Tail 'Em: A Reverse Harem Shifter Romance (Jailbreak Book 1), page 4
I glanced up, something that all three men seemed to find amusing before dropping my eyes hurriedly.
“I have to be up at the new institute at eight am tomorrow, so I better not, but thank—”
My words were cut off by a hiss from the girls, the men immediately tensing up.
“Whaddya doing in a place like that?” Eddie asked.
“The alphas fought the council, fought them wanting to build on that site,” Jarrah said. “Too many of ours died in that prison. They wanted it turned over to them, but this new lot came in flashing money around.”
“It’s a bad business, what’s going on in there,” Jai said finally, everyone else falling silent.
Stay down, little brother… The words from Diablo’s memories came rushing back, my fingers tightening around my bottle, but I didn’t dare look up.
“I’ll bring you some food,” Jai said. “Eat, and then we meet with the alphas.”
“Someone’s gonna get it…” Jaz said in a low singsong voice as the men paced away, the two girls threading their arms through mine, then they burst out laughing. Eddie and Jarrah took a look at us over their shoulders as they went over to the food table, something that quietened them down, for a minute at least. “Nah, but serious, Shan. You always was my sister from another mister. Now you really will be.”
Don’t say no. Don’t contradict them.
“So which one gets Eddie and which one gets Jarrah?” I asked, shooting them side eyes over the mouth of my bottle.
“Well, we had to fight it out…” They started laughing again when I looked at them in shock. “Shan, we’re not that feral! Jaz and Eddie, me and Jarrah.”
Rita’s tone had softened somewhat as she watched the men pile plates up with ridiculous amounts of food. The girls might have that amazing metabolism that meant they could pack away the food and still remain willowy, but I couldn’t. The guys caught us watching, grinning amongst themselves before ambling back.
“Congrats,” I said, looking at each girl, seeing the contentment there and envying them for it. “But you know I—”
“Don’t,” Jaz said, seriously for once. “Don’t say that anymore. I know what your crazy nan said, and you know me, I don’t talk ill of elders, but her way’s not your way. You belong here, just like us. Whatever she thought was coming for you, it won’t get past the pack. Not for a second. Now, humour that stupid brother of mine. He’s trying, Shan.”
And right as the words faded away, the man himself came back to stand before me, taking a seat on the ground in front of us, the other guys doing the same. My eyes widened. Usually, pack always had their heads higher than non-shifters, only bowing them to senior members. When I glanced at the girls, I saw their faces were transformed, a curious peace settling over them as they accepted the plates from their prospective mates. Their movements, their hands, had a ritualistic quality to them, and I felt a stab of shock when each woman took their forks and took a mouthful from the plate.
Pack determined who ate first, usually the kids, because everything was about future generations, but…
“It’s OK, Shan,” Jai said, my eyes flicking back. He grabbed my hand and placed his spare plate in mine, putting the fork in the other. He nodded to the huge mountain of food, watching me with those eyes. My hand wrapped around the fork tightly, feeling the growing pressure to do something, anything. But I remembered the slap of my grandmother’s hand down on mine when I was a kid, invited over for dinner one night, all ready to hoe into the yummy smelling food before I was given permission.
“Just eat something,” he said finally, dropping his eyes and doing the same with his food, like I wasn’t quietly having a breakdown.
“It’s OK,” Jaz hissed, giving me the side eye. “Just calm down and have a meal. He’s not gonna set up shack in your house tomorrow.”
Right, right…Beth’s food, plentiful, lovely, and warming, focus on that. Jai’s eyes flicked my way as I speared a chunk of potato salad and put it in my mouth, only partially stifling the groan of pleasure when I did. She always added these seemingly weird ingredients like walnuts, green onions, sun dried tomatoes and parmesan cheese to it, and it was amazing. He snorted at that, no doubt catching every sound with that hearing of his, and kept on eating.
As we all ate, I thought I’d earned a reprieve, lulled by the incredible tastes of Beth’s food. Eddie had been right, nothing beat her cooking, not even pizza. But as plates were put down and forks laid across them, the men reached out for the girls, and bloody Jaz and Rita took them, leaving me sitting on the log alone. I put the plate to one side, finally giving up as my stomach felt stretched tight as a drum, and Jai shifted in a fluid movement to sit beside me, my body instantly tensing.
Something that only ratcheted higher when his leg came to rest against mine. I felt and heard everything—the crack of his beer can as he opened it, the sound of him swallowing, the shift of his body as he put his hand behind my back, resting it on the log. Then came the swell of his scent, spicy, woody male mixing with the fragrant smoke from the burning eucalyptus logs. I found I was breathing noisily through my mouth in an attempt to stop it from flooding my senses.
“Shan, it's OK.”
His voice was light, calm, gentle, but it contained that thread of iron that had all non-pack nodding along. I felt it more than most, but still, my spine loosened, my breath lengthened, and the tension leached out of me slowly at his say so. I let out a long ragged sigh, appreciating the benefit, even if it was forced on me.
“You always smell so good…” came his dark, disembodied voice. “Part prey, ready to skitter away before me, for me to hunt down, part…”
My teeth ground down at that. I’d spent most of my school years around boys like Jai, who took incomprehensible glee in startling me. His people and mine were two sides of the same coin. We could control them in animal form, and they us in human form with that shifter alpha whip. The boys had played at this sometimes, young cubs finding their power and flexing a bit, freezing us girls on the spot, only to let us go moments later.
“You wouldn’t like that?”
My eyes flicked up, meeting his, and damn the consequences. I didn’t come by here often unless called, finding the strictures of the pack hard to cope with. My nan and the alphas had a pact that I would always honour, but I was apart from this, them.
“Look, Jai…”
“And she’s going to shoot me down.” He snorted at that, then rubbed at his face. But he recovered quickly, eyes dropping down slow to rest on my lips. “Tell me you don’t want it. I know what she told you, that you can’t say no, but you can. To this.” He caught my gasp when his eyes met mine again. They burned now, catching some of the firelight in those bronzed depths. “Tell me to piss off, that there’s no hope here.” The steel was back in his voice, demanding a response from me.
“How about you talk to me about whatever the hell this is?” I hissed, my hand going to my lips as soon as I realised how I’d spoken to him. But he smiled, slow and easy, like somehow, I’d pleased him by breaking the rules. “We haven’t talked beyond simple pleasantries since…”
He nodded encouragingly, like he needed me to be the one to put it into words. But how could I? It was a memory I brought out sometimes, like you would an old worn photo of a loved one, holding it close when times were tough, even if it made your heart ache with the sweetest of pains.
We’d been kids back then, just finished school, and I’d come around for a big party the pack had put on, celebrating the end of childhood and our move towards becoming adults. His eyes had found mine across the fire all night. They’d glowed like they did now, with that reflected heat. Jasmine and Rita hadn’t noticed, too caught up in their own crazy antics, and I was always quiet, so they didn’t really notice that my attention had been redirected. I watched him and he watched me, until finally, I’d been forced to step away from the fire.
He’d been waiting for me in the hallway, emerging out of the darkness of the bedroom door when I walked out, stepping into my path. I’d looked up, on the surface wondering what was going on, but we both knew. His hands cupped my face in the following movement, his lips crashing down on mine with the next, then his tongue was sliding inside when I gasped, thrusting the taste of beer, BBQ, and him in.
It had felt strange, to run my hands up his bare arms, to tangle my fingers in hair I’d longed to touch for so long. He’d caught my little sob, of terror, excitement, and need, all rolled up in one, and pulled back so that his forehead pressed against mine.
“It’s OK, Shan. It’ll all be OK now.”
He’d taken my hand and led me out the backdoor, past the fire and our friends, farther out towards the trees. I felt the cool night air and darkness on my skin, which was soon replaced by him and his hands when he brought me to a blanket he’d stashed out there. We’d dropped down onto it, our lips connecting on automatic, unable to spend too long without the others’ upon them.
“I’ve been wanting to do this for so long,” he’d said, mumbling the words against my collarbone as he kissed his way along it, stopping with a question in his eyes when his fingers slid under the spaghetti strap of my top.
I’d felt like someone, something completely different when I yanked it up and over my head. I was brave, confident, able to face down his molten gaze and take it as my due. The questioning returned after he soaked up everything he could see in the moonlight, his hand reaching out to slide against my chest, pushing my bra strap down, trapping my arm, then his palm cupped around me.
We both gasped as one when he’d grazed my hard budded nipple, his eyes meeting mine, wavering, almost looking pained by what he felt. Perhaps it was the same knife sharp stab of need that slid through me, wanting everything he was doing and so much more. He’d pulled away, shedding his tank top and undoing my bra in a series of fumbling movements, then he pushed me back and covered his body with mine.
It wasn’t the first time I’d had sex. Like a lot of girls, I’d lost my virginity in a series of furtive fumbles after school one day in year ten to a boy I’d been seeing for a while. That and most times afterwards, it’d been fast, sometimes painful, and difficult to understand what the big deal was. But Jai… He touched my body with the same confidence he did everything, building a terrible pleasure inside me that I’d only managed to do on my own, then moving well beyond that. He swept me up in a flurry of touches and caresses, reading my moans and twitches and pushing me higher.
I’d watched the moon hanging above us in the night sky, the chatter around the bonfire a dim buzz in my ears as he settled between my legs. “Shan…” he’d whispered into my thigh, following it with kisses that kept going lower until…
My back bent like a bow as his tongue slid through me, parting me, brushing over my clit and making me want to scream for more. “Mm…” he purred, the vibrations rattling through me, and my legs splayed wider, not wanting to provide any impediment to his movements. “Sweet, Shan, so sweet…”
Jai always had a hunger for life, throwing himself into rugby games, pranks, and pack business with everything he had, so to be on the receiving end now to all that intensity was mind blowing. I was gabbling some incomprehensible noises as his fingers pushed into me, hooking up. “That’s it, Shan,” he crooned between long licks. “Come apart for me.”
By the time he’d slid up my body, a dark shadow promising a million honey sweet pleasures with that sickle smile of his, I’d been panting through one orgasm and ready for another. He’d made me feel so soft, wanton, my fingers roaming across his shoulders as he rolled the condom on and then into me.
It’d been a bit of a fight initially, to accept his size, but it’d been one I’d willingly lost, both of us sobbing when he finally buried himself deep.
“You OK?” he’d rasped out, his arms shaking.
I’d reached up and drew his lips down on mine by way of an answer, our movements starting small, then involving our whole bodies as he rocked into me. I was still so sensitive, every little action building a fire inside me that, at the time, was a little scary to experience. But he’d drawn me along, caged within his arms, until we both moved with a breath-stuttering synchronisation. Until it happened.
My cry, his howl, had announced to the world what we were up to.
At the time, I’d thought it meant a whole lot more, but when we finally came back to the bonfire and found Uncle Rob standing there, Jai had dropped my hand like a hot coal.
I came back to the present with an unpleasant snap, Jai’s presence by my side an oppressive one rather than enticing. He watched me edge away. I was trying for subtle, but there was no small detail missed by pack members. I swallowed and then looked up, facing him now with a much cooler gaze, I hoped.
“You said the alphas wanted to see me? What’s that about?”
Chapter 7
I stood in front of the pack, eyes downcast, Jai at my side.
“You asked me to bring Shannon to you,” he prompted.
I heard the shift of old bones in chairs, the tap of a cane in the dirt, the harrumph of old men clearing their throat. They kept us waiting, because they could, because it wasn’t us that controlled the flow of communication, and because it wasn’t yet the time. They operated on a temporal flow the rest of us couldn’t understand, that wasn’t confined by the ticking of clocks or the changing dates on calendars. They were eternal, knowing their sons and grandsons would step up and take their place when it was their time to pass on, so their patience was endless.
Unfortunately, mine wasn’t. I felt the warmth of Jai’s hand on my arm and wanted to shake it off, but didn’t dare. Instead, I just stood there, tolerating his presence and wondering what the fuck they wanted from me now.
“You’re Moira’s girl.”
What should have been a question came out like a statement, the voice deep, corded with age in the raspy tone.
“Yes, sir.”
“Sir?” A series of rusty laughs went around the group.
“I’m sorry,” I said hurriedly, trying to remember the proper honorific. How the hell had I forgotten all of this?
Because you haven’t been brought before them for years, I replied to my own thought. Because you thought this was over.
“It’s all right, girl,” the old man said. “I know your grandma raised you right. You have a look of her. Hair like sunlight.” My eyes flicked to where it hung in front of my eyes. “You’re going up to the bad place on the ridge tomorrow?”
“How did you—?” I snapped my lips shut. It was not my place to ask questions, confirmed by the chuckles that came from the pack. “My apologies, Alphas. Yes, we are due to go to the Capricorn Institute—” I flinched when I heard the sound of phlegm spat on the ground. “Tomorrow morning. Stuart’s team, we’ve been offered work there.”
“This is a bad business,” one said. “Bastards taking that place, slapping a nice façade on the cage that held too many of ours.”
“Why this town? Why there? Animal conservation? Pfft… There’s something else going on. What about you, young Jai? What did your crew find?” another said.
“We didn’t get far, Alphas. The security… That’s no zoo or rich man’s project. They had trained men, guard dogs…”
“Did they indeed?” I could almost hear the wheels spinning as they conferred amongst themselves. “You have asked to court this girl?”
What? My head almost jerked up, only habit keeping it down.
“Yes, Alphas.”
“Moira’s girl. Do you want this young fella buzzing around? We don’t let the pack pick outsiders for mates often. Young Rob pleaded your case to us.”
“I…”
I spoke because it was expected of me, because I knew better than to ignore a question from an alpha, but I struggled to form a response. What. The. Actual. Fuck. Pack be damned, I was having this out with Jai after this debacle was done.
“I’m sorry, Alphas. I haven’t had a chance to talk this over with Shannon yet. I…”
“So whaddya been doing, sniffing around her place every night then? She seen you in skin form?”
“Ah…yes, Alphas.”
“That was enough for my Gracey. Seen the old trouser snake and she…”
I bit my lip to keep my responses to myself. Snake…? Was he talking about his…?
“Talk to the girl, see if she’ll accept you. But, Shannon, granddaughter of Moira, we want to know what’s going on in that place up on the hill. You tell him between kisses, or you come ’round here, tell your Uncle Rob what’s happening, y’hear?”
“Yes, Alphas. I’ll come around tomorrow night and make sure to tell Rob everything I saw.”
“Not yon Jai?” More chuckles at that. “My Jenny put up a fight too.”
“She had you howling through the valley after her. Remember when that bastard, Cahill, was trying to woo her out from under you?”
“Jenny was nothing compared to my Nance. Damn near wore myself ragged for that old man of hers. Bastard had me redo their whole fence line before he’d let me within ten feet of her.”
“Enough of that. You’ll scare the girl off before she’s had time to consider the boy, though right now, she don’t smell scared.”
More mad laughing.
“Jai’s gonna get a hiding!”
“I’ll report back, Alphas,” I said, the need to get away beating as sure as my heart. My muscles quivered with it. I could feel the long strides I’d take to get clear of here, of all the pack bullshit. “I need to get home if I’m to be there early in the morning.”
“All right, girl. You keep us posted, and you’ll be seeing to your side of the bargain. You can go.”
I dropped my head lower in an ungainly bow and then spun on my heel, straightening up and getting the fuck out. A half walk, half run, I stalked past all the people that called out to me as I went, including Rita and Jaz. I’d call them when I got home. When I cooled down, I amended. I was in no fit place to talk to anyone. But of course, that couldn’t be allowed to fly.
