Tricks & Treats: A Romance Anthology (9 page)

This room was dark and smelled of leather and wood smoke. Katherine considered switching on the lamp but electricity was still new to Maxwell and the Tungsten lamp would probably be a distraction. She wanted 100% of his attention right now. Besides, wolf eyesight was fantastic and there was a full moon tonight.

Katherine glided across the room to stand in front of a pair of French doors framed between two beautiful wine colored curtains. She clicked open the lock on the doors and pulled them open, then stood enjoying the night breeze as she stared out at the trees that lined the perimeter of Wild River. The beauty of the scene took her aback for a second and she forgot, momentarily, about her planned seduction. She smiled, thinking about all the years she’d spent at Wild River. She loved it here, loved being with her family and running with complete freedom whenever her wolf wanted to be let lose.

This was home, but lately there was a part of her that perked up whenever someone talked about traveling the world or women’s rights. Politics and law stirred something inside of her that made her turn into a fierce defender of rights. According to her father, it was because she was a natural born leader, and according to her mother it was because she was just like her father.

Regardless of why she was who she was, Katherine knew she wouldn’t be content to stay at Wild River forever, nor would she be willing to settle down and start a family anytime soon. She hadn’t even started her life yet. Although, that was going to change right now.

Katherine glanced over her shoulder and smiled coyly at Maxwell who was standing just inside the door, watching her silently. She knew the moonlight glinting off her dress and hair would make for a powerful image, which is why she’d gone to the doors in the first place.

He stepped toward her hesitantly, suddenly very much the boy she knew. Disappointment flooded her, she’d wanted him to be a man tonight. Slowly, without taking her eyes off him for a second, Katherine reached up and pulled the ribbons of her mask, catching the beautiful piece of art in her hands. She put it down on a small table so it wouldn’t get damaged.

“Make love to me.” She turned and spoke the words in a husky voice as she closed the doors behind her and pulled the curtains to give them privacy.

Her words struck Maxwell like a fist. His eyes, already dark with desire, turned mad with lust. All the indecisiveness of the previous moment vanished and the man she craved stood before her. He crossed the room with long strides and swept her into his arms, his soft lips hard with need as they crushed hers.

Katherine’s nerves alit with sensation as Maxwell grasped her skin, touching and sliding with a roughness she’d never felt before, up and down her arms, her neck, her back. His tongue delved into her mouth, tasting her, only to retreat and follow with his teeth. Katherine moaned when he bit into her bottom lip then sucked it, relieving the pleasurable pain.

Maxwell was an animal and she couldn’t get enough. Katherine grabbed at his tuxedo, desperate to feel his skin against her hot, aching body. She had no thought as to what they’d do when it was over, what state they’d be in. She felt only need so strong that it hurt.

Her dress slid to the floor in a heap of red satin, sliding off her skin like the softest of caresses. Katherine stood in a single beam of moonlight that stole through the gap in the curtains and let Maxwell see her as a woman.

She’d worn black lace beneath her dress so that in this moment she could stand before him in only lace and heels and know she’d never looked sexier in her life. The stunned, speechless reaction she got was validation enough.

Maxwell’s hand froze just inches from her body, his eyes flicked down and back up to drink in the sight of her. Almost reverently, he extended his arm and stroked the skin over her breasts, barely touching her. His fingers grazed her fancy French lace bra, making her nipples go rigid. Katherine hummed in pleasure and rolled her head back.

The spell broke. Maxwell pressed his lips to her throat and licked, inhaling her arousal. His hands moved to the back of her bra and worked quickly, unlatching the clasps and freeing her sensitive breasts from their confines.

Katherine dragged her fingernails down Maxwell’s back, scoring his skin and eliciting a roar of pure lust from deep within him. He kissed her punishingly then pulled her head back, his hands in her slicked back hair.

She could see his face in the thin moonlight. He looked like a different person, a hungry wolf hiding inside the body of a man. His voice was gravelly and dark when he spoke. “Is this what you want?”

Katherine wanted to scream “Yes!” but she held it together and bit her lip, nodding her consent and desire to her strange, new lover.

Maxwell’s hands went to her waist and lifted her smoothly up against his body. Shocked, Katherine wrapped her legs around his waist and held onto his neck as he crossed the room and laid her roughly on a large desk that her father used to study.

The wood was warm against her body which felt like it was on fire. Maxwell growled again and grasped the thin lace of her panties, pulling them off quickly and tossing them to the floor. His hungry mouth descended on her, tracing the curves of her body with tiny nips and soothing licks.

When his teeth closed over her nipple, Katherine arched and gasped with the intensity of the pleasure. Maxwell ignored her pleas for “more!” and teased her flesh. She writhed on the desk, gripping the edges to stay quiet, while he slid his devilish tongue into her navel then down to the junction of her thighs.

Maxwell paused just above her most sensitive peak and looked up at her, his eyes almost glowing with hunger. Katherine kept her eyes locked on his as he bent down and licked out the tip of his tongue to taste her.

An explosion of sensations overwhelmed her and she threw back her head and sobbed, wanting more, needing release. Her body was ready for him, the anticipation of this night made everything touch and taste so much more tantalizing. He licked and sucked at her until she couldn’t take it anymore. Katherine reached down and grabbed Maxwell by the hair, yanking him away from her delicate parts. “Now!” She demanded.

Maxwell obeyed. There were no playful bites this time, no licks or kisses to tease and sooth. Maxwell gripped her hips and plunged into her body, while she held on for dear life to the edge of the desk.

Katherine’s body exploded with more pleasure than she’d ever felt in her entire life. Maxwell’s powerful thrusts brought her closer and closer to release with each stroke. Her moans grew as his fingers sunk into the flesh of her hips causing equal pain and pleasure to bloom inside of her. He covered her mouth with his big hand, stifling her cries, and kept pounding into her, taking her to the very brink. Katherine threw back her head and screamed into Maxwell’s hand as her body and mind plunged over the precipice and shattered into a million tiny white stars.

Maxwell collapsed on top of her and shuddered, holding her while they recovered from the most erotic moment of their lives. Katherine grinned into her boyfriend’s hand, which was still over her mouth, and licked out her tongue.

He lifted his head and looked at her, his eyes filled with wonder. “You’re evil.”

She smiled and pressed a kiss to his lips, then bit his bottom lip like he’d bitten her. “Thank you.”

Maxwell stood and reached for her, pulling her up and to him. He nuzzled her neck and placed a kiss on the sensitive spot he knew she loved just under her ear. Katherine purred and wrapped her arms around him. “I love you.”

But I’m not going to stay for you.

The thought came unbidden and she felt so guilty for thinking it after sharing such an amazing experience with him, but she knew it was true. She might not leave tomorrow, or even next week, but she would leave and make something of herself outside the LaFlamme family.

Katherine pushed those thoughts out of her mind and took the tiny piece of black lace Maxwell held out to her. They laughed together as they pulled on their underthings then went in search of their rumpled clothes.

Maxwell’s tuxedo had faired a lot better than Katherine’s dress. The satin was wrinkled beyond repair for the evening, it would need to be ironed. Luckily, she’d had two choices for the evening so there was another dress waiting in her room. It wasn’t as regal as this one, but it was shorter and that meant she could dance in it.

“Here, let me.” Maxwell slid up behind her and slowly ran his fingers up the length of her back, adjusting her straps. He leaned into her from behind and breathed in her love infused scent. It would be obvious to pretty much every wolf present that they’d slipped away for a rendezvous, but there was little to be done about that.

“I have to run upstairs and change. I’ll be back down in ten minutes.” She walked over to the doors to get her mask.

It happened quickly.

The door snicked open, drawing her attention. She thought someone might have wandered over from the party and tried the door, but then a hard object pressed into her right side and a deep voice whispered from behind the heavy curtains.

“Move and I’ll kill you.”

Katherine froze in shock. Her eyes darted down to her waist and she realized the hard object pressing painfully into her skin was a gun.

Katherine felt her stomach, just so filled with joy, flood with dread and terror. She jerked her gaze away from the gun and stared at Maxwell, whose expression was a mixture of fear and fury. He looked like he could tear her attacker apart with his bare hands.

“Make no mistake,” the man stepped into the room, pushing past the curtains so they could see his face, “this gun is loaded with silver bullets.” He pushed Katherine with him, careful to keep the gun pointed at her internal organs, “One shot might not kill you, but it will give me time to put another in your heart and end your unnatural life once and for all. Now you’re going to tell me exactly what I need to know” he spoke to Maxwell, “or I’m going to put a bullet in this little wolf’s head.”

Maxwell stepped forward, unable to stop himself, and the man lifted the gun from her side to her head in one swift motion. Maxwell’s entire body went rigid. His eyes moved rapidly from her face to the gun and back again. Neither of them cared what the man looked like, he was just another filthy hunter in it for the money or acting out of hatred for their kind. Regardless of his reasons, he wanted them and everybody at Wild River dead.

The image of her mother, dressed so beautifully tonight, covered in blood flashed through Katherine’s mind, jarring her from her state of shocked submissiveness. The gun pressed to her temple could kill her, but if she didn’t act now it would kill those she loved. She thought of her little brothers, Anthony, Ronan, and Teagan, not so little anymore but forever hers to keep safe. There were here tonight too, along with just about everyone she knew in this part of the world. There was no way she’d let scum like this hunter hurt any one of them.

Every self-defense and martial art lesson her father had ever arranged for her came flooding back. Katherine brought her right hand up and grabbed the gun, using momentum and his surprise to knock it behind her head. Spinning towards him, her hand still on the cold metal, she reached for the trigger, but before she could get her fingers around the butt of the gun, the hunter wrenched it from her hands.

Maxwell sprang forward, knocking into the enraged hunter like a linebacker. The gun skittered onto the floor and under a chair.

Katherine brought the heel of her hand up and connected with the hunter’s jaw but he saw it coming and moved so it glanced off the edge and barely hurt him. She roared in rage and hoped someone would be near enough to hear.

The hunter and Maxwell grappled, knocking into furniture and furiously beating at one another with fists and anything they could get their hands on. Katherine saw the hunter reaching for something in his pants and yelled, “He’s got a knife!”

Maxwell grabbed the man’s hand and shoved it away but not in time. A silver knife flashed in the moonlight and Katherine screamed as blood gushed from her boyfriend’s arm. Maxwell grabbed at his arm and roared, then looked down for a second to see the damage. Katherine watched in horror, too far away to stop it, as the hunter grabbed a heavy vase and smashed it over Maxwell’s head.

Maxwell crumpled to the floor in a heap, his arms gushing blood, and Katherine heard a shriek of fury. The echoing sound seemed to come from everywhere at once. Inside her head, all thoughts vanished and she moved, instinctively, at the hunter who was still brandishing the now blood covered deadly weapon.