Chapter 4 The Wolf's Hunger
Malach
She really thinks that little black Ducati can outrun me. That’s so fucking cute, I will let her keep the fantasy.
Her scent was everywhere on the mountain road: cigarettes, gasoline, cheap vanilla body spray, and something that seemed never to change. The same smell that has haunted me every day, a unique fragrance of jasmine and earth that no god or demon has ever been able to replicate.
I let the shift rip me open the second her taillight disappeared. One heartbeat, I was in my wolf form, running beside her at a hundred and twenty, like we're on a Sunday stroll.
Next heartbeat, I’m a man again, naked on the side of the road, chest heaving, cock so hard it hurts, my blood roaring one name it’s been roaring since before the desert had sand.
Evangeline.
The way she looked at me up on that catwalk, frost-blue eyes huge, braid whipping, mouth open like she forgot how to breathe. Fear so pretty it almost looked like love.
She had no idea. She never does.
I drag a hand down my face, smear somebody else’s blood across my jaw, and laugh once: low, cracked, the sound of a man who hasn’t laughed in months and just remembered how good it feels.
The moon’s almost full, hanging up there like it’s waiting for an apology it’s never gonna get. I stare till the torc burns against my skin.
Keep watching, baby. You’re about to lose.
I start walking. The night is cool, and the earth feels solid under my bare feet.
Evangeline 'Eva' Harlow. Born in a trailer park to a mother who OD’d before her second birthday. Baptized in a river with a rattlesnake coiled around the preacher’s arm. Bounced between foster homes, where she learned to pick locks and fight dirty before most kids learned cursive.
Fluent in seven languages, three of them dead. The best goddamn thief on the continent. Record cleaner than a preacher’s collar on Sunday, not because she’s good, but because no one’s ever lived long enough to press charges. I made pretty sure of that.
I’ve had a file on her since she was sixteen.
Pictures. Addresses. The way she laughs just before doing something that could get her killed. The way her whole body goes bowstring-tight when she’s about to do something reckless.
Goddamn, I love this one.
The sharp tongue. The reckless tilt of her chin. The way she makes my cock throb and my wolf snarl just by existing.
She’s perfect.
Tomorrow night, when the moon’s fat and drunk on itself, I’m walking through whatever cheap-ass door she’s hiding behind. I can picture it:
She’ll look up, clove cigarette dangling from those full lips, and see me standing there. She’ll throw a lamp or a bottle of vodka or maybe the damn bookshelf itself.
She won’t scream. Eva doesn’t scream. She fights.
I can’t fucking wait to fight her.
I’ll let her fight. Hell, I’ll let her cut me open; she always does.
Then I’ll slam her back against the wall, fist twisted tight in that platinum hair, and drive into her so deep she forgets every prayer she ever learned.
Because the only god she’s ever gonna need is the one buried inside her, claiming every inch of the only woman I’ve ever wanted, ever waited for, ever torn the whole damn world apart to get back to.
But tonight?
Tonight I will wait. Because patience is a weapon, and I’ve had five thousand years to learn how to use it.
I make it back to The Hollow just as the last of the drunks are staggering out. The air still stinks of stale beer, sweat, and that metallic tang of blood. My boys are already cleaning up, dragging bodies, hosing down the octagon.
I nod at Jed, my Beta. He’s a good man. Loyal. Follows orders without asking questions. He has a wife and two kids in a small town down the mountain, humans who think he works in construction. We might be a pack, but I'm not a monster. At least not to my own kind. Not always.
“Boss,” he says. “All settled. Two broken arms, a dislocated shoulder, and a ruptured spleen. But they’ll live. Mostly.”
“Good,” I say, my voice a low rumble. “Get everyone out. Lock it down.”
“You got it,” he says, then he hesitates. “You all right, Malach?”
I just looked at him, one eyebrow raised.
Jed knows better than to push. He lowers his gaze and starts herding the last of the crew out.
“You heard him! Clear out!”
When the doors are sealed, and the only sounds are the dripping water and the hum of the old tunnels, I walk past the cage, ignoring the bloodstains, and head to the stairs leading down to my private rooms.
It’s more of a sanctuary than a bedroom. Concrete walls, a massive bed with a dark wood frame, and shelves lined with books. My collection of Bibles. First editions. Not for God, but for her.
Her.
I walk into the adjoining bathroom. I turn the water on as hot as it can go and step into the shower. The scalding water ran over my skin, washing away the grime, the sweat, and the blood, turning the water at my feet red.
But it's her scent I can't get off my skin.
My body responds, my cock hardening again, a traitorous, desperate thing that has been denied for far too long. I lean against the tiled wall, the water pounding down on me.
I shut my eyes, and she’s right there, so goddamn beautiful it hurts.
That face, pale and furious, braid snapping behind her like a battle flag while she ran from me tonight, fear pouring off her in waves, thick and sweet, the best drug I’ve ever had.
My hand drops to my cock like it’s got a mind of its own.
I grip hard, slow at first, just letting the ache build. Then my thumb drags over the head, rough circles, and a growl tears out of my chest. My hips jerk forward, chasing a mouth that isn’t here.
Tomorrow night she will be. On her knees because I put her there, hair twisted around my fist like a leash, those frost-blue eyes spitting murder while I feed every inch past her smart-ass lips. Her cheeks hollow, tears cutting clean lines through the dirt on her face, still biting, still clawing my thighs, still swallowing me down like it’s war and surrender in the same breath.
That’s all it takes. My balls pull up tight, aching, ready to empty years of want straight into the fantasy of her throat.
I come with a snarl that echoes off the concrete, the first spurt hitting the tile hard enough to splatter. The second rips her name out of me like I’m tearing my own heart out.
I keep going until my knees nearly fold and the last shudder leaves me empty and still starving. I stay slumped against the wall, forehead on my forearm, and my chest heaving.
It’s not enough. It’ll never be enough.