Nix Read online

  Thankfully, Nix kept our conversation to guns and ammo for the rest of dinner.

  Chapter Five

  Nix

  Taking her to my house instead of back to her car was a gamble, but I had to try. The poor thing had practically cried when I’d mentioned the fact wolves don’t fuck around. I wanted her in my bed and I didn’t want to have to wait.

  Could I hold up in bed beside an Encantado? The most charming species on the planet, known for their ability to charm and seduce anyone who catches their fancy? Encantados are freshwater dolphin shapeshifters, and the mythology says they must wear a hat in human form because they retain their blowhole. Their name literally means enchanted one, and their skills in bed are legendary. The Encantado she was married to is also a famous musician who’d have his choice of women even if he were human.

  Tippy and her former husband had lived in a mansion just north of New Orleans, right on the Mississippi River — which made more sense knowing his species.

  And her scent when she told me what he was… regret and grief.

  The major networks aren’t a fan of guns, so you have to seek out the Olympic shooting competitions if you want to see them. I’d followed Tiffany Mason through World Cup competitions as well as the Olympics, and to have her sitting in front of me at dinner? It’d been like sitting with a rock star. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye just yet.

  She noted I wasn’t taking her back to her car and tapped me on the stomach a few times to get my attention, but I ignored her. Finally, I heard her yell, “Isn’t the gun store the other direction?”

  As long as I kept my speed up, she was trapped on the back of my bike. She’d probably be spitting mad when I got her home, but surely I could charm her into looking at my guns while she was there. Or… something.

  But then I felt steel at my side and realized she’d drawn on me. Damn, but I wanted this woman in my bed.

  I was almost to the interstate but didn’t dare get onto it with a gun pointed at my kidneys. I’d smelled silver on her and I didn’t know if it was a knife, or in the bullets, but it was probably best I didn’t chance it.

  She jumped off the bike the instant I stopped in the parking lot. She put her weapon in her pants pocket and kept her hand on it. She didn’t want to draw attention to us but she wasn’t letting her guard down, either.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “My house.”

  “No.”

  “Brain — our hacker — drove your car to our compound and put it in our garage where it’ll be safe and you don’t have to worry about it. I’ll take you back to it whenever you insist, but I’m hoping you won’t insist just yet.”

  She shook her head no as she asked, “How’d he drive my car without the keys?”

  I grinned. “He’s a hacker.” She shook her head no again, and I said, “Look, I enjoyed our dinner conversation and I wasn’t ready for it to be over yet. Nothing will happen unless you want it to, but you can’t be uptight about sex if you were married to an Encantado — and don’t you owe it to yourself to see if anyone else is going to be able to hold a candle to him in bed?”

  I smelled resignation and my heart hurt for her. I gentled my voice to say, “That’s it, isn’t it? No one else has been able to?”

  She looked at her feet and I said, “Sweetheart, you were married to one of the most enchanting beings on the planet, and possibly the most charming of even all of his race.” I touched her chin and lifted her face until her gaze met mine. “I won’t make any promises, but give me a chance? I’m enchanted by you, and I’d be happy just talking guns all night.”

  Though I’d be much happier buried to my balls in her.

  “You thought I couldn’t stop you, once you had me on your bike?”

  I grinned. “I’ll take you home when you insist. You have my word.”

  She didn’t say anything so I relented and answered her question. “Yes, I figured once I had you there it would be easier to convince you to stay.”

  When she still didn’t say anything I told her, “You walk like a ballerina. Your deer’s grace shows in everything you do, and yet like I said before — you’re no one’s prey.” Just watching her handle her weapons on the internal security cams at the store had me so hard I had to call someone to come relieve the pressure — though I figured it best I didn’t admit to either secretly watching her or fucking someone else while I wished they were her.

  “I thought you hadn’t been here long. How is it you have a house on enough acreage you have a two-mile gun range?”

  “The MC President’s wife is a real estate agent. Part of the package they offered to get me to come to Chattanooga instead of another city who wanted me included her looking for properties they thought I might like. I closed on it two weeks ago and spent a week cutting down enough trees to give me a two-mile line of site. The house is bigger than I need it to be, but I couldn’t resist the land it’s on.” I sighed. “Look, I’m not enchanting but I’ve never had any complaints — I’m a wolf, and a biker, and what you see is what you get. We have a few things in common and I’m not ready to say goodbye yet. Give me a chance?”

  “If we have sex, it’ll just be sex. I’m not promising anything more.”

  “Deer aren’t monogamous,” I thought aloud. Did this mean she wouldn’t want to settle down with one person? Was that why she’d been okay marrying an Encantado?

  “We aren’t having that conversation right now.”

  I leaned forward and kissed her forehead. I didn’t go slow to make sure she’d be okay with it, I just did it, and it seemed to have been the right move because she said, “Fine, I’ll go home with you, but if you hurt me I’ll hunt you down and hurt you back, and if you kill me and eat me I’ll give you terrible indigestion before I haunt your dreams.”

  Chapter Six

  Tippy

  I considered his motivations while I rode on the back of his bike. I held on for dear life on the interstate but I had a feeling he was going slower than he normally would. He knew the bike scared me.

  He’d seen me shoot in the Olympics, so he had preconceived ideas about who I am before he met me — but that didn’t explain why he was being so aggressive to try to get me to… what was he trying to get me to do? Sleep with him? Or was he taking me home to play some kind of sick game with the deer. He lived in the middle of the woods, a wolf could have a lot of fun with a… no, I hadn’t gotten that vibe from him at all.

  And I’d be lying to myself if I didn’t admit I was intrigued by the fact he apparently thought he was good enough to compare to an Encantado. The supernatural version of my divorce agreement gives me the right to tell any supernaturals I’m considering getting into a relationship with the species of the person I used to be married to. Jinn had actually insisted on making it legal, saying I needed to be able to be honest with people I considered for his old position.

  His old position…. Yeah, he’d been charming all right, but he’d known just how charming he was, too.

  So, Nix knows I’ve been with probably one of the best people in bed in the human realm at this time, and he had the confidence to still want to fuck me. Just the fact he wasn’t scared away had me curious. I spent some time in Faerie a few months ago and was about to get it on with an incubus, until someone let it slip who I’d been married to and he bowed out. A fucking incubus — a creature who feeds off sex and has had centuries or possibly longer to perfect his technique — decided he didn’t want to have sex with me.

  Had I told Nix what Jinn was to try to push him away? Yeah, probably, though I hadn’t given it that particular thought when I told him. Still, I was surprised he was still interested.

  Also, he was right about Deer not being monogamous. No way would a relationship between us work. No freaking way.

  I mentally ticked off all the things he had going against him — wolf, biker, monogamous.

  Fucking a wolf might be the king of all bad ideas, but if he could give me a night of good sex, I’d
take it.

  He’d warned me his house was more than he needed, but I’d expected maybe three or four bedrooms instead of the one or two bedrooms most bachelors were good with.

  This house was a mansion. Combine the structure with the hundreds of acres of property he must’ve had to buy to get two miles of range, and he’d likely spent well over a million on this place. No way did he make that kind of money from the military, and I doubted he made it from the RTMC gun shop classes, either.

  So, of course, the first words out of my mouth when we arrived were, “How the hell do you afford this place?”

  He grinned. “It’s in the sticks and it was a foreclosure — I paid just under half the fair market value. Duke’s wife got me a helluva deal.” He nodded toward the barn. “Since I don’t intend to have horses, I’ve talked to Duke and Brain about the RTMC buying some cows. The club owns part of a meat processing plant already, and I wouldn’t mind renting the land for the cows, and feeding them and such. The RTMC will have to handle whatever veterinary crap has to be done, but it would be a good use of that part of the land.”

  “I’m assuming you’ve been all over it as a wolf?”

  His smile lit his face. “I found an entrance to a cave, and lots of wildlife I hadn’t expected. Based on the scent markers, I’m pretty sure I have a nesting pair of eagles either on or near my property. When I find the nest — if it’s on my property — I want to put some video cameras up to keep an eye on them.”

  Even at half price he shouldn’t be able to afford this place, but I decided not to argue. I was here for sex, not his financial status. Granted, if he was moonlighting as an assassin for hire I should probably know, but asking again felt rude, so I didn’t.

  He’d stopped just outside the garage, and now he pushed a button beneath his bike’s speedometer and the garage door opened. I walked in with him as he pushed the bike, and noted five more motorcycles, an old nondescript pickup truck, and an Audi RS7. Bigger and more expensive than mine. No wonder he’d known so much about my car.

  “I test drove the RS7,” I told him, “but preferred the agility of the five. How do you like your seven?”

  “Love it, though I don’t drive it often.” He nodded toward his bikes. “I prefer to feel the wind, usually.”

  Even when it’s freezing outside, I thought as I made a conscious effort not to let him know how cold I was after the ride.

  Again, I wanted to ask what he did to earn so much money, but I reminded myself this was just a night of sex and it didn’t matter.

  I followed him to the door into the house and he hesitated before he used the keypad to unlock it. “I haven’t bought any new furniture yet, and my old doesn’t really work with the house. Plus, there are still lots of empty rooms.”

  I smirked. “The biker bad-ass cares I’ll think his décor sucks?”

  He rolled his eyes and pushed the door open to show off a gorgeous kitchen with miles of marble countertops and a beautiful island.

  “Do you cook, or is this kitchen going to be wasted?” I asked.

  “I can cook every kind of meat a variety of ways.”

  His scent changed and I didn’t have to wonder why he was suddenly so uncomfortable. I turned away from him as I asked, “Do I want to know how much venison is in your freezer?”

  He sighed. “Tell me about deer shifters. I don’t remember anyone listing Deer when they talk about those of us not susceptible to silver, but you must not be as sensitive to it as most of us.”

  Interesting — I point out he likely has pieces of dead deer in his freezer and he counters by reminding me I could just as easily kill him at the moment. I shook my head as I reminded myself wolves eat deer and I’d already known this when I’d agreed to come home with him. We’re both in human form right now and I needed to act human. I turned back to him to ask, “Is the silver bothering you? I’ve been careful not to touch my gun directly to you, even through our clothes.” I shrugged and grinned. “You know, other than when I pulled on you.”

  “I can feel it when you touch me, but I’m okay. I smelled it from the beginning, though. Would you’ve really shot me with silver?”

  My first bullet is lead with no silver, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to tell him that just yet, so I shrugged and reminded him, “You’re the one who keeps telling me I’m no one’s prey.”

  “Can you handle it directly, or do you have to wear gloves to load them?”

  “I wear gloves. It seems the most lethal of the supernatural world are the most susceptible to silver, and those of us who aren’t as likely to go mental on the population aren’t as bothered by it. There are exceptions, but…” I shrugged. “I feel a burn when I handle it, and my skin will be red for a few hours, but it isn’t a huge deal. I’ve never been shot or stabbed with it, but I assume it would be bad.”

  “Can you get drunk?”

  I nodded. “It doesn’t last as long as it does for a human, and it takes a little more to get me there, but yeah. I can handle cold weather better than humans, but not as good as you, which is why I’m paying to shoot in an indoor range while it’s so cold out.”

  He stepped to me and stopped inches away, but didn’t touch me. “And the human part of you? What do I need to know about you? Do we need to discuss a safeword?”

  I shook my head. “I have one, so I guess you should know if I say venison then you should stop whatever you’re doing, but I’m not interested in doing anything that might require a safeword, tonight.” I gave him a mischievous grin. “Do you have a safeword?”

  His eyes went hard as he said, “No.”

  I’m not sure what I expected him to do next, but I thought we’d talk some more, or perhaps he’d show me around the house.

  Instead, he leaned down and kissed me with the energy and intent of a dozen wolves, and my arms went around his neck for support as he bent me back, his tongue invading and exploring my mouth. The first couple of seconds were almost violent, but he quickly dialed it back to lust and desire. His initial energy had my heart beating triple time and my adrenaline spiking, but I didn’t want to run from him — I wanted to climb him.

  He stood me up long enough to pull my shirt off and remove my bra, and then his mouth was on mine again, and his hand on my breast. I groaned as he massaged my left breast from the base up, and then tweaked the nipple just right.

  He pulled away from the kiss long enough to say, “Not gonna romance you tonight — gonna fuck you ’cause that’s what you need. Tomorrow you may need romancin’. We’ll figure tomorrow out when the sun rises.”

  It wasn’t until much later that I realized he was testing me to see if I was good with staying the night, or if he was going to need to take me home when we finished. At some point, I figured out much of what Nix says has a dual purpose, but at that moment all I cared about was his lips, his tongue, his hands… and hopefully his cock.

  Nix knew what I wanted and he didn’t make me wait. He walked me backwards into the living room, unfastened my belt and jeans, and turned me around as he pushed my pants and panties down at the same time. I took my bellyband-holster off and put it — weapon and all — on a side table. I’d like to say I let him bend me over the sofa, but I’m pretty sure I bent over it without any coaxing.

  He didn’t finger me first, didn’t prepare me in any way for his cock — just shoved his thick length in and started fucking me, and it was exactly what I needed. Nix wasn’t worried about competing with Jinn, he was worried about giving me what I craved in that moment.

  And his cock was perfection — thick and hot and hard as fuck, he only pumped slow a few times, as if getting to know the landscape, and then he fucked me like an animal. I pressed my fists into the sofa cushion but it didn’t let me arch my back enough, so I grabbed one of the pillows and put it under my fists. The sofa moved across the floor as he pounded me deep and hard, but I wanted more and harder and faster — and the second I told him, he gave it to me. I reveled in the sound and feel of flesh against flesh
as I braced myself and took what he gave me, and screamed my pleasure to the rooftops.

  With my jeans around my knees I couldn’t spread my legs, couldn’t fuck him back. I couldn’t reach back to touch him, and my only option to let him know how I felt was the vocal feedback he was getting through my moans, yelps, and screams. He sensed when I was about to come and he pounded me harder a few seconds before my world exploded in sensation as I screamed, writhed, and shuddered on the back of the sofa while his hips continued their rapid-fire rhythm. One minute my legs were mostly vertical and straight, and the next instant I was falling as the wood of the sofa splintered inside its fabric casing.

  Nix’s reflexes kicked in before we hit the floor, and he lifted me so my back was to his chest, and walked us to the edge of the room with his cock still inside me. “Hands on the wall.”

  My feet didn’t touch the floor as he held my hips and fucked me from behind, and I somehow kept my head from bashing into the sheetrock while my mind was consumed with overwhelming pleasure. Two orgasms later — mine, not his — he threw me over his shoulder and took me upstairs to his bedroom. I landed on my back on the bed and let him get my shoes and pants off, which he did in a handful of seconds and I could finally spread my legs and welcome him in.

  Now, I could connect with him, and I luxuriated in his heat as I wrapped my legs and arms around him, and we both groaned low as he sank back into me. His intense gaze drew me until I thought I’d drown in the depths, and when my next orgasm hit I could only open my mouth in a silent scream as my gaze stayed locked with his.

  I don’t know how many times I came, I only know he didn’t change our positions every time, as Jinn had. I hated that I was comparing them, but I loved that Nix could rock my world in ways Jinn hadn’t. This wasn’t about technique and finesse. It was raw, animal, beastial, feral.

  I stayed on my back, sometimes with my feet planted on the bed so I could fuck him back, and sometimes with my legs wrapped around him as he slid in and out of me. When he finally came, he did so while I was screaming my way through yet another release, and he let me see the intensity of his orgasm — his eyes open, his face an odd mix of tense and relaxed, and his energy wild.