Page 24 of Reformed Wolf
Chapter 11
Tristan
I rolled over yet again, the soft sheets clinging to my damp skin. The guest room was nice, far nicer than the hotels I usually slept in when I came to the city, and a far cry nicer than my cabin in the woods. I should’ve slept like a baby on this cloudlike mattress. But as exhausted as I was, sleep was nowhere in sight. My mind was still doing cartwheels after dinner. I didn’t like to talk about what happened to my moms and sister. The wound was always festering just under the surface, and now that the scab had been pulled off, it was bleeding freely all over again. And if my spinning brain wasn’t enough, my body? Oh, shit. My body was ready to go another ten rounds in the ring. I was like a pharmaceutical ad for restless leg syndrome the way I was flopping around.
Groaning, I rolled onto my back and blinked up at the ceiling. “This is so pointless,” I said out loud to my wolf, but he clearly didn’t agree, since the only reply I got from was a soft snore. “Traitor,” I mumbled. “We’re supposed to suffer together, remember?”
I’d left the curtains pulled back and the balcony doors open, blowing in a fresh breeze, hoping it would clear my head. I felt like I was being pulled in two different directions at the same time, the tug-of-war tearing me straight down the middle. On the one hand was my home, my family. Pack had been everything to me growing up—until I met my mate. Now, I was no longer the man I was just a few days ago. My priorities had shifted so that even my own Alpha wouldn’t recognize me anymore. Dylan was the only thing that could’ve made me consider leaving my pack behind. I didn’t want to, but I would, because he was my future, my entire world, whatever that looked like going forward.
For the first time ever, I wished I had a cell phone so I could talk to Shan about it. He was the only one I knew who’d experienced a fated bond. He would understand.
I was mid flip when I heard a sound, like a twig snapping, from the open balcony doors. I tensed, sitting up, the sheet falling around my waist. Are you asleep? I asked my wolf. Normally, he would’ve been on high alert to any threat, of which there were many now that I’d painted a huge-ass target on my back, but he snorted sleepily at me, oblivious to any potential danger. But then, the breeze carried a scent now as familiar to me as my own. Lily of the valley.
“Dylan?” I whispered, creeping out of bed. The floor was cool, the air kissing my bare backside as I padded over to the balcony. “Dylan, are you—”
There was a rustle, a crack, and then sudden movement from overhead. I opened my arms right as a body came dropping out of the sky. “Oof!” Dylan grunted. He was wearing nothing but a pair of flannel sleep pants. Trying to regain his composure, he smoothed his dark hair back. “You didn’t have to catch me, you know. I would’ve landed on my feet.”
I chuckled softly, shifting his weight in my arms and carrying him into my room. “Sure thing, kitty cat, but maybe you belong in my arms. Do I want to ask why you’re climbing the vines outside my window when my room has a perfectly good door?”
He huffed, smirking. “My dad likes to keep a close eye on me, especially at night… especially when my fated mate is under the same roof, just down the hall.” He hooked his arm around my neck and nuzzled closer, tracing a line across my skin with his nose, breathing me in. “You’d better be taking me to your bed,” he murmured, his voice raspy.
“At your command,” I purred, kneeling on the bed to lay him down in the middle of it. Then I followed my forward momentum and lay across him. His warmth heated my skin, his wandering hands raising goosebumps all the way down to my bare ass, and when he arched his back, he ground his hard length into me, the only thing between us a thin layer of flannel. It would be so easy to just slip the elastic waistband down and…
But then his words sank in, and I froze, my lips close enough to his to feel his breath skating over my tongue. I propped myself above him, gazing down at him. His skin was glowing beautifully with a blush, eyes heavy-lidded with lust. “Wait… Why would your dad be keeping an eye on you? You said you were 21. Please tell me you’re legal.”
“Oh… Yeah, I am.” He bit his full lower lip, a crease forming between his brows, amber eyes filled with guilt, and my heartbeat started to stutter. “Um, so, it’s all part of the prize for the competition. Whoever wins gets some very lucrative business deals with my dad and gets me as their mate… and my v-virginity.” His voice squeaked a little at the end, and his gaze skittered off to the side.
“You’re a virgin?!” I shouted too loudly, before I could stop myself. We both turned our heads to the door to listen for a second, and when no one came barging in, I lowered my voice to a whisper. “Are you serious?” He nodded, and I groaned, dropping my forehead to his shoulder. “Just when I thought you couldn’t get better…” My cock twitched against him as if begging for a chance to change his virginal status, and it squeezed out a dribble of precum. I’d assumed we could have sex as long as there was no marking, but this…
I rolled off him and grabbed a pillow to cover my aching hard-on. Rubbing my hands over my face, I groaned again. “You didn’t give head like a virgin.”
He pinched the corner of the pillow and dragged it off slowly, the friction of the fabric like a delicious kind of torture. “I might be lacking in experience, but you should see all the fantasies I conjure up in my mind, all the sinfully wicked ways I want you to take me…” He tossed the pillow aside, his gaze focused on my raging boner. He licked his lips, and the tether on my restraint nearly snapped.
I closed my eyes and breathed through my mouth so I didn’t get pulled in by his fragrant aroma, but now I swore I could taste it instead. From there, it was just a hop, skip, and a jump to thinking of all the other different flavors his body might yield. Focus, dammit! “Dylan, shit, you deserve someone better than me. I’m… I’m not a good guy. I’m like an anti-virgin. Is that a thing?”
The mattress wiggled as he moved closer, his arm brushing mine. His voice was tentative as he asked, “Do you want someone else?”
My eyes snapped open, and I glared at him with bright eyes that I knew must reflect my wolf. “Never. You are the only one I will ever want for as long as I live.” It was insane! We’d just met, had barely had a full conversation, but I just knew he was it for me. This was full-on, romance-novel instalove! My wolf and I were fully on the same page about this.
His smile was like a sunrise from my own personal sun. “Then you’re perfect, because I plan to reap the rewards for all that experience.”
I swallowed hard. “You’re sure? It’s not too late to change your mind, we haven’t marked each other yet. I could leave, and you could find someone more worthy.” Except as I said the words, I was already reaching for him, already anticipating his reply.
“No one is more worthy than you,” he whispered as he brought his mouth to my chest and laved his tongue across my nipple. His tongue was textured, his panther rising up to the surface, and holy hell, I’d never felt anything like it.
I carded my fingers through his short hair, intending to pull him off, have him wait for a second so I could think straight, but instead, I held him right where he was as he administered a proper tongue bath.
“You know,” he mumbled against my chest as he crawled overtop of me, straddling my hips. “Just because we can’t have sex, that doesn’t mean we can’t fool around.”
“Mm-hm, that’s good,” I said, eyes rolling back into my head, thoroughly distracted by what he was doing with his mouth. I could die a happy man as long as he kept doing that.
He moved his ministrations up my chest, my neck, nipping at my pulse point in a show of trust. My hands coasted over his back, kneading my fingers into his lean muscles. I loved his body. He wasn’t bulky, but I could sense his strength lying in wait. I couldn’t wait to meet his panther. Me too, my wolf agreed.
With our bodies flush, chest to chest, he leaned over me. “Mine,” he purred, amber eyes flashing, before he gripped my jaw and owned my mouth with his. His flavor filled my senses as he licked through my mouth with that rasping tongue. All coherent thought fled my mind, leaving behind only Dylan.
As the kiss deepened, I slid my hands lower, down the back of his soft pants to squeeze the perfect globes of his ass, holding him in place so I could grind against him. My fingers met his slippery excretions dripping from his crack, and I moaned into his mouth. This was going to be harder than I thought. “Are you sure we can’t have sex?”
He shook his head. “I’m not sure of anything anymore,” he panted. “What’s my name again? I can’t seem to remember.”