She snarled at him.
What the hell is going on with you? There are at least two wolves out there. Behind you. Are they your friends? Because if they are, buddy, you are in deep shit, because I’m gonna put you there.
Lily? What . . . ?
The nearest wolf charged out of the shadows. It was huge—almost a third again larger than any Chanku or natural wolf Lily had ever seen. Sebastian turned at the last moment and countered the attack. He was large, but the pale gray wolf that attacked was even bigger than Sebastian. And he had surprise on his side.
It missed the killing bite on Sebastian’s throat but managed to clamp down on the loose skin above his shoulders. Sebastian yipped, twisted, and bit down on the wolf’s front leg.
Lily heard the bone snap and winced at the gray’s sharp howl of pain, but she didn’t wait to see the results. Instead, she charged out of her refuge, leapt over the two wolves rolling in the dirt, and hit the second wolf as it raced to help the gray.
Her attack seemed to surprise the beast. He pulled back, but she hit him hard, slashing his muzzle with sharp fangs, rolling him off his feet, and clamping her jaws down on his throat.
He clawed at her with his hind feet, ripping dark fur out of her soft belly as he twisted and turned, struggling to break free. Then Sebastian was beside her. Lily almost lost her grip. Who would he side with—the other males or the female he’d somehow decided to claim as his own?
He bit down hard on one of the wolf’s flailing hind legs. Again, that sickening snap, a howl of pain, and the animal’s attack turned to a mad scramble for escape.
Lily turned the beast loose and backed off. The gray and his darker companion limped away snarling with ears back and tails tucked. They paused in a shaft of moonlight just at the entrance to the canyon, heads down, sides heaving. Blood speckled the muzzle of the gray, but Lily couldn’t tell if the other one bled or not. He did, however, hold his left rear paw off the ground.
The gray favored his right front leg, but he stared at Lily and Sebastian through eyes filled with rage. After a moment, Sebastian snarled and charged the two.
They turned and raced away, each on three legs and limping badly, but still managing a fair burst of speed.
Sebastian slowly turned and walked stiff-legged back to Lily. His eyes were narrow slits, his ears back. Would he attack? Even now, after they’d fought together, after he’d helped her defeat her assailant?
He went flat to the ground, belly pressed to the dirt, and bared his throat. A totally submissive gesture. She’d not expected this, but she’d be damned if she wasted the opportunity. She closed her jaws over his throat, clamped down hard enough to make her point, and then turned him loose.
Lily, I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened. Did I hurt you?
What do you mean, you don’t know? You son of a bitch! You tried to mount me. You chased me here and wouldn’t let me out. Not the best first date I’ve ever been on, that’s for sure.
Oh. But . . . shit.
He looked honestly perplexed. That didn’t make sense. He shook his head, a terribly human act that looked almost comical in the big black wolf.
Who were those guys? I’ve never seen them before. Why would they attack us? Were they after you?
I’ve never seen them, either. But I recognize their scent.
How?
I smelled it a couple of days ago in Golden Gate Park. At the scene of the latest murder attributed to wolves.
Crap.
Exactly. Now, are you going to tell me what happened tonight?
He sat back and stared at the ground between his paws.
I have no idea. My last memory is running behind you. You scared up a rabbit. I remember losing the rabbit in the brambles, racing after you . . . and then nothing.
She stared at him, searching his mind for any sense that he lied, but all she felt was his confusion. What the hell had happened ?
We need to get back.
Breaking their mental connection, Lily trotted a few steps, looked over her shoulder, and waited. Sebastian sat in front of the tumbled boulders where he’d held her captive. She sensed his confusion, his need to understand what had happened to him. What he’d almost done to her.
She turned and followed the trail that would lead them to the parking lot. After a moment, she sensed Sebastian following.
This time she recognized the Sebastian she thought she knew.
But there was another side to him, a dark and dangerous side. She had no idea where it was hiding, or when or if it would break free again.
Trotting along behind Lily, Sebastian couldn’t recall ever feeling as much shame as he felt at this moment. Shame and fear, and an overwhelming sense of confusion. What the fuck happened back there? He’d never before lost himself in the wolf, never once had his sentient human mind disappear during a shift.
Until tonight. Tonight there was nothing but a huge black hole in his memory. Tonight, when he’d finally met a woman who could matter to him, who might understand him, he’d totally fucked up any chance with her. He’d be lucky if she’d let him give her a ride home after this.
The parking lot was as empty as when they’d left it over an hour ago. The moon had settled a bit lower over the ocean, but the shadows were as dark and the night as still. Sebastian trotted over to the tree where he’d hidden the car keys, rose up on his hind legs, and snagged them with his teeth.
Lily waited for him beside the car. She hadn’t shifted yet, and he searched her mind, expecting anger. Disgust, maybe, though he hoped there was no fear. He hated to think he’d frightened her, but there was none of that. No, the only thing he felt was her arousal, strong and rich, drawing him close. Teasing him with her ripe scent, her beautiful dark eyes.
It was too much. He drew inside himself and called on the magic. After an interminable wait, he felt the shift take hold and he stood in the darkness, a tall, naked man staring at a wolf bathed in crimson with strong shafts of iridescent pink.
All colors of sexual desire. A powerful, driving need to mate. His breath caught, stuttered in his chest. Her aura hadn’t been visible to eyes seeing with the wolf’s visual spectrum, but his human eyes now registered the colors, the beautiful aura he would always associate with Lily Cheval.
Damn.
He unlocked the car and reached for his clothing, turned his back, and pulled his knit boxers on, then his slacks. He almost laughed. He’d been hard and aroused when they’d first started out. Shame had left his dick entirely flaccid. He wanted to howl his disappointment, but his wolf had gone silent.
The night was warm, and his body hot from the run. He picked up his shirt and stared at it a moment, debating whether to put it on.
“Leave it off.”
He jerked his head up at Lily’s soft comment. He hadn’t even been aware of her shift, and jealousy spiked through him, that she could do this so easily. She’d slipped that beautiful dress over her head, and somehow she actually looked more naked wearing it than when he’d seen her earlier, unclothed.
Then her words hit him. “This?” He clutched the black shirt in his hand. “You want me to leave it off?”
“Oh, yeah.”
She winked. Lily actually winked at him? She should be furious. Disgusted. She . . .
“Less to take off when we get to my place.”
With that, she slipped into the seat on the passenger side. Sebastian just stood there, feeling like an idiot. Then he leaned over, grabbed his shoes and socks, his tuxedo coat, and his shirt, and threw them all into the back.
He wished he had a clue what she was thinking, but she’d blindsided him with her invitation. Did her body clamor for sex after a shift the way his always did? Imagining Lily Cheval hot and naked and willing was almost more than his libido could handle. What the hell was going on? His thoughts spun and his hands shook as he started the engine and pulled back onto the highway.
They were only a short drive from Lily’s home in the Marina District. He hoped like hell she wouldn’t change her mind before they got there.
The slick fabric sliding across her nipples sent an electric pulse directly to her clit. Lily tightened her shields to keep her traitorous thoughts away from the man beside her, well aware she had to consciously force herself not to look at Sebastian. Not at his gorgeous chest with its perfect dusting of dark hair, an insidious lure that made her want to bury her fingers in its crisp texture. And she knew she’d be caught like a mouse in a trap the moment she focused on the rhythmic bunch and stretch of his powerful arms.
And, of course, like that stupid mouse drawn to the cheese, she realized she was staring, and yes, she was caught. There wasn’t an ounce of fat, not a blemish anywhere beyond a small cut across his very fine nose where she’d marked him when he tried to mount her. No flaw in that coal black widow’s peak over his forehead, or the darkly defined trail of crisp hair disappearing beneath the flat waistband of his black slacks.
Her vaginal walls tightened, clenching against emptiness, flooding the car with the ripe scent of her need. She wondered if Sebastian was sensitive enough to pick up a scent that was embarrassingly strong to her, one she knew a human man wouldn’t even notice.
She clenched her fists and let out a deep breath. Damn it! She had no reason to feel embarrassed. She could no more deny her needs than she could refuse her wolf. She was Lily Milina Cheval, an alpha Chanku bitch, and her libido was part and parcel of the whole package.
If she were mated, if sexual release wasn’t something she only prayed for, it would be different, but she hadn’t had sex in much too long. The last time had been with Alex, and it had been wonderful as always, but it would never be enough because Alex wasn’t enough. She loved Alex Aragat, but he was little more than a precocious child when compared to Sebastian Xenakis.
Lily had always been a stronger wolf than her lifelong buddy and best friend since birth, and both of them knew it.
She needed a man. One who challenged her.
A man like Sebastian, with all his quirks and his strange aura of darkness, with the mysteries she itched to unravel. She wanted his arousal, his sharp edge of danger, and his powerful hunger.
Hunger focused solely on her.
She studied his strong profile, and a shiver ran along her spine. There was something about him that might have frightened her had she been a little less sure of herself, but Lily knew and trusted her strengths. Where her magic might not be enough against a wizard as powerful as Sebastian, her wolf would always protect her.
She turned away and stared out the window as the massive struts of the Golden Gate Bridge flashed by, thinking of Alex, the one constant lover in her life. Where Alex was home and safety, unconditional love and acceptance along with a certain amount of hero worship, Sebastian was dark shadows and danger. Mystery clung to him, a subtle sense of peril that Lily found as arousing as the man’s body.
No, there was nothing safe about Sebastian Xenakis. He’d tried to mount her tonight, but then he’d turned and fought wolves much larger than himself to protect her. He had her so twisted up inside she wasn’t sure what she wanted or what she really believed about him, but one thing was certain.
She wanted him in her bed. Not as a wolf, at least not until she trusted him, but as a man. And she wanted him tonight. Her gaze was drawn once again to his strong profile just as he shifted his eyes in her direction. Even in the reflected lights from the dash, she could tell they were an inhuman shade of teal blue. Nothing of the wolf about them at all, but the slight crinkle at the corners as he smiled at her dissolved the danger, chased the mystery aside.
Was the mystery all in her mind? Was he merely a very sexy, very nice man who just happened to use magic to become a wolf? But, what if . . . ?
“Have you ever been tested?” she asked.
He frowned, but his concentration was on the bridge and the traffic slowing for the automatic tollbooth. “Tested? For what?”
“To see if you’re Chanku.”
He shook his head. “No. No reason. How’s that work?”
Lily shrugged. “You take a capsule that’s filled with specific nutrients for a couple of weeks. Either you shift or you don’t. If you have the right DNA, you can become another creature. The first shift is generally a wolf, but some people do other predators.”
He laughed. “I can already shift, in case you hadn’t noticed.”
She punched his arm. “I noticed. Trust me on that, but I also think you could shift without the magic. Just a feeling. If I give you the capsules, would you take them?”
“I guess. No reason not to.”
He took the exit that led to her home before Lily even thought to give him directions. “You know where I live.”
“Busted,” he said. He glanced her way. “I’ve wanted to meet you. I’ve heard of you. We’re neighbors in Montana, but you’re never there.”
“Rarely. The job keeps me tied here more than I like. I prefer Montana.” She stared out the window as he followed the road to her house. Her mom’s uncle Ulrich had owned the place for many years, but all the family had settled on the compound in Montana years ago, when the world of man first learned that shapeshifters lived among them.
Luckily, the expected backlash hadn’t been nearly as bad as they’d feared, but Tia and Luc, along with the rest of the pack, had decided they preferred living a communal life. It meant the kids could grow up with others like themselves, but it also meant the parents weren’t alone raising children with powers even the adults didn’t always understand.
It was almost funny, now, to think of everyone’s shock when she and Alex and then the others had shifted while they were still so young, but they’d been exposed to the nutrients since conception, and then through breast milk. Unlike the older generation who hadn’t discovered their Chanku heritage until they were already adults, Lily’s was a generation born Chanku.