Slip of Fate (Werelock Evolution Book 1) (24 page)

“Maybe some tea?” Alex suggested.

Tea did sound good. An eye signal from Alex prompted one of the huge wolves sitting on the patio with us to jump to his four legs and bound off in the direction of the house.

“As I was saying,” Alex resumed, his deep voice smooth and composed, “you’ll see a doctor tomorrow, and we can go over all of your concerns with her, all right?”

I forced a hum of agreement.

“We’ll still consult with Kai, of course. But I procured a female doctor for you because I thought you’d be more comfortable with a woman.”

Oh? “Well, that was”—I struggled for an appropriate adjective—“
nice
. Th-thank … you,” I stammered, apparently incapable of normal speech. I couldn’t help but be wary of Alex whenever he pretended to be sweet and considerate. I had a sneaky suspicion there was more behind this doctor decision than my comfort.

His smile was lazy as his eyes caressed my features. “You are welcome.”

I shifted in my seat. Something about his relaxed, friendly demeanor made me wish I hadn’t drunk so much wine.

I was thankful for the interruption when a man arrived with a tray bearing what appeared to be a fancy, formal tea service and a selection of at least a dozen herbal teas in little jars, none of which I recognized as anything I’d tried before as he politely told me the name of each.

Nope, I’d never heard of any of them.
What’s more, I was sure I wouldn’t be able to repeat the names of any of them even if I could decide on one. I should’ve known better than to think I’d find some regular ’ole Earl Grey or Chamomile in Alex’s fancy stash. The man had a day spa in his bathroom!

I felt my cheeks color with renewed embarrassment when the server looked at me expectantly, awaiting my selection. I was about to tell him I’d changed my mind about wanting tea altogether, when Alex asked if I’d allow him to choose one for me.

I nodded, staring at a fixed point on the tablecloth rather than look at either of them, as I cursed myself internally both for drinking so much wine and for allowing myself to become flustered so damn easily all the time.

I just wanted to escape.
To be alone somewhere with my iPad, flipping through photos of my mom. Why the fuck should I care what any of them thought of my table manners or my lack of fancy-pants wine or tea knowledge anyhow? To do so would be asinine considering they were all a bunch of criminals and I was their unwilling detainee.

It didn’t matter that my grandfather, father, and brother had been servants in his house. I refused to accept or be any part of that heritage. I would find a way out of this whole hellish scenario, or die trying.

The server spooned the tea selected by Alex into a mesh infuser and left, leaving it to steep. I felt the heat of Alex’s hand land on my leg underneath the table a moment later.

“Milena?”

Though I couldn’t pinpoint what it was exactly, there was a distinct quality to his voice and to how he’d said my name that caught my attention, alerting me to a difference in him even before I raised my eyes to find his feral golden ones.

My breath hitched. I’d not seen his eyes look like that since my first night in Brazil.

“Come here,” he beckoned with a tilt of his head.

Without so much as a second thought, I arose from my seat and bridged the small distance between us as his hands reached for me. I found myself sideways in his lap, somewhat baffled as to what on earth had possessed me to instantly do as he bade.

But as his hands ran up my back and his cheek nuzzled mine, I chose to let go of little concerns like sanity and pride. Because a deep, subtly audible purring had begun reverberating through his chest, and the sound and vibration of it was so inherently inviting I was loath to remove myself from his lap regardless of what better judgment might dictate. I nestled closer instead, drawing my legs up as my body curled into his.

This was the solace I’d turned my back on in the little hallway off the kitchen and had felt desperate for since. In the back of my mind I rationalized it was because I’d had too much wine, and because Alex had scared me earlier with his warnings of the repercussions that could come from pissing off his
Cujo
side. But in truth, he simply smelled too good to
not
get closer.

And he felt too good to not touch back. Remembering I had his explicit permission, my fingers uncurled to tentatively press against his warm, bare chest. I both heard and felt his lulling vibration strengthen against my palm. It increased as I slid my other palm up to his shoulder.

He growled into the crook of my neck as his arms tightened around me, squeezing my body into his and forcing the air from my lungs in a half-sigh, half-squeak. His hold relaxed in response, affording me the space to expand my ribs and breathe again. But my body had already stiffened, and my hands remained frozen in place against him as I evaluated whether touching him was such a wise choice after all.

“Don’t stop,” he growled, capturing my earlobe between his teeth.
“Safe.”

Why on earth that one-word edict, delivered in a voice that sounded more animal than human, should reassure me, was beyond rational comprehension. Yet it did, as I realized I did feel safe—moronic as it may have been. And soon my trembling hands were roving his chest and torso, canvassing his impossibly chiseled eight-pack stomach and traveling over his muscled shoulders.

I was oddly captivated by how his muscles twitched and flexed, dancing to life beneath the feather-light touch of my fingers. I was even more fascinated with the sounds he emitted in response to my touch. Every little purr, each guttural groan and grunt spurred me on, feeding some deep-seated, primal need within me that I’d never known before.

With growing astonishment I realized it was more than my own mounting carnal desire, more than an innate, if twisted yearning to return the inexplicable comfort and pleasure his nearness and his touch provided me.
It was power
.

Something I’d never recognized as wanting or needing before. But I knew it was a desire at least in part driving my actions now. For while his responses made me feel important and desired, they also made me feel powerful. And I was discovering how much I liked that feeling. Especially after so much time in a situation where I held so little power, I realized I liked it
a lot
.

Ironically, the louder his inner animal rumbled and grunted in reaction to my exploratory touch, the more formidable I felt. Even as I knew in the back of my mind that I was playing with fire interacting with and tempting his beast side like this, it somehow provided me a glorious, if however incongruous feeling of control to know I could elicit such responses.

And despite Alex’s earlier assertions about needing to protect me from his wolf, who presumably wouldn’t have adequate concern for my feelings or human frailty, I couldn’t shake the intuition that he was wrong somehow, that he had it backward and that his wolf was actually the safer, less predatory of his two natures.

The wolf was instinctual, yes, but that alone didn’t make him dangerous. The wolf was simply more direct, his thought process clear and straightforward compared to the man’s, whose judgment was clouded by ego and human subterfuge. The wolf knew what he wanted; the man was still figuring it out. His wolf nature felt
honest
to me—pure in his intentions.

Unlike Alex’s human nature, the wolf didn’t seem bent on intimidating me through manipulative mind games or sexual prowess. And as intense and savage his feral energy felt beneath my wandering fingertips, I noted it had been markedly easier than ever before to believe him when he’d growled out that I was
safe
.

I could hear and feel his heartbeat pounding more forcefully amidst his growing excitement, and I realized he was exerting substantial effort in order to hold himself in check. I could tell by the way his hands would grip and release me as they cautiously roved my frame. It was exhilarating.
Arousing
.

Then without warning, he licked up the side of my neck.
That
was a little bizarre. It was like a friendly lick a dog might give his owner. It was wet, and it tickled. I giggled. He did it again.

But right when I was adjusting my expectation to what I thought was now going to be playful interaction, he latched onto the side of my neck that he’d licked and began sucking in earnest.
And my whole body burst into flames
.

Suddenly I was the one moaning and making whimpering noises, my fingers yanking at the roots of his short hair, clutching his head to me in a mad, frenzied need to keep his mouth affixed to my neck for as long as I could possibly stand the unbearable pleasure of it.

As I felt his teeth scrape my sensitive skin, his lips and tongue devouring everything in their wake, I couldn’t quite gauge what the hell he was even doing to me; all I knew was I never wanted him to stop.

And when he began to get a little rougher, latching on and sucking my skin harder, his teeth sinking ever deeper into flesh, I heard the crazy sound of my own voice pleading
“yes”
over and over, like a woman possessed.

That was the moment I knew, I was suffering something far worse than Stockholm syndrome.
I definitely wasn’t myself. And yet I felt more alive, more authentic and present than I ever had before.

Then he abruptly, unexpectedly paused. And he growled so furiously against my neck that for a terrible second I feared I was about to become the dead idiot girlfriend from the bad horror flick rather than the gangster film.

Somehow, I held perfectly still and calm with my throat between his trembling jaws as he commenced groaning in agony against my jugular.

Lord only knows what possessed me to do it, but I let my hand slip from his hair, allowed my fingers to slowly caress the side of his face and neck all the way down to his chest, where I pressed my palm over his heart. And I whispered,
“Safe.”

My throat was abandoned. Alex was breathing heavily as his head lowered to fall against my chest. I ran my fingertips gently through his hair, hoping to soothe him, but his head snapped up and he pulled my wrists away.

His eyes were once again black, and his face was a mask of emotions I didn’t recognize. He was definitely upset—angry with me for some reason. When I tried to ask about it, he insisted everything was fine.

“You should go back to your seat now,” he said. “Your tea’s getting cold.”

Huh?
I glanced over my shoulder and noted someone had apparently poured a cup of tea for me while I’d been preoccupied getting the hickey of a lifetime.

“Go on,” he nudged.

Wow!
He’d gone from mauling me as if his life depended on it to kicking me out of his lap in the blink of an eye. Well, he wouldn’t have to ask me twice!

I practically ran back to my own chair. It took a minute, however, for my trembling hands to calm sufficiently before I attempted to pick up my steaming cup of tea. As it turned out, my stupid fancy-pants tea proved to be delicious. I drank it in bitter silence while Alex sulked and pretended he wasn’t sulking.

After a while, he seemed to mellow and we made awkward, idle conversation. He asked me what I wanted to do for the day, and once again I requested to see Alcaeus, Remy, and Alessandra, mentioning specifically that if I couldn’t see Remy today, I at least wanted to send a message to him thanking him for my luggage.

At that comment, Alex casually nodded, then picked up the teapot from the table and forcefully pitched it clear across the terrace, smashing it to smithereens.

Fucking psycho!

“Hey! Know what?” he said with forced cheerfulness. “I think I hear Remy playing a game with some of his friends out in the garden right now. What do you say we go find him and say hello?”

I was still working to scrape my jaw off the terrace, trying to recover from his bewildering teapot violence, but I nodded cautiously nonetheless at his suggestion, thinking anything was better than staying here on the patio with him. And hoping beyond hope he wasn’t lying about Remy being in the gardens.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

We strode through a maze of hedges, many of which opened up into private and semi-private gardens with pretty fountains, sculptures, lounge seating, and quaint dining areas. The ones I was able to view as we passed were breathtakingly lovely.

Alex was leading me along quickly, though, seemingly eager to deliver me to Remy and his friends. As we ventured deeper into the garden, and my heightened sense of hearing picked up what I thought might be Remy’s voice, I was elated that Alex hadn’t misled me and I was going to see Remy after all.

In my excitement, I told Alex that I could hear Remy, and he seemed surprised as well as impressed by my enhanced auditory function. He encouraged me to run on ahead of him and test out my newfound skills.

I followed the sound of Remy’s baritone and was able to make out his voice along with several female ones as I came closer to them. Possibly that third glass of wine spritzer was distorting my perception, but my first thought was that it sounded as if Remy and his friends might be playing a game of
Charades
or
Twister
, or practicing a coordinated dance move … perhaps something acrobatic? Whatever it was, it sounded like they were working hard at it, and that Remy was trying to keep them all focused and …
synchronized
it seemed?

But never in my life could I have guessed what I was to actually come upon as I rounded the final hedge. It was most certainly not
Charades
or
Twister
.

A well-built, attractive naked man was rocking in and out of a woman on all fours from behind. The woman being pleasured from behind had her face planted between the spread limbs of another woman lying on her back. And a third woman was straddling the reclined woman’s face.
It was a ménage a quatre!

And it was well beyond anything I possessed the ability to rationally process. So I did the only thing I could do. I gasped.
Loudly
. Loud enough to completely disrupt the outdoor ménage activity of four unsuspecting naked persons singularly focused on a synchronized orgasm.