“I won’t,” she answered. “I swear it.”
And she did. With every cell in her body, every aspect of her soul, she promised not to hurt him. She’d never turn on him, she’d never turn away even though he was a bear and she was a wolf. In that moment, he became her pack, and she shuddered at the implication of that. But she also welcomed it. Lost no longer, outcast no more. He had called her his home, and now he was hers.
Suddenly she was pushing him over. She didn’t let him fall out of her as she straddled him, pinning his shoulders and his hips to the mattress. His eyes widened, but he didn’t comment. Especially when she began to lick him.
She did everything a wolf did with her mate. She tasted his skin, she bit gently at his throat. She nuzzled into his belly. The position forced them to separate and she helped him clean up as well. And then she licked his thighs and his hips. She inhaled his musk deep into her lungs, and she licked his organ. He was thick and hard as she took him deep into her mouth. She thought she’d finish him off that way, but he didn’t let her.
Well, not exactly.
He lifted her off the mattress and twisted her around. She pulled off him to support herself on her elbows while he began to taste her in the way of a bear. Broad flat licks, rumbling nuzzles, and suction in surprising ways, special places.
She moaned her delight with every caress. And as she allowed him to touch every part of her—including her vulnerable belly—he settled deeper into her soul. One pair, one pack. They claimed each other, and when orgasm hit, they did it together.
Joy pulsed from her to him and back.
Together.
And maybe it went just a bit further.
Her eyes shot open in shock. Maybe it wenta lotfurther.
Chapter 22
Ryan felt her stiffen, moving from orgasm to languid to suddenly anxious way too fast for him to follow. He was still boneless from his own release, reveling in the scent of her all over his face and body, not to mention his position between her thighs. But when she tightened—in a bad way—and started to roll off him, he gathered his scattered wits and tightened his grip on her thighs.
“Frankie?”
“I think…” He heard her swallow and pulled back far enough to see her face. “I think I just did something…um…unusual.”
He waggled his eyebrows. “I hope so.”
She flushed and shook her head. “No…I mean, yes of course. But…um…” She was obviously struggling to pull her wits together. That made him feel a little better, but it also showed him the importance of what had just happened. Whatever that was…
He took a deep breath and gathered his thoughts. He also adjusted their positions on the bed so that they now sat facing each other. She pressed her hand to her mouth and her eyes lost their focus. It didn’t take him long to guess that she was feeling her pack link.
His gaze slid to the window where everything was as it had appeared before. Floodlights on in an empty street. No attack, at least not that he could see. No werewolves or bears mixing it up. When he listened, he couldn’t hear anything unusual either.
So he waited with increasing impatience as Frankie continued to stare blindly into space. Fortunately, she soon took a breath and focused on him, but she didn’t speak.
“What happened?” he prompted.
“I think I just told my entire pack what we were doing.”
He blinked and tried not to gape at her. “Uh, why would you do that?”
She sighed and looked away. “Do bears have an alpha link?”
“You mean a psychic connection with everyone else in the clan?”
She nodded.
“Not generally. Nanook had something like that, but it’s rare. We all thought it was because he was part polar bear.”
“It’s an alpha trait in wolves. Everyone in the pack feels the connection, but the alpha can broadcast. Usually it’s just emotions, sometimes it’s commands, but that’s rare. Either way, it’s what makes the alpha so hard to unseat. Once he takes control of a pack, the other members are compelled to fall in line on a subliminal level.”
He nodded as if he understood what she’d done. He glanced out the bedroom door—startled to realize that they’d just made love with the thing wide open—to see her father still sleeping unaware of everything. “Your father’s not awake, so you broadcast?”
She shook her head. “I shouldn’t be able to do it at all. I mean, I’m good, but I’m not a full shifter. I can feel the pack, but I’ve never broadcast.”
