Becoming Bad (The Becoming Novels) (23 page)
Read Becoming Bad (The Becoming Novels) Online
Authors: Jess Raven,Paula Black
Connal took possession of her mouth and kissed her with the kind of raw desperation she could feel from the curl of her toes to the depths of her soul. He was animal and vulnerable all at once, rough hands framing her jaw and knotting in the fall of her hair, angling her mouth for the fever of his kiss. His tongue invaded the parting of her lips, wet-velvet intimacy stroking inside and reaching deep to tug at the core of her.
She was drowning in sensation, with no desire whatsoever to come up for air. Palming the nape of his neck, her fingers twisted into the short spikes of his hair, tugging and clawing at his scalp, dragging him deeper. When she sucked his lower lip between her teeth, he groaned and the sound made her clench, low in her belly. God, compared with this, Mac had felt like kissing her granny. Dizzy and needy, she went up on her toes to reach for him and the makeshift sarong slipped from her breasts.
Their tongues tangled in open-mouthed passion as she scaled his hard body, her weight carrying them over until his back hit the bed and she was mounted across his hips. His rough hands rode the curve of her spine to shape the naked rounds of her ass, grinding her down the thick length of his arousal. She needed him naked, skin on skin, buried deep and easing the furious ache inside her. His hips bucked between her thighs and she reached blindly between them, fingers grappling with the fly of the over-tight jeans. Her hair whipped across her shoulders as she tore herself from his mouth.
Their gazes locked and Connal’s expression was wild with the same lust that burned in hers. Coming full-circle, they were back to the beginning, to the very first time he'd intruded on her life. Electricity still crackled violently between them, only this time the intensity was fueled by love and not adrenaline. Not a frying pan in sight.
He lay there, watching her, straining with desire as her eyes scrolled down his naked chest. Running her hands over sculpted muscle and the wolf-brand in his skin, she mourned the loss of his metal, his flat nipples scarred where the rings has been ripped from his flesh. So many bruises, so much pain. Her heart squeezed in her chest. Close up, the scratches and bites around his throat and ribs bore an unmistakably female signature. Had he gone to a
thrall
, after she’d hurt him? Ash supposed she’d lost the right to ask.
No.
The slate was wiped, she had her man back in her arms and she was going to love him so long and hard that any trace of another would be obliterated. She was wolf and she was going to mark her mate.
She hooked her lower lip between her teeth and her hands moved lower, stroking the hard ridge of his cock. He was shaped in glorious anatomical detail by denim so tight, it must surely be painful.
She could take care of that.
Popping the button, she drew the zipper slowly down over the tensed fabric. He moaned and her growl was all animal satisfaction at the reveal. Even more impressive in the flesh, the rigid girth of him pulsed in the stroke of her palm. His hips canted up off the mattress and she peeled the jeans down his hard thighs. Her hands pushed at his knees, making room for herself in between, nipping the sensitive inner skin.
Pleasure thrummed in her throat, she couldn’t help it. Ash was luxuriating in the intimacy, branding him with kisses and the threat of sharpened canines. Chancing a look from under her lashes, she saw Connal’s face, taut with bliss and restraint, his hands clawed into the sheets. He looked a kiss away from breaking and she had barely touched him. She wanted him to come undone for her.
Mine!
Her mouth was merciful. She flicked her tongue out and watched him shudder. Tremors ran through his muscles, clenched his abs and rolled his hips in a silent plea. Torture, and not just for him. He smelled divine; musky and raw and aroused, an aphrodisiac she couldn’t resist. Her flattened tongue curled over the blunt head of his erection, sleek and warm, encompassing him in the gentle suction of her mouth. When he pushed for deeper, she slowed, punishing him with a low laugh and a playful graze of teeth. Rolling just the tip of him between her lips, Ash locked their gazes. His eyes had long bled from polished steel to blood crimson, setting her heart thundering. He needed more and Ash was brutal in her obedience. She waited for the pleading kick of his hips before she growled low and swallowed him. Thick inches stretched her lips around his girth, and she hollowed her cheeks in a harsh draw on his iron flesh that had him bucking into her mouth. His groans stoked fires under her skin and she was moaning with him, her lips sealed in a stretched kiss at his base.
Connal bowed up, all straining muscle. Ash revelled in the sight and taste of him as he took her mouth in a slow-rising tempo. No longer the frightened mouse, afraid of her own shadow, Ash was a lion-tamer, and she had her beast on a short leash and panting. For her. She was embarrassingly wet, arousal throbbing at her core as she took him into the constriction of her throat. He was stunning in his surrender, stomach muscles tense-relaxing a rhythmic dance with the rough beat of his hips. It drove her crazy, made her heart soar.
His snarls, hoarse and hungry, ignited her soul, lit her up, inside and out with animal possession. Connal was hers, those sounds were for her.
‘Fuck, I need to come inside you, Ash,’ his voice sounded wrecked. The
please
went unsaid, but his hands were in her hair and his body was arched, begging.
Her satisfied laugh hummed on the head of his cock and then she was releasing him with a parting kiss to his pulsing erection.
He hauled her up his body, twisting them in one ragged motion so she was breathless beneath him. Despite his urgency, he was careful with her.
She was going to change that.
Ash scratched at his nape, grasping at his short hair. She fed on his mouth, deep, bruising, biting her lust at his lips. Hips winding, she was needy and hot with his weight pressing down on her, the heavy shaft of his tongue-slick cock riding the cleft of her sex. She jolted when he glided over her sensitive bud. Connal’s large hand spanned her stomach, holding her down ... he did it again and her hips jumped, a whimper falling into the air. The bastard was actually teasing
her
, now?
‘You know, if you want to come inside me, you have to
be
inside me ...’ She was beyond frustrated and painfully turned-on.
His strokes quickened, his thumb pressed to the tiny bundle of sensation and when she was a snarl away from pulling rank and commanding him, they collided. Connal was tormenting her one stroke and slamming inside her the next.
He stilled, his weight settled between her thighs. Nose to nose, chests heaving, his breath warm on her lips, they looked into each other’s eyes and she felt it deep. His hips kicked, kissing that depth.
‘I love you Ashling DeMorgan. I have never stopped loving you. Whatever comes to pass. Never doubt that, never forget.’
Ash sobbed as her soul joined her body in the reunion and emotion swept her up.
Tear-wet lashes lifting, she spoke to the vulnerable hope laid bare in his steel grey eyes.
Her breath hitched. ‘I love you, Connal Savage,’ she dragged her lips along the scruff of his jaw, ‘I never stopped loving you. You’re in my bones, Big Bad, you’re part of me. No matter what.’ Ash punctuated her last words with hard kisses, imprinting the truth to his stubborn mouth. She hadn’t been able to breathe without him, and now she was overdosing on his oxygen.
Sealing them together in a kiss, Connal’s snarl was all affirmation and possessive satisfaction, rumbling against her lips, his strong hands pushing her thighs up and angling her into the brutal, snapping tempo of his hips.
She raked her claws over his scalp, fisting soft, short hairs for purchase. They were animal and Ash was going down in flames, her flushed curves arching and grinding in the cage of his powerful form. Her teeth left shallow punctures on his throat, marking her territory. Elongated nails hooked into his shoulders as Connal’s hips drilled her into the mattress, his thrusts synchronised to the circling pressure of his thumb on her clit, so she quivered around the punch of his cock on every stroke. Sounds spilled from her lips, praises and curses spurring him on and demanding
harder, faster, oh yes, do that again.
Ecstasy had her on edge, nerves twitching, muscles seizing, bracing for the violent thrusts hammering home emotions too strong to word. Neither could explain how their souls were irrevocably bound, or how they weren’t really two people, but one. They could only try to show it. And so they battled it out in frenzied collisions and biting kisses.
Rough hands braced her thighs wide as Connal went in for the kill, drilling himself so deep inside her there could be no doubt. His tempo quickened and pleasure twisted, winding her up, tighter and tighter until she was barrelling straight for the edge of a cliff, her orgasm chasing every guttural moan and whimper until Connal tipped their bodies and they fell, together.
Instinct snapped her jaws around the straining tendons of his neck and she sank her teeth into his heartbeat as she came apart. Connal reared up in a lightning strike that knifed his canines through the exposed line of her throat, plugging them both into the carnal connection that set stars behind her lids. Endless waves of ecstasy rewired her nerves and vised her down around the punching thrusts of his girth, rhythmically milking his release as it pulsed hot to her depths. They surged through the crests of their pleasure, rode them beyond the shudders, and collapsed in a tangle of limbs and shivering muscle. Sated, complete.
Ash ran her nose lazily behind his ear and purred, Connal’s weight a living blanket securing her languid curves beneath him. She was content, surrounded by his scent, her hands smoothing down his spine, long strokes that made him arch up into her palms and pushed his face into her shoulder. He was burying himself in her hair, tonguing at her skin and she smiled, gathering him closer.
It was the smallest drop, but it was warm and it tickled as it slid over her skin. A tear. Connal's body hitched slightly, his hands tightening on her. Wetness pricked at her eyes and she nodded into the curve of his neck. She carded her fingers into the soft, short spikes of his hair and just held on. It was all ok. They were free, and they were together, and she would fight tooth and nail before she let anything separate them again.
Connal lay awake, propped on one elbow, watching the small miracle of Ash breathing. She was alive and sharing his bed, and wearing his bite-marks on her throat. He curled the ends of her hair in his fingers. This incredible woman was his one in a billion: somebody he didn’t have to lie to about who, or what, he was. With her, he had the chance to be himself. No holding back his true nature for fear of hurting her. No cold sheets from sneaking away in the night. No fear of forming attachments he could never honour. Connal had lived his lone-wolf existence for so long, he’d forgotten what is was to not be lonely, if he’d ever known. Ash loved him. Unconditionally. And it scared the hell out of him, because that unconditionality was about to be severely tested.
Brevity adds infinite poignancy to life’s fleeting moments.
The Morrígan’s words taunted him. A life for a life, she’d said, and Connal thought he’d got off easy. Now? He realised she’d done this on purpose.
His thumb stroked Ash’s open palm, and the dual crescent-shaped mating marks embossed there. However much Ash protested wanting his half-brother, Connal was no fool. Her scent had been in MacTire’s bed, just as it was in his. He’d watched them kiss, and though they might be faded now, he’d seen the teeth marks in her skin that weren’t his own.
MacTire had tied their blood. Why else would Ash have goaded Connal into having sex with her that day in the forest, if not because they all three shared the same biological link? It was a tragic legacy of their birth, and it was more than that. Connal witnessed Ash and MacTire’s friendship, and felt the stab of jealousy at their easy exchanges. The King had saved her life, and had turned on his own men to do it.
And that was precisely why the Morrígan, in all her sadistic generosity, had granted him this month’s stay. She wanted to make it harder on him, to prolong his agony. He should have done the deed as soon as he knew Ash was safe, but he was weak, he couldn’t bear to let her go. This moment alone with her could prove to be his last, and so he cherished it, committing every detail of her sleeping form to memory. Ash was going to hate him for what he had to do.
Food first, death later. Connal’s stomach growled, a reminder of how long it had been since he’d eaten a proper meal. That would be the steak and eggs Ash cooked for him. Assuming the pack outside hadn’t devoured the entire contents of his freezer, he planned on repaying the favour, with breakfast in bed.
Slipping silently from the sheets, he pulled on a pair of his own jeans and navigated the sprawl of passed-out wolves, following the scent of freshly-brewed coffee to the kitchen area.
MacTire was at the table, mug in hand. Their eyes met in a guarded truce.
‘You look like shit,’ MacTire laughed, ‘was your barber drunk? Or only blind?’
Connal scrubbed a hand over his shorn scalp. ‘Long story,’ he said, ‘and not one I want to talk about.’ The bargains he’d struck with the Morrígan were not on the table for discussion.
MacTire poured a second mug and slid it across the table. Connal’s hand hesitated on the back of the chair before he reluctantly pulled it out and sat. A plate of hot, buttered toast was pushed in his direction. To an outsider, this scene would be so ordinary, he thought. Two brothers trading insults over breakfast. In reality, this was the closest he’d been to his half-brother in almost a thousand years. United by a woman they both loved, yet doomed because of her.
‘Cheer up,’ MacTire grinned. ‘Only a few hours, and we’ll be out of your hair. The
thegn
are mobilising to evacuate the prisoners as we speak. I’ll have them take care of the mess upstairs too.’
‘I appreciate that,’ Connal answered tightly, cradling the mug.
Dark eyes met Connal’s across the table. ‘They said Doyle, the bartender, failed to report in. You know something about that?’
‘Nope.’ Connal’s expression was shuttered. Reluctant truce or not, he didn’t trust MacTire when it came to Madden.
MacTire shrugged. ‘Saves me the bother of killing him myself.’
Connal popped a brow.
‘Kidnapping children is not my style. Doyle will be made to pay for his rogue actions, if he hasn’t already.’ Mac regarded Connal briefly, then drank from the mug and ripped his teeth through a slice of toast. ‘Go a month without bread,’ he groaned, ‘and you forget how damn good it tastes.’
Connal strummed his fingers on the coffee mug. 'Tell me something, MacTire. Why did you do this?’
‘You know the answer to that,’ MacTire replied, ‘though I don’t believe you want to hear it.’
Because the bastard loves her.
‘No,’ Connal shook his head, ‘I get why you saved Ash. But why spare me? You’ve had ample opportunities to finish what you started.’
MacTire dropped his toast and looked Connal square in the eye. 'This will be hard for you to believe, but I am a man of honour. The laws are clear. You withstood your punishment a true warrior. Balor knows how you survived the blood-eagle and the raveners, but some higher power chose to spare you, Connal Savage. The debt between us is paid. In my eyes, at least.’
Connal stared back at him for a long moment. ‘You know I won’t let you take her back there,’ he said quietly.
‘I would have her come to me, willingly.’
Connal felt the muscles tighten across his spine. ‘You’d really let her choose?’
MacTire topped up both mugs and scratched his temple. ‘These centuries leading the pack have taught me something of life. When a man is handed his every desire, or can simply take what he will by superior force, how shall he ever know the measure of his own worth? There is true satisfaction only in what is rightfully earned.’
Connal’s brows disappeared into his hairline. ‘You’re prepared to risk your people’s future existence over pride?’
‘I follow my instincts. Second guessing destiny only makes it harder for her to find you.’ MacTire drank deep and exhaled. ‘Did you know the
thegn
unearthed an ancient prophecy claiming the next generation will be the one to break the Morrígan’s curse forever? I believe in prophecy, and therefore in fate. What will be will be, however tortuous we make the path.’
‘So what happens now,’ Connal asked warily. ‘You’re just going to walk away?’
‘I can’t compete with a dead man.’
‘I’m not dead.’
‘No, you aren’t.’ MacTire’s mouth curved in a half-smile as he licked the melted butter from his fingers. ‘You know, I think a part of me knew all along you weren’t dead. You can separate
félagi
, but you can’t sever the connection. It was the same when we were boys. For years, after you were taken, your father would ask me if I could feel your life-force. He was obsessed with finding you. I did everything in my power to win his respect, but it was never enough to make him forget you. I could never measure up to the perfect son he’d conjured in his head.’ MacTire stared into the depths of his coffee cup. ‘So you see, even then, I was competing with a ghost, and that’s one fight I learned you can’t win.’
‘You’re not going to fight me for her?’ Connal asked.
‘What would be the point?’
‘We are physically matched. Who knows, you might even win,’ Connal laughed humorlessly.
‘And have Ashling forever resent me for killing you? Such a contest would have no victor. Perhaps I prefer to watch you fuck it up with her, Brother, and drive her back into my arms.’ MacTire’s smile didn’t reach his black eyes.
‘We are not brothers.’
‘We were, once. Our fates could so easily have been reversed. Sometimes, I even wished it so: to be the favoured, prodigal son, free to fight and fuck, with none of the responsibilities of leadership.’
A growl ripped from Connal’s throat. ‘I was not free. That man you call my father made me no better than a slave.’
MacTire’s blond head dipped in acquiescence. ‘He thought he was doing the right thing, teaching you to survive in our world. He believed your human upbringing made you weak, but I admit your father's treatment of you was wrong. I could have intervened, but I resented my wife’s affection for you. I knew all along that Aoife was fucking you, just as I knew the child was yours, and that she was planning to run.’
'And so you killed her, and my son ...' Bitterness twisted Connal’s voice.
'I didn't kill them.' MacTire’s expression was level. ‘Their deaths were a tragic accident.’
'Impossible,’ Connal’s mug hit the table hard, spilling its contents over the rim, ‘I heard you arguing, you released the untame on them. You said to me, on the sands, that you slit her throat.'
'A lie,’ MacTire’s mouth thinned. ‘I wanted you to hurt as I had,’ he confessed, ‘I loved Aoife. I knew she was leaving me, for you.’
Connal’s jaw went lax.
‘I wanted a clean break, for both our sakes,’ MacTire continued, ‘I went to her to sever our bond, so we could both be free to mate again. She owed me that much.’
‘Is that even possible?’ Connal asked.
MacTire inclined his head. ‘I consulted the
thegn
Masters and they gave me the
Skil
. Do you know of it? I don’t suppose you would. It is a blade whose steel was forged in the blood of our forefathers. It's cut is said to sever the mating ties of our kind.’
Connal’s eyes flared. ‘And does it work?’
‘I never found out. I followed Aoife to the arena on the night of the Blód-Samhain. And yes, we argued, because she didn't believe me. When I drew the blade, she saw it as a threat to her and the child. She snapped. Right there on the sands, she shifted, and the outcome was disastrous. The child was swaddled too tightly in her robes. He was crushed by her wolf form. By the time she realised what was happening and shifted back, it was already too late for Quillan. Aoife took the dagger from me. I thought she meant to break the bond herself. Instead, she used it to take her own life.'
Connal’s breaths were shallow and a tic worked the corner of his left eye. 'But you released the untame.'
'I did,’ MacTire’s face was grim. ‘I wanted to spare her and her family the shame. There is no crime more heinous to a Fomorian than infanticide. I thought, if I made it look like an accident ...'
Connal shook his head, hands curled into fists on the table. 'How can I believe you? After all this time, after everything?'
'Rún was there that night. He will corroborate every last detail. I never wanted them to die. I never wanted us to be at war.'
The heavy weight of silence settled over them. Elbows on the table, Connal tunneled his hands through what remained of his hair. 'But you hold me responsible for the genocide,’ he said. ‘You wanted me dead, you ordered my execution.'
'What choice did you leave me, Brother? You set those beasts on innocents, you turned your back on us, you hunted my men ... can you blame me for hating you?
'I never knew.’ Connal’s intense grey eyes lifted to MacTire’s as he shook his head. ‘I swear to you, I never knew the Morrígan’s plan. She promised to raise the dead. I thought she meant Aoife and the child. I was a fucking idiot, and by the time I realised, it was too late to stop it. I'm not proud of what I did. There was no going back. She enslaved me, and yes, I hunted for her, but only the wolves that chose to stray lost their heads to me. I respected Haven law, and the
thralls
were mercy killings.’
The King rocked back in his chair, wide-eyed. ‘Would that you had come to me then ...’
‘You wouldn’t have believed me if I had.’
MacTire nodded slowly. They both knew the collective grief of the pack would have killed on sight and asked questions later. ‘A thousand years of animosity can't be just turned on the axis of one fight,’ the King extended his arm across the table, ‘but you have my gratitude.’
Connal’s expression tightened, his eyes fixed on MacTire’s offered hand of friendship. His own arm was leaden. He had to take what the King offered, but doing so would feel more like marking him for death than a handshake. ‘What I did, I did for Ash. Not for you,’ Connal said.
‘Nonetheless, I would have you call me Brother, and mean it. One day, perhaps.’ MacTire’s smile was warm as he clasped Connal’s forearm in an affirming grip. Connal’s was grim as he returned the gesture.
‘Hi.’ Ash's voice was sleepy from where she was blinking at them in the doorway. Connal's heart leapt at the sight she made, bed-rumpled and clad in one of his shirts, a gentle flush illuminating her pale cheeks. The two men jumped apart, distancing themselves, but her drowsy eyes lit up with a stirring tenderness. She'd seen. ‘I don’t mean to interrupt,’ she smiled, ‘but I think there’s somebody at the door.’