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  “But you are not healing as fast,” he said, laying her back on the big king-sized bed. The quilts brushed her face, a tangled mess still from their earlier, half-asleep lovemaking.

  “I’m fine. Just the walk and the being picked up and…” She stopped, the breath stalling in her chest when he pulled her sweater up and nuzzled at her collarbone. His tongue tracing slippery circles around her nipple until her throat tingled with emotion.

  Liv pushed her hands into his thick dark hair.

  He needs a haircut. Maybe he’ll let me cut it.

  She tugged at him to get his mouth to hers. She tugged too hard and the echoing bite of pain in her stitches made her gasp.

  “You really are a terrible listener, Liv.” Garrett tsked as he bounced off the bed and went to the closet.

  “Where are you going? I’ll behave!” she cried. She watched him, curious and a little panicky. Her body warmed like an engine. Parts of her giving off little blips of pleasure. Her belly loose, her pussy tightening gently and then insistently on itself. The pull of desire strong in her womb. She waited, restless but intent.

  “I just need to make sure you don’t hurt yourself so we have improvised restraints, for your own good,” he whispered, coming at her.

  Liv caught the tarnished metallic flash of his eyes and she was locked in a perfect mixture of fear and thrill. “I’ll be good. I don’t really need you to restrain me,” she whispered. But deep down she wanted him to and Garrett could tell. His eyes said he could and that kicked her into a place of borderline ecstasy.

  “See, I think it’d be best for everyone,” he said.

  She just stayed that way. On her back watching him as he placed her right wrist gently above her head, like he might break her if he didn’t go slowly. He tied it to the wooden-slatted headboard with a strip of soft cotton he’d obviously torn from something larger, like a sheet or a curtain. Liv made a small sound in her throat, her pussy clenched up, eager, her nipples hard where they jutted from under her sweater. “I’m still dressed,” she said, feeling confused.

  “Not all the way, you’re not,” he said. His teeth were so perfect and white when he smiled at her and she closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the sharpness of those teeth on her skin, and Liv flitted closer to orgasm. He hadn’t even touched her yet and she was ready to come. Garrett pulled her other hand up but made sure it didn’t pull the stitches that cross-hatched her pale skin. He kissed above and below the wound, his eyes going glassy for a moment.

  “God, Garrett, kiss me,” she said when she saw his harnessed emotions but he just smiled and shook his head.

  “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? To distract me that way?” His fingers slipped under the waistband of her jeans and he drew them leisurely toward the center. Her body was on red alert and she rose up to meet his hands in any way possible. He stopped. It was only when she dropped her hips and waited, breath shallow and fast, that he tackled the lone button on her jeans. He dragged the zipper down and tugged so that her jeans started to slide. When she wiggled to aid him, he froze.

  She was learning.

  Liv stayed completely still and Garrett peeled her jeans off and then hooked her panties with his fingers and drew them down too. Bare from the waist down, arms secure above her head, she felt utterly vulnerable and yet…completely trusting.

  Liv parted her legs just a bit. Just enough that he could see the rosy flesh of her sex, just enough so that his expert hunter’s nose could catch her scent. The scent of how very much she wanted him in her, filling her with his cock and moving against her. Pinning her flat and taking her. She wanted the world to stop and it to be only them. Soft sounds, eager movements, eyes locked, skin on skin. With her head full of all that, she said, “Please, Garrett. Don’t toy with me.”

  “That’s no fun,” he said but he settled himself on her, giving her a brief moment of the idyllic pressure of himself. Hot, hard, leanly muscled man, pressed flat to her. Then he slipped lower, his eyes on hers as he put his face between her legs and started to lick. Torturous swipes of his tongue over her clit so that within seconds an orgasm ripped through her, making her tug against her bonds, though she’d promised herself she wouldn’t.

  She came with a cry and Garrett continued to lap at her, drinking her in, his fingers slipping inside her to press and test her until she felt on the verge all over again. “I want you ready for me, Olivia. Really, really ready because I have no patience tonight. No part of me will be gentle or soft or patient. So you need to be ready. So ready you’re practically crying.” The tips of his fingers brushed her G-spot, manipulating the fragile bundle of nerves until Liv chewed her bottom lip, swallowing a whimper.

  “See, just like that,” he said and stood to unbuckle his belt and shuck his jeans. His cock stood out hard and ready, blushing the plum color of arousal as he kneeled back on the bed, between her pale legs his tan flanks were the color of caramel.

  Garrett placed her legs, one at a time, like she was made of porcelain, on his broad shoulders. His hands dipped the mattress when he pressed them down by her hips. He pushed the tip of his cock to her. So wet, she felt her own moisture pooled there between her thighs, so ready she was on the verge of simply begging. Babbling for him to enter her, pleading with him to fuck her, promising him anything in the whole wide world that he wanted if he’d just be in her.

  She forced herself not to move. Not to jerk up to meet him as he slipped into her inch by inch. If she moved, he would stop and if he stopped, she thought she might actually die. Liv held her breath and he kissed her calf where the muscles ached. She hadn’t realized they ached until his lips were on that spot. “We need to get you loose. I’ll have to fuck you until you don’t have any tension at all,” he murmured.

  She made a small sound of desperation and he went still again. She thought she’d lose her mind but then without warning, he thrust deep, filling her cunt so that she sucked in a big breath with her surprise. Then she shivered, whispered, “Ohhh” as he started to move.

  Liv felt her wrists want to test her bonds but she forced herself to be docile. Garrett caught the look on her face, the indication of her internal war, and he bit her ankle just enough to make her pussy spasm around him, milking his cock so that they both stilled for just a moment. “Good girl. You’re trying to behave, aren’t you?”

  She nodded, not trusting her voice to do anything but beg.

  “Perfect.” He fucked her faster, his face dark, almost grave, something not usually present on his relaxed features. Garrett touched her, wrapping his fingers around his cock as he entered her, dipped his fingers into the wet recesses of her body and finally, pressed his fingers to her clit and worked her as he moved faster. His breath hot on her ankle, his cock high and hard inside her, Liv’s legs stretched with tension from riding his shoulders.

  But when he worked her with his fingers, the rush of sweet pleasure was all encompassing and her ears rang a bit, her vision flashing white for an instant as she held her breath.

  “Come with me. I told you—fast and hard. No niceties tonight. I need you to come with me though, Olivia. So please.” He thrust into her, filling her, touching all the perfect places with his cock as his fingers played a counter tune on her clitoris. When he said it again, he took his finger from her, pressed it to her anus and pushed slowly. Up to the first knuckle, pressing so that a whole new kind of pleasure found her, swept over her. “Please—” he murmured and she did. She obeyed Garrett with an orgasm even as his own release took him down and under so that words were gone and only sounds remained.

  He covered her with his body, his muscles twitching and cooling even as she trembled slightly under him. “I love you, Liv. Forever,” he said into her hair, kissing her shoulder and finally kissing her mouth, the smell of him filling her head.

  She wanted to touch him back, to tell him she’d never thought she’d be allowed to have this. That she was still a little fearful that it would all go away. Instead, she nodded and returned t
he kisses. Unable to wrap her arms around him. She encircled his hips with her legs and he groaned.

  “God, you’re gonna get me again, woman.”

  “That’s fine but untie me first. This time I get to touch you.”

  So Garrett obeyed her.

  Chapter Twenty

  Square

  “What are you so nervous about?” Her nerves were making his nerves a mess. “It’s just the monthly meeting. It’s a check-in. We all eat and drink too much and announce stuff and basically keep track of each other.”

  “I’m just really nervous. I don’t know. Sorry. Sorry.”

  Garrett watched her and couldn’t help but smile. Her cheeks were rosy and the wind rushed down into the valley tossing her hair around like wheat in a field. Big brown eyes shot with hazel magnified by the sunlight gazed at him. She grinned big and he bent to take her face in his hands and he kissed her.

  Her lips were warm and sweet and her tongue tasted like honey and cream from her tea. “Tell me.”

  “There’s nothing to tell,” she said and she was lying.

  “Tell me.” He held her in place though she started to walk. He lifted her easily from the ground and her feet walked to nowhere.

  Liv laughed. “Put me down! Unhand me, you brute!”

  She smelled different too. Like fall grasses and the full moon. He cocked his head and waited. It would come to him.

  Thanksgiving had just passed and Liv had spent her first holiday with the pack. She had held her own, helping to harvest and prepare the meal, eating with gusto, bonding with the men and women alike. She had even argued for leniency for A.J. when the matter was discussed at the council meeting. He was still under house arrest but he was possibly going to keep his position if he could make amends and reconcile with certain pack members.

  “You’re keeping something from me, Liv,” he said. He turned her, studied her face, the set of her jaw, the sparkle in her eye. “It makes me nervous. Tell me, please.”

  Garrett ran his thumb over her lower lip and watched her weigh her options. Tell him or not. He held his breath. Soon it would be Christmas. He had made her a sleigh bed for her gift. Chester had taught him to woodwork as a teen and he’d rarely used his talent. For her, he had made the effort. It was something she had confessed one night she had always wanted. She said, when she would hear her stepfather and her mother, she would picture herself tucked into a wonderful sleigh bed, safe and warm in soft white sheets in a safe warm house.

  That was his gift to her. A sleigh bed, soft white sheets he had found, the safe house and his arms. There would also be a diamond ring in that bed and a question for her.

  “I’m just excited to announce that I’m square,” she said and dropped her head. She dug the toe of her cowboy boot into the dirt and blushed a startling crimson.

  Garrett shook his head, baffled. “Square? What? I’m lost, baby.”

  She looked up, her smile beatific. She made the sign of a small square in the air with her fingertips. “I’m square. All is repaid.”

  Garrett laughed. “I’m either ridiculously slow or you’re talking in code. Tell me, you’re driving me mad.” He playfully shook her by the upper arms and she giggled.

  “My sentence, Garrett Gustafson, was to stay here and prove my loyalty to the pack. And possibly to…”

  “To one day repay the life you had taken with a life for the…” he stopped.

  “For the pack.” She said it softly.

  “Wait. That means… you mean—”

  She didn’t speak. She took his hand and put it over her faded jeans, low on her belly, over the cold metallic zipper. For an instant he imagined he felt something. Too soon but he did feel a leap of joy in his gut. His heart pounded. “You’re…”

  “I took the test this morning. I was too afraid to say until I did. And it’s…well, Ben confirmed a positive. He said the tests can be wrong because of—”

  “DNA issues. But he?”

  She nodded even as he moved in, kissing her, kissing her, kissing her like he would never be able to stop kissing her. “He said yes,” she said in his ear. Garrett picked her up, too happy to mind his strength.

  “So you’re providing a life for a life.”

  “Gladly.”

  “I love you.”

  “And I love you.”

  Garrett set her down, dropped to his knees, pressed his lips to her belly. Whispered, “And I love you.”

  “Garrett, he doesn’t even have ears yet.”

  “Doesn’t matter.” He kissed her belly again. Paused. “He?”

  “Mother’s intuition.”

  He bent his head and she ran her fingers through his hair. The wind smelled sweeter than it had. The light was more golden. The sounds and smells of the meeting coming from the barn were more welcoming. She bent and kissed the back of his neck. “Now come on, Daddy. Let’s go tell them that not only are they stuck with me but there will be more of us.”

  He’d never been happier to make an announcement in his life.

  Epilogue

  Ben bent his head and frowned. “Hmm. Give me one more push, Miss Liv.” He groped, grappled and held up a squirming bundle of screaming baby. A few snips and he yelled to his friend. “Come and collect your young one, Dad! Hurry up, you goof, he’s kicking me. Has his father’s strength.”

  Caleb Gustafson let out an eardrum-piercing cry as his father came to collect him.

  Liv raised her head to see and Garrett brought the boy down for his mother. Ben sank back down on his stool. “Now to deal with the afterbirth. And, oh—”

  “Oh?” Garrett said, not really paying attention. His eyes were locked on his boy and his wife. Each of them eyeing the other with a look of mutual admiration and love. Or so it appeared. They were the most beautiful people in the world to him. He thought he might drop dead of pure, unadulterated love right there.

  “How you feeling, Liv?” Ben asked softly.

  She paused, frowned, “Crampy. Really, really crampy and oh God—”

  “Yeah, push for me, sweetheart,” Ben said.

  Liv did, gripping Garrett’s waiting hand, eyes wide, brow popping out in a fresh crop of sweat. “Ben?” she gasped.

  “Yeah, you’re not quite done. Caleb’s been keeping a secret,” Ben said, his head down, face intent.

  “What?” Garrett asked, hands shaking even as he soothed his brand-new son.

  “Push once more, hard,” he said, ignoring his friend.

  Liv did as asked, crying out, tears streaking her face. She gripped the birthing bed, straining, and then another cry broke the hush that had fallen.

  “What?” Garrett yelled, feeling stupid and slow.

  “A sister,” Ben laughed. “Looks like you two are square squared. Folks, meet your daughter.”

  Liv looked down and laughed.

  “But…but we don’t have a name,” Garrett stammered as if that mattered.

  Ben cut the cord and wiped off Garrett’s daughter. He wrapped her, presenting her to Liv who was quietly weeping. She studied her daughter, kissed her forehead.

  “Drew,” said Liv.

  “Drew Gustafson. Wow. That’s a big name for a little girl,” Ben said and started cleaning up Liv.

  “Why Drew?” Garrett asked.

  Liv smiled. “It means courageous. And she will always be strong, always be courageous.”

  Garrett turned the boy to the baby girl his wife now cradled. “Caleb, this is your sister, Drew. Don’t mess with her or I think she’ll kick your ass.”

  Then he kissed his lovely, brave wife who couldn’t quite hold back her laughter.

  About the Author

  Sommer Marsden writes from her cozy Baltimore home, which she shares with a very patient family and a chunky wiener dog. She’s widely published in the erotica genre. Her work has appeared in dozens of anthologies, multiple magazines and on numerous websites. When she’s not writing, you can find her haunting thrift stores, walking, drinking red wine and eating frozen
blueberries. Often simultaneously. Visit Sommer at her blog, Smut Girl (www.smutgirl.blogspot.com), to keep up with her dirty ramblings and daily updates about her life of controlled chaos.

  Sommer welcomes comments from readers. You can find her website and email address on her author bio page at www.ellorascave.com.

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