“Just like that?” he teased.
“You’ve been gone a while,” she told him and arched her back. “I missed you.”
She watched close up as his face gentled before he murmured, “Baby doll.”
She loved it when he referred to her as “little one” because, at five foot nine (and three quarters) she was far from little.
But she loved it even better when he called her “baby doll”.
She pressed her lips against his, tightened her limbs around his body, lifted her h*ps into his, dug her nails into the muscles of his back and begged, “Please, my handsome wolf, f**k –”
She didn’t finish, his h*ps reared back, her breath caught in thrilling anticipation and she waited for his invasion.
* * * * *
Sonia’s eyes opened.
“Damn!” she snapped softly into the night.
Always, right before the good stuff happened, she’d wake up.
And always, when she woke up, she was hot and bothered.
Immensely so.
Frustratingly so.
Unless she did something about it, which she always did.
She turned to her nightstand, took out her toy, touched the button and slid it between her legs.
Her neck arched, her body tightened and not long later, her mind filled with visions of her handsome wolf, she made herself come.
It was nowhere near as good as her dream even as frustratingly short as her dream always was.
But it was all she was going to get.
Her “puppy” was dead and her “handsome wolf” didn’t exist in the real world (alas) so her toy was all she had.
For some reason that night this upset her more than it usually did.
She put her toy away, got out of bed and padded to her window seat to look out into the dark.
“I need a dog,” she told the window.
And she did. She’d always wanted one, even as a child. Her father had actually bought her one that last Christmas and he and her mother were on their way to pick it up when they got into the accident. But after they’d been killed, Gregor, not wanting the animal in his home, had given the dog away.
A dog wouldn’t think she was weird because she could see better, hear better, smell better and sense things. A dog wouldn’t care just as long as she fed it, pet it and threw a Frisbee for it.
“That’s it,” she told the window, “I’m getting a –”
She stopped, her body froze but her head jerked around to look toward the door.
Someone was in her house.
She jumped up and ran to the bedside table, yanking her phone from its cradle.
She’d pressed the nine and the one before they were on her.
This stunned her.
When she’d sensed them, they’d only just breached the door and her alarm didn’t go off. She knew no one who could move that fast and that silently while at the same time disabling an alarm.
One hand at her mouth and one arm around her waist, she was swung around, her legs flying wide and she dropped the phone.
Instinctively, her fingers formed a claw and she scratched the arm holding her waist. She felt her long, strong nails (she religiously took a cocktail of vitamins every morning and this gave her shining hair and fast-growing, strong nails, that, in that particular moment, she was deliriously happy for) digging in deep.
She heard his inhuman howl and she was tossed away with such force she flew across the room, literally right through the air, and slammed into the wall.
She fell to the floor and didn’t hesitate. She surged up already on the run.
She was tagged within seconds. Her wrist caught, she was whirled sharply, the tug at her arm causing her to feel an acute, intense pain up her arm and along her shoulder. She had no time to cry out, her arm was wrapped around her front, her other wrist caught and pulled forward as well. Her attacker, she noted distractedly, was huge and had enormous hands, holding both wrists tight at her front with little effort while his other hand went to cover her mouth.
His lips came to her ear.
“Play nice, queenie,” he ordered.
“Jesus, f**king, God, she’s a goddamn wildcat,” the other swore from behind them.
Their smell hit Sonia then.
She’d smelled them before.
They’d tracked her before. They were the menacing ones.
But they’d always kept a distance. Now, obviously, there was nothing distant about them and this made terror slice through her.
He held her easily. His strength was hard to miss. She was kicking out with her heels, connecting with his shins and he didn’t even so much as grunt.
He could snap her neck in an instant, she knew it. How she knew it, she couldn’t say, she just did.
Still, she fought his hold and only stopped when she noticed what he was doing.
Her body went solid.
He was sniffing her.
Sniffing her.
She held her breath.
“Fuck, do you f**king smell her?” he asked against her neck, his arms tightening painfully.
She felt his comrade get close but she heard him pull in breath through his nose.
Then his friend muttered, “Jesus.”
“You touch yourself tonight, queenie?” her captor asked, his voice a leer.
Her body jerked with surprise.
Oh my God, she thought hysterically, they’re like me.
“Sure she did.” The other got close, bending from his enormous height to peer in her face. “She doesn’t smell like that normally. I would have noticed.”
For some strange reason, her captor was rubbing his temple against her neck, her jaw, her cheek. “Christ, I’m getting hard.”
“What do you think?” his friend asked, getting closer, his voice dropping, becoming ugly with greed. “Will we get medals, promotions, or both, we do her before the king can claim her?”
Sonia’s body locked tight as fear froze every muscle.
“Both,” her captor muttered, his hand moving from her mouth, down her neck, her chest, his aim unmistakable as he continued, “Me first.”
She opened her mouth to scream. Her captor’s friend’s hand shot toward her face and she gave an almighty heave to get loose when they heard the thundering, unbelievably terrifying howl.
Everyone froze but Sonia’s eyes shot to the door.
The man from her dream stood there.
She gasped.
Then he moved, dropped down and crouched low on both legs and not even a second passed before he surged up…
And the man was gone but, suddenly – she could not believe her eyes – her wolf, alive and snarling, was flying across the room.
He landed on her captor’s colleague who went down with a wounded yelp.