Chapter 45: 45. Wet Dreams and A Stalking Mate

Four shapes stood around the massive bed I laid on.

The firelight caught Soren’s dark hair. Mercer’s jaw was tight but his eyes burned. Quinlan had a small smirk blooming on his lips. Jericho’s shadow blotted out the light.

They were all naked.

My heart hammered against my ribs in frantic beats.

"What are you..." I stammered, pushing myself up on the pillows. The sheets slipped, revealing that I had nothing but a thin, silk slip of a gown. It clung to my breasts, the hem riding high on my thigh.

I didn’t recognize it. I didn’t own a single silk gown. And I knew better than to wear something like this in a house full of grown men.

What was happening? The last I remembered, I was... I was...I couldn’t remember.

"Get out of my bedroom," I ordered, surprised at how steady my voice sounded, even if I didn’t.

Soren moved in, eyes shuttered. His fingers wrapped around my ankle. "Your nipples are hard, Adams."

A flush swept from my stomach to my cheeks. The slip felt too tight against my skin, touching me in places I never had before. I felt a wet, slick warmth between my legs.

I tried yanking my foot out of Soren’s grasp, but it was firm. His fingers were rough, calloused, and they traced the bone there up to my calf. "You’re a fucking tease, you know that?"

I sucked in a sharp breath as the bed dipped beside my waist and I felt Mercer press in close to me, his thumb skimming against the thin hand of the strip, causing the silk to rasp against my nipples, pebbling them.

A tiny sound escaped me and my hip bucked.

Quinlan laughed a soft sound that dragged down my spine like a caress. He was on the other side of Mercer, his thigh brushing mine. "So defiant. And yet so pliant, arching that pretty back for us."

My mouth was dry and my tongue felt thick. "You’re way in over you head," I said, but my body betrayed me, my spine arching even further. My breasts strained, the outline of my nipples clear against the pale fabric. The silk slipped all the way down my thighs and bunched around my hips.

"Fuck," Jericho breathed in a gravelly rumble.

Soren’s hand slid higher. To my knee, then pushing inward. He parted my thighs. The cool air of the room hit my skin and the heat of their gazes hit my core.

I was open. Bare underneath. Naked. Exposed to four hungry gazes.

I was terrified. And yet, a raw, thrumming need hollowed my stomach.

To no one in particular, Soren ordered, "Kiss her."

Mercer leaned down. His thumb caught my bottom lip and tugged down. My chest heaved against his. Up and down. I expected it to be harsh. Cruel, like he usually was. But his mouth opened mine softly, his tongue sliding along the seam of my lips before pushing inside.

A moan climbed up my throat. My hands found Mercer’s shoulders, digging into his skin.

The kiss deepened, turning wet and messy. It became angry and passionate, like Mercer was. Mercer’s teeth grazed my bottom lip, his tongue stroking mine, deeply, slowly. I felt Quinlan’s hand on my hip, Soren’s tracing the instep of my ankle, Jericho’s teasing the curve of my breasts. It was too much.

When Mercer broke the kiss, I was panting, and a shameless needy sound broke past my lips. "Please."

Quinlan was there. "My turn."

He didn’t kiss my mouth. His head dipped, his mouth finding the peak of my breast through the silk. And he sucked.

The sensation was sharp, electric, pulling a thread of pleasure straight to my centre. I cried out, my legs spreading wider.

Soren’s rough, wonderful fingers, found my inner thigh, then higher, until I felt them push against my folds. I gasped at the light brush, as he gathered the pool of wetness on two fingertips. "Dripping wet," he commented, before plunging a finger inside me.

My body bowed off the bed and—

I jerked awake with a gasp, heart thundering. 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

My eyes were wide as I looked around my bedroom. I was alone. I was... alone. My bedroom door was still locked and the chair was wedged behind it. I glanced down at myself. I was dressed in my pajamas.

My thighs were trembling. Sweat coated my skin. And between my legs, no matter how hard I tried not to acknowledge it, there was a raw, demanding ache blooming there.

I was wet. My pants were soaked, slick. The sheets were soaked in my sweat.

My nipples were hard against my pajamas shirt.

I turned to the mirror and found my eyes wide with terror, my pupils dilated with lust, and my cheeks flushed.

Perhaps, it was that Brynn’s lectures sank deeper into my subconscious than I realized, but I needed to get rid of the heat burrowing under my skin. I felt the thing in my chest stir.

It wanted something. It wanted them.

My insides clenched tight and I gasped. The friction of my nipples against the cotton material of my pajamas made me non—actually moan—like some heat-struck animal.

I hurtled for the bathroom, trembling like an addict who had gone long enough without her fix as the lance of fire burned hot. I wanted to rip my clothes off and run out into the hallway. I wanted it hard. Fast.

Goddess above.

I turned only the freezing cold shower and stood underneath without taking off my clothes.

The water sizzled on my skin.

The fire inside cooled, but it didn’t go away, not even when I almost turned blue from the cold.

I needed an outlet. So, I found the first running gear I could find, pushed my feet into a pair of sneakers, and I went for a run, at exactly 4 a.m in the morning.

I might have been frightened, but the Lycans’ estate was safe and protected. No one would be crazy enough to trespass anyway. Not if they wanted to turn up dead and dismembered.

I started slow on the forest trail, but my legs began moving faster. Harder than I thought ever possible.

Trees blurred past me. I leaped over fallen logs without thinking, caught a low branch and swung myself up to the next branch, before landing gracefully like a cat.

I laughed, staring at my hands and legs, a startled laugh bubbling out of me. Oh my god. It felt amazing.

The thing inside me stretched, alive and hungry for more.

I ran even harder, faster, the wind whipping my hair as I leaped even higher, swung easier with an impossible upper body strength. It was exhilarating. I felt free.

I didn’t know how long or how far I ran, before I completely depleted the energy and heat inside me, at which point the creature inside simply shut her eyes and went back to sleep.

And I became ordinary again, falling off a branch and landing on my ass. "Ow," I whined, looking around.

None of the trees looked familiar. Just how far had I run?

It took about ten minutes of backtracking before I realized I was walking around in circles.

Chest heaving, I began trying to follow my scent back. But it was all over the place. And just when I found a trail of footsteps to guide me back, the hairs on the back of my neck prickled.

I was being watched.

I whirled and my heart stopped cold.

"Maisie."

Cole Douchebag Hayes stepped out from behind a thick, oak tree. He looked like hell. His green eyes were bloodshot with circles underneath them, hair messy and tousled, his clothes rumpled. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days.

I stumbled back. "What are you doing here? You can’t be here."

"I... I miss you," he said hoarsely.