The Beast Within (5 page)

Despite Tony’s confidence, Aaron brought a packet of gauze pads and the peroxide along just the same. He washed his hands at the sink, singing his arm hair on a candle in the process, then knelt by Tony’s side.

“Arm up,” he commanded.

“You always this bossy around half naked men?” Tony teased.

“You should see me when they’re fully naked.” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. He bit his tongue and went to work cleaning the wound. To his credit, Tony did not wince or groan when he poured the peroxide across the tender flesh.

“Now the ointment.” Tony’s voice was low, intimate in proximity.

Aaron couldn’t force his gaze upward to meet Tony’s. He concentrated on the gash, using the corner of a clean piece of gauze to spread it across Tony’s side. The medicine slid easily across the flesh, warming as it touched the damaged areas. The heat below his fingers became searing. Tony stiffened, grabbed the edges of the toilet seat with both hands. A sound of pure agony built in his throat, tearing from his mouth in a ragged scream. His feet lashed out, missing Aaron by a scant inch.

“What’s wrong? What’s it doing? Should I wash it off?” Aaron shouted over Tony’s misery.

“Leave. It,” Tony managed to say past gritted teeth. “Melts.”

Aaron nodded and moved to Tony’s front, placing himself between his knees as a brace so he didn’t slide off onto the floor. The flesh on Tony’s side became molten. Tony howled as his skin sizzled. Sweat covered his pale face. He leaned forward, buried his head in Aaron’s shoulder. Aaron cupped his neck and held him as he screamed. The steaming, liquid flesh flowed together across his ribcage, sealing closed as if by an invisible zipper. The last of the wound disappeared, leaving a red-hot patch of unmarred skin. Tony’s shoulders relaxed and he slumped into Aaron’s arms, panting. The angry inflammation quickly faded. A moment later, Tony sighed in relief and pulled back enough to look Aaron in the eyes. Without the cocky radiance, they were soft, vulnerable. Aaron became aware of his hand’s lingering presence on the back of Tony’s head, and even more so of the desire to keep it there.

“Thanks for that,” Tony said. His voice was worn, raspy from the screams.

“You could have warned me,” Aaron whispered back. Something fragile seemed to hover in the air around them, something that even one harshly voiced syllable could shatter into irretrievable pieces.

“And miss this?” Tony reached out and stroked Aaron’s face. He slid his thumb along the hollow of Aaron’s cheek, once, then again.

Aaron closed the distance between them in a swift, sure motion. He covered Tony’s mouth with his own. Tony responded, pushing his tongue past Aaron’s lips, gliding it along his tongue with deep intensity while he spread his legs farther apart to accommodate Aaron’s body against his own. Even as Aaron slid his hands to either side of Tony’s face to control the pressure of his lips, he could not wrap his mind around what he was doing. Tony was his partner. His
new
partner. In a new town. This was more than breaking the rules, it was snapping them into tiny pieces and tap dancing on them. Aaron pulled back.

“Tony,” he said, his tone hardly a firm one. “Tony?”

“Yes?” Tony stroked Aaron’s arms, ran light fingers down to his clenched fists, which rested between his legs. Tony played with the balled digits. “You were going to say this is wrong and we shouldn’t.”

“Yes.” Aaron watched the hands playing with his own, then looked beyond to the unmistakable bulge resting against Tony’s thigh. “The rules—”

“The rules are stupid,” Tony interrupted. “They tell us we can’t be involved as it presents a safety hazard. But, let me ask you this, would you protect me less if we were fucking?”

A blush rose to Aaron’s face. He couldn’t hide it. Decided he didn’t need to.

“Would you be so busy looking at my ass that you wouldn’t see a ghoul coming at us?”

“I might.” Aaron gave a wicked smile.

“Fair enough.” Tony grinned back. “How fast would you move to rectify that situation, were you distracted as described?”

“Fast.”

“Well, then. If you are as bound by desire as you are the rules to protect me, as you attest”—Tony bent and kissed his eyelid—“I don’t see a problem.” He planted a kiss on Aaron’s other lid. “Do you?”

Aaron looked up into Tony’s face. His smile grew so large he thought his face might split.

Tony nodded, satisfied, then lunged forward. He caught Aaron’s head in his hand as he drove him backwards, his mouth crushing his lips, legs straddling his body. The force slammed them against the tub. Aaron took little notice. All that mattered was Tony pressed against him, his warm, sweat-dampened chest sliding against his shirt.

Tony’s kiss was deep and skilled. With each caress of his tongue, a jolt of electric pleasure shot down Aaron’s abdomen to his groin. His dick stiffened. Tony moved to his neck and he licked and kissed along his jugular, lapping slow and cat-like. Aaron clenched Tony’s arms. The muscles rippled beneath his hand. Tony arched in, and pressed his cock against Aaron’s. Aaron’s dick jumped at the proximity. He reached for Tony’s pants, but he was slapped gently away. Tony grazed Aaron’s neck with his teeth as he smiled against it, letting out a little laugh.

“How do you like it?” he whispered in Aaron’s ear. Dizzying blood pounded there at the question.

“I just want you,” was all Aaron could answer. His body trembled with anticipation.

Tony trailed along Aaron’s jaw, up to his mouth. He kissed him lightly, still smiling. His teeth snapped over Aaron’s lip, biting hard. Aaron cried out in surprise. A moment later, Tony’s hand cupped his balls and rubbed gently. Pleasure coursed through his cock.

“Do you want me like this?”

Aaron didn’t trust himself to speak. He had never been with someone so confident, so sure of what would bring his own body pleasure. The dark thing roiled against Tony’s alpha play. Anything the nastiness inside him disliked, Aaron found appealing. Besides, the look in Tony’s eyes and the delicious tingle in his lip and crotch were too much to resist.

“How about this?” Tony grinned and pulled the Class-A restraints out of his belt.

Enthralled by Tony’s charm, and aroused beyond reason, Aaron held out his hands. The creature inside him growled, but desire drowned the protest.

Tony closed the distance between them with a kiss. As he explored Aaron’s mouth with his tongue, he worked his hands down Aaron’s arms. The cold metal shackles clamped around one of his wrists. The magic within them hummed pleasantly against his flesh. Tony kissed his neck, brought his hands to the side to a loop of pipe protruding from the floor. He threaded the restraints through the pipe and clamped the restraint over Aaron’s other hand. A moment later, the pleasure turned to stabbing pain. The dark thing howled in fury. Aaron had been tricked.

“What are you?” Tony pulled back, all trace of warmth gone from his face.

“What do you mean?”

“When you came out of the Laundromat your eyes were yellow. Why?”

Aaron shook his head.

“I could have called Acquisitions to come get you right then. But I didn’t. I wanted to give you a chance to explain. So don’t throw my generosity back in my face with stupid blank stares and lame shrugs. What are you?”

“You know.” Aaron sagged into his restraints. The humiliation of being lured into confinement in an obvious holding device in his partner’s bathroom was nothing compared to the fact he was to face this reality with a still raging hard on. His sins of omission had come home to roost far sooner than he’d expected. “Everyone suspects it. How else could I survive an attack of the Six Rivers clan? You know as well as anyone in our line of work that a werewolf bite is lethal unless you are that one person in twenty-five thousand who has the gateway gene. Everyone in my office had werewolf bites.”

“And you’re not dead.”

“No, I’m not.” Aaron gave a small smile. “Although there were times in the beginning I wished I were.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“And say what? Hi, I’m Aaron Marvell, werewolf, and your new partner? Or should I have turned right there in the bullpen? That’s what Ellison was angling for, you know. He was trying to humiliate me into turning. A couple of months ago it would have worked.”

“You have better control that that, though?”

“Now, yes. Thanks to Carlos, my ex. He reached out to me after the attack. His clan had heard about what happened, that there was a survivor. He found me and counseled me about the change. Fortunately the full moon had just gone, so I had a few weeks to wrap my head around it before the first shift took me. Carlos and the others made sure I was secluded and safe for that first transformation. They guided me through the process. Carlos then mentored me, taught me what it was like to live as a werewolf in modern society, to avoid doing the things that make people like you and me head out on a termination hunt.”

“But he didn’t come with you to Maryland?”

“No.” Aaron sensed a shift in Tony’s line of questioning. It was a sign of hope. “We ended up together too soon after the attack. Some days I was fine, almost normal. Other days I had horrific nightmares, panic attacks where I screamed my head off for hours on end, general freak-outs where I forgot where I was, who my friends were.” Aaron shifted in an unsuccessful attempt to ease the cramp growing in his side. “I often shifted during those times. I couldn’t control it. After the initial transformation my shifts became violent, unpredictable. The full moon guaranteed a shift for me, but the rest of the month was not a change-free period for me the way it is for other weres.”

“Why not?” Tony asked.

“I don’t know. Nobody does. But, that’s how it was—is—for me.” His answering shrug sent a wave of pain down his wrists from the restraints. He stopped moving. “They locked me up in Carlos’ house and kept a guard on me twenty-four hours a day. I would change unprovoked, and attack whichever pack member was assigned to babysit me. Carlos had to shoot me with tranqs to keep me down. And then I would shift back, wake up with blood staining my mouth and cry for hours, begging Carlos to kill me.”

Begging was the mildest term for it. Naked, snot running from his nose and drool dribbling down his chin, screaming unintelligible words as he slammed his head into the wall in the hopes of dashing his brains out of his skull… Aaron fought off a chill at the memory.

“We did have a few good days out of the five months we were together. I clung to the memories of them while Carlos grew brooding and unreachable, haunted by the countless days that were nowhere near happy. Even though I eventually gained control of myself, it was too late for us. Carlos had given me everything he had, and in return I emptied him like a soda can and crushed him for good measure. When the transfer order came, he encouraged me to head out and give my life another shot. He was relieved.”

“Did you ask him to come with you?”

“Of course. And of course he said no.”

Tony watched him for a few moments, his expression softening. Finally, he said, “What’s Ellison’s beef with you?”

“Who knows?” Aaron laughed. “He’s been a jackass since day one. I lost track of him after the attack. Thought shaking loose of his endlessly running mouth was the one small blessing I’d earned in this mess. But no, here he is. Maybe he resents me for what happened to our co-workers. More likely he resents I was the one lauded as a hero when he was off taking a sick day and missing the slaughter. He definitely suspects I’ve become a were. Maybe he’s waiting for his golden opportunity to shift the paradigm, turn himself into the hero that saves the Grange branch from the nasty werewolf.”

The floor trembled, cutting off Tony’s reply.

“Qi?” Aaron asked, although he was certain he knew the answer. His stomach knotted once more, urged him to escape his bonds and make for the sulfurous gateway that had just opened. The awareness of that odd sensation faded as the shaking increased. The lights in the main room flickered. The furniture jounced.

“I’d say so,” Tony replied.

“Let me out, then.” Aaron jangled his restraints. “You need me for backup.”

Tony cast a critical glance at him, then at the restraints. He opened his mouth again to speak, then shut it and shook his head.

“You don’t trust me. I get it.” Aaron pressed. “But, I had your back today in the Laundromat. And what I agreed to, about always having it, I meant. Whatever bullshit game you were playing with me through the past twenty minutes, I don’t care. I meant what I said. If nothing else that happened between us matters, fine. But, I am your partner. Sworn and bound to protect you from harm.” His voice rose as doubt flashed across Tony’s expression. “Sworn and bound. And I can’t do a thing about it with my damn hands cuffed to a pipe.”

“Sorry,” Tony said. “I have to concentrate on one potential threat at a time.” With that, he rose and left the room, pulling the door closed behind him.

Aaron didn’t bother to struggle against the restraints. They were magically sealed and intuitive to the size and potential lethality of their captives. The more flexing and prying he did, the tighter the bond, the more severe the electrical shocks would become. He scooted to a full sitting position and sat cross-legged and sullen, listening to the commotion outside.

The shaking escalated until the light bulbs rattled in their sockets, then died off, replaced by voices. Although Aaron couldn’t make out the words, he could hear the charming, enticing lilt in Tony’s voice, and the contrasting sandpaper-across-concrete rasp of Qi’s. After a few moments of back and forth, the grating voice began to rise in agitation. Aaron leaned forward to try to hear what was being said. The restraints tightened with his movement.

“…not your problem…” A few of Tony’s words made their way to Aaron’s ears. “…broom…who bought…?”

Qi’s rumbling grew louder, more menacing. Aaron scooted forward, his arms now uncomfortably strained to one side, his wrists pulled tight against the cuffs. His joints screamed against the strain, his hands burnt with electrical fire.

“Who hired—?” Tony was suddenly cut off. A fraction of a second later, something crashed into a piece of furniture, splintering it. “Hang on a second, Qi. Hang on.” Tony’s weakened voice came from another area of the room. The sour note of panic drifted under the door to his nose.