Page 60 of Wolf.e
It’s in this instant I realize I am useless in the face of terror because I still don’t move. I just watch in slow motion as my hunter stalks toward me, grips both my arms and pulls me to him roughly, our bodies flush and his sweet scent washes over me, drawing me in deeper.
“If I find you before that sun is set, I fuck you, and from this point on youwillremember that I own you.”
His lips hover over mine, both his large hands move up through my hair and I feel him, already hard and pressing into my abdomen.
“You may fuck me, but you’ll never own me” I test him.
Gabriel grips my hair in one large handful at the roots and tips my face back sharply for better access.
“Fucking little brat.” His deep voice makes a shiver echo up my spine.
His mouth comes down and hovers over mine, I wait, already panting because I can’t move. The way he’s wound his hands in my hair, he’d rip it from my scalp if I tried. I can onlyrun when he releases me, and he knows it. His minty, bourbon-laced breath bleeds into me as he slides his tongue across my bottom lip. He sucks it into his mouth and then bites it hard enough to draw blood. My brain tells me it’s pain, but my body ignites, my pussy instantly throbs, and I moan into his mouth.
“What are youdoingto me?” he asks, his voice ragged and almost as breathless as mine.
I look into his eyes and test him further, remembering Layla’s words. It’smybody he wants, it’smethatheis aching for. I find my power and arm myself with it. I look down, then back up at him.
“Please…” I whimper like I can’t wait for him to devour me.
He growls into me, and I feel it, the moment he gives in and his control completely snaps, falling along with every inhibition I have to the floor below.
“Fuck it—”
He barely gets the words out before his lips come crashing down on mine, the same way they did in the woods but this time, he doesn’t stop. Gabriel slides his hands out from under my hair to either side of my jaw in one fluid, intentional moment, tilting my face for better access, his tongue slinks inside and moves in a languid pace with mine to taste every corner of my mouth. This kiss is full of a passion I can’t explain. It’s lips, tongues, and teeth. With it he claims me, kissing me like there’s no such thing as time. And I realize, I’ve never really been kissed before.
No other man should count.
I wrap my arms around his shoulders, feeling the muscles ripple under his shirt, and I long to feel his skin, his naked body pressed to mine. I slide my hands up and fist them in the hair at the nape of his neck. I pull tight, and he groans into my mouth. I can’t get close enough, I desperately grasp and pull at him,forcing him closer. I sink right into him like his body was made to house mine, but there’s no place I can burrow that gives me what I need. Gabriel kisses me so deeply that I don’t know how long it’s been since my last breath, and I don’t care. Let me die like this in his arms. Let this high last forever. Hands slide back into my hair—seconds later? Minutes? I have no idea.
He tips his forehead to mine.
“Hide well, little hummingbird. When I find you, I’m going to fucking ruin you.”
Gabriel’s breaths come as quickly as mine and my more sadistic side that I’m just discovering loves that I make him as uncontrolled as he makes me. A deep rumble courses through his chest, and he lets go of me abruptly, leaving me barely able to stand. His hands fall at his sides. I see his fists clench and his jaw tense.
“Run,” Gabriel commands once more, and then I’m flying.
I take off through the house as fast as my feet will carry me, almost tripping up the stairs as I go, my heart pounding in my chest. I think of every space I could hide as I run, listening to hear if he’s broken his word, all the while I count.Twenty-four, twenty-five…knowing my time is limited. I push open every door as wide as they can go, so he won’t know which room I’ve entered, and then make my way to the last bedroom at the end of the hall., It’s small, unassuming, and quiet.Thirty-eight…thirty-nine…
I slide a rocking chair away from the wall just enough to get behind it and twist the handle I know is hiding in the wall paneling, opening the secret entrance to the old storage room in the attic. I carefully close the door behind me with shaky hands.Forty-six…forty-seven…My heart feels like it might beat out of my chest as I move like flames are chasing me, climbing up thestairs, knowing exactly where to go. I’m utterly terrified but somehow want him to find me all at the same time.Fifty-one…fifty-two…
I reach the top of the attic stairs, pausing to catch my breath as I quickly scan the room where my nana kept all her old belongings. I glance around, trying to determine the most inconspicuous spot. I slide over the top of my nana’s cedar chest and crouch down behind it in the darkest part of the attic.Fifty-six…fifty-seven…I’m lightheaded and alive with need and desire. The thrill of waiting consumes me as I count the final seconds until my wolf comes to hunt me…Fifty-eight…fifty-nine…
Sixty.
Chapter 30
Gabriel
I watch her form disappear up the stairs in the dark house and I suddenly find myself at war with my own nature, fighting to give her the head start I promised. The beast in me pushes back against its chains, wanting to take her flesh between its teeth, tear into her heat and claim all of her. I’ve never been so hard. I’ve never been so desperate for any single thing in my entire life as I am right now, at this moment, for Brinley Rose Beaumont. The entire world could go up in flames around us, and I’d still find her and fuck her without pause until we both burned to cinders.
I glance out the back window of her house, watching the sun slowly dip below the fields on the horizon. The sixty seconds I gave her pass agonizingly slow as the patter of her feet sound from above me. The noise quiets, then disappears, and suddenly I’m bolting up the stairs behind her, positive this woman is making me lose my mind. I launch myself up them three at a time, following the trace of her jasmine scent that stilllingers in the hall. I look to my left. The hallway lined with bedrooms is too easy, and the sun is disappearing quickly as I make the snap decision to run to the other end of the hall. I enter a bedroom there and pause, listening before exiting and continuing my search. There’s no sound, my little hummingbird has found her hiding spot. Wherever she is now, she’s not going to be there long.
I move through the space, my training taking over and I become light on my heavy feet. When I get to the last door at the end of the hall, it’s open—the same as all the others. My gut tells me she’s there and I never doubt my gut. I make my way in and stop to listen for the sound of her breath, a rustling of fabric, anything, but again I hear nothing. I look around the room as the last hint of the sun slips below the horizon. I start to leave, but something gives me pause and that’s when I see it, a small handle in the panelling. A secret door, perhaps?
I make my way there and open it, a stairway leads up to the attic and I instantly know she is up there. It isn’t lost on me that she hid where the only way out is through me.
I take those stairs just as quickly as the last, I’m not quiet about it, she has nowhere to go. She sucks in a sharp breath when I reach the top.
