Connor noticed my panic first, and he turned with a growl, placing himself between me and whatever was scaring me.
“No,” I whispered, stepping into his back. My hands wrapped around his biceps. “No, you can’t take him on… He will kill you.”
Connor looked down at me, and then lifted his head to his boys. They stepped up, all three on high alert. Louis didn’t care, though, and I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him this furious. His eyes were almost glowing purple, and shivers streamed up and down my body, covering me in goose bumps.
“Who the fuck is that?” Paulie asked.
“Louis,” Connor bit out. He knew there was only one supe in the world who could get me riled like this.
My chest ached, as did my arms and legs as I fought against running to the sorcerer. Why the hell did he have to be so gorgeous? He was close to the boys in height and breadth, and if you teamed that with his power, there was no supe more lethal … or attractive … than Louis.
“I need to deal with this,” I said, wiggling my way between the guys so I was slightly in front of them.
“No. Fucking. Way!” Connor bit out, and I heard the growl of bear in his voice. Multiple hands landed on me as they tried to pull me back.
Louis paused then. He was about ten feet away, and those glowing eyes were locked on me. On the hands touching me. His chest started to rumble, as did the floor we were standing on.
“Let me go,” I whispered urgently. “Let me goright fucking nowor everyone is going to die.”
For once they took me seriously and I was released. I took a step toward Louis, fear keeping me alert and burning away the last of my drunkenness.
“Louis,” I said slowly, trying to draw his attention away from the three bear shifters behind me. “What are you doing here? I thought we decided to take some time.”
There was the slightest of twitches at the corner of his right eye, and I actually felt like I might pass out from panic. It didn’t matter how powerful I was, no one could take Louis on like this. I knew through our bond that the darkness remained under control, but it had left remnants behind, and that made for a slightly darker—even hotter, if that was possible—Louis.
Our standoff was drawing attention, but none of us shifted. I felt like the slightest movement was going to cause an eruption. Louis moved first, prowling across to me, sucking all the air from the room around us. He reached out and touched my throat, almost wrapping his hand around it. “You belong to me,” he rumbled close to my ear, and fuck if my legs didn’t go weak in that moment as heat flooded my body. “The next man to touch you dies,” he warned, lifting his head to stare over the top of me again.
Growls sounded from behind me, and I almost panicked as those purple eyes shifted to my pack. “Don’t test me, bears. I will rip you into pieces and not think twice about it.”
I growled then, and that drew Louis’s attention back to me. “If you touch them … harm one hair on their heads … I will make your life hell, Louis. True mate or not, they’re my pack, and they’re everything to me.”
A wave of darkness flickered across Louis’s eyes, and on instinct I reached out and touched him. He was so tall that even with my heels I still only reached his pectoral muscles, the hard planes flexing under my fingers. His jaw clenched before he worked it slowly, like he was trying to get himself under control.
“Dance with me,” I whispered. Dancing took away my darkness. Maybe it would do the same for him.
He regarded me silently, head tilting to the side as he tried to read me. Slowly, I linked our hands together and started to lead him further into the crowd. The humans were dancing again by now. Connor, Paulie, and James remained on high alert, but when I flicked my head, they relaxed slightly, and following my cue, headed back out onto the dance floor.
Candy Shopby 50 Cent blasted out into the room, and I started to move against Louis. At first he was stiff, but then his hands came out and rested on my hips. His grip was almost biting, just short of painful, and I clenched my legs together to stop the ache. I needed to get laid, as soon as possible.
We didn’t talk, because there was too much that needed to be said between us. We just danced. I’d forgotten how well Louis could dance; his rhythm matched mine perfectly, sexy, smooth, hands remaining firmly on the small of my back as he pulled me into him. His thigh parting my legs so I could press even closer. Desire flared strongly between us, and I wondered how I could possibly resist him.
I’d never even kissed Louis, but in my dreams we’d done so much more than that. I figured dreams were all I’d get. But he’d come for me. Pretty much the second I landed back on Earth, he was here, and that had to mean something.
Hope was the worst, because I was opening myself up to be destroyed again.
Don’t Chawas the next song, and this one had the sexy beat I preferred, so I swung around, pressing my ass back into Louis. He groaned, and I looked over my shoulder. “Are you trying to kill me?” he asked, looking pained. But the darkness in his eyes was almost gone now as he continued to calm.
I shot him a cynical smile. “You’ve been trying to kill me for years. Only fair that I get a little payback.”
He moved so fast then that I almost missed it. I was in his arms and my back was slammed against a nearby wall. A throbbing need rocked me, and I wrapped my legs around his waist, pressing my hips into him. His huge body crowded into me, and I let a small moan slip out. I had no defense against him, and he was reacting in a primal way to the fact I’d been dancing with the bear shifters. His face was buried into my neck as one of his hands tangled in the loose strands of my hair.
“I need you, Tee,” he breathed into my skin. “I’m fucking losing my mind without you, and the darkness…”
He trailed off, but we both knew what he wasn’t saying. He was struggling to fight the darkness again. In that moment, my decision was made. My heart was already destroyed. What did it matter if I let him wreck it a little more? I couldn’t say no to him … because I needed him too. I’d given him the week without me, and he’d still come the moment I returned. That had to mean something.
“Maybe this will help us move on,” I lied, knowing I would never move on. “Get it out of our systems.”
He almost smiled at that, his lips twisting as he pulled back to face me. “Not sure that’s possible, but I’m willing to give it a shot.”
