CHAPTER ELEVEN
Kenyon couldn’t stay away, no matter what Himani had threatened, and he knew she would follow through on her threats. His mother was so well protected here by the tigers she had brought with her, he couldn’t get to her. If he’d been able to, he would have killed her. After running wild all night, trying to clear his mind and seeking out Nik’s scent, he returned to Sage’s bedside, unable to stop himself from being near her.
Her face was twisted in a nightmare when he walked in, and all he wanted to do was reach out and pull her into his arms, tell her everything would be okay, that he would find a way out of this. He would break the oath his mother had made, would make the Canadian tigers understand her word had no weight in South Louisiana. Except there was a problem with that entire notion. Her word did have weight. His cousins, his aunts and uncles, they would all follow Himani’s lead, because that was what tradition told them to do. And if she declared her eldest son to be dead and her second born to be leader, it would be so. And if she declared that her second son must mate with a Canadian tiger to strengthen the race, it would be so as well.
He would die before that happened. The only person he planned to mate with was lying in a hospital bed, his name escaping from her tortured lips as her body thrashed in her sleep. Seeing her like that, knowing how vulnerable she was, made his heart break for her. He looked down at his wrist, the X that Himani had drawn through his tattoo with her knife, a pink reminder of the fact that no matter what he wanted, Sage was no longer his.
Swallowing hard, he reached out to push a hair off her forehead. It was a lie. She was his and always would be. She loved him and had admitted that fact, and he would not let her go. Tradition and obligation had brought them together and he would be damned if it tore them apart.
His breath lodged in his throat when her eyes fluttered open, and his heart broke at the smile she gave him. But it quickly vanished as she remembered what had happened and that he’d let her go, betraying her in the worst possible way.
“I didn’t think I’d see you again.” She pressed a button on the bed to sit up, her face twisted in a grimace.
“Be careful. You shouldn’t try to move.”
“I’m fine. Have you found Nik?” Her concern for his brother made him weak in the knees. God, this woman was everything he’d ever wanted.
“I do not wish to discuss my brother.” He sank down onto the bed next to her, careful not to jostle her too much with the movement.
“How about you? Can we discuss you?” Her voice was soft, her eyes haunting, slicing a hole in his chest.
“I’m fine. Good as new.”
She scowled at him, but she didn’t argue, which was one of many signs that he was losing her. Before, she would have challenged him, called him out on his lie. Instead, she sat there, lips firmly pressed together.
“You aren’t going to argue with me?” He folded his arms across his chest and raised an eyebrow at her.
“Is there any point in arguing? You’ve already made your point perfectly clear.” The way she raised her chin at him, her eyes glittering with unspoken anger made him think that maybe all wasn’t lost.
He leaned forward, his hair brushing against her face as he breathed in her scent. His pulse raced just being near her, and he wanted to run his fingers along her face, caress her skin, then lick his way down from her neck to navel. Instead, he pressed a firm kiss to her forehead.
“Sleep,” he ordered, knowing he had to get out of there if he planned to keep any of his sanity. “I will be back before sundown.”
He had to find a way to undo everything his mother had done. If Nik could come back, everything would return to normal, but there had been no sign of his brother. His entire future was wrapped up in whether or not the rightful heir would return, and right now, he wasn’t feeling much like a betting man.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Kenyon didn’t return before sunset. In fact, it was almost midnight before she managed to fall asleep, and she still had neither seen nor heard from him. But she had seen the wounds on her body, had unwrapped her wrist and saw the perversion of her tattoo lying there with a deep X marking through it. So that was how the Maddux clan got rid of unwanted people. They drew an X mark through their destiny. Kenyon’s sister, Melanie, had come in to change the dressing, and she demanded that she bring in a mirror so she could see the damage done at the hands of the tigers, both of them.
Her eyes watered when she looked into the reflection and saw that the dark, deep red lines went all the way from her shoulder to just below her breast. There were four lines in all, the middle two being the deepest. Near the center of those two was a yellow film that she knew to be the infection. That wound was nothing compared to the one on her wrist, the one which made her eyes glitter with tears, the one proclaiming her to be the nobody she felt like.
“They are healing well.” Melanie had offered.
Her voice caught in her throat. “How bad was it before?”
She pressed her lips together. “It was bad.”
The deepest parts of the wounds had been sewn shut, and she had black threads lining those areas. She was sick of looking at herself like this. She had inflicted a lot of damage in her days, but she had always escaped unscathed for the most part. This was something she hadn’t expected. These wounds would not disappear. She wasn’t a vain person, but she hated the thought of Kenyon’s brother’s imprint on her body. Even more so, she hated the fact that the tattoo she’d had for so long, the one she had shared with her soul mate, was gone.
After Melanie dressed her wound, Sage asked for a pain pill, more to dull the ache in her chest than to help with the pain from her wounds. She wanted to scream and cry and let herself be a girl for once, going on about how life was so un-fucking-fair. But she didn’t. She swallowed her pill, thanked Melanie for helping her, and closed her eyes, hoping to find some semblance of normalcy when she reopened them.
There was nothing normal about waking up at two A.M. and finding a very haggard man standing next to her bed. She gasped because she hadn’t expected to see Kenyon standing there. He looked terrible, his face still filled with lines of exhaustion, and it hit her square in the chest. He may claim they were over, that he was setting her free, that he’d removed his mark from her, but the way he kept showing up, hovering over her, looking as if he needed salvation only she could provide, told her he wasn’t through with her yet.
She shifted in her bed, noting how his thick gaze masked whatever was going on inside his head, but his yellow eyes were telling her a story. Longing, desperation, need.
She reached out to touch him, her hand coming into contact with his arm. His skin was ice cold, and she knew he’d shifted tonight. Her skin chilled after she changed back from wolf to human and she knew the tigers had a similar situation with their temperature and blood pressure. She didn’t know why, but she wrapped her hand around his arm and pulled him to her, unable to stand the distance between them anymore.
So much had happened in the last few days, she couldn’t even begin to explain to herself or to justify what she was feeling. All she knew was she needed to touch him, needed to get rid of whatever it was inside him that was driving him to desperation. Even if only for a few minutes, she wanted to take away the pain of everything that had happened. And she wanted one last moment with the man she would always love. That thought was palpable, right on the edge of her mind, as if it were standing in the room with her.
Whatever pain she’d felt earlier was gone, and she was thankful for it when she pulled him toward her and raised herself up enough so she could wrap her arms around him. He let out a low growl, his eyes flickering in the darkness before he steadied himself, his hands on her shoulders.
She wanted him with everything she had inside her, and she knew she shouldn’t. The need for him coursed through her like a drug, and she knew that after this moment things would never be the same. She was giving in to the fact that she couldn’t live without him.
His lips touched hers, dangerously hungry, his breath hot on her skin. She was ready for him, wet for him. She was desperate to wrap her body around him and take away all of his pain.
“I shouldn’t be doing this. You shouldn’t be doing this.” He was careful not to touch her left side even as he climbed onto the bed with her, his weight causing her to sink against the mattress. He nuzzled against her neck, his hand tracing along her ribcage. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You aren’t.” She sank her hands into his hair, twining her fingers into the dark mass, opening her mouth for his kiss, pressing her hips into his. She shivered beneath his touch, her body aching for him.
“I don’t mean physically. I don’t ever want to hurt you.” He spoke the words against her neck, her cheeks, her ears, tracing his lips and tongue along her skin.
The tattoo on her wrist began to burn, sending a wild sensation all through her body. It may be damaged, but like them, it was still alive and well, drawing them to each other. Somewhere in the midst of everything, Kenyon’s shirt disappeared, so she took her time outlining the black stripes on his body, running her fingers along them, memorizing the pattern that was unique to each tiger.
There was something fatalistic about his tone, but she swore she wouldn’t dwell on that right now, not while her body was responding to him and needing him. Her hospital gown was a flimsy excuse for clothing in the first place, and he managed to remove it with ease. Now his skin pressed against hers again, turning her just right so all of her weight was on her right side.
He cradled her against him as his hand slipped down between her thighs. His sharp intake of breath told her how pleased he was to discover she was ready for him. His fingers slid into her pubic curls, then lower to find her clit. For a moment, she stopped breathing when he traced a little circle on her most sensitive area.
She wanted him inside her. She wanted to feel him moving inside her, stroking her, taking her, devouring her. She pleaded, the sound coming out of her throat sounding more like a whimper than anything else. He pulled her to him, draping her left leg over his hip and pressing her back against the bed so nothing would brush against her wound.
Then his fingers moved lower, seeking out her hot wetness. God, she wanted him! She was already quivering and anticipating his touch. When he sank his fingers into her, she shook with delight and clasped onto him while he moved them in and out in long, slow strokes. She could already feel her orgasm building, and there was nothing she could do other than just ride out the waves and let him take her over the edge.
Her nails dug into his back as her pussy quaked around him. He still wore his jeans, but she felt him hard and ready beneath the fabric. She wished she could move, climb on top of him and take him, ride him until the morning. Tame the tiger.
“You are so amazing.” His words slid against her throat as she clung to him, her hips rocking in time with his hand. “You have no idea how badly I want to fuck you right now. I want to show you that you are mine. How much you are mine. How you will always be mine.”
She nodded her agreement. She wanted him to fill her up. She wanted to feel his hard cock press against her cervix and stretch her inner walls as he took her over and over again. The visual alone was enough to drive her over the edge.
“Look at me, Sage. I want to watch you come.”
She opened her eyes and locked onto his gaze. Then she threw her head back in wild abandon as the sensations ripped through her body and her orgasm took her to a whole other level. She clung to him, and she swore she heard him roar a little as she came.
“Oh my God,” she managed, breathless.
“Are you okay?” He pulled his fingers from her body, and she hated the fact that he was no longer joined with her.
“Yes. God, I want to fuck you right now.”
“I don’t think that would be very safe, do you?”
She had no idea what he was talking about. They had managed this much without hurting her. She felt fine. “I don’t think it would be very safe not to.”
“Why? Are you going to turn into a wolf and rip me apart?” He grinned, that sexy crooked smile that she loved, and there was no doubt she still loved him—she would always love him.
“If you think I’m too much for you to handle…”
He shifted a little on the bed and grinned again. “I’ll show you too much to handle.” He unfastened his belt, then unbuttoned his pants. She could see the outline of his cock beneath his underwear once he pulled the waistband of his jeans down a little. “Do you think you can handle this?”
“I think I can handle it like a pro.”
He slid off the bed and removed his pants and underwear. His cock sprang free, hard and protruding from a nest of orange and black curls. The black stripes disappeared into the nest of hair, but didn’t cover his cock. “Move to this edge. Stay on your side,” he directed.
She obeyed, holding onto the edge of the bed to steady herself.
He climbed into the bed behind her and carefully placed his right arm under her side before pulling her flush against him. His left hand slid down her thigh, then raised her leg a little to give him access.
She could feel his cock pressing against her lower back before resting against her pussy. He tilted his hips back a little to give himself room to move. Then, with one long, slow stroke, he entered her. She gasped at the invasion. It had only been a couple of days since the last time they’d made love, but then it had been so fast and so heated. Now, it was slow, languorous.
“This is not how I imagined our reunion would be. Me taking you in some shed and a motel room, then again in a hospital bed. I wanted to fuck you slowly, on your knees, in the woods somewhere, then take you in my king sized bed.”
His words were hot, and she could imagine those scenarios. She’d be lying if she said she hadn’t thought about him during her time away or thought about how it would be when they saw each other again after so long. She, too, had imagined how they would have sex because they ultimately did, every time they were together. Ever since they were sixteen.
His teeth grazed against the back of her neck as he moved inside her. It was the tiger’s way to hold onto his mate’s neck as they had sex, and Kenyon was no different from his animal brethren. He always managed to seek out her neck and nip it with his teeth every time they were together. Feeling his mouth on her, his teeth against her, only added to the eroticism of his movements.
His right hand reached for her breast and teased against her nipple. Her left breast was jealous, pouting in anticipation, but she knew he would be too careful and wouldn’t touch her that close to her injuries, no matter how much she wanted him to.
The bed didn’t give them much range of motion, but he made the most of it, his cock sliding in and out of her, her pussy milking him with each motion, squeezing against him, begging him to find his release deep inside her body. Finally, his teasing against her neck became more forceful and his nips became bites until his teeth clasped onto the back of her neck.
Her whole body quivered beneath the touch and her pussy began to spasm while he moved with a renewed frenzy. Her clit hardened and she wanted to reach down and touch herself, but they were already so tangled on the bed that she couldn’t touch herself without compromising their position, and she wasn’t willing to do that. Instead, she tilted her hips and squeezed her thighs together bringing some relief to her throbbing nub.
“Oh, God, Kenyon!” she cried out as the intensity built up inside her then spilled out, coating his cock with her juices.
He groaned against her, his teeth still clamped onto her skin. Her nails sought out his arm and dug into it as he shot his seed into her. Her pussy clenched, taking every last drop from his body. Then they lay there, their breathing ragged, their bodies completely spent.
He had let go of her neck and was now covering the wet spot beneath her hairline with soft kisses, nuzzling her with his nose. “I think I may have bruised your neck.”
“I think you may have.” She couldn’t help but smile. She didn’t want to move from this spot, but knew the cruel reality would come crashing around them soon enough. He wanted to get rid of her, and it was something she still had to face.