Page 14 of Wolf Chosen

Love.

The word shouts through my mind, terrifying in its intensity.

No matter what my brain conjures, this isn’t real.

The reality is, I’ve just made love with a man who wants me. A man who managed to slip under my tighter-than-tight defenses. What I’m imagining is just a product of my lonely, desperate heart latching onto someone who has shown me kindness.

I’m unsettled, that’s all. Liam knows the reality. He’s an adult and a doctor who understands my prognosis. Both he and I made a choice. Liam's arms tighten around me, his breath warm against my neck. I want to believe in the impossible but I can't afford to indulge in fantasies. With a heavy heart, I close my eyes and will myself to sleep, trying to ignore the ache in my chest that whispers of a reality I can never truly have.

Chapter Eight

Liam

I make love to Taylor over and over through the day and night. I can't get enough of her… the taste of her skin, the warmth of her flesh, the intoxicating scent that has me burying my nose against the curve of her neck as I move inside her. Holding her in my arms, feeling her heart beating against my chest, it's pure ecstasy unlike anything I've experienced.

After we’ve made love, I feed her. Giving her the nutrition she’s not been able to accept into her body until now due to her illness. I return to her room as the bathroom door opens and she appears wearing nothing but a towel in a humid waft of steamy air that’s infused with her woodland rose petals scent.

She’s delectable, with pink skin that glows. Her cheeks are flushed and as she catches me staring at her, the blush works down her neck and over her chest. She’s lost the pallid complexion of her disease, and as she walks toward me, I’m happy to see that she’s so much steadier on her feet.

“I made some risotto for us.” I place the steaming bowl on top of the small table in her room, the rich aroma of parmesan and fragrant herbs filling the air between us.

“Oh wow. Thank you.” Her eyes glow as she raises onto her toes to kiss me before sitting at the table. She takes a bite, and her eyes widen in surprise. “You’re an amazing cook, Liam.”

Warmth blooms in my chest at her delight as I slide into the opposite chair. Providing for my mate, nourishing her, is a basic drive I can't resist. “A necessity due to hectic work hours, I’m afraid. Pizza and burgers get old when you buy takeout all the time,” I deflect with a chuckle. “And I'm happy I can give you something better than fast food.”

Taylor laughs softly. She shakes her head as she dips her spoon into the bowl. “There must be something in the air here. I haven't had an appetite like this in months.”

The reminder of her illness, of how badly she was fading when she stepped into Sally’s Diner, has my wolf bristling but I push him down, focusing on the flush of life now coloring her cheeks.

She forces a smile. “To be honest, I haven't really been able to keep much down lately. Mostly Graham crackers and water. This is a nice change.”

My heart clenches at the struggle she's been enduring all this time. If only she knew the truth… that her days of suffering are over now she’s been treated for her actual disease.

She meets my gaze, so beautifully vulnerable. “Is that common? To get back my appetite? For someone in my condition, I mean. Do doctors typically encounter that?”

The irony of her words isn't lost on me. As a doctor who treats humans, the drugs she was on should have helped her, but as a wolf shifter doctor her disease wasn’t human.

“Miracles happen to the best people,” I say simply. My gut churns. She deserves to know the truth. Needs to understand what’s happening to her. But not just yet. She needs more time.

Taylor chuckles and takes another bite of her meal. She takes my words as a kindly jest, not realizing I haven’t told her the truth she deserves to know. I watch as she eats, satisfying my primitive desire to feed my mate. The desire grows into something more complex and desperate.

My wolf growls, the sound too low for her human ears, but she picks up on my arousal though the bond. Her pupils dilate and the spoon clangs into her empty bowl, forgotten by the both of us. The bond snaps with need and I heed its call.

I’m out of my chair, striding around the table and pulling her out of her chair. The towel drops to the floor and I hold her naked body against mine, claiming her lips in a searing kiss as my hands roam the curves of her body.

I lead her back to the bed where I fall between her parted thighs. She’s already so wet for me. I slide into her welcome, slick heat and let her arousal consume me. I let everything I feel flood the bond, willing it to strengthen faster.

Deep down a part of her already recognizes the truth, but her human mind still rejects it. I feel her reeling emotions—the confusion, the longing, the persistent sadness that haunts her. She thinks what she feels about me is her imagination. She still believes she's dying, that her life is slipping away, unaware that my blood is rewriting her DNA with her wolf heritage.

It’s kinder to wait until she feels the bond more strongly. Until it’s irrefutable. Until there will be no doubt in her mind. So I simply love her with a tenderness that has become my entire world, for the rest of the day.

We watch the sun dip into night through the window as I hold her in my arms. I already know her soul. Now all that’s left is to hear about her life. I pepper her with questions, committing everything she says to memory.

“I'm a conservationist who's always been driven to preserve endangered species and their natural habitats. Grew up in a small Oregon town, fell in love with the outdoors from an early age. After college, I started working for a non-profit focused on conservation efforts,” she says, her voice soft.

She turns in my arms and her scent washes over me, more potent and muskier than it’s ever been. My hands freeze on her hips. Her brow creases as she no doubt feels the way my heart has stuttered.

Her scent is almost as potent as a born female wolf shifter. I drive my nose into the crook of her neck and drag in her scent, making sure I’m not imagining things. I’m not wrong. Her scent is developing.

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