“It’s called being loved,” I told her, as I handed her the toddy already the perfect temp, and shut the door, giving her the privacy she claimed she needed but never actually wanted.
While she soaked, I stripped the bed and put on the “hotel sheets”—the Egyptian cotton ones she’d insisted we buy after one night in a Dallas Four Seasons. I even remembered to turn on the electric blanket, so the bed would be warm when she crawled into it. By the time she came out, wrapped in a towel with the ends of her hair still wet, I was sitting on the edge of the mattress waiting for her.
She crawled in next to me, still smelling of honey and rain, and nudged my thigh with her foot. “Are you gonna give me a massage, or do I have to beg?”
I smiled. “Babe, you never have to beg. But it’s more fun when you do.”
She rolled her eyes, then sprawled belly-down on the sheets, arms folded under her head. I warmed my hands by rubbing them together, then started at her shoulders, working my thumbs into the knots that always built up just below her neck. Her skin was warm and damp, and she hummed with every hard press, the sound somewhere between a purr and a sigh.
I worked my way down her back, slow and methodical, focusing on each muscle like it owed me money. When I reached her lower back, she arched, shifting her hips and making it impossible not to notice the swell of her ass, the way her thighs parted ever so slightly in invitation. I dug my thumbs into the tops of her glutes, working the tension loose.
I kept kneading her, working my way down her legs, kneading her calves, then circling back up to start again. The second time I made it to her ass, I slipped my hand between her legs, cupping her mound and feeling the heat radiate off her.
She pressed her hips into the mattress, moaning softly. “Mmm, Finn.”
“Just making sure you’re relaxed,” I teased, but my cock was so hard it was an act of God not to climb on top of her and take her right there.
Instead, I kept my word to myself. I focused on her, on the way her body responded to every touch, every press. When I couldn’t take it anymore, I rolled her onto her back, spreading her legs and settling between them. She looked up at me, eyes glazed, lips parted, and for a second all I could do was stare at her—this beautiful, broken, perfect woman who’d let me be the one to put her back together.
I bent down, kissing her belly, her hips, the insides of her thighs. She was already wet, slick and hot and eager for me, and I licked her slowly, savoring every taste. She bucked against my mouth, hands tangled in my hair, her moans getting louder, more desperate. I kept her on the edge for what felt like an eternity, then finally let her come, her whole body tensing under my tongue.
I didn’t stop. I licked and sucked, pushing her through a second orgasm, this one leaving her limp and panting, her hands falling away from my head. When she was done, I cleaned her up with a warm cloth, then pulled her into my arms and tucked the blanket around us both.
She fell asleep almost instantly, her head on my chest, her breath warm and even. I lay there, staring at the ceiling, feeling the last of the tension slip away. For the first time in days, I let myself relax.
I must have dozed off, because the next thing I knew, it was deep night—the kind of dark that made the world feel hollowed out and abandoned. The clock read 2:37. Brie was still asleep, breathing steady, but something was wrong. I could smell it before I heard it.
There was a tang in the air, sharp and metallic, like a fresh cut or a struck match. It didn’t belong. I sat up, sniffed the air, but couldn’t place it. A second later, Brie started to whimper.
It began as a low moan, barely audible, then built into a soft, desperate chant. “No, no, no. You won’t take him from me. You won’t—” Her voice broke on the last word, and she started to sob, fists clenched tight in the sheets.
I shook her gently. “Brie. Babe. You’re dreaming.”
She gasped awake, eyes wild, and for a second she didn’t recognize me. Then she slumped against my chest, shaking. “It was… it was so real.”
“What happened?”
She shook her head, wiped at her face. “Can’t remember. Just… darkness. And then I thought I’d lost you.”
I held her close, stroking her hair, whispering nonsense until the trembling stopped. After a minute, she drifted off again, her breath ragged but settling.
But I didn’t sleep. I lay there, staring into the dark, the smell of blood and steel still hanging in the air. I’d never heard of a wolf who could bring a scent back from their dreams.
Whatever it was, it wasn’t done with us.
And I’d be damned if I let it take her away.
The next morning, I got Brie up and out the door before the sun had fully risen. She’d barely touched her toast and was in a foul mood, not her usual “I hate mornings, kill me now” routine, but the tight-lipped, no-jokes kind of bad. I left her at the gallery with a kiss and a promise to pick her up at five. She gave me a look that said she wasn’t sure she’d last until noon.
I went home and did what any rational, not-at-all-paranoid man would do: I spent an hour crawling around the baseboards and HVAC vents of our house, sniffing for gas leaks or anything metallic, checking the circuit breaker for shorts, running every tap and drain just in case. Nothing. The place was clean, almost aggressively so. The only thing I found was the lingering scent of her on the sheets, mixed with cedar and a memory of sweat.
After exhausting every possible home hazard, I gave up and went out to the pasture. A section of barbed wire was down along the west fence, probably knocked over by one of our idiot steers trying to reach the greener grass on the other side. I loaded the tools into the bed of the truck and set out, knowing the job would take half the day at least.
The labor was pure, simple, and honest. The only things that mattered were the heft of the post driver, the way the wire bit my palms through the gloves, and the burn in my shoulders with each swing. I let my mind go blank, except for the occasional intrusive thought about last night: the sharp tang of metal, the panic in Brie’s voice as she fought her invisible enemy.
It made no sense, any of it. But sense was a luxury. I’d spent most of my life making do with the scraps of logic fate tossed my way.
The job took longer than it should have, mostly because I kept stopping to watch the clouds roll in. There was a storm on the horizon, a thick blue wall with the promise of lightning in the air. My wolf always got restless before a storm, and today was no exception. I could feel the hair on my arms standing up, taste the ozone on my tongue.
