The Breed Casstiel's Vow (15 page)

Her back arched and her thighs quaked with pleasure as
he worked her with his tongue.
his
tongue moved faster
than she ever thought possible, making every muscle in her body scream out in a
beautiful tenseness.

Without warning he brought his two fingers up and began
to circle her, then plunged deeply into her body.

His fingers stretched her, and pleasure ran through her
body. She had no idea how he could do both things at once, but she never wanted
him to stop.

He kept up a steady rhythm of working her clit with his
tongue while his fingers pounded inside of her, ratcheting her pleasure higher
and higher.

Her eye lids fluttered, her hands clenched tightly into
fists, her breath left her lungs in a jagged rasping moan that turned into a
scream as the second orgasm over took her.

Every muscle in her body tightened at once as she
clasped around the fingers inside of her. The orgasm went on forever, stoked by
his unrelenting rhythm, making her shudder and writhe beneath him.

Finally her body stopped contracting and Tessa fell back
onto the blankets. Her bones weren’t solid anymore, her lungs were empty,
her
eye lids were so heavy she could barely keep them open.

“That’s better,” he grinned kissing her knee, then lay
down and wrapped his arms tightly around her.

Tessa stretched languidly and pulled the blankets closer
to her body as memories of the night before played through her mind.

As her lips tingled with their good night kiss, and it
amazed her how he could be so strong and commanding with his men, yet so soft
and gentle with her.

The smell of coffee wafting down the hallway reached
her, filling her with jittery excitement as she rushed to fill her best friend
in.

Nora was sitting at the table facing the doorway,
already dressed in a grey wool winter dress, and an impatient look on her face.

“It’s about time you woke up,” she tried to sound
serious as a sly smile slid across her lips.

“Yeah I guess I was out pretty late,” Tessa shrugged,
then laughed and sat down.

 “I bet you were! So what happened?” 
she
demanded excitedly.

Taking in a deep breath, and trying not to explode, she
began telling her everything.

As the story went on however, Nora’s face went from
excited to
worried
.

“Then that was it, he didn’t even take his clothes off.
He said he wanted me to know what he could give me, and that no other man could
give me the pleasure that he could,” she repeated, blushing.

Nora leaned back in her chair and sipped her coffee, a
sour look planted on her face.

When her friend didn’t give her the response she had
been expecting she stumbled on, “after that… we just talked and cuddled until
it got close to sunset, then we came home and he walked me to our apartment.”

The serious look didn’t waver from Nora’s face as she
stared off into the distance, still not speaking.

“What is it?” she finally asked, not being able to
handle her friends’ strange reaction anymore.

“I think we have a big problem. I didn’t really want to
believe it, but I don’t see another explanation. When Jax told me I just
thought he was full of shit, maybe even trying to mess with me, but I can’t
think of any other reason why Cass would have done what he did,” she spoke
through tight lips.

“Alright, any time you want to tell me what you’re
talking about would be great,” Tessa snapped.

“I think Cass has bonded with you,” she answered, panic
in her eyes.

“Bonded with me,” she repeated slowly as the words began
to sink in, “Oh… shit.”

“You need to go and talk to him, get this figured out,”
Nora was all business.

“I can’t talk to him about this, are you crazy?” she
grunted in frustration, “I come here to find my brother, I meet a cute guy and
think ‘cool I’ll go on a date, maybe actually get laid’, and now I’m… what?
Bonded? Tied to him no matter what?”

“I don’t know what’s going to happen, which is why you
need to talk to him,” she replied, and Tessa began to have the nagging feeling
that Nora was more frightened of what was happening than she was.

Yesterday she had thought the idea of bonding sounded
like a romantic fairytale, but when faced with it in the real world it seemed
like some sort of barbaric arranged marriage.

“And say what?” she exploded, “Hey Cass, I just heard a
rumor that you’re my soul mate and we’re bonded for life, if it’s true could
you please let me know so I can make the proper arrangements.”

Though her comment was dripping with sarcasm, and the
idea of being bonded to him seemed absurd and slightly terrifying, she couldn’t
deny that things felt different when she was with him. In just one day he had
made her feel special and beautiful, and more importantly he had made her feel
wanted.

“You’re being stupid,” she snapped, “Don’t you
understand? This isn’t some ridiculous human crush. This is serious. It’s all
or nothing for him.”

The look of fear in Nora’s eyes took her aback, never
had Tessa seen her so worried and panicked. She knew that her attack had something
slightly to do with the bond, but had it been enough to terrify her like this?

 “I need to get out of here,” Nora snapped, her
hands shaking, “I need some fresh air, I’ll be back later.”

Before she could even think about stopping her, Nora was
out the door, leaving Tessa with a whole new list of worries.

~

Casstiel's calf muscles were screaming as he pushed them
harder on the treadmill. More than thinking about what happened last night, his
mind had begun focusing on a new much more complicated subject: what the hell
was he going to do now.

Tessa’s feelings would be ever changing. She might be
beginning to care for him, but she was nowhere near in love, and whether or not
they found Quinn tonight in the subway, their time together was running out.

Her whole life was in Boston; she wouldn’t up root
herself and leave everything behind to come to New York, especially not for a
man she met yesterday.

A growl left his lips as he hit the treadmill faster.

What
could
he do?

Follow her? Just quit the defense department, put
someone else in charge of running the embassy, and go chasing after her like
some love struck teenager?

He needed to try and explain the bond to her, but he
knew it was going to scare the hell out of her. Normally a person of the Breed
wouldn’t even begin to mention the bond until the human was completely in love
with them, but in his case he just didn’t have the time.

Casstiel forced himself not to think of what he would do
if she shunned him. He didn’t want to know what her rejection would do to him;
it had driven others to complete insanity, and he wasn’t sure he could handle
it any differently. 

Bonding with a human was a risk no one in the Breed
wanted to take.

He looked up as he heard the rest of his team enter the
gym.

“Want some company?” Jax asked as he stifled a yawn, his
golden hair a rumpled mess on the top of his head.

 “I checked the video feed’s before I came down
here, no activity from the hunters, and sill no sign of Quinn Roberts. The
embassy agent who sighted him emailed her full witness statement this morning,”
Ghost reported stiffly, then headed into the changing room himself.

“So we missed you at the bar last night,” Jax gave him a
once over glance as he walked out of the changing room shirtless, wearing only
work out shorts and gym shoes.

Casstiel flipped him off and powered down his tread
mill. He was thankful for the distraction; At least with them around he could
bury himself in work, instead of thinking about things he had no control over.

“This case just has a weird vibe to it,” Kain changed
the subject, coming out of the changing room covered in black Under Armor.

“I know, but we need to stick to the plan,” he replied
firmly, he had more riding on this working out than he wanted to admit.

“I think we all have a lot on our minds,” Ghost cut in
and gave Casstiel a suspicious stare through his sunglasses. It wouldn’t
surprise him in the least if Ghost and the others had figured out his secret,
and he was thankful they weren’t out right talking about it.
Yet.

“You can say that again,” Casstiel sighed and headed
over to the bench press.

~

Tessa had been unable to find Nora anywhere in the
defense building, which wasn’t surprising given the size of the place. Finally
giving up she headed to the defense department to wait for everyone to get
together for the subway excursion.

When she entered the room she realized she was alone
with Cass for the first time since last night. Her heart skipped a beat that
she knew he could hear, but she kept her face poker straight, wanting to play
it cool.

“Morning,” he gave her a dazzling smile.

She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she had been
holding.

“I can’t find Nora, we we’re discussing some…. Things
this morning,” she muttered, “and she got really upset, I mean I’ve never seen
her so freaked out. She just ran off.”

Casstiel gave her a look that clearly stated he knew
exactly what they had been discussing, but to her great relief he took a deep
drink of his coffee and didn’t mention it.

“Your friend has suffered a great deal,” he finally
spoke, “I fear she now believes all men, especially those of the Breed, have
evil intentions.”

“Does everyone in the Breed know what happened to her?”
she asked, her heart aching.

“Unfortunately they do. Things like that almost never
happen, so the gossip
spread like
wild fire. It’s the
main reason Memphis turned to my brother and his shelter, to protect her from
her sad celebrity like status,” he explained.

“Does she know?” she asked quietly.

“I think she does,” he nodded, “but she handles it
bravely, certainly better than I would.”

“My girls a tough one,” Tessa replied, full of pride.

“As are you,” he made her blush with the adoring look in
his eyes. She needed to come up with a change of conversation quickly or she
knew he would bring up the bond.

She could feel him burning to talk about it, but she
needed time to think. Committing herself to someone she met yesterday was
insanity, but she knew she couldn’t simply dismiss him either.

“I think we should talk,” he prowled towards her.

“So when are we leaving for the subways?” she threw out
the first thing she could think of, daring to buy herself a little more time.

He stopped mid step.

“You’re not going,” he replied firmly, giving her a ‘non
negotiable’ look.

 “This is a joke right?” she cocked her head to the
side. 

“I’m serious Tessa,” his muscled legs were planted
firmly, his arms crossing over his chest.

Oh hell no
.

 “You cannot seriously be trying to keep me locked
up here while you go off and find my brother. I came here to find him, not sit
around like an invalid,” she fumed, unable to believe his attitude. She was not
one of his employees.

“I’m not ‘locking you up’, I’m trying to protect you,”
he replied calmly, trying to avoid a fight, but sticking to his guns.

“Protect me?” she scoffed, his air of calm making her
even angrier, “It’s a subway! Millions of people use it every day.”

“We’re going down into the abandoned subways; we
personally have found rapists and murderers down there. There’s no way in hell
you’re going with us,” he responded with the same infuriatingly calm voice.

“I’m going with vampires and werewolves, I’m pretty sure
I’d be safe against any human down there,” she wasn’t going to back down, no
matter what he said.

“What if there aren’t just humans down there? Just
yesterday you thought a pack of blood thirsty werewolves kidnapped your
brother, what if you were right. He could have been running from them all this
time, and we get into that subway and there they all are,” he demanded, trying
to force her to see reason.

“Then you’ll protect me,” she shrugged. Somehow she felt
like him protecting her was one of the most basic elements of life, along with
drinking water and breathing air. Deep down somewhere she knew as long as he could
get to her, she was never in danger.

“How am I supposed to protect you while leading my team
and saving your brother? You need to stay here,” the muscle in his jaw clenched
as he spoke.

“I’m going into that subway,” she replied, outraged at
his tone of voice, “I’m not a child. I get it that you’re the boss around here,
but you’re not my boss, and you’re not in charge of what I do.”

“This isn’t an argument,” he visibly stiffened. He
wasn’t used to anyone arguing with him over his orders, and he wasn’t going to
become a fan any time soon.

Tessa stared at him in disbelief for a few moments
before she could even register the situation she was in.

“So you’re saying I have no choice?” she demanded,
angrily grinding her teeth, “I just have to sit in this place like a little
princess while the big bad men go be heroes?”

“I’m saying I refuse to let you enter a dangerous
situation,” he wasn’t going to budge an inch.

“You’re worse than Sebastian,” her anger boiled over
making her shake with rage, “who the hell put you in charge of my life and what
I do with it?”

“Sebastian’s not bonded to you, I am. I won’t put you in
a situation where you could get hurt, or I can’t concentrate on my job because
I’m worried about you. I won’t risk your life or the life of my team,” his
temper finally snapped.

She was too pissed off to care that he had just admitted
to bonding with her, in this moment she couldn’t give a damn about him or his
bond.

“This is such bullshit!” she raged, clenching her hands
into fists and wanting to throw something, “I’m not a child, you can’t tell me
where I can and cannot go, you can’t just take away my choice.”