Talons (30 page)

“
Classically disgusting is
what they were,” she replied vindictively as she looked up at him.
“What do you need all that for if you have me?”

Eli shook his head, seeing the gleam in
her eyes. He knew she threw it all away to punish him for forcing
her to move in with him. He frowned slightly, thinking of his vast
collection sitting in the dumpster now.

“
In that case, you will have
to be very clever, Vivvie,” he said as he propped himself up on his
elbows, a look of admiration in his gaze. “I require more than an
average amount of stimulation.”

Vivvie felt his stimulation growing
rock hard against her thigh. She reached down to stroke his long,
rigid length. “Yes, I can see you need a lot of attention, Eli.
You’re very high maintenance. We will have to take extra special
care of you.” Vivvie was pleased to see his eyes close in
ecstasy.

“
Did you find the magazines
under the sink in the kitchen too?” he asked with a moan as she
stroked him with slow deliberation.

“
I found everything,” she
whispered as she rubbed him faster, seeing him tense at her
words.

He opened one eye as her sensual
perusal became rougher and more insistent. “Even the stuff in the
pantry?”

Vivvie let out a sigh of disgust. He
rose above her and pushed within her. Her body clenched around his.
“I may have missed those,” she said between gasps as he moved
hungrily within her.

Eli growled low under his breath, his
face buried in her neck, his big body sinking within her smaller
one. “Thank God you forgot those, Vivvie.” He seemed to become even
more aroused, thinking she overlooked some of his porn in her
cleaning spree.

Afterwards when Eli held her tightly
against his sweaty chest, Vivvie let out a frustrated
sigh.

“
You don’t even care that I
threw it all away, do you?”

“
Not really, no,” he said
with a chuckle and dropped a kiss on her nose, laughing softly
against her hair. “Ah Vivvie, you made my day. No, this will be
fun. I bring it in and you drag it out. It will be a challenge to
see how long it takes for you to let me use them on
you.”

She gasped with a look of horror and he
chuckled evilly. “You’re my girlfriend now. I thought you wanted to
make sure I was taken care of?” Eli chuckled and held her closely.
“This should get interesting.”

~~~~

The weeks passed blissfully. By day,
Vivvie engaged her online classes, finding them daunting as she
studied while Eli worked. By night, she hunted with Eli, becoming
quite proficient in bringing down prey on her own. Eli was as good
in making her rethink every awful thing she ever thought of
him.

He wasn’t the cold, callous beast she
first thought him. She was surprised to learn he had considerable
depth to him. Listening to how he dealt with members if his tribe
made her see how difficult his job was, how thankless.

The nights and the passion between them
made her cheeks get warm. Eli was so sexually high-charged it was
rare they didn’t end or begin each day making love. He was
insatiable and chased her around if she denied him. Denying him was
rare. Still, he was far more adventurous than she was ready for.
The things he made her feel made her face burn.

Just thinking about how quickly she
latched onto Eli made her grow cautious. No rebound was at work
here. The feelings she began to have for him already formed without
her knowing it. Still, after making a fool of herself over Ty, she
refrained from sharing them with him, expecting to be sent back to
her old room soon.

The emails received from Ty were
impersonal and informative now. She was a bit perturbed by his
obvious omission of his feelings to learn she and Eli lived
together. He showed no surprise or jealousy, much to her disgust.
He wished her well. A small catty part of her hoped it bothered
him, even if she felt more content with Eli than she ever felt with
Ty.

Vivvie suspected Eli hacked into her
email account to read the messages from Ty. It warmed her he
thought enough to be jealous, but she had no intention of trusting
that counted as true caring. When he came home from his work, they
fell into a pattern of lazy domesticity.

If one considered normal domestic life
how they hunted together for their evening meals, sat upon the rock
ledge each night, and wrestled and played constantly together in
their animal forms. He enjoyed taking her in his animal form,
biting into her neck tenderly all the while. They were in tune with
one another now, and it was difficult for her to think of it all
ending when she left him.

Vivvie allowed Eli to talk her into her
dreams and guide her to finding Ryken. She was learning to channel
her power, but yet to grasp him in her dreams. Eli was growing
frustrated but he was patient.

The tribe was accepting, if not happy,
of her place at Eli’s side. The women didn’t dare speak ill of her
to her face, but her heightened hearing heard their jealous
comments. She felt saddened she was no closer to making a friend
among the females of the compound, but it was very much the way it
was.

She was an outsider still, an
interloper that stole their Alpha leaders. The fact Eli sought no
others pleased her, as much as it enraged the women who waited
eagerly for his signals. Those signals didn’t come.

A trip to Denver under protest recouped
Eli’s supply of ‘passionate aids’ as he called them, and soon she
never complained again when he demonstrated the use of each,
chasing her around his suite with determination.

That morning an urgent call came in
from Florida from Ty. Jericho and Eli were locked inside the
conference room and their demeanors were grim when they came out.
Vivvie felt Eli’s stress when he returned to their room, though he
said nothing.

She could see the worry around his eyes
and lips, and that night she hunted for a young doe while he
brooded at the rock ledge. The situation was worsening while she
was trying to master her gift. More women went missing. The FBI
assembled a task force now. Agent Whitlow was leading the
investigation.

Jericho insisted upon putting her under
in the clinic with a mild sedative to get her deeper into sleep,
but still Ryken eluded her. She found Ty instead. Seeing him asleep
in his room in Florida brought back memories of their brief time
together. She didn’t mention it to Eli, knowing he wouldn’t
understand her doing a drive by in her dream.

Eli grew alarmingly possessive of her.
She recalled his shifting in a rage during a movie night when one
of Gideon’s son’s flirted with her. The young man was named Dillon
and he was quite determined to corner her on her way to get more
popcorn.

The sight of Eli pinning the younger
man in a death grip with his massive jaws only reminded her she was
very much his. After that, she avoided meeting the eyes of other
males, learning it invited such attention.

She learned much about her own nature
when she arrived to dinner to find his female entourage draped over
him. Rage was spewing through every pore as she tossed females out
of his lap, her teeth showing, eyes spewing in fury. Eli was amused
to see her shift and bear down on two females who enjoyed
tormenting her.

They were very in sync to one another’s
moods. Vivvie knew when to leave Eli alone, sensing when he got
quiet he had much on his mind. He knew when she grew melancholy
over missing her human world enough to leave her be. Eli even knew
she was going into heat again before she did.

The growing temper, her increased
sexuality, and her wandering attention failed to be noticed by her.
She was three days into heat when she realized Eli hardly left her
alone. If anything, he was even more attentive. He lingered with
her in the mornings, bringing her to a shrieking climax before he
went to work, only to break in the middle of the day to join her
for long, heated encounters. The dizzying passion made her
oblivious of the danger.

She accepted Eli’s explanation he had
not noticed her condition, but deep down she knew better. Her scent
was an immediate alert to him and every male in the compound. She
went to see Jericho a week later, tense and aware of the new
changes in her body.

He confirmed it after a simple urine
test. His yellow green gaze met hers sadly.

“
You’re breeding,” he said
quietly and saw her face fall at his words. “Eli should be
pleased.”

“
I’m not!” she snapped and
paced in the exam room, eyes filled with unease. “This is hardly
good news, Jericho. Oh God, what am I going to do?”

“
You’re going to be a
mother, Vivvie, regardless of Eli’s intentions,” Jericho said and
patted her shoulder. “You’re young and healthy. First litters are
difficult, but you should do fine.”

“
Oh God, one is bad
enough!”

“
Be lucky you’re not a
bigger female, they can have upwards of five. You’re small boned.
No more than three, I would say, two at the very least.”

Vivvie didn’t know how to feel about
it. “Will he know? Do I have a scent that tells everyone I’m
breeding too?”

“
Vivvie, Eli has been
through this a dozen times before,” Jericho said with a chuckle. “I
think he knew you were breeding before you did.”

Vivvie left the clinic and returned to
her room, finished her computer work for her classes and waited for
Eli. Her boyfriend was buried in paperwork for the tribe, his
business, and other matters. He told her he would be working late
as a result.

Evan, one of his twin sons, and her
most devoted admirer brought her dinner. The boy stayed, sensing
her depressed mood. He called her Miss Vivian, which made her feel
ancient to his fifteen years. She knew he had a crush on her and
didn’t encourage it, knowing Eli would snap his son’s neck if he
got into one of his jealous rages.

“
You seem sad, Miss Vivian,”
Evan said as he surfed channels on the big screen. “Miss Mara said
talking helps.”

Miss Mara could bite her ass, but
Vivvie smiled sweetly. “You wouldn’t understand. I don’t even
understand myself.”

“
My father will be happy
about the babies you know,” Evan said and smiled brightly at her
shocked expression. He rushed to explain. “I have a gift I just
discovered. I sense things like that, life growing,” he explained
proudly making her face burn.

“
What else can you do?” she
was afraid to ask.

“
I can communicate with
them; the babies,” he said and smiled shyly, looking so much like
his father her heart ached. “Yours haven’t shut up since I’ve been
sitting here.”

“
Evan, do they talk to you?
Do you hear them?” she said and grew slightly faint when he smiled
proudly and nodded. “Are my babies the only ones you have ever
heard?” and again he nodded.

Vivvie knew Evan possessed no gift. He
was merely hearing projections from her children, which obviously
had their father’s same strange ability. Eli would be very pleased.
She was furious too, knowing Eli knew and heard them from the
start. “They say you’re not happy about them,” Evan said quietly as
his blue eyes met hers sadly. “They’re afraid now.”

Vivvie felt her heart clench at his
words, knowing them to be true. She thought of what she said to
Jericho and cringed to think her babies knew how she felt, how she
dreaded having them and they weren’t even born yet.

“
How many of them are
there?” Vivvie asked breathlessly, fascinated by the fact her
unborn children confided in Evan.

“
Two, a boy and a girl,”
Evan replied and smiled in delight.

“
Yeah, that’s great,” Vivvie
said and tried to sound cheerful, but felt deflated her own
children failed to speak to her, making her feel more like an
outsider than ever. “Why don’t they talk to me?”

“
They say you don’t want
them.”

The blood drained from her face. Is
that how she felt? She felt horrible. “It’s just such a surprise.
Tell them I’m a little nervous about being a mom.”

“
I did, I told them all of
that,” Evan assured her. “They understand, and said they won’t hold
it against you.”

Vivvie found the conversation very
disturbing and then Eli came home. Evan left after speaking with
his father for a few minutes. She saw the affection he had for his
son and it pulled at her heart.

Evan was close with Eli, even if Eli
couldn’t stand the boy’s mother. The woman put stories in both
boys’ minds trying to turn them against their father because Eli
lost interest in her years ago.

“
What’s on your mind,
Vivvie,” Eli said as he joined her on the couch, his blue eyes
glowing. “You have that look on your face again, like I did
something wrong.”

“
Apparently you did
something right!” Vivvie snapped as soon as Evan was out the door,
her eyes boring into his accusingly. “I’m pregnant!”

Seeing Eli’s lack of surprise made her
seethe in anger. “We haven’t kept our hands off each other in
weeks, Vivvie. We weren’t careful. I thought you would be
happy.”