"He. Is. Only. My. Flatmate," chanted Gemma carefully. She'd been stating it with various degrees of indignation, resignation or embarrassment all day, to no evident effect; Kate and Bethan obviously had their blood up and were revelling in teasing her. She'd hoped that they would be a bit more discreet on the open street, but no chance. Having restrained themselves to mere whispers on the bus, her two exasperating friends were now, as they walked up the road to her flat, reverting gleefully to full-volume outrageousness.
"Oh, yes?" drawled Kate, raising one eyebrow sceptically, "Haven't we heard that innocent tone somewhere before? What was it you said again? Something about Mike and platonic and mere friendship, wasn't it, just before he kept us all awake all night caterwauling romantically outside my window after the Christmas ball?" She sighed, before adding tartly, "Last time you get to sleep over."
"Methinks," chimed in Bethan on Gemma's left, "that the lady (so to speak) doth protest just way too much."
Gemma ignored them, pulling her coat tighter against the cool evening breeze and hitching her bag more securely over her shoulder, dipping her head to hide her burning cheeks behind the fall of her dark hair. Sometimes her friends were just so irritating.
"Mmm-hmm," agreed Kate, "Just makes you wonder why, doesn't it? But then, you don't have to look far for her reason. The eyes kind of get stuck on Mac as soon as they connect with him."
"He's only my flatmate," repeated Gemma resignedly. Thank god I'm nearly home, she thought.
"And she may be protesting too much now," Kate continued with a wink across at Bethan, "but I can't imagine her making any protestation when she gets home."
"He is only my flatmate." As you both know very well. Half a street to go. Gemma speeded up, knowing trying to shake them off was futile, but it would cut down harassment time before they parted at her door.
"Oh I don't know," Bethan replied across Gemma to Kate's, her long legs easily adjusting stride to the new pace. She abruptly changed her tone to a breathless coo, "Oh please, Mac, please don't," she panted huskily, "oh don't, oh, no, oh, oh, oooh, Mac, oh, nooooo."
Gemma stopped dead on the walkway and closed her eyes, clenching her fists, trying to block out her brain's suggestions as to what Mac might do to her to generate... she wrenched her mind away from that pointless path, well aware that her nipples were painfully peaked and the dampness was spreading against her panties. Again. Then she took a deep breath, pulled herself together and faced off against her so-to-speak friends.
"I thought you two had become accustomed to him FINALLY."
"Accustomed?" echoed Kate, "How do we become accustomed to that absolutely gorgeous male model adorning your flat?" she queried incredulously.
"He's a photographer, not a model."
Bethan swatted away Gemma's interjection with a careless hand. "Whatever. Look at him. He's so nice and tall," she sighed the last word in appreciation of a male who easily topped her own graceful height. Then she added, "Well, anyone is to you admittedly."
"And he's got that gorgeous mop of tawny hair," Kate joined in, her eyes beginning to shine at the thought.
"Deep, deep, green eyes that make any girl just melt away, mmmmm." Bethan cast her own eyes up in an expression of rapture.
"He's funny," sighed Kate.
"Thoughtful."
"Smooth, rippling muscles."
"Although we haven't seen the best of them," Bethan leered at Gemma, who rolled her eyes.
"Did you just see him in that shirt last night - rolled up to expose those forearms - the definition, the dusky tan, the lean strength, the welcoming smile in his eyes... mmmm." Kate was obviously off in a dream world.
"Divine," agreed Bethan, her voice now slightly husky.
"Muy, muy male. Mmmmm." Kate looked as though she was following her thoughts into heaven. Or more probably somewhere else entirely.
Gemma had had enough. Her whole body was trembling, simmering. She didn't need the reminders. "Okay, okay," she snapped out, "I will ask him never to wear that shirt again ..."
"Or only privately for her," Kate interrupted in a whispered aside, and Gemma glared at her supposedly intelligent blonde friend as she continued, "... as it turns the two of you into nincompoop trollops..."
"Nincompoop trollops? Nincompoop trollops!? Been working hard on your deadly insult list, Gem?" queried Bethan, grinning down at her.
"... and no, you are Not Coming In." Gemma stopped outside the outer door and flicked her wrist in disdainful dismissal, glaring back at them as she fumbled for the lock with her key. They had both stopped also a few paces back, and were grinning naughtily, happily, at her.
"Have a good evening, Gemma."
"Yep, study hard. Concentrate."
"Don't let anything distract you. No naughty thoughts."
Gemma stuck out her tongue at them, then smiled wryly as she pushed open the door and stepped into the entranceway. She caught Bethan's parting stage whisper as they turned on up the road toward their own flat, "Quick, girl, quick. He'll be going to work soon, don't miss out!"
"Idiots," she snorted, and shut the door somewhat forcefully behind her. Then she leaned back on it, and took a deep breath. Counted her stampeding heartbeats. Another deep breath. Another. Damn. She was on fire. The idiots had been at it all day, and her unruly brain had been indulging in more and more erotic fantasies until she couldn't even think through the fire in her veins and the aching pool of warmth between her thighs.
She had to calm down. That pair didn't have to deal with the fact that Mac was just patently not interested, whatever she might not be able to stop herself- or them -from fantasising about. After six months, she and Mac had settled comfortably into being really good friends and she didn't want to mess with that. He was way above her league, and something about the stillness, the sadness in him kept her from probing why he'd ended up in a student dive (albeit postgrad) when he was probably about ten years older than her and accustomed to sleek downtown penthouse apartments. It was like he needed silence.
She smiled at the thought. Mac often teased her that he'd moved in with her to get some peace - he didn't ever need to talk again, now, as the sole requirement of being her flatmate was being able to listen, incessantly, to cheerful burble. She usually swatted him when he made cheeky comments like that, he liked provoking her, it had become a game. She never could land a slap, and he would dodge easily around her taunting, "Slow-coach! Slow-coach!" as he tapped her on the nose or stole her hair grips. Smug male. Her heartbeat had finally slowed fractionally, and Gemma was still smiling a little sadly to herself as she started to climb the stairs.
It was strange that the door to their top floor flat was slightly ajar, but she guessed Mac had nipped back in for something he'd forgotten on his way out to work. He had a second job as a barman in the evenings to bring in regular income, and usually left around the time she got home. Sadly, thought Gemma wryly to herself, then grinned. OK, maybe sometimes a girl did hurry home a bit early in the hopes of seeing her living work of pornographic art drifting around their flat before he left, busted, sue me. Then as she pushed open the door she started to feel a tingle of apprehension down her spine, and her brain switched abruptly from vague sexual fantasy to alert. She could hear - well, she didn't know what it was really, sort of a snuffling grunt, and there was a very strange, faint tangy smell. It made her uneasy and she slowed silently in the hallway. The living-room light was the only one on, the door half open allowing a block of light across the hallway like a Hitchcock movie.
That's why you're feeling jumpy, Gemma told herself; horror lighting effects. She stepped into the living room doorway and froze again. Absolutely froze dead, heart pounding out of her chest and cheeks on fire, feeling as though someone had simultaneously poured petrol on the smouldering fire inside her and punched her hard in the gut, blasting out all the air. Mac. Mac was stretched out naked on the floor in front of the fire, and two girls - no, bloody well three girls, were licking lovingly over his naked, rampant cock and balls. Feasting, with those whimpering, grunty little snuffles of sexual delight, as they licked, nipped, suckled, and slurped with total joyous, lascivious abandon. And, well, bloody hell, no wonder. He was big. Magnificent. And shuddering. And absolutely, totally gorgeous. Drenched in soft light and sweat, all beautiful smooth muscle and toned flesh. As much as she could see of him past...
Suddenly, Gemma's brain clicked in. There was also a bunch of men, the closest, the one with the long, elegantly tailored coat and wide, arrogant stance, was standing with his back to her between her and Mac, shielding Mac's chest from her view, looking down at the man straining of the floor. And the reason Mac was stretched out was because there were two or three men pinning each limb to the ground, holding him down as the girls slowly, thoroughly, joyously suckled and licked over his throbbing, erect cock. Or actually, the guys were struggling to keep each limb pinned to the floor. Mac wasn't shuddering purely from arousal, this was a fight. And that tangy smell...
Abruptly, the elegant one swung around and fixed his feral gaze unerringly on the girl standing frozen in the doorway. He was petrifying, there was no other word for it. Gemma's last breath grunted out of her on a desperate little squeak, frozen wide-eyed as he paced meaningly towards her. She heard a ferocious snarl from the pack on the floor and sensed a sudden heave of movement, just before the man reached her, and then her hair was twisted painfully in his grasp and he wrenched her head backwards, bending her over easily, effortlessly.
"I told you not to say no," he murmured softly, and Gemma, through the pain, anger, and terror, wondered what the hell he meant. She rammed a fist up at him at the same time as she felt a sharp implement scoring across her back, and she yelped as her coat, jumper, and dress were all shredded off her in seconds while she was wrenched further back into a spine-cracking, agonising arch. Her knuckles impacted on an unmoving wall of stomach underneath the sheer coat, and his thin lips twisted into a sneer. She heard another snarl from the floor as she struggled, completely uselessly, against the agonising grip and the knives scoring lightly along her skin. Her bra and panties were ripped off and abruptly, wearing nothing but her long boots and knee-highs, the elegant, feral stranger tossed her across the room to sprawl over Mac's lap. Stunned, shocked into shuddering stillness, Gemma saw a shimmer of movement as the pack dissolved, springing for the door and the windows at a speed her eyes couldn't comprehend, although she caught a sight of one stumbling as Mac, at full stretch from his prone position on the floor, cracked the gang member a phenomenal blow across the leg, before the panicked guy scrambled, terrified, leg dangling awkwardly, over the sill.
Gone.
In the stillness after their abrupt exit, Gemma's first trembling awareness centred on the large, hard, pulsing cock throbbing demandingly against her soft stomach. Her pussy was seeping wet, and her heart rate, already fast from fear, skipped to erratic excitement of a different kind. And then there was the closeness of his musky scent, sending the tingling through her veins, ramping up the agony, demanding that she just rub her soft belly against that hard, thrusting muscle. Intoxicating, his scent, but tainted slightly, mixed with that smell of blood. Blood. Her head jerked around.
Mac's eyes were closed, his face twisting in agony, lips writhing as his face contorted again and again, snarling silently, continuously straining, fighting against something. Gemma's breath caught as her eyes landed on the spear, yes, spear, pinning him, through his lower ribcage, to the ground.
Ten men and a bloody spear, she couldn't help thinking as she frantically grabbed up his nearby shirt and leaned over to pack it gently around the seeping flesh where the silver-etched wood penetrated. Her unthinking twisting movement rubbed her belly against his rampant cock, and Mac sucked in air in an abrupt, tortured sound, as the heavy organ pulsed a bead of precum against her skin. They stilled, waiting, and then groaned in unison as his cock surged again against her softness. The air seemed to echo with their mingled groans as for one resounding moment they lay motionless together, savouring the sensation. Gemma had a feeling of sinking helplessly into heat as she struggled not to press herself against him again. She rested her head on his chest and whimpered, feeling hot liquid from her pussy leaking onto his thigh, conscious only of his heat, his scent, his strength, and his want. And hers.
Abruptly Mac snarled and, slamming a palm down beside them, levered himself sideways out from underneath her. He yelped a curse as his movement wrenched the spear from the floorboards, and surged to his feet, furiously snapping the protruding shaft. Gemma watched incredulously as slowly, implacably, face contorted with pain and strain, he reached behind himself and hauled the embedded part out through his back by the blood-covered spearhead, to a fluent stream of curses. I can't believe he just did that, she thought. I can't believe he could do that.
Standing tall looking down at Gemma where she was kneeling on all fours, Mac again fell still, tension shuddering through him, fighting what must be agony as the blood ran down his stomach. And still, despite the memory of pain and fear left by that gang, sympathy for the agony he must be in, and the frisson of knowing there was something going on here beside the obvious, Gemma couldn't help but be mesmerised by how absolutely beautiful he was. Her eyes were drawn back down his sweating, muscular chest to the large, throbbing cock straining proudly against his taut belly. Just above her eye level. She shut her eyes. Deep breath. Not now, Gem, she told herself sternly, and again reached gently forwards with the cloth. Then she noticed that his fiery gaze was fixed on her breasts swinging free, shimmering in the soft light from the fire. And something in that gaze sent a faint shimmer of apprehension back down her spine even as her blood sped up in her veins and another pulse of liquid seeped between her legs.
"Go," Mac growled, the word barely recognisable through his clenched jaw, and he closed his eyes again, lifting his clenched fists to press against the lids. Gemma sucked in air as she took in his lacerated forearms, the tortured, ripped purpling skin where he had fought against their grip. Drawn both by heat and sympathy she ignored him, stepping forwards to Mac, her flat-mate and friend, pressing half the shirt against the open wound on his chest, reaching an arm around him to pad the other end against the exit hole, murmuring on a soft note of pain, "They hurt you so much".
Fingers twisted again in her hair, but gently this time, and Mac urged her head back so he could glare down into her eyes. The gaze was strangely glittering, and he bit out each word very carefully, "You need to go. Go. Now."
Under that black shimmering glare, feeling the heat off his skin, Gemma was trembling against him, aware, very aware, of what he meant. And also that she didn't understand. She could feel the blood surging in him; feel the need and the barely contained power, the wild, animal lust. She knew she couldn't handle this, not as a first time, he scared her, but also - her breath speeded up - excited her. She bit her lip hesitantly and as he let her go, she dropped her head so she needn't meet that demanding gaze. The heat was shuddering through her and although she could feel the danger, the fire was just so delicious, so warm, enticing, it was tempting her in, together with the intoxicating musk drifting from his muscular chest, sleek with sweat. Just a taste, fluttered across her heat-swirled mind and she bent forwards swiftly to press a soft kiss on the siren pulse beside his collar bone.
A sound between a groan and a snarl escaped Mac and abruptly, forcefully, his mouth was over hers and his tongue was thrusting down her throat, astounding her with the power of the silken glide. She had barely time to lose herself to the demanding invasion before he drew back and nipped her lip, breaking the skin precisely. He licked gently across the drop of blood and Gemma moaned, feeling a jolt of further heat melting her, even as she was swept back onto the rug, on all fours, pressed down with a hand between her shoulder blades and the other arm wrapped around her thighs.
What? stuttered across her mind at the speed of his movements, and the implacability of his grip, before she whimpered again on a surge of intoxicating feeling, reaching, reaching for something as that hard tongue speared between her thighs from behind, delving into her wet pussy, tasting, tempting her towards whatever that delicious goal was.
And then suddenly he was leaning over her and her breath escaped in a sharp cry as his hands gasped tightly around her thighs and he thrust home, no warning, his large cock searing through her tight pussy and plunging deep, shocking her through sudden pain into stillness. Mac snarled in satisfaction, and began to pump, mindlessly uncaring now of anything except the sweet glide of the tight wet pussy over his straining cock and the need to spurt as deeply as possible. His hands left her thighs to lock his arms over her shoulders so he could fuck into her hard as he grunted with the pleasure of each thrust, hearing her soft whimpers as he rutted the little female below him. The pleasure tripled with the sweet, boundless joy of being uncaged.
Gemma couldn't - she just couldn't - anything. Mac kept pounding, slamming thrusts into her, he was holding her so she couldn't move, could do nothing except accept the force of his relentless cock slamming home, no thought, no respite. There was an aching pain, fading then burning anew with each stroke of him inside her, and she could hear herself whimpering but there was also a haze and a sweet melting of her limbs, something building in the fire of pain and lust. Her brain just wasn't capable of following - well, thoughts flickered occasionally, but he kept up those searing, deep penetrations, pounding, and she just couldn't gather herself in the fire, couldn't connect, coalesce. Ow. Oh my god, he was moving so hard, and it burned so much but felt so good. Raw. Alive. So damn good, so much power.
How do I survive, flickered across her whirling mind, as the heat in her belly built, surging higher and higher through her in increasing waves of painful, intoxicating flame, stoked with each thrust. Her nipples felt like aching bullets and the whimpers were increasing. Power. Heat. Building. Lost in the overload of pleasure and pain as he relentlessly continued to hammer into her, Gemma slowly became aware of a change. He was deeper, dammit, that hurt. Each thrust, her whickers were now even louder, gasping groans, mingled with breathless begging pants for him to stop, to continue, harder, softer, please, softer, as the sensation of being pushed towards a precipice grew, tightened.
"Good...god... good...unh....", eyes closed, she could hear breathless moans escaping her lips, mingling with each pleased grunt that blew across her neck as he repeatedly sheathed himself deeper, deeper. He had speeded up the pounding, his thighs slapping forcefully, rhythmically, inexorably against hers and then, as he shifted in closer and tilted for a deeper angle, there was something else, larger, pushing into her already overstretched pussy --ow, ow, ow. Too much, too much. Gemma let out a scream as he forced it home and her arms gave way, but simultaneously she felt huge jaws clench across her shoulder and the side of her neck, and he held her up with his grip as he continued with short, jabbing thrusts to force his buried cock deeper. The flames searing through Gemma exploded in a sudden wave of unstoppable pleasure, and she screamed again as her body arched into exquisite convulsions, rippling and shuddering around his pounding member under his clenched jaw as the intensity peaked again, again, and again.
The pleasure of the female's silken sheath milking his cock as he bit her washed over Mac, and he felt the rising swelling of his own approaching orgasm. He released her neck and snarled his pleasure as he forced himself a little deeper and pushed her shoulders down to the floor to hold her as he ground his hips, spurting copiously, filling her, spurt after spurt, deep, panting, satisfied, excellent. Sated, he sank heavily on top of her, breathing harshly, feeling the rippling aftershocks of the final drops releasing as he slowly relaxed. Basking in the pleasurable aftermath, sinking slowly, something flickered across his mind, but before it could take hold, he drifted out.
Gemma lay under him, shuddering. Just shuddering. No. Yes. No. Wow. Ow. What the hell happened? Wow.
Wow.
She had never imagined such intensity existed. Such. Just so much. That you could feel like that. Or like this, now. A small smile drifted across her lips as she lay, breathing heavily, underneath his weight, held down with pleasure, satisfaction purring through her still gently shuddering limbs.
Wow.
Ow.
Her awareness slowly came back into focus, and she felt a frisson of apprehension feather down her spine again. You are imagining things. That is not fur across your back, she told herself as firmly as she could.
Something was just wrong. Don't get hysterical. The trouble was, there was a strange brushing sensation on her currently hypersensitive skin as the unconscious - man - lying half on top of her breathed deeply. She didn't really believe it. Fear shadowed through her again as she switched her brain away from disbelief to another awareness - of the rising ache within her shaken limbs and her sore, sore pussy. Savaged neck. The pain was beginning to surface and she began to tremble in a different way. Okay, so that may not have been the loving, gentle introduction to sex you hoped for, but he did tell you to get out, she reminded herself.
Gemma found tears were leaking quietly down her face onto the rug. She smothered them as best she could and realised with a jolt of her pulse that it was far easier to do when she became aware they might wake him up. Oh god no. Afraid. Then she stuttered in a staccato gulp and the tears were rolling again as she remembered his playful threatening that morning when she'd swiped one of his pieces of toast on her way out. Her friend Mac. She couldn't have imagined being afraid of him. Then.
The trouble was, that glitter in Mac's eyes when he'd warned her to go had reflected the same wild, feral light as the eyes of the terrifying creature who'd ripped her clothes off and thrown her across the room. Effortlessly. The same shadow of power in both. Her brain stopped dead, and she drifted for a moment, thought free.
The pain started to pull her back. Her blood was congealing, and the memory of the pleasure with it, while the rawness in her limbs was ramping higher and higher as the haze of lust faded. Automatically, she smothered her panic.
You're not afraid of him. The thought calmly strode into her mind. You're just afraid of this ever happening again. You just don't want to know. The lust she had felt for six months, whenever she saw or pictured his body, was gone, blocked behind a wall of coldness, fear - he'd grind her into mulch if he ever did this again.
If we ever did this again, she reminded herself tautly, he did try to stop you in the first place. Tears leaked again, embarrassment at her own actions, her inability to stop herself, hold back the desire. Memory of that false promise to herself of "just one kiss", when she had known - had felt him trembling in his effort to hold back. To get her to leave. Trying to escape her thoughts, Gemma's blurred eyes opened, focussing instantly on the huge white paw lying in front of her face. She scrunched them shut again immediately.
Hallucination. Hallucination. Hallucination.
Her eyes opened again, and the paw was still there. And she was still warm, despite the cooling sweat on her body, the nearly dead fire, and the broken window. Come to think of it, her brain was slowly filtering in information, half of that gang jumped out of a third storey window. No. They must've ... her brain just kept stopping and retreating into fog and tears.
After some time, she drifted back to awareness again. She was warm. Warm because there was a bloody wolf lying half on top of her. No, impossible, answered her brain instantly. Hallucination, you're understandably stressed from the evening's happenings and not thinking straight. That started the tears leaking again. Bloody wolf. Bloody stupid sexual fantasy this is.
Bloody.
Slowly, Gemma realised that she could feel the patch of warm stickiness against her back was still growing. Slowly, slowly. That meant - Mac was still bleeding.
Good, the pain made her snarl internally, but her heart clenched in a different way at the same time. Her brain flipped to that wonky chocolate cake he'd made for her birthday, despite the fact that he hated chocolate. The night he'd gone out to hunt down her bus pass when she'd dropped it on the street, the happy croon from the bathtub as he drenched the room in hot water.
How can a person have so many stupid tears in one head? Gemma asked herself angrily.
Ah, her brain whispered carefully after another long pause, that much blood loss might also mean that he can't wake up -- he's unconscious, not asleep. Gemma felt a glimmering of hope. If she could only get out of here before he did come round, she could forget this had ever happened, forget she'd ever made up this weird fantasy where she'd been hardcore fucked by a wolf... werewolf. She lay trembling for another minute, considering, as her brain drifted in circles, possibilities. The one thing she was certain of was that she couldn't bear to look into his eyes. So.
Gingerly, Gemma stretched out a hand past his - paw - and began to shift her weight onto her palm. Her breath hissed in a sharp gasp as every single muscle in her torso and thighs screamed, her neck spasmed in agony, and she felt a searing, raw pain where the root of his cock was buried unmoving inside her. She collapsed back with a whimper, shuddering against him on the floor. Her muscles felt like she'd been pounded all over with a hammer, and her vagina and neck -- oh my god, now that the adrenaline had worn off, they felt absolutely excruciating, ripped, torn by - don't even think about it. Don't move. Don't move.
Gemma huddled for a long while, trembling under his fur until she'd calmed down and the pain receded. Slowly she felt all emotion seeming to drift out of her brain. She was an analyst. This was a problem. Emotion was useless and distracting. Balanced precariously in constructed calm, internally cold, she started pondering the problem. If he bled to death, would that free her from his cock? Or would it happen normally? Would he wake up? Her mouth twitched in a brief smile as an irrelevant thought surfaced -that all the stories about men falling asleep instantly after sex were obviously true. Back to the problem. He hadn't woken when she'd jerked back into him against the pain just then, and she knew he was usually a light sleeper. So let's assume he can't wake up. But I can't get free.
Anger spiked briefly in memory of pain, at being tied to that monster. I could cut it off. Nausea rose in swift counter to the thought. No. And besides, she realised, I don't want him to die. He was a good friend. Was. So what if being in his presence ever again was an absolute no, that didn't mean she wanted him to die. Didn't mean she had to turn into the kind of person who wanted him to die. It wasn't like he didn't try to get you to leave. Yes, but I just didn't realise what staying meant, that he'd ... her mind echoed emptily in more circles, avoiding memories before she hauled it under control again. Stop snivelling, girl. And admit that even if you're sore as hell, you also begged him to drive you into ecstasy and he did it - his own way. You always thought he was too much for you to handle. He is. Deal with it.
So, she should stop him bleeding before he died anyway. Gemma looked around for his shirt, and reached cautiously across the carpet with her toes, crinkling them up to hunch it towards her. As she moved again, she realised both that the pain in her limbs was sinking to bearable, and the pain of his cock stretching her was slightly less. He felt slightly looser. The only really bad bit was her neck, and she could be careful how she moved. Very careful.
Gripping his shirt, which was ripped anyway, she worked slowly to tear the body and sleeves into long strips, pulling the collar and cuffs loose for pads, without jarring her own body into pain. A distraction. She had to knot the strips together to make a makeshift bandage, and as she did, she hunched up slightly and felt a wave of pain and relief as his softened cock slid, finally, out of her. The interminable tears started to flow again, keeping pace with the slow leak of cooling moisture down her leg, but she ignored both. Carefully, she crept out from under him, and shivered in the cold night air. She thought about getting clothes first, but decided she didn't want to come near him again, so impassively pressed the pads to his sluggishly bleeding, furry back and chest, and bound them on tightly with the rest. Then she slowly, agonisingly, got to her feet and stood, swaying slightly, looking down at the bandaged, huge white wolf comatose on her tatty old fireside rug. Weird.
Feeling cold, empty, and very, very old, Gemma shuffled carefully through to the bathroom and gently sponged the blood off her hands, neck and thighs. In her room she wriggled very carefully into warm, non-abrasive layers before squashing a spare set of clothes and her wash kit in a backpack. Numbly, she picked up her purse in the hall, not even glancing towards the living-room doorway as she let herself quietly out.
*****************************
Mac was finding it strangely hard to pull himself awake. He was a wolf, for god's sake, what could... his eyes shot open and the fur ruffled down his back. Nicolas. Here. And then - Gemma. Oh god, Gemma. He bounded to his feet, driven by instinct before memory had fully surfaced, then staggered, and growled as his head span and his legs seemed to shake under him. What the hell? Blood. So much damn blood, thick scent in the air. Most of it his, some from that cur he'd swiped as they fled, but some -Gemma's.
Shit. No, not Gemma.
His heart accelerating with fear of what he would find, Mac padded swiftly, shakily through toward her room, following the scent. Where the trail doubled in the hall he realised that she'd left, and felt a whine of bitter shame reverberate inside his head. Left, still deeply marked with his seedscent and her own damn blood. Gemma, little human caught in the cross-fire. That he'd thought he was out of.
At least she could still walk. Just about.
Slowly, he became aware of the rage that had been rebuilding inside him since he woke. Rage was too gentle. Damn Nicolas, damn him for setting this up so that the shame of raping the girl was on Mac's own damn head. Damn himself for not damned well having better control over his own damn wolf. Damn the whole fucking grey tribe, and the warlords. They were so fucking going to pay for this. Mac was already shifting human by this point, yanking on clothes in his room over his infuriatingly unsteady limbs. The bandage unravelled and fell to his hips as he twisted, and he stared at it, and the rough, already puckered-over scar on his chest.
She'd fucking bandaged him? After he'd...? He could smell the kid's fucking blood on his own fucking cock, and some of it was virgin blood, and yet she'd still ... Angrily he ripped the final shreds of his ex-shirt off and pulled on a T-shirt, then stomped into some trainers and grabbed a packet of ham from the fridge, wolfing it down as he jogged unsteadily down the stairs following her scent.
He lost her at the airport. She'd been first to the late-night pool, and damn, that was either clever or very lucky, because it was impossible to sift her individual scent out under the stench of chlorine clinging to everyone who'd walked out of there. Probably, Mac admitted to himself, she'd gone in because she'd needed to feel clean and hadn't wanted to stick around in her own flat with him there. He growled quietly, hating the wash of guilt. After the pool, he'd wasted a lot of time trailing around tracking the twelve individuals who'd been for a late night swim, and eliminated all but the four of them who had gotten on the down town bus and then separated off in the diesel stench at the bus depot. One of the bus crowd had headed out into town, one was in the station cafe, and the other two had caught other buses on.
Then the scent staining the ground where she'd waited at the aircoach stop - his own seed, mixed with her blood and vaginal fluid - had made him clench his jaw, and directed him to follow out here to the airport. But with no new scent to find, god knew which flight she'd caught. It's not like she ever had enough money. Damn. Exhausted, blood loss and silver poisoning shaking his limbs, Mac scanned the timetable, but couldn't work it out. At least, if he couldn't, no-one else would be able to scent follow her either. Nicolas couldn't, he named in his mind, and felt his wolf growl silently. His rage had banked down to a steady, implacable fire and he'd decided what to do. Find the girl. Protect the pack. If the greys wouldn't leave him alone, well, so be it, let them deal with the consequences. He would deal with the wolf. He could feel Peter already responding, startled, to his mind nudge.
I'm back, he called. Come get me.