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Chapter One
Nicky read somewhere once that if people didn’t change, they didn’t grow. And if they didn’t grow, then they really weren’t living. He’d done an awful lot of both in the last few months since that awful day on the mountain when his little art class was attacked by the Hunters—changing and growing, that is. The living part remained to be seen.
Standing now in front of the steamed-up mirror in his bathroom, he hardly recognized himself. How was that for change? Drying himself absently, he turned away from the mirror and ran a hand through his shaggy hair. He felt restless, as he did most of the time these days, so he wandered over to the window in his quarters to look out at the scene below.
His friend Logan was outside, leading physical training for the mates and a few of the natural pets who’d expressed an interest in learning some self-defense. It was a class he did about once a week and had proved to be very popular, especially since the Hunters’ attack that had killed one of the mates and injured several more.
Nicky used to think learning self-defense was a good idea too, and he’d even gotten trained himself at one time. That was before he realized all the hand-to-hand combat training in the world was useless against a high powered rifle, or even against someone coming in on you fast and determined and jabbing you in the thigh with a hypodermic needle. He stood by the window and watched Logan going through the motions, though, and wished the two of them could be as close friends again as they once were.
That was pretty much impossible now—Logan was the mate of Ian, who was the beta of the wolf pack and Marco’s best friend, but no matter how much Ian liked and even trusted Nicky, things were different now. These days Nicky was much more wolf than human, and the idea of another wolf around his human mate made Ian uneasy and irritable. Even Casey, whose mate was another wolf, felt nervous over what he sensed was another alpha male around Rory.
Since the attack on the mountain, when Jeremy Tate, the head of the new Hunter group, had injected him with God knew what from that hypodermic, a lot of things had been different. It wasn’t the first time he’d been attacked by Tate, former heart surgeon and chief of surgery at the Brevard County Memorial Hospital. Tate had once fancied himself desperately in love with Nicky and in those awful, lost days when Marco got sick and they had come so close to losing everything between them, Dr. Tate had given Nicky some comfort and badly needed self-esteem. For a time, Nicky had allowed himself to imagine what his life would be like if someone like Jeremy Tate had been his lover. If there had never been a Marco—never been an attack on the streets of Atlanta as Nicky walked home after work one night. The mugging had nearly taken his life and certainly changed the course of it forever.
So later, when Marco turned his back on Nicky, leaving him floundering like a trout rudely hauled up on a riverbank, Jeremy Tate had been there to pick up the pieces. Except the pieces were too fractured, too completely shattered by Marco’s rejection to ever put back together by anyone except for Marco himself. Nicky and Marco eventually found their way back to each other again, but Jeremy Tate had never forgiven either one of them, and he had never forgotten.
The hairs on the back of Nicky’s neck prickled, and he jumped as Marco came up behind him and wrapped his arms around his waist.
“Damn, you’re like a fucking ninja, Marco,” Nicky said, with a little huff. “How can anyone as big as you are move like that?”
“Just lucky, I guess.” Marco bit his earlobe and trailed a path of fire down Nicky’s neck with his tongue. “What are you doing standing here naked in front of the window? Are you trying to make me whip somebody’s ass for ogling you?”
Nicky turned in his arms and brushed his lips against Marco’s. “How can you still be jealous after all this time?”
“Don’t answer a question with another one.” Marco grabbed Nicky around the neck and gave him one of those open-mouthed, hot-as-fuck kisses that made Nicky’s body respond immediately, just as it always did. But this time, as Marco tried to invade his mouth and force him to submit, Nicky countered and tried to claim Marco’s instead. As Marco’s grip tightened around the back of his neck, Nicky’s hands found Marco’s shoulders and he dug his fingers in, holding him back with his own strength.
Marco pulled away and looked down at him, one eyebrow quirking up a little in surprise as he grinned and pushed forward, shoving Nicky’s naked ass up against the glass. He ground his hips against Nicky’s and cupped Nicky’s balls with his free hand.
Nicky grinned back at him, knowing that Marco hated submitting to anyone. But this was becoming a new ballgame and one he had no intention of losing. At least he would give Marco a run for his money. He might not be quite as large as Marco yet, but he was getting bigger every day, almost six feet two now, and he’d gained a lot of muscle in the last few months. He let Marco handle his balls and even put a knee between Marco’s thighs to move himself in closer.
Marco’s hand left the back of Nicky’s neck and went up to his head. He grabbed the back of his still-wet hair, yanked back, and they were suddenly looking eye to eye. Marco’s jaw jutted out a little, aggressive and challenging. He was trying to stare Nicky’s wolf down and deep inside him, Nicky’s wolf stirred uneasily. “Bastard.” The alien thought sprang into his mind before he could stop it or wonder why he’d even thought it.
Once, long ago, Nicky had tried to top Marco, who agreed readily enough and then made a mocking game of directing every move, and lending a whole new meaning to topping from the bottom. He’d been condescending and something of an asshole, and though Nicky always enjoyed their games, he’d never forgotten how angry and resentful he’d been that night. This time would be different.
They were playing a game now too, at least at first, but then it gradually became…something far more serious. A need to make Marco submit to him swept over him unexpectedly. A part of him still had the presence of mind to wonder where exactly this urge was coming from. In the almost four years they’d been together, he’d never felt this way before.
Marco’s own aggression was hot as hell, and Nicky responded to it. He moved his hands slowly and seductively down Marco’s chest, seriously aroused, but only pretending to give in. He moaned softly and Marco loosened his hold on his hair, bending to nip at his neck. Nicky moaned once more and then hooked his foot around Marco’s leg while pushing as hard as he could against his chest.
Marco threw out his arms as he fell helplessly backward and his eyes went wide with shock. He hit the floor hard with a whoosh of breath and Nicky pounced on top of him, rolling him over on his stomach before he knew what hit him. Grabbing the waistband of his jeans, Nicky dragged Marco’s pants down past his knees and dropped down on the backs of his thighs, pinning him in place. Marco’s hips fought against his captivity, so Nicky put an arm across his lower back to hold him down.
“No you don’t. You’re not going anywhere.”
Bending over his back, he laughed huskily in his ear. The groans Marco had been making were turning into faint little sounds that were suspiciously like whimpers, sounds he’d never heard before from Marco. “Open your legs, baby.”
Marco tried to heave Nicky off him, but Nicky was ready and leaned all his weight against him. He was breathing hard and Nicky couldn’t tell if he was angry or turned on. Probably both. Maybe he was just too far gone to know what he was.
Nicky’s cock was harder than it had been in months. He pressed it against Marco’s crease and ground it in. “Open up for me, baby.” He laughed against his ear again. “Take it like a man.”
The whimpers had turned to low growls, and Nicky returned them, biting the back of Marco’s neck hard for good measure. Marco kept his face turned stubbornly down toward the floor, his muscles trembling with the effort to get up. Nicky couldn’t remember the last time he’d wanted Marco so badly. He wanted to ram his cock up Marco’s ass and own him. Marco heaved upward again, but not as strongly as the last time. His breath was coming in short gasps and his hands were clenched in fists on the floor. He eased his legs open a couple of inches, though, just enough to give Nicky what he wanted.
Still holding him down, Nicky spit in his hand and rubbed it across Marco’s tight, hot hole. He’d need more lube than this, but this was about staking his claim and showing Marco how the terms of their relationship had shifted. He shoved the tip of his cock inside and Marco arched up, groaning at the pain. Nicky gave him a moment to adjust and then he pushed inside a little farther, making him take it, forcing his muscles to accept and adapt.
“We’re doing this, do you understand?” Nicky growled softly in Marco’s ear. He ignored him until Nicky gave him a sharp nudge with his cock, forcing his way in another inch. “I said, do you understand?”
At first Nicky thought he wouldn’t reply, or that he’d jump to his feet and tell him to go to hell, but finally he gave a short, sharp nod and drew in a ragged breath. Relenting, Nicky kissed the side of his face.
“Okay. So I’m going to get some lube so I won’t hurt you. Don’t move while I’m gone. You hear me?”
After another barely perceptible nod, Nicky pulled out and got to his feet. They kept lube in practically every room of the house, so he didn’t have to travel far. His hands trembling, he found what he needed in the drawer of an end table and turned around. Marco hadn’t moved. His hands were still clenched into fists and his body was tense and flushed a dark red, but so far he was accepting this, and Nicky could hardly believe it. He must be as turned on as Nicky.
Nicky pulled Marco’s jeans off his ankles with a quick motion and fell back between his legs, shoving Marco’s thighs farther apart and bending over to nip him on the tender skin between his ass and his thigh. Nicky splashed lube down Marco’s crease and spread it on his hole as he squirmed and tried to haul himself forward to get away. Nicky pulled him back, his lube-covered hands digging into Marco’s hips like talons.
“No, you don’t. Stay with me, and I’ll make it good for you. I promise.”
Marco looked back over his shoulder at Nicky for the first time, his eyes stormy and filled with lust, before those thick dark eyelashes closed over his eyes, and he nodded and turned away. He gave another sigh and Nicky reached beneath him to close his hand around Marco’s dick at the same time he pushed the wet tip of his cock in from behind. Marco gasped as Nicky held his heavy cock in his hand and raised a knee to give him more room.
Marco thrust into Nicky’s hand as Nicky pushed into his ass. Marco’s cock softened with the pain and Nicky used slow, intense strokes to get him hard again. He kissed his neck as he pushed inside Marco’s body with the same long strokes. “I’ve dreamed of fucking you like this,” Nicky whispered to him. “Of owning you like you own me.”
Nicky had once, not all that long ago, thought Marco was lost to him like their bloodmatch had been—ripped away by the Hunter’s cruel experimentation with drugs and ghoulish compounds made from the blood of murdered wolves. Nicky tightened his grip on Marco and pushed in again, possessing him, staking a claim that had almost been taken away from him for good.
Now, ironically, and again because of Jeremy Tate, some of what they’d lost had been restored to them, even though Tate had bastardized and corrupted it, injecting Nicky with what the doctor was calling the Bloodlust drug and changing him irrevocably, it seemed. Nicky had survived the injection, but would he survive what came after? No one seemed to know.
Marco shuddered again and reached back with one of his hands to hold Nicky’s hip. He turned the side of his face toward him again and Nicky rewarded him with kisses. “I love you, Marco. And you’re just as much mine as I am yours. Forever. You understand?”
