Chapter Twenty-One
Saturday – The Burren, Ireland
Melody
When I regain consciousness, I’m lying awkwardly on the forest floor. It is cold and dark. The side of my face feels swollen, and my left eye won’t open all the way. But I don’t think my arm is broken because I can move it now. My leg throbs as I sit up. I reach down slowly to my calf, my hand comes away hot and sticky with blood. Where am I? I think, looking around and squinting up at the sky. That’s when it dawns on me. This is my dream. Breathe, Melody. Just breathe.
I listen to the noises around me and can hear the waves of the ocean. I know I’m not in Kildare anymore. The tall trees around me, the moss and sharp rocks under my hands. It’s all exactly how I dreamt it. I know if I take my eyes off the sky and look into the trees, they will be there. All eight sets of red eyes are watching me. I’m in a circle of standing stones. I take a deep breath, close my eyes, and when I open them again, I’m looking directly into the dark red eyes of a wolf. I know it is not Dagda in an instant. He is not the wolf I saw on the road at our house in February. I cringe when I see him, he is enormous, glaring down at me. I exhale a shaking breath.
“What do you want from me? He won’t come here. You can’t use me as bait. Finn is smarter than that.” I hear a man laughing from the darkness, and then he steps forward and towards me as the wolf standing over me steps back into formation.
“Oh, lass,” he says. “He will come.” I turn to look at this strange man emerging from the woods. I can’t place his ancestry, not precisely Irish. He is olive-skinned, has dark hair, and black eyes that look through me rather than at me. A scar runs down the left side of his face from his temple to the corner of his mouth. He is terrifying, and I don’t believe for a second, he is human.
“What are you?” I ask as I scoot myself slowly backward on my butt. My leg is useless. But I can push with one foot. I am grasping for anything behind me to use for protection. The deep laugh that comes from him turns my blood to ice. Tears start to slip from my eyes. “Please,” I beg. “Please just let me go. I’m not a part of this. Finn won’t come for me. You can’t possibly think he would come for me. You’ve been watching us. You know he hardly knows me.”
“You don’t know?” he asks, tilting his head to the side, his eyes gleaming red, then back to black. “Oh, this is rich.” Dagda bends down next to me and rubs his hand down the side of my face. I flinch away from him and try to move back. He grabs me by the ankle of my hurt leg and drags me back towards the center of the circle. I cry out in pain as he digs his hand into my flesh.
“See, the thing is, lass, I do think he will come. When he does, I will make him watch me kill you before I kill him.”
I think I must be losing my mind because I start bargaining with the lunatic. “But why? Please. Just let me go. I won't tell anyone what you are. Why are you doing this to us?”
I’m on the verge of hysterics, begging for my life. Finn, please don’t come. I send a silent prayer up to the sky that the rest of their plan went off and the other families and Alphas are safe. If Dagda is here with me, he can’t be attacking at the Summit.
“Oh, see, sweetness. That’s the thing. I can’t let you go. Because the half-breed brat you’re carrying will grow up one day and hunt me down. I have no doubt about that. Trust me, the damned thing would be as stubborn as its father and the rest of that mangy pack.” My eyes go wide, and I protectively reach up and grab my belly.
“What?” I think I must be hallucinating because if he is saying what I think he is saying, he thinks I am pregnant with Finn’s child. He can’t know that. It’s too early. I don’t even know.
“He didn’t tell you, did he?” I’m staring at him in shock. “See, I knew he was breeding you like a bitch in heat when I came to that cesspool in America and found you. But I didn’t know until I smelled it on you when you were outside at the keep yesterday that he was successful. Which means I will have to put you down, too. To end his line.”
“It’s not true! I’m not pregnant. I can’t be.” Am I? Suddenly the way that Lydia and Finn have been treating me makes sense. My appetite, their comments about needing rest, and encouraging me to eat. Does everyone fucking know but me?
“But you are, aren’t you? I can see you working it out in your head. You’ve even realized that your little Finn knows too, haven’t you?” He is starting to circle me, and I notice the wolves around him getting restless. Nervous even? Maybe. I know that with the moon, they aren’t able to shift back into their human forms. But something is off about them. They're communicating with each other in their wolf forms, but Dagda is listening to something as they do. Can he hear them?
I imagine by now they’re ready to be done with his toying with me. Will he let them eat me? I wonder.
“Please make it quick,” I say, defeated, so tired now. My entire body hurts. I feel as if he has been talking to me for hours. I just want to go to sleep. Suddenly there is a snarl among the wolves, and they’re whining, communicating some threat that I can’t see or hear.
“What?” Dagda turns to them, frustrated that they have interrupted his game. He turns but not to speak to them. He just stands looking at one of the wolves. Their eyes both go deep black while they’re looking at each other, communicating. But I’m not sure how. I look around into the woods behind them. Finn? Please don’t come. Please.
I grab one of the rocks under my hand and throw it at him. It hits his side with a soft thud and falls to the ground. He turns to me, snarling, his eyes a deep red as he stalks closer to me.
“Just get it over with, you bastard!” I yell at him, crying. My head is throbbing.
“I will when I am ready! First, I want to know what he sees in you that is so damn good, that he puts himself at risk like this for a piece of ass.” He falls on me then, hands groping me, I cry out.
“No, please. Stop!” I’m screaming at him now. Looking for anything I can use against him, maybe if I fight back hard enough, he will just kill me. But not that, anything but that.
This creature, whatever he is, is touching me. My skin is burning where he touches me, his mouth on mine fills it with a sour taste, and a rotting smell enters my nose. His hands are on my pants then, pulling them down. I scratch at his face and his eyes. I kick at him with my one good leg. It’s no use. He is inhumanely strong.
That’s when I hear it. A stick snaps in the woods to the right, and the entire pack turns their heads in the direction of the sound. At that exact moment, a massive brown wolf erupts from the trees and lands behind Dagda. He is still trying to undress me and didn’t hear the wolf appear. They must tell him because his eyes go out of focus, and his head pops up, but he is too late. Finn grabs hold of him by the back and flings him across the circle. He slams into a large standing stone. But is up on his feet before I can even blink. He shifts into the black wolf, with glowing red eyes, snarling.
***
Finn
I can hear Melody screaming as I get closer, and I know I’m in time. She is still alive. As I burst into the stone circle, I see him on top of her. He has her pants down around her knees and is kissing her. Mine. My Alpha growls in my mind, and I lunge forward, grabbing him and tossing him to the side. I put myself in front of Melody.
I can’t look at her and see the fear and disgust in her eyes. I know she must hate me for letting this happen to her. I zone in on Dagda and watch as he rises from his position on the forest floor so quickly he almost blurs out of sight. He shifts instantly into the dark black wolf from our legends.
***
Melody
I look back and forth between the two wolves. This is the first time I have seen Finn as a wolf up close, and I’m taken aback by how massive he truly is. He is nearly twice as big as Dagda. I see Dagda’s eyes widen with the realization at the same time that mine do. Yips and howls come from the woods. The wolves turn their backs to the three of us, not wanting to be attacked from behind. One by one, I see wolves step from the trees towards Dagda’s pack.
They are outnumbered three to one. If this is Dagda’s entire pack, he has severely underestimated the size of the Caomhanach pack. I see Dagda glance over his shoulder, watching as the eight wolves around us are taken down one by one. Finn still hasn’t moved from his defensive position in front of me. He is waiting. He will not be the one to make the first move against his adversary and risk leaving me unprotected. I see him glance back for a second quickly, and I try to tell him I’m okay, but it happens before I get the chance.
“Finn!” I scream as the Dagda attacks, going straight for his throat. The two collide, and the ground shakes under me with their impact. Finn is on his side. Dagda has him by the throat and is snarling. Then they move so quickly I can’t focus on what’s happening. Using my one good leg to push myself, I move back away from them until my back is against one of the large rocks at the edge of the circle. The noise around me is deafening. Wolves yelp, snarl, and growl as the battle between the packs goes on. I look back to Finn, and he is on top of Dagda now, standing over him, one paw holding him down by the neck. He turns to look at me, and I get the feeling that he is motioning towards me. Then he bends down and takes Dagda’s neck in his massive jaws.
I squeeze my eyes closed, but I hear the crunch of bones as he snaps his neck. The sound of muscles tearing and bones breaking continues. There is silence then. Every wolf in the forest must stop moving. I hear a thud. I open my eyes, and Finn is standing over the lifeless body of a wolf with no head. Next to me lies Dagda’s head, red eyes staring up into the night at the full moon. Howling breaks out around me, and I see a few of the survivors of Dagda’s pack backing away into the forest. Finn jerks his head to the right, signaling his pack, and they take off after them. Before the night is out, I have no doubt that not a single one will be left alive.
***
Finn
Dagda clearly did not anticipate that the entire pack would be here so quickly. Most of them followed him as soon as they left the keep with Melody. The rest arrived with me. However, those of his pack who were at the keep did not follow. His group of shapeshifter seems not to have the same loyalty towards him that my pack has towards me. Once they saw the fight they had ahead of them, they abandoned Dagda and his cause. When we arrived here, we outnumbered those left massively.
The moment he shifted into wolf form, we both knew he had made a mistake. I am nearly twice his size, and he seems to be weakened somehow. I’m unsure if it is the long flight here or if what my grand da did at the dolmen worked because dark magic is at work. I can feel it coursing up out of the Earth and through my paws. Infusing my inner Alpha with strength. Is it what is weakening him?
When I turn back to look at Melody, she screams my name, and I leap for Dagda. The second we collide, I feel the power inside me grow. This dark power is enormous. I do not care where it came from, only that it will help me destroy the monster that dared to touch my mate. I snap his neck so roughly I decapitate him.
I toss his head to the side, and it lands with a thud next to Melody. I command my pack to track down those who ran, but I know that we will never find them if they choose to shift to another form. Pucas. The word comes to me then as if whispered in my ear just before I feel the magic slowly leaving my body back into the ground. I exhale and turn towards Melody.
***
Melody
Turning towards me, he takes a cautious step forward. Lowering his head. “Finn,” I say, reaching my hand out to him and pressing it to the top of his head between his ears. “Thank you.” He nuzzles my hand, the side of my face and my belly. Then looks down at my still bleeding leg and nudges it with his nose. “I’m okay. You saved me,” I say with a smile. Placing my hand on my belly, “You saved us,” I say.
Finn sits back on his haunches and lets out a howl. One by one, each member of his pack adds their own melody to his song. They’re singing to the moon. I smile. “My Alpha.”
***
Tuesday – Kildare, Ireland
Melody
The heavy fog of sleep keeps me from opening my eyes right away as I try to put my finger on what it was that woke me. I feel the heat of Finn's body pressed against mine and push back against the length of him as his fingers part my lower lips and slide slowly into me. My eyes peek open, and it is still dark in the room. The soft glow of the clock tells me it is 1 a.m. Finn must have just gotten home from patrolling with the pack.
A soft moan escapes my lips, and I grind myself back onto him again, the hard girth of his arousal pinned between our bodies, only adding to the growing fire his fingers ignited within me.
“Sorry I woke you, Mel. I tried to let you sleep, but I just couldn’t help myself,” he growls in my ear, his low voice sending goosebumps across my neck and down my arms. His hand still in my pajama bottoms, he continues to slowly slide his fingers teasingly in and out of my hot wetness as I push back against his body, begging him for more. He lets out a low chuckle at my eagerness, even in my half-asleep state, and shifts, so I roll onto my back next to him. Looking up into his eyes, they flash amber as he looms above me, and I smile. “It’s okay that you woke me, sir. Please.” I sigh as he finds my sensitive bud between my legs and starts to rub slowly, building my pleasure.
“Are you going to come for me like a good girl?” Finn asks. The teasing in his eyes makes me smile at him again, and I gasp when he pinches my clit hard then starts to pound his fingers into my slick pussy.
“Fuck! Yes, sir.” I squeeze my eyes closed as the sensations fall over me, and I start to see little silver stars behind my eyelids. I’m close to climax from his teasing, and I arch my back up to meet his hand as he continues to fuck me with his fingers, his thumb finds my clit, and I cry out. An explosion of sensation shoots across my body, my skin is on fire, my ears are buzzing, and I can feel my toes curl as the orgasm takes me over, turning me into a more wanton beast than human, matching his Alpha with my wildness.
I try to roll onto my side and stretch my neck up to kiss him. I just miss his lips as they brush mine, and he chuckles. “Oh Melody, sweet thing. You want more?”
***
“Yes!” I gasp, forgetting myself and unable to think straight as he continues to fuck my pussy hard with his expert fingers. But I want more, I need more, I need to feel him inside me. He stops moving and pulls his hand from inside my pants, and I whine at him. “Sir, please.”
“Hush,” he says as I watch him stand from the bed and remove his shorts. I slide out of my pants and then pull my shirt off over my head. “Eager thing, aren’t you?” Finn asks as I kneel before him on the bed, naked. I nod. My need for him, burning inside me like an inferno I have no control over. I reach out and take his hard length into my hand, grip him firmly and slide up and down his length, my fingers barely touching wrapped around his girth.
“Fuck me, sir? Please,” I say to him softly under my breath and look at him from under hooded eyelids. My bedhead and puffy face are not helping with my attempt at seduction. But after the craziness of the past few days, I need him, our wounds are healing, and we need each other now. His Alpha and my inner beast.
The cold night air filling the room makes my nipples tighten and stand. Finn bends his head and slowly swirls his tongue around one, then the other. I arch my back, trying to fill his mouth with my breasts and get him to take all of me in. I need to feel the heat of his mouth on me.
“I need…” I whimper. He stands again and takes my chin in his hand, tipping my face up to his, then his mouth comes down on mine, hard and demanding, owning me. The kiss makes my head swim, and my legs give out under me as he finds my clit again and pinches it harder this time. I fall back onto my heels and am only still upright because Finn has me by the jaw, holding me to him as he devours me. I'm cold when he steps back and removes both hands from me.
“You need what, Melody?” Finn asks as he stands next to our bed, watching me gasp for breath, panting with my excitement, waiting for him to pounce on me again. I watch as his eyes turn from brown to deep golden amber and glow softly.
“You, sir. I need you to touch me.” I smile, slide my hand down the inside of my thigh, stopping just before the soft patch of curls there.
“Show me where,'' Finn commands. I follow his instructions, and I lower myself to my back, spreading my legs for him. I slowly draw a road map across my body for him, pointing out all of the places I need his mouth and hands on me.
“Here,” I softly whisper as I glide my hands up over my breasts and take my nipples between my fingers, pinching and twisting them, arching my back up off of the bed. “Here,” I say again as I slide my hands down my sides to my hip bones and pause momentarily before turning in slightly and running them over the soft curves of my thighs. One hand finds my pussy. I’m so ready that I gasp as I slide my own fingers through my hot center. “Here! Please, sir.”
“No, I think you’re doing a pretty good job yourself. I want to watch you make yourself come for me, Mel.” His words settle around me, and I don’t hesitate. I watch as he jerks himself roughly, watching me find my own pleasure. Finding my clit, then dipping my fingers into my wetness and rubbing circles over the tight bud as I run my other hand back up my body to my nipples and pinch them, playing with myself under his watchful eyes.
“Come, I want to watch you make yourself come." Finn's command sounds rough, his voice husky with his own need.
I’m panting now, my chest rising and falling under my hand as I grope at my own breasts, squeezing hard, trying to mimic his grip on me. Suddenly it takes me over, and I arch up off the bed. Before I can cry out, Finn is on top of me, and his mouth is over mine. I gasp into his open mouth, giving him all of me.
“That’s a good girl,” he says as he puts one hand around my waist and turns me onto my side, pulling me back against him again. This time I reach down between us and position him at my opening. Then pushing back roughly, I pound myself down onto his length. “Fuck,” he growls low in my ear, “you feel amazing. Come on, do it for me again, Mel.”
A hand snakes around my throat and the other over my hip with my back pressed to his chest. I try to focus on slow, steady breaths as he pinches, pulls, and rubs my clit as he pounds into me. “Come again for me, Melody, now!” The command snaps something inside me, and this time when I come, I feel the sensation like I’m flying. I squirt onto my thighs, and as he drives into me again, my cum gushes out around him. Finn laughs. “There’s my girl. I love your cum all over my cock, baby,” he says as I keep riding the orgasm out and finally whimper softly next to him.
Finn rolls us both and pins me under him on my stomach as he fucks me hard and fast from behind. A hand around my neck again holds me down, and he bends over me. “Come all over my cock again, Mel, so I can finish inside your wet pussy.” This is us now, the soft exchanges between us mixed with the rough aggression of his Alpha. He owns me now just as much as I own him.
The hand around my throat and the motion of him listening in and out of me builds my orgasm quickly, and I squirt again. I’m floating and see stars on the edge of my vision just as he roars and stills, his cock twitching inside me, filling me with thick, hot semen, mixing with my own cum.
A few moments later, he turns to me and looks into my eyes. “You’re so amazing, Mel.” I smile at him just as he bends down and kisses my forehead. “Thank you for being you and accepting me as I am, Mel. I’m so sorry—” I cut him off and put my hand over his lips.
"Hush, don’t apologize for something you didn’t do," I say sleepily. "I couldn't imagine my life without you, Finn. You're my family now. We're going to be a family."