Pretty Poison (22 page)

Just not today. Not much.

He maneuvered his crutches around an obstacle course of chair legs, pool noodles, and clumps of wet beach towels the pack’s whelps had abandoned. And shivered under Wade’s avid stare once he’d navigated to the sun-warmed cement around the hot tub.

His dick stirred in his swimming trunks.

His mate was gorgeous. Wade had defined sexy to Noah, even before they’d fully mated and bonded. Any man or women would feel the alpha’s pull, shifter and human alike. His thick untamed hair poured like a black waterfall down the proud line of his back. Kissed bronze from working outdoors, his broad shoulders begged to be caressed. Stroked. Tasted. His full lips had been made to be licked, the interior of his mouth hot and sweeter than the finest wine. But it was the eyes that held Noah captive, the red glints in Wade’s hungry, silent regard jellying his legs and spiking his pulse.

Wade’s gaze could eat Noah alive, swallow him whole, and when his mate did that, took him into that skilled mouth to suck Noah’s cum from his dick, Noah was glad to be consumed.

Setting his crutches aside, well away from errant splashes, Noah dropped his ass to the paved edge and sat, facing his beautifully ruthless mate on the other side of the hot tub. He dangled his legs in the frothy water, up to only the top of his calves despite the sardonic arch of Wade’s eyebrow.

“Come here,” Wade said on a growl that brooked no argument, corded arms widespread and draped on the lip of the Jacuzzi.

Noah licked his suddenly dry lips.

His mate was naked in that tub. If Noah reached his hand down, he knew he’d find his alpha’s bare cock jutting. Noah curled his fingers on the cement, the remembered weight of his lover’s dick heavy in his palm. Wade’s whispered orders echoed like phantoms in his ears to make it slow, to scrape his teeth on the mating bite as Wade liked, to grip him tighter. There was nothing Noah wanted more than to slip into the hot water, nestle against his mate, and kiss that water-dabbled shoulder, marred with the pinpricks of Noah’s keen wolf’s teeth. Pleasuring Wade, obeying and satisfying him, was such a lovely ache.

But he shook his head.

“Shy, little wolf?” Wade curved his lips and pushed from the side of the hot tub. He rose from the water, bubbles teasing his waist and cruelly robbing Noah of the sight of his mate’s hard dick. Water soaked the pelt of Wade’s chest, droplets gathering to spike his lashes as his confident stride split the water separating them. “You can’t hide the scent of your desire from me.” When he reached Noah, big hands settling on Noah’s thighs, Noah trembled. Wade angled his chin at the others. “Nor from them.”

Though the pack shifters averted their attention and pretended to ignore both Noah and their horny alpha, Noah’s cheeks burned. “I can’t.”

Wade skimmed his fingers under the hem of one leg of Noah’s swim trunks. “Would you rather I tug your ridiculous shorts down and suck your pretty cock?” The alpha nudged Noah’s thighs wider and heart pounding, Noah spread. A moan locked in his throat when Wade brushed his fingertips over Noah’s balls. “Or bend you over right here and now?”

The red sparks in Wade’s eyes indicated that the questions were genuine, tripping Noah’s wayward breath. Wade leaned forward, lips skimming Noah’s taut stomach. “Your blushes arouse me, but there’s no need for your embarrassment.” He circled Noah’s belly button with a long, wet lick. “Few shifters have bothered to dress. You see that.”

Tearing his gaze from Wade’s dark head to survey the pool area pained him, but Noah had to admit Wade spoke the truth. Shifters weren’t modest by nature. Why hide nudity all would see every month at the full moon and with every shift between?

Sex wasn’t always private, either. Wade had fucked him at every hunt since their highly atypical first and would continue to do so, with Noah’s enthusiastic approval. Noah wouldn’t give up the thrill of being chased by his mate when Wade’s wolf neared the surface. His ass clenched at the memory of his alpha’s predatory stalk, of Wade pinning him down under the glow of the moon...and under the unblinking stares of some shifters as well, those who steeped in the sex scents and sounds of the alpha coupling to stimulate their own mate hunts. Wade had fucked him by the pool before, too, not the furtive hand jobs underwater or the blowjob Noah had tried to hide under towels, as if the pack wouldn’t notice his head bobbing on Wade’s lap? A happily bonded and virile alpha was the herald cry of a strong pack, though. If Wade sometimes prized the pack’s confidence in them above Noah’s very human sense of discretion...Well. Noah had never stopped him. Noah didn’t like being in charge, preferring Wade’s control over him when they fucked. That electrified Noah, every time. That didn’t mean he had no say in what they did, though.

Still, the entire pack chattered and played around the pool, dozens of shifters and their children. Shifter whelps weren’t human any more than Noah was, but Noah didn’t care that shifters considered sex a natural act, one to be celebrated rather than hidden as if shameful. He drew the line at fucking in front of kids and he’d black the eye of any shifter pair who coupled in front of his children.

Wade sighed from the water. “Join me,” he said, scraping his knuckles along the base of Noah’s cock inside his shorts. He chuckled when Noah gasped. “I need to debauch you.”

Noah’s body instinctively softened, his bunched muscles going lax. Would he ever be able to resist his mate? Noah doubted that. Not for long, anyway. But this time, he must. “No.”

Brows furrowed, Wade studied him with narrowed eyes. Noah didn’t miss the glint of bright red in his mate’s stare during the examination of him, either. Wade’s nostrils flared. “You want me.”

Snorting, Noah glanced away. Want him? Noah couldn’t remember when he didn’t crave his alpha, his lover. His love. “I can’t go into the hot tub,” he said.

Unaccustomed to being defied, especially in front of his pack since Noah broached his objections privately to show his unwavering support of his mate, Wade crossed his arms over his wide chest. “Why?”

Happy joy filled Noah, finally allowed free. The secret he’d carried these past days, when he hadn’t kept anything from Wade since...forever, was his most precious treasure and miracle, but hiding the news had also been an anchor around his neck. Curiously, now that the time had come to share, Noah couldn’t say the words. They stuck in his throat along with the giddy anxiety that clogged his chest.

He couldn’t speak so he grabbed Wade’s wrist, gently withdrawing his hand from the leg of his swim trucks. He flattened it over his stomach instead.

“What?” Wade regarded him quizzically, his lust mixing with confusion. And concern. “Whatever is—”

His hand jerked. His eyes rounded as comprehension sank in, first with stunned shock, but quickly following that, stark terror. “Trudy,” he shouted, his husky tenor no longer seductive. His voice rang out in shrill alarm, strident. “Trudy!”

Noah’s words abruptly unstuck. “It’s all right, Wade.”

“No, this Goddamn isn’t.” Wade somehow managed to heave his slick form from the hot tub without moving the palm splayed over Noah’s lower abdomen. “You are going to shift. Right now. Where I can see you.”

Amused, Noah snorted. “I will not.”

Before he could register the wet dousing him, Wade yanked him into his arms. “It isn’t a game, Noah. You’re healing. There are limits to what you can do, what abuses your body can cope with. Don’t be stubborn, not about this.” Endearingly, the alpha’s face paled to bloodless alabaster when Noah stared wordlessly up at him. “Shit,” he said, then looked around them in urgent appeal. “Trudy, for the love of God.”

“Calm down.” Trudy appeared at Wade’s elbow, bare-breasted and with a towel in a negligent twist around her waist. Her nipples played peek-a-boo through her curtain of blonde dreadlocks. When she lifted her hand, she clenched the pre-loaded piercing gun in her fist. “Here. You’re all set.”

When Trudy pushed the tool at Wade, he stumbled back, dragging Noah with him. “No.” He gaped at Trudy, then at Noah. “No,” he repeated, pulling Noah against him, Noah’s back to Wade’s dripping front. He clutched his arms around Noah, holding him tight. “His wolf hasn’t totally recovered—”

“Only two,” Noah said, nudging Wade to force the room he needed to turn in his embrace and face Wade. “Trudy used ultrasound equipment at Vanguard to confirm it yesterday. There are only two.”

“Our treatments and proper shifting have fortified him considerably. Physically, he’s as capable and healthy as he’s ever likely to be. His body can handle the burden of two,” Trudy argued, piercing gun out-stretched. “If he carries to term, we’re only talking about sixty days. With his history, not shifting for sixty days should be a cake walk, easier on him than most.”

Ignoring the healer, Wade frowned down at Noah. “The pack accepted you and our mating. Where’s the hurry? We have years to fulfill our obligation. I already named Chase as the next alpha so we need never meet breeding expectations at all. Have you thought of that?”

“Would any other alpha mate wait to perform his or her duties to the pack? To you?” Noah cupped Wade’s smoothly shaven cheek. “I can do this, Wade.”

Wade squeezed, his grasp around Noah as snug as any viper’s. “I don’t care. Why won’t you understand?” He shook Noah. “If the pack demands children, then they can find another alpha to lead them. Nothing is worth risking you.”

Spine stiffening, Noah straightened. He squared his shoulders. “I’m not weak.”

“I never thought you were weak,” he said, fingers digging into Noah. His low voice rang with sincerity. “Never.”

Stomach twisting with bitter disappointment, Noah jerked his shoulder to try to break free. Wade held on more fiercely. “What about crippled?”

“No,” his mate shook his head once, vehemently. He leaned down until his dark eyes became Noah’s whole world. “You were ill when I met you. Suffering. They’d poisoned you for over half a dozen years. You needed help, but at no point did I believe you were weak
or
crippled. Since you were four, you didn’t stop fighting. You learned, more than most shifters do. You gambled on anything that might push your recovery ahead, and when you’d taken human therapies as far as you could, you adapted. You struggled to make a life for yourself even after this pack failed you. You never gave up. That isn’t weakness, little wolf. That’s strength, Power.” His lips curved. “Enough to lure the mating bite of an alpha.”

Gulping, Noah swallowed down the joy and relief balled in his throat. He’d suspected. Regardless of Wade’s motivations for forcing his family to honor the mating pact and tearing Noah from the farm, Wade’s wolf wouldn’t have accepted Noah if that wolf hadn’t judged Noah and his damaged, poisoned wolf worthy. The beast within Wade hadn’t hesitated. Wade hadn’t bitten Noah to mate them as much as Wade had mauled him. Noah hadn’t doubted the desires of Wade’s wolf, not after that bite. Of the two of them, Noah’s tentative bite at Wade’s shoulder had been the more uncertain. Wade’s wolf hadn’t suffered the same distrust and insecurities that had plagued Noah.

Noah hadn’t been as sure of Wade, the man.

“I have to do this.” Noah swept his gaze to the silent crowd of shifters watching them. “I’m no better or worse than any of them. I’m not a burden to you or this pack, but shifters won’t believe until I prove that.”

“You have nothing to prove. To anyone.”

“Yes, I do!” Noah smiled sadly, lifting a hand to brush Wade’s temple. “It’s safe here for us. Temporarily.” He glanced at Mia, so damn young and cute with her black pigtails and shiny new prosthetic leg. “Unless we show outsiders in other packs that shifters like me, like Mia, are useful and productive inside our communities. Once I give you the children I’m expected to provide to my alpha, they’ll know I’m capable regardless of my knees and migraines. I’m too valuable to be mercifully put down or hidden in the country like a shameful disgrace.” He tipped his head at the little girl. “And so is she.”

Wade’s shoulders drooped. “But you’re just twenty.”

Sensing victory, Noah grinned, glad when it wobbled only a little. “You probably should have considered that before forcing me to honor a mating pact.”

“I didn’t care about the pact. I used whatever I had to, whatever was necessary to get to you.” Wade’s lush mouth quirked. “Mating pacts. The duty to bear children for the alpha. No wonder humans think we’re barbaric.”

“If you’re saying the expectation to produce a litter of whelps after mating with an alpha is archaic, I agree. That should change.” Balancing precariously on the tips of his toes, he lifted up to brush his lips with his mate’s. “
After
our daughters are born.
After
I prove that being different shouldn’t be a death sentence. Maybe I don’t need to prove anything to this pack, but other shifters are watching us now. They need to see that being different is...okay. Good.”

Wade kissed him, tongue darting into Noah’s mouth to taste. “You don’t even like kids.”

“I like them.” He peered around Wade, at Mia and at Chase standing beside her. “Maybe not those kids. But a pair of our own could be intriguing.” Noah licked into Wade’s mouth. “We’re going to be great daddies, Wade.”

His mate kissed him back, a little greedy, a lot desperate, the wet slide of their tongues familiar but no less a wonder to Noah. “We’ll be outstanding parents.”

“Then pierce him.” Trudy harrumphed. “A barbell in each ear.” She passed the piercing gun to Wade. “His control isn’t what it should be.”

Scared, exhilarated, Noah shook as his mate took the tool from Trudy, and he stiffened to brace himself for the sting when Wade bent to position the silver stud at his right ear. “You realize this won’t make me love you,” the alpha said.

Pain stabbed briefly into the lobe. “I know.” Noah mightily resisted the urge to lift a hand to rub the fresh wound, angling his jaw instead to present his other ear for the same treatment. “But I don’t need to make you love me.”

“You don’t?” Wade solemnly accepted the second silver stud from Trudy. He winked at Noah as he loaded into the gun the extra silver that would help Noah halt shifting long enough for Noah to birth their daughters.