Shelly Laurenston: Go Fetch

He felt so good inside her. He wasn’t wearing a condom and her muscles gripped him tight, pulling him deep. He growled again and she felt it across her body.

His thrusts were slow and deep and she was completely lost in them. Her body rose to meet his, loving the feel of his flesh. Nothing had ever felt so right before.

Before she knew it, an orgasm slammed into her and she gripped Conall to her tight. Then he was coming inside of her. Another orgasm rocked her just after the last one ended. She clamped onto Conall’s chest with her teeth and bit down. She tasted blood and, before she knew it, she was licking his wound clean. As both their bodies settled down, she unclamped her teeth and released his flesh, but she held on tight to the man.

“I love you, Viking,” she whispered, enjoying her dream moment.

“I love you, Miki-baby.” Then her dream man started snoring.

Conall woke up when the sun hit his eyes through the window. He felt great. Better than great. That was the cool thing about the fever. If you survived it, you usually felt better than you did before you got hurt.

Miki was in his arms and he relished it. Especially since the last thing he remembered from the night before was having a huge screaming argument with her. But he didn’t want to think about that now. He pulled her closer and she sighed softly in her sleep.

As right as this all felt, he knew something was wrong. He just couldn’t quite figure out what. He looked down at her. Asleep and as beautiful as always, she was also naked and had her limbs around him. It took him a second, but he realized he was inside her. Inside her without a condom.

Uh-oh.

The pillow behind her head had blood on it. He winced as he gently reached around and touched the back of her neck. Then it was her turn to wince from him touching the wound.

He remembered that the day before she’d been going into heat. He leaned in and sniffed her. Her scent had changed. Which meant only one thing.

He closed his eyes. She is going to kick my ass.

She stirred underneath him and he immediately got hard again. Boy, was this bad timing.

Miki stretched, her arms going wide, pushing him off and out of her. She yawned and rubbed her hands over her face. She looked around and then seemed to remember why she was…well, wherever the hell they were.

“Conall?” She turned and looked at him. “Conall? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, Mik. I’m fine.” She leaned over him and felt his forehead. Her bare breasts rubbed against his arm and he had the sudden urge to have her again.

“Your fever broke. That’s good.” She gave him the oddest expression. Then she suddenly launched herself into his arms. He was so startled, he fell back on the bed. He pulled her close and she hugged him tight. “I’m so glad you’re okay,” she whispered fiercely.

He closed his eyes. Nothing ever felt so right as when this woman was in his arms. And knowing she actually cared about him enough to worry…nothing before had ever made him feel so good.

Miki, clearly not comfortable with showing her emotions, pulled herself out of his arms. She sat on the edge of the bed. “I’m really sorry about yesterday, ya know.” She glanced at him, then turned away again. “You took me by surprise. And I never thought you’d want…I just never had…” She shook her head and he saw her smile. “Forget it. We’ll talk about this later. Really talk. You and me. Okay?”

But before he could answer her. Before he could tell her the decision had already been made for them, she slid out of bed and headed to the bathroom. “When I’m done, I’ll let Van Holtz and the Pack know you’re okay.”

Christ, they were on another Pack’s territory. Well that explained the strange wolf scent he smelled everywhere.

Conall lay back on the bed and waited. Waited for her to realize what had happened. She probably thought like he first did. That it had been a dream. But he had marked her. She was his. Would be for life. And there would never be another woman for him. Never.

But he knew Miki almost better than he knew himself now. She wasn’t going to take this well. She’d feel trapped. And she hated feeling trapped. He was having trouble remembering last night but he knew they’d been caught up in something primal and older than most of the gods. In fact, he was almost positive she’d told him to mark her. Knew what he intended without him actually saying it. The wolf in him wanted her. Knew she was the mate for him. And she was.

Miki could have run yesterday. Taken off with Conridge and never looked back. But she’d faced down a vicious Clan of hyenas to protect him and his Pack mates. She hadn’t even been worried about herself. Only him. Those were the actions of a mate. His mate.

He heard the toilet flush and Conall counted. “Five. Four. Three. Two—”

“Conall!”

“One.” He sighed and waited.

Miki stormed out of the bathroom, wearing only white sweat socks and a really pissed-off look.

“What the fuck is this?” She pointed at the back of her neck. He didn’t bother to look. Not when she was standing in front of him naked.

“My mark.”

She stared at him. He waited for it. The explosion of anger. The rants. All of it. He knew it was coming.

But it didn’t come. Miki just stared at him. Then she silently grabbed her clothes off the floor and returned to the bathroom, quietly closing the door behind her.

Okay. That was definitely not the reaction he expected. He expected rage. Rage he knew how to deal with. Whatever she was going through at the moment, they didn’t even have a name for.

He got off the bed and pushed the bathroom door open. She had gotten on her shirt and panties but that was it. Now she sat on the edge of the bathtub holding her sweatpants in her hand and staring down at the floor.

“Miki?”

She looked up at him. Her dark eyes glittered in the well-lit bathroom. “You couldn’t let me decide for myself, could you?”

This was controlled rage, and this worried him. When she was ranting and raving, he knew she was simply being wacky Miki. But this…this was Miki who blew the head off a lion.

“It wasn’t like that, Mik, and you know it.”

She sighed. Calmly. He was getting more and more freaked out by the second. “I’m going back to Texas, Conall.”

He crouched down next to her, gently laying his hand on her leg. “No.” He spoke softly. He wanted her to know she was safe. Safe with him. “Not until we talk about— ow !”

She’d punched him. Right in the nose.

“What the hell was that for?”

“ Because you’re a lying sack of shit! That’s what that’s for!” Yeah. There was the Miki he knew and loved. “I’m going back to Texas and you can’t fucking stop me!”

Conall stood, crossed his arms in front of his chest, and blocked the doorway. “No. You’re not.”

She stared at him. Those big, giant arms, crossed in front of that big, giant chest. His big legs braced apart. He was completely blocking the doorway. Hell, he was completely blocking her. And she didn’t like it one damn bit.

“I wasn’t asking you, Conall.”

“You’re not running away from this. From us.”

Us? At what point did the booty call turn into an “us”.

She dropped her head in her hands in pure frustration. He was making her nuts. “There is no us. There will never be an us.”

“Why?”

Okay. Why did that question throw her? “Because.”

“Because why?”

Christ, it was like talking to a ten-year-old. “Because I said so.”

He smiled. “That the best you can do, Miki-baby?”