as it gripped her, sank claws through her throat. Her heart.

Clamping her teeth against the urge to chatter them, she slipped her hand into Ben’s and let him pull her from the sofa. He held her hand even when she’d found her feet, guided her out of the den and through the halls without letting her go. Every footfall carried with it an echo of her fears—what was she meant to be to these strays?

She thought she’d covered this angle, thought she was ready, but with her mating heat eased to a tired simmer, the rest of her brain was overcompensating.

What should she offer to earn her place?

Ben halted outside of a door, one of several lining a bright, airy hall. The long rug underfoot was thick and plush, patterned in soft browns and greens. He let go of her hand, nodding at the door. “We’ve all got rooms here, but they’re usually empty. This one’s yours.” His voice scuffed against her nerves. Settled over them like cooling salve.

She took a deep breath.

When it shuddered, his dark eyes snapped to hers. Held.

Natalie almost jumped out of her skin when his large hands come up to frame her face. “What’s wrong?”

Could she say? Her heart hammered in her chest.

Ben’s thumbs rested against her cheekbones, fingers brushing her hairline with infinite care. His palms were warm, rough like she’d come to expect from most werewolves, but gentle. Cautious with her, like she was the fragile type.

No one ever treated her like she was fragile.

Her fingers slipped around his wrists. “I don’t…” She hesitated. “What should I do?”

Ben’s lips quirked. “For the moment? Sleep. Get your strength back. There will be food when you wake up. As much as you want.”

“But for
what?
” she asked, a ragged note of fear she couldn’t stop.

His smile faded. His eyes banked, but when she might have expected a sudden shift to aggression, Ben’s fingers eased through her hair. Pushed the tangled mass away from her face. “For nothing, little girl. Just because you’re here, and you’re you, and Nico isn’t in the habit of enslaving anyone.”

“Then…” Again, her voice trailed away.

“Ask,” he ordered, in that way that was both dark and commanding and encouraging all at the same time.

Her lashes fluttered closed. Her face dipped, but Ben’s hands tightened in her hair, forced her to keep her chin up.

Disobedient girls didn’t get rewards. Right now, all she wanted—aside from sleep—was reassurance.

She lifted her gaze. Warmed when his mirrored back his approval. “Why was Nico so hard on Jackson? Did he do something wrong?” And would she cause a similar reaction without knowing it?

Ben shook his head. “No. But Nico is our leader. It’s up to him to remind us when we forget what the rules are.”

“House rules?”

“Pack rules, little girl.” Using her hair, he tugged her gently towards him, easing her body against his. His fingers pulled through her glossy waves, forcing a small sound of pleasure from her, and he splayed his large hands at her back. “We may not be an official pack, but we try to live like one. Jackson just needed a reminder.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Ben replied, smiling down at her in his quiet way. “He’s already got ideas in his head about what you are.”

Natalie tipped her head. “What does he think I am?”

“His.” He said it simply, without rancor. Although she’d swear there was a glint of amusement to it—a little bit of humor at Jackson’s expense. He didn’t let her ask about it, though. She took a breath to do it, but it cracked into a yawn, and Ben eased back from her with an apologetic shake of his head. “You should have what you need for the moment. Go sleep.” He reached around her, turned the knob and opened the door to her assigned bedroom. “Alek and Damien should be back tomorrow. They’re the only ones scheduled to return anytime soon. The others are on mission.”

When he turned away, she grabbed the doorframe and asked quickly, “What happens if I—um, if I wake up?”

Ben paused in the hall. His voice, husky and deep, soothed her in ways she couldn’t quite pin. But she liked it. “We’ll be here, little girl. Whatever you need.”

She didn’t have to ask to know it for the promise it was.

N
atalie woke
up with a sudden start. She was trembling, her body coated with a thin film of sweat. She’d kicked the sheets off in her sleep, wrapped them into a tight tangle trapped under her bare legs.

She shoved her hair out of her face, gasping for breath. The lingering echoes of her dreams burned to a curling crisp around her.
Heat
. It simmered through her, a rolling shimmer of hunger that had nothing to do with the food she’d desperately need soon, and everything to do with the smell of the air, the taste of need on her tongue.

Her wolf shuddered inside her skin.

Want. Flesh.

Whose?

It didn’t matter. Jackson, Ben, maybe even Nico.

Maybe… Her throat closed around a hard knot as she swung her feet to the floor. Maybe she could have all three. Maybe she could ask them to touch her, to taste her at every part of her body. Jackson to lick her nipples, Ben at her pussy.

Nico—where would he lick her? Her mouth?

Her neck?

She was shaking as she adjusted the too-large T-shirt that had been laid out for her on the bed. She’d drawn it on over her underwear, left her clothes in a pile on the floor to take care of later. She didn’t know which man her impromptu nightshirt belonged to—the fragrance was freshly washed, rich with the clean smell of soap and now with the musky scent of her own arousal.

Her panties were already wet. Whatever her dreams had been, they had stroked her biological need, pushed her cycle to a crackling hum that tingled in her fingertips. Her tight nipples, visible through the thin cloth of the olive green shirt, ached.

Whatever you need
. Ben had promised.

She needed now.

The door opened under her touch, surprising her a little. Natalie hadn’t expected them to imprison her, not really, but the wary voice of experience cautioned her not to let her guard down just yet. Not until she was mated—never until she was mated. When she found that man, the one her wolf would accept, it was supposed to be better.

To be a kind of freedom.

She wanted a taste of that freedom now.

The cabin was quiet. The faintest threads of light pooled through the skylights—she figured it wasn’t that long past dawn.

Her bare feet rustled gently on the rug. She padded down the hall, her skin prickling, breath heavy in her chest as she curled her fingers into the front of the T-shirt. Her heart slammed, a heady refrain that had her pausing to brace herself against the wall and fight for breath.

Her body throbbed. If she stopped right here, if she slid her own fingers against the front of her panties, dragged her fingertips over the aching bead of her clit, she could come right here. Right now.

But it wouldn’t be enough.

She wanted more. She wanted to be touched, to be needed. Filled.

Filled to breaking.

A small sound from an archway across the hall sharpened her gaze. Her nostrils flared. She drew the air into her lungs, senses snapping to attention as two new scents earned her wolf’s panting focus. Males. Two of them, mostly unfamiliar. A lingering echo of something nagged at her scattered thoughts, but Natalie didn’t stop to sort it out. It didn’t matter.

She padded to the open archway, fingers sliding along the wall, catching at the corner as she found herself looking into the kind of room she’d have called a man-cave. The type of den that was all heavy, dark furniture, a pool table, bookshelves filled with a mix of books and entertainment.

The remains of a fire glowed in the fireplace, embers glowing dull red among blackened ash.

Sprawled on the sofa, shirtless but with his boots still on, the man she’d seen but hadn’t met lay fast asleep. Alek. She recognized the close-cropped style of his dark blonde hair, the lean athleticism of his build. He was whipcord muscle where Jackson was solid, with skin pale as moonlight. His beautifully defined chest rose and fell with every deep breath.

Natalie’s stare followed the shape of his chiseled abs, the faint glow of his darker body hair as it traced a line into his unbuttoned jeans. They rested so low, she knew without a doubt that he wasn’t wearing anything underneath.

It’d be so easy to ease her hands into that open zipper. Wrap her fingers around his cock, stroke him to an erection. Taste him.

Take him.

Make him take her.

Except he wasn’t alone.

A wolf sprawled on the outer edge of the cushions, his muscular body too big to fit alongside Alek without mashing him into the back of the couch. He was beautiful, with tawny fur tipped with black, and varied patterns of white and gray over his paws and chest. The smell of him, sharp and fresh—a bitter wind on a snowy day—seared through her senses, her lungs, filling her belly with ice and fire.

They were similar in smell. Different, but also the same.

This was Damien, then. Alek’s twin brother, the youngest of the two.

Would they share a face? Would they both sound the same when they came inside her? Her mouth dried. Her fingers twitched.

The wolf’s ears flicked.

Natalie took a step forward, unaware she did until Damien’s eyes opened. They were stunning yellow framed in black, sheened with a golden light that reflected back the glowing embers of the dying fire. His head lifted, smooth and fast. The black line of his lips peeled back, bared his teeth.

Anger. No,
fury
. She could feel it in him, all but sense it on the air between them. A rage so deep, it made a winter storm feel like a beach day. Warning flickered in that stare, and more. Something deeper, something worse.

Fear.

Of her?
For
her?

He didn’t move. He didn’t have to. Natalie froze in place, her heart in her throat, gaze caught by the ferocity of yellow eyes and a soundless growl.

As if he knew, Alek’s eyes flicked open. His head turned, his gaze followed the line of his brother’s glare—God, whatever he thought, it flared like a beacon in the shadows of the den. In stark contrast, the feel of
his
gaze on her bare legs, the liquid slide of it as he traced the line where the hem barely brushed the tops of her thighs, seared her flesh.

Fire and ice. So different, even as they both burned.

Natalie gasped, a breath of mingled fear and desperation. Her pulse pounded so hard, she couldn’t hear anything but the rhythm of her hunger. Frightened, yes, she was that. And nervous.

And uncertain.

But oh, God, she wanted to sink her fingers into that wolf’s thick ruff. Ease her hands over his haunches.

Stroke the softest fur behind his ears.

And when she was done with that, she wanted him to shift into human form so she could do it all over again—this time against his bare skin. Open her mouth over his cock while Alek licked her into stunning release.

She felt so
wrong
.

A footstep thudded softly behind her.

Damien’s powerful shoulders tightened. His body locked down, ears laying flat, as he gathered himself—to leap, to howl, something savage and fierce.

Alek locked a powerful arm across his brother’s chest, jerked him hard against his own just as another arm wrapped around Natalie’s ribs. The wolf whined sharply, but Natalie muffled a startled shriek as Jackson plucked her bodily off her feet and yanked her back out into the hall.

The wall thudded as her shoulders collided with the polished wood, slammed again as Jackson palmed the wall beside her head and corralled her into place. Her breasts flattened against his chest.

His eyes blazed down into hers, wild green and already lit to a hungry gleam.

“Not,” he growled between his teeth, “a good idea.”

Her fingers closed in the front of his T-shirt, pulled the fabric taut against his straining muscles. He smelled, oh, so good. Hot and close and smoldering. But even as she licked her lips, shuddering in Jackson’s grasp, her senses strained for more of the males beyond the wall. Alek’s murmur, low and unintelligible, and Damien’s muted growl combined to twist something up inside her.

Something dangerous and a little darker than she was used to.

Scarier than Ben’s effortless domination. Than Jackson’s unbridled strength as he pinned her in place.

Her voice shook with it. “I know,” she said breathlessly. “I know, but I…” She raised her chin, met Jackson’s stare. “I have to meet them.”

“Meet,” he repeated, a world of subtext wrapped in the word. His hand shifted, eased into her sleep-tousled hair like he couldn’t help himself. The small touch, the warmth of his palm, seeped into her scalp. Her senses.

She shuddered.

“The wolf,” he murmured, “is Damien. Alek’s brother.”

“I remember,” Natalie whispered. Her back flattened against the wall as he shifted closer. One knee eased between hers, separating her bare legs until the hard muscle of his thigh tucked against her. Hot, strong. She sucked in a breath. “He’s…” Angry? Afraid? She wasn’t sure the right answer.

Jackson’s other hand skated across her breast, a feather-light touch at odds with the leg he pressed into her sex. She gasped. “They came to Nico,” he said tightly, his gaze flicking to the study door, “when their pack turned out the weak.”

Her eyes widened. “
They
were kicked out?”

A corner of Jackson’s mouth kicked into a feral line of sharp humor. Maybe it would have scared her once, but the press of his thigh muscle into her sex, the warmth of his fingers as they closed over her breast, kept her too narrowly balanced on an edge between intensity and seduction—sensual hunger and vicious need.

Her blood seared in her veins. Pulsed in her ears.

Arousal dampened the fabric of Jackson’s jeans. His thigh muscle flexed.

Natalie bit back a groan as the flesh between her legs warmed. Her hips tilted. He pressed harder. Ground his leg against her, tucked her hard into that wall until she could feel the ridge of his erection against her hip. His fingers closed over her nipple, taut behind her borrowed T-shirt. She hissed out a shuddering breath.

“Damien was,” he said huskily. “Just him.”

Oh.
Oh, no.

She didn’t need it spelled out. The packs weren’t known to be soft when numbers got too big for the territory. The weak were culled or kicked out, and that was that. Wolves didn’t turn on their packs. Didn’t abandon each other once accepted. Damien was tossed out, and Alek—considered stronger—had given up everything to follow. Earned for himself a reputation for betrayal.

That explained a
lot
.

And made her curious. Made her wolf want to test them harder. Push them farther. Together.

She shivered, back arching to give Jackson unfettered access to her breasts. To bring him harder, hot and unyielding, against her body. It dragged her sex against his leg, forced a low growl from him as she bit her lip and swallowed a moan. She wanted, so much, but this wasn’t enough. It wasn’t what her wolf hungered for.

She grabbed at his arm, fingers digging into his biceps so hard, he hissed out a warning between clenched teeth. “Please,” she whispered. “I have to meet them. I have to…” Touch them. Try them.
Taste
them. She licked at her dry lips.

He blew out a long breath. It stirred the loose waves of her hair by her cheek.

Her nails dug into his arm. “Jackson.”

“I know,” he said huskily. “I know, it’s just complicated.” He looked again at the door, then back to her as if weighing the odds.

Natalie shifted against his leg. Ground herself against him in a wordless plea. Her body clenched.

He eased his leg away. “Okay. Trust me?”

She was nodding before her brain even registered the question.

Oh, yes. She trusted him. Somehow, for reasons she couldn’t place, she trusted him with everything that she was. Her body. Her safety.

Jackson’s hand slid to her jaw. His thumb rasped against her bottom lip. “Then brace yourself, sweetheart.”

J
ackson could feel her shaking
, aware of every tiny breath, gasp and shudder as he turned her slowly around. Pushed her up against the wall and pinned her there with one palm, fingers splayed between her shoulder blades. Her skin was hot through the thin T-shirt. The hem hiked a fraction, bared a sliver of pale white cotton stretched over mouth-watering curves, sexy and so perfect he could barely keep from tearing the T-shirt off her right here in the hall.

But this wasn’t for him.

Not entirely, anyway.

Natalie’s hands thumped against the wall in gentle echo of the heartbeat slamming against his palm. She closed her eyes, her cheeks red with the fever gripping her. With the hunger he could smell on her skin.

He had no doubt Damien could, too. The question was whether it’d be enough.

It was no secret. They all carried a chip on their shoulders, but Damien’s was a little bigger. A little more jagged. Cut with whatever scars left by the fact he’d cost his brother the security of a pack, and Jackson had no doubt that Damien suffered from a caustic mix of jealousy and adoration, gratitude and guilt. It made him fiercely protective of Alek—and divisive as fuck.

Natalie needed them, that much was clear, but could Damien’s wolf handle it? Without hurting anyone?

And worse, if he did hurt her, would Damien survive the regret it’d score in his soul forever?

No.
Jackson’s job was to ensure Natalie’s safety, and the health of his pack. They
all
needed to ensure the health of the pack, and Damien was no exception.
He trusted the twins.

But he’d do everything he could to make damn sure that trust wasn’t in vain.

Jackson sank to his knees. Her fists curled into the wall; her spine tilted subtly, pushed her hips out just enough that he knew she wanted him—whatever he had planned, whatever he wanted to give her, she’d take it. Willingly. Hungrily.

Her pale thighs gleamed in the shadowed corridor. The sun had kissed her face and arms, but faded to her natural color where she’d kept herself covered—and that seemed to him like a crime. That she’d cover this beautiful body, hide herself away.

Never again. Jackson eased his hands up her soft skin, desperate to touch—to feel her, warm and lush and alive. She jerked once, then squeezed her eyes shut tighter and trembled in leashed silence. Her small, breathy sounds of anticipation drew shorter, faster, until his fingertips grazed the edge of the T-shirt—
his
, his wolf growled—and dipped beneath.