Wolf's Bliss (Paranormal BBW Erotic Romance, Alpha Wolf Mate) (3 page)

Our relationship, of course, had fallen apart long
ago. He couldn’t handle my bizarre work schedule; it became harder and harder
to make time to see each other. After we’d broken up, I’d put on a bit of
weight. I was always a curvy girl to begin with, but the breakup took a toll on
me. I stopped going to the gym (which I already rarely did anyway) and started
ordering delivery a lot more. It was the one small luxury I could afford.

Over that same time, I’d taken on more hours at the
hospital, so my free time had dropped down to basically nil. I spent my few
hours of free time either lounging around or sleeping, completely exhausted
from work. I still wasn’t over Brad, and hadn’t given a second thought to men
until the encounter with Caleb the night before.

Caleb had changed things. What was it about him that
had so possessed me, had grabbed me so completely? It wasn’t
just
his
looks. Sure, he was shockingly handsome, his body large, but agile – athletic
some might say. He was tall, with dark, dark hair. But it was something beyond
his physical appearance that had captured my attention.

I tried repeatedly to turn my mind away from this
course of thought, but the more I drank the more impossible it became. I
replayed the events of the previous night over and over again, hearing the
words spoken by his smooth voice, oddly enough with a bizarre hint of a growl
underlying its calm tone.

He exuded this intense confidence, a faith in
himself, both his capabilities and his aims. But there was something else I was
attracted to: his dominance, his commanding nature, how I’d found myself
powerless when confronted with his demands. There was some sort of animalistic
attraction I felt towards him, primal and inexplicable.

Then there was the wolf thing. I shook my head and
poured myself another glass of wine. How could I make sense of
that
? That
was the part that truly scared me, that made me fearful that any second he
might show up at my door. He was unpredictable, a wildcard. And what was I to
make of the story about him fearing for his life in the hospital? That was
another piece of the puzzle I hadn’t quite been able to place.

I was way too drunk now, and soon enough I was
passed out on the couch. When I finally woke up it was 4:30 AM. Dammit, I
thought to myself. This is totally going to throw off my sleep schedule.

I got up and decided to take a shower. When I was
done with that, I made myself a quick breakfast. I had errands to run, but the
stores weren’t open yet, so I hung around the apartment for a while, reading a
book I’d just bought and drinking a cup of coffee. Daylight was breaking, and
pretty soon I’d be able to go about my day.

I’d need to make sure to be in bed sometime around
three or four o’clock if I didn’t want to be too exhausted for work the
following night at 11 PM. Such was my life on the third shift.

***

When I woke up around 9:45 PM, I was tired, but at
least I had the willpower to drag myself to work. I hopped in the shower and
heated up some of the leftover delivery food for dinner. After eating I was on
my way, only making a brief stop at Starbucks to grab a latte before my shift
started.

As soon as I entered the hospital my nervousness
returned. There was every reason to believe that if Caleb wanted to find me, he
would come here to do it. I was on high alert all night long as I made my
rounds and carried out the duties of my job.

But when I left at 9 AM, I found that everything had
gone smoothly. It was a perfectly normal day of work. The rest of the week went
similarly. No surprises, whatsoever.

In fact, everything was exceedingly typical over the
next couple of week. I got back into the familiar rhythm of my work schedule. I
never forgot about Caleb and the kiss we had shared, but the threat, that
element of unpredictability seemed to disappear entirely. I figured he had
moved on, escaping from whatever danger he’d been concerned about. Apparently, he’d
forgotten all about me.

The strange things I had witnessed that night seemed
vague to me now. Had I really seen a man transform into a wolf, or was it my
imagination? In hindsight, it
did
seem likely that my mind might have
been playing tricks on my given the stress I was under that night.

It might sound odd, but something about this struck
me as disappointing. Yes, despite all the nervousness and anxiety I’d felt, the
underlying intensity of what I’d been through had excited me. Maybe it was the
sick thrill of helping him escape from the hospital or the spontaneity of the
kiss, but that night had offered respite from what had otherwise become a
somewhat boring, routinized life.

I know that’s weird to say. I should probably just
feel contented just to be safe, right? But it didn’t end there. Right when I
thought I was in the clear, he showed up again.

It happened on an otherwise normal evening about a
month after our first encounter. It was my night off and I was engaged in my usual
day-off activity, some wine and a reality TV marathon. I’d saved a bunch of
episodes up on my DVR during the week and now it was time to kick back and
relax.

I’d ordered food around an hour ago. So when I heard
someone ring the doorbell to my apartment, I buzzed them through the locked
outer door of the entrance to building. About a minute later there was a knock
at my door. I hurriedly ran over to open it, not bothering to look through the
peephole.

As I swung the door open, I had a momentary feeling
of dread sweep over me. Before I even saw him, my body was overpowered by
anxiety. It was as if I was frozen in time. The process of opening the door had
initiated a sequence of events I was powerless to turn back on. I knew he was
standing there before he even came into view, felt the powerful attraction of
his desire before he even laid those blue eyes on me.

“Hello, Ali,” Caleb said calmly, a smirk on his
face. “Miss me?”

I was about to scream when he put a finger to my
lips and gave me a glare that told me that doing so would be a bad idea. I
covered my mouth to muffle my cries.

He touched my shoulder and ran a hand down my arm
sensually.

“Got anything to drink?”

I nodded.

“Good. I can help myself. Why don’t you have a
seat?” he said, walking into my apartment uninvited and waving a hand towards
the couch in my living room.

He walked into my kitchen and found the bottle of
wine.

“Got anything stronger?” he asked.

I nodded again, indicating with my eyes the top of
my refrigerator where I kept several liquor bottles, mostly for making drinks
with my friends on those rare nights when we went out on the town.

Caleb looked through the bottles before finding
something he liked. He selected a bottle of vodka and took a glass out of my
cupboard, pouring several shots into the glass and tossing in a few ice cubes.

“You want one, too?” he asked casually.

It was a weird dichotomy. Here he was, showing up
uninvited and unannounced, yet he was acting as if it was his apartment and not
my own. But I felt incredibly anxious and I nodded “yes” hoping that a drink
would calm my nerves and help prepare me for whatever was to follow.

He walked over with the two glasses and set one down
in front of me.

“Cheers,” he said, holding up his glass.

He took a deep gulp, emitting a sigh of pleasure at
the biting coolness of the vodka. I took a sip of my own drink, far too strong
for me, the alcohol numbing my throat. But I liked the distraction it provided,
so I took another sip, bigger this time. I felt my pulse slow slightly from its
peak. Finally, I felt calm enough to talk.

“What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to see you,” he said, as if that was a
perfectly normal reason given the circumstances.

“How did you find me?”

“It wasn’t hard.”

“How?”

“Your scent. I’m drawn to it. Impossible for me
not
to be.”

“That’s weird,” I said, my nerves returning.

I took a sip of the cold vodka to settle them down.

“Not for me,” said Caleb, matching my sip with one
of his own.

“What the hell are you?” I blurted out.

“A werewolf. A shifter. You can call it whatever you
want. But you know what I am; you’ve already seen both sides of me.”

“Why did you come here?” I asked, feeling scared as
I realized that my mind
hadn’t
been playing tricks on me.

How could there possibly exist someone, some
thing
like Caleb in real life? Wasn’t this fantasy?

“I’ve already answered that question. I wanted to
see you.”

“But why did you want to see me?”

He pushed a lock of my hair behind my ear, bringing
his face closer to mine.

“I guess you could say I want to finish what I
started back at the hospital.”

I flinched, feeling small next to him, wanting to
run or hide. I still had so many questions. There was no understanding him, no
unraveling the mystery of the creature that stood before me. I felt powerless,
lost and confused. I wanted him to leave right now, to forget about me and I
about him. But deep inside I wanted something else – something I couldn’t even
admit to myself at this moment.

“I can tell you want to ask me something,” said
Caleb. “Go ahead, ask away.”

“No, I don’t. I just want you to leave me alone.”

“Ali, I can read minds. Don’t try to fool me, because
you can’t.”

I couldn’t exactly tell whether he was joking or
not.

“Why now? Why wait until now to track me down?” I
asked.

I heard my own voice and recognized a note of
sadness, or disappointment, as if I was bothered by the fact that he hadn’t
come to find me
sooner
. I hadn’t intended it that way, but my voice gave
resonance to my unconscious desires.

“I had some things to deal with,” said Caleb, taking
another sip of his drink.

“What things?”

“Well, not so much things, but persons, other
shifters. I had to avenge myself – to kill the ones who put me in the hospital
in the first place,” he said calmly.

“Who were they?” I gulped. “And why did they hurt
you?”

“They are wolves I used to consider my closest
allies, but they betrayed me. I had no other choice but to end their lives.
They turned on me that night, cornered me. It was two versus one, an unfair
fight. I fought them off, but sustained heavy wounds. I escaped into the park,
but the damage was done. You know the rest. Someone found me lying unconscious,
that’s when I was rushed to the hospital.”

“Why did they betray you?”

“They thought I was becoming too powerful, that I
was becoming a threat to their livelihood within the pack.”

“Are we in danger right now?”

“No, I was careful to come here undetected.”

“But there are still others after you?”

“Yes,” he said calmly. “Needless to say, there are
some shifters who aren’t pleased with my decision to kill those two. I expect
someone will come for me sooner or later. But I won’t let that stop me from
living my life. I’m alone in this world now. I need someone I can count on.”

There was a note of sadness in his voice. It might sound
strange, but I could feel his loneliness, could tell that he needed comfort and
tenderness just like anyone else. I reached out to squeeze his hand, a small
gesture of intimacy. The feeling I encountered was one of strange intensity and
vitality, I felt alive again at the slightest touch of his skin.

He looked over at me next to him on the couch,
leaning in towards my neck and inhaling deeply. I felt his breath on my skin
and sighed to myself.
What the hell was I doing?
I thought to myself.
Was
this all just a big mistake?

I felt him nuzzle my neck and that simple sensation
made me notice a certain wetness growing between my legs. He was a complete stranger,
a dangerous mystery completely unknown to me, and yet here I was, undeniably
attracted to him, unable to avert my desires, to slow the flood of lust that
was rolling through my waiting body.

He moved his face up from my neck after a while
pulling
me
in for a kiss, long and sensual. He maneuvered my body on the couch, pressing
his muscular body down on top of me so that I could feel his big heart pounding
in his chest. Images from the night I’d helped him escape flickered through my
head. Somehow, now that it was happening, this outcome seemed inevitable, that
first kiss we’d shared hinting at the pleasure to come.

Caleb hard risked a lot to come find me; he was
risking a lot by being with me, just as I’d risked a lot on the night when I’d
helped him escape, the night he first revealed to me his true identity. Even as
we kissed, I knew that the danger was still great.
Was he to be trusted?
What
about those others who were after him, would they come for me too by my mere
affiliation with him?