Her Shifter Kingdom (House of Wolves and Magic Book 5) Read online

  Nina reached out and cupped the side of my face gently, as though she was scared she'd hurt me. The electricity that seemed to flow between us as soon as our skin connected was like nothing I'd ever felt before. Electricity usually hurt, but this didn't; it was energizing and made me want to move. Well, a specific part of me, at least.

  She leaned forward and waited, as though she needed me to meet her half way, which was only fair, but I did more than that. I pushed toward her and kissed her hard enough that she fell back on the bed with a delightful squeak. My wolf ate the sound up and roared to life within me, the force of him so strong it almost made me shift on top of her.

  Her body arched up to meet mine as she pulled me down and claimed my mouth with a kiss. Her soft, pillowy lips were like silk under my own, and I couldn't help but devour her. Lips, tongue, teeth—all of it seemed to clash and meld together until we were moving against one another in a rhythm that was going to have me finishing in my shorts if I wasn't careful.

  Nina's hands slipped down my body and pulled the hem of my t-shirt up until she was able to get it over my head then went to work on getting my shorts down. I'd only put on some basketball shorts when we got back because they were stretchier than most things and more forgiving if I did have to shift fully clothed for some reason. They also made it obvious when I was hard. My cock jutted out, tenting the fabric as I leaned up to let Nina work them off my hips.

  As soon as I was naked, I began the process of undressing her. Fortunately, she hadn't dressed much either. The thin t-shirt she was wearing was sign posting her nipples for me, and though I was anxious to see her naked—to devour her with my eyes as well as my lips—I also wanted to pleasure her more than anything else, so I ducked my head and sucked one of her nipples into my mouth through the fabric of the t-shirt.

  I grazed my teeth over the delicate nub and swirled my tongue around it, making her moan and grip my hair in her hands as though she couldn't tell whether she wanted me closer or not. When I switched to the other nipple, it was already painfully hard, like a pebble under her t-shirt, and as I wet the fabric and sucked on the sensitive skin, she writhed beneath me.

  "Denver," she breathed. Hearing my name come from her lips as I gave her pleasure was overwhelming and made my cock jerk in an effort to get inside her.

  I couldn't wait any longer and pulled her t-shirt up and over her head, exposing her breasts to me before I did the same with the shorts she'd borrowed. The fact that she was going commando under the shorts was hotter than hell to me. Once she was naked, I gently spread her legs and pulled her toward me, my mouth watering at the sight of her glistening folds.

  She was that wet for me. Her body wanted mine just as much as mine wanted hers. I licked from her entrance up through her folds to her clit, where I circled it with my tongue. She tasted as sweet as honey, and the more I licked her the more I wanted to taste her pleasure on my tongue. I slid two fingers into her core and began to thrust in and out of her as I sucked on her clit, swirling my tongue around it as her body twitched and jerked around mine.

  The harder I thrust my fingers into her and the more I sucked on her clit and gently bit it, the closer she climbed to her orgasm. When I switched and thrust my tongue into her core along with my fingers, using my other hand on her clit, she seemed to explode into her orgasm. The guttural scream that was pulled from her only matched my groan as her body gushed with fresh wetness, and I could taste the tang of her orgasm.

  "If you don't get inside me soon, I'm going to scream…again," she said, her voice hoarse from the scream of pleasure a moment ago.

  "As you wish," I replied with a grin and pulled both of us up so we were on the bed properly instead of me being on the floor and her on the bed.

  Her legs wrapped around my waist as she pulled me close. All I had to do was line myself up with her opening before she practically pushed me inside of her, her feet digging into my ass. The hot, wet, tightness of her pussy was almost overwhelming. I had to freeze for a moment if I wanted this to last more than a few minutes.

  When I started moving, the slow, torturous pace I set wasn't something she was willing to put up with for long, and she surprised me by rolling us so she could be on top. As she positioned herself above me, I enjoyed the view of the curves of her hips as I wrapped my hands around them and her full breasts as they began to bounce and swing with her movement.

  The pace she set was faster and rougher than I would have expected and had me trying to recite all the states and their capitals so I didn't finish too soon. I at least wanted to feel her come on my cock first. With that in mind, I slipped one hand around to her front, twisting at an awkward angle until I could reach her clit. I began circling and pinching as she moved, following her and not letting her retreat from my attentions.

  My other hand went to one of her breasts, cupping the weight of it and rolling the nipple between my forefinger and thumb until her head was tipped back and I knew she was chasing her orgasm. For just a moment, I abandoned her breast so I could pick up one of her hands and direct it to her other breast—the one I couldn't reach.

  It put her a little off balance, but the added stimulation seemed to make up for it, and I could feel her core tightening around my cock. I began to push up to meet her thrust for thrust, the sound of our skin slapping together filling the room along with our ragged breaths as we both sought our orgasms.

  The tighter she got, the harder it was for me not to come, and when her orgasm swept over her and made her collapse forward, I supported her. Her body clenched around my cock, squeezing it in a way that was impossible to resist. I pumped up into her a few more times as her body fought to keep me inside, and then I lost it. My balls tightened and my cock jerked as I spilled myself inside her.

  We lay there sweaty and panting, until I gently withdrew from her, making her moan all over again and making my cock try and stir to answer her call, even though I couldn't—at least not yet. I cuddled her up to me and marveled at the mate bond that had cemented itself between us. I'd never felt anything like it, and knew that I never would. This was something special; she was something special—a gift from the gods. One I wouldn't overlook or squander.

  3

  Nina

  When I came out of the shower the next morning, I knew something was wrong. The way the guys were all standing clustered around the small table by the window was unusual, to say the least. Denver had gone out to get some coffee, and the aroma of the roasted beans filled the small space of the motel room, the delicious scent making me hungry.

  There was a small, naive part of me that hoped that they were just gathering around the coffee. But the rest of me, which was more pragmatic, told me otherwise. I’d toweled off in the bathroom but needed to grab some clothes. I wanted to make sure I was dry before I came out, because apparently, watching your mate rub a towel over her naked body was enough to stir some feelings and desires. I quickly dropped the towel and pulled on a pair of jeans and a tank top, followed by a light sweater. As soon as I was dressed and the towel had been hung up in the bathroom so it didn't get moldy, I made my way over to the guys.

  “What are we looking at?” I asked.

  Roman’s gaze found mine first, and the pinched position of his eyebrows told me everything I needed to know. Whatever they were looking at, it wasn't good. Each of them turned around slowly, as though they could spare me whatever was about to come out of their mouths, but we all knew that they couldn't. As I approached, they parted before me like the Red Sea.

  And I saw a piece of paper lying on the table surrounded by coffee cups, the tall white pillars seeming to frame it in a way that made me uncomfortable. It was a little bit like the coffee and paper version of Stonehenge, or at least what I imagined it to be like. Half of me expected letters cut out from magazines and pasted to the paper, but it was just a simple handwritten note. It read: I found you. Come out now or face the consequences. It was signed with a simple J.

  My stomach sank.

&nb
sp; Part of me wondered whether it was actually Jax who had found me. It was possible one of his lackeys had, and this note was simply written on his order: tell her this, do that, shoot this. Jax was very fond of giving orders, but I had yet to see him actually leave the compound.

  Underneath the capital letter that was his signature, there was a small post script that read: I'm giving you this chance. It's the last one you'll have. Come to me.

  I sat down heavily on the edge of the bed closest to the table, and a cup of coffee found its way into my hands. I was grateful for the warmth spreading through my fingers and hoped it would ease the chill that had seeped into my bones. The only thing that kept running through my mind was that my circle of mates was complete.

  Sure, he could kill them, and that would break me in ways that I couldn't quite comprehend. But I knew if he did that, I wouldn't be long for this world either—and I'm sure he knew that too.

  If he took their lives, he would essentially be ripping my heart from my chest. They were each a part of my soul. There was no changing that now. So, to kill my mates, he would also have to kill me. And if he killed me, he wouldn't be able to make me bond with him, and his plans would go completely out the window. So, I wasn't sure what he had to gain from getting me to meet with him again. Although this wouldn’t really be a meeting—it would be signing myself over to him, which I wasn't willing to do. I might be willing to talk, though.

  As he’d said, this was my last opportunity. After this, I knew the guys wouldn't hesitate to kill him, but I wasn't quite comfortable just taking a life for the sake of it. Denver had made a good argument the night before, but there was still something in my gut—something pulling at my heart. Maybe it was the shadow of the bond, but whatever it was told me that taking Jax’s life wasn't going to be as easy as we thought and that if we tried before we were ready, we’d all pay the price.

  If we did decide to take his life, I wanted to be sure we did it in the easiest way possible—in a way that none of my mates would get hurt. Just the idea of them dying and making this all for nothing made my heart hurt.

  I didn't really think the Fates would allow that, but they were also the Fates—they had their own goals and agendas to fulfill, some of which did not include me or my mates.

  “This isn’t how we wanted your morning to go, love,” Blake said.

  “I don't think any of us expected him to find us here in Denver's hotel room, far away from pretty much everywhere else we've been,” I replied, sounding frustrated. I got the sentiment. It certainly was starting to seem like nowhere was safe. The only option we would have, if we didn't kill Jax and he wouldn't stand down, would be to leave the city, the state, or maybe even the country. Even though my mates’ packs had kicked them out, I wasn't sure that was something they'd be prepared to do. After all, those were their families, as horrible as they might be sometimes.

  I looked up at each of them, unsure how to phrase my next statement. “I think I should meet with him,” I said, deciding to just lay it all out there.

  “Why on earth would you want to meet with him?” Roman demanded, his anger making his skin flush red, which was something I very rarely saw.

  “Because I want to give him the chance to stand down. Now that I've got all five of my mates, we may be misjudging how far he's willing to go. Now that I've got you and our bonds are complete, there’s a chance he might back off. I don't want to take a life when we could have spared it. He might be willing to talk. We could set up a meeting, maybe somewhere he isn't familiar with—somewhere new, somewhere not on his compound, somewhere not on pack lands…all that kind of stuff. We can do that, and we can choose the date and time, and we can make him meet us there. That way, we're prepared, and he's not.”

  “I don't like it. I don't like it at all,” Blake huffed.

  “I have to say, I agree with Blake on this one, beautiful,” Micah added.

  “I’m sorry, but I'm with the guys on this one,” Tate said, giving me sorrowful eyes, as though he wished more than anything he could be on my side. When I didn't respond, he added, “I can't risk him going berserker and killing you, us, and everybody else—because that's what he would do. I feel like, if he finds out you've got all five mates, his anger will be unlike anything we've seen before. It'll wash over everything in the area, destroying anything that's in his way or that he doesn't like or tolerate. This whole city would be changed, probably for the worse.”

  “But there's nothing he can do. My bond with you is complete. I have all five of you. He can't stop what's between us.” I wasn’t quite pleading with them, but it was getting close.

  “He could kill us,” Denver said quietly.

  “But he knows if he does that, he'll just be killing me, too. He wouldn't have me. Not really. Not in any way that counts. Sure, he might have my body, but that would be it. My soul, my heart, my mind…everything would be gone with all of you.”

  “You really believe that he won't hurt you?” Roman asked, sounding shocked at my naivete.

  “I've known him since we were kids. He was my brother's friend. He was supposed to look out for me and take care of me if anything happened, which it did. But I didn't even give him a chance to do that. I know it sounds stupid, especially after everything we've been through with him, but now that I've got all five of you, I feel like I need to give him the chance to stand down.

  “If he doesn't, then that's on him. And we can go for him as hard and fast as we want. I will support whatever decision we make after that, but I have to try this first. To do anything else would make me feel like I'm betraying Sam.” It was a low blow, and I knew it. It wasn't that I was intentionally leveraging Sam, but every time we had a confrontation with Jax, all I could think about was my brother and the friendship that the two of them had…and also how horrified he would be to see Jax today. The state the pack was in because of Jax—because he’d killed his cousin to become Alpha. It was all too much when I thought of it from Sam’s perspective.

  “If you think we're just going to let you walk in there without any protection, you're crazy,” Blake said.

  I shook my head and ran my thumb up and down the seam of the coffee cup. “Of course I don't expect that. I want you guys there with me, just not, you know…in striking distance. I want him to be able to see and feel the bond that we have with each other. I want him to know that this is something he can never break apart—not without destroying all of us completely.”

  “And what if he's OK with that to get revenge?” Micah challenged.

  “I feel like that's a chance I have to take. You guys don't have to take it with me, but I have to try.”

  “This is stupid,” Blake said as he pushed his hands through his hair. “You're giving him credit where credit isn’t due. He's proven over and over again that he is willing to do anything to get you. This is just another ploy.”

  “And if it is, then we will deal with it. I’ll cut him off. But if we don't try, I will always wonder. I will always question whether we could have done something differently and whether Jax had any goodness left in his soul at all. He might not; he might be evil through and through, like you guys think. But sometimes, when we're talking, I see the little boy that I knew. I see the man that I expected to grow up with. I see the man that I expected to become part of our family one day.”

  “You were expected to mate with him?” Tate asked.

  I shrugged. “I think so. I don't really know. I don't know if a child can have those kinds of thoughts in an understandable way. Or a teenager, I guess. But I knew there was something different about him, and that was why I was drawn to him. That was why Jax and my brother got along so well, because Sam felt like an outcast as well—although he literally was an outcast. We both were. Jax, for all his faults, wasn't the one who betrayed him. He wasn't the one who destroyed everything and made my life implode. Let me send word back. We'll pick a meeting place and time, and we'll be in and out. Either he stands down or he doesn't—either way, we’ll have
our answer and know how to move forward. Please do this for me.”

  “If we do this, you have to swear on our bond that you will never try to pull something this crazy again—that we will go after Jax and kill him and take that problem out of our lives for good.” Roman's voice was cold and calculating, and if my bones hadn't already been chilled from the note, they certainly would have been then.

  “I swear, if this doesn't work, if he doesn't stand down, we will go after him and take him out of our lives. I swear on the bond.” As I spoke, I focused on the bond I had with each of them, especially Roman, and hoped he could sense my sincerity. I just really hoped I was doing the right thing. If this failed, if I put us all in danger again, I wasn't sure I'd be able to forgive myself. But I had to try. I had to see if that little boy from my childhood was still in there somewhere. I just hoped if he was, he didn't hate me for everything that we'd been through.

  4

  Nina

  With my mates' combined knowledge of the area, we were able to come up with a plan and identify an area they felt was the most secure for us to meet Jax—one that would hopefully keep us all safe. We had written the location, date, and time on the back of the note that had been left for us and set it back outside.

  When we got it back a few hours later, the only addition was a checkmark next to the writing. We assumed that was Jax's version of a yes, so we put our plan in motion. Each of us knew exactly what we wanted to do and how we wanted to protect the area. We also had to assume that Jax would want to do the same thing, especially since we had given him ample time.