Free Web NovelChapter 24: Pack Mentality
The forest beyond the house stretches endlessly in every direction, the trees drenched in dawn light are full of birds chattering to one another about bird things. Tiny bird politics.
I sink onto the wooden decking of my balcony and pull my knees to my chest, the plan is to just sit for a while. For the first time in days my brain doesn’t feel stuffed full of cotton wool. I’ve had flu before, even caught swine flu when that was a thing, but I’ve never had a fever like this. I know it’s not gone quite yet, because the back of my eyes are still sweaty.
Probing my psyche, making sure that tears and pleading aren’t at the forefront, I take a few bricks from the dam I’ve built to hold questions back. A little trickle starts through.
What’s more likely, that people who can turn into wolves are real, or I imagined it during a breakdown?
Easy, I imagined it.
Except, I really, really didn’t. I know what happened, what I saw. Not just the meditation incident, those men who stood right there, below my spot here, they had ears and tails. Ok, so then I need to probe further.
If werewolves exist, how is it not common knowledge? And what other fairytales are real life not myth?
All those things I’d managed to shove behind the wall are gathered and trying to push through the gap I’ve made.
I don’t actually know these men, yet I’ve allowed myself to be drawn in totally and completely without asking so much as a question. That’s bad on its own, coupled with the fact I don’t want to ask, don’t want to burst this bubble, want to be around all five of them 24/7 and what we have is a very scary shit sandwich.
My pulse picks up.
Would the police do anything even if I called them?
Time to add those bricks back now until I’ve had a cheeseburger and a beer or seven.
The balcony door slides open behind me.
I don’t turn around, I already know who it is. Could be that I’ve spent the last few nights hallucinating and drenched in the smell of him.
Jax steps onto the balcony and stops beside me carrying two mugs. He’s barefoot and beautiful in cargo shorts and nothing else. Show-off.
Craining my head back, his expression brightens when I look at him and he offers a beaming smile. I can’t return it.
"You’re a wolf." May as well rip the bandage off.
He was halfway through sitting down and freezes in a squat, mugs held out in front of him. Maybe I’ve actually broken him.
Suspended in a pose that has to be aching, I can see on his face that he’s evaluating several possible responses and hates all of them. He completes the movement and plops down next to me, holding a mug of fruit tea toward me.
"You look better." He replies carefully.
I bark out a laugh. Not because any of this is funny, because the audacity is incredible and I expected nothing less.
"That isn’t an answer." I snap. I leave the mug hanging and look out at the trees. I’m angry. Furious. Doubting my own mind because of them.
"I know what I saw, Jax." I keep my tone carefully controlled now. "Do not treat me like I’m stupid. You turned into a giant wolf."
"Yes."
He actually answered. I was expecting it, I swear I was, but even with that expectation of the impossible, it doesn’t stop the bile creeping up my throat.
"You’ve all lied to me." This comes out much quieter than I wanted.
There’s no way I can look at him, I keep my eyes trained on the forest which has fallen silent around us. Maybe I just stop hearing it. All I can think about, focus on, is every conversation we’ve had. Every weird answer, every time one of them changed the subject, every moment they looked at each other instead of telling me the truth.
Would the outcome have been any different if I’d have known? If they’d have said, oh the job comes with entrance to a secret supernatural reality that’s going to tear your entire world view to shreds? Maybe.
"You made me think I was losing my fucking mind."
I look at him now, the expression on his face is so miserable it almost steals my anger.
"Frankie..."
"Don’t dare." I shake my head.
His shoulders slump and for the first time since meeting him, he looks tired, written in his body is the declaration that he’s carrying something heavy.
"We wanted to tell you."
"Why didn’t you?"
He doesn’t answer. Just like I knew he wouldn’t. Fuck this, my teeth are chattering again and I can feel the buzz of sickness creep back under my skin. I push myself to my feet just as a wave of dizziness rolls across me.
Jax has stood with me and takes my elbow, holding me steady. I try to yank it out of his hold, but I’m so weak I couldn’t waft a fly’s fart away. After everything he won’t say, everything I know but refuse to accept, all my anger and frustration, my traitorious body still relaxes the second he touches me.
"Let me help." His words are quiet.
I want to cry, again, and scream. I’m tired, physically, emotionally, spiritually, tired of unanswered questions, tired of confusion, tired of reality shifting.
The dizziness hits again. I let out a frustrated noise and drop my forehead against his arm.
"This is ridiculous."
A small laugh rumbles through his chest. "Bit."
Despite everything, despite the fear and anger and impossible questions still hanging in the open, I feel a reluctant smile tug at my mouth.
Jax’s arm tightens around my shoulders and he leads me back inside.
**************************************
All I can do is doze, and dream. I force one eyelid open and see that the sun’s finally set. It could be today, tomorrow or the next day, time has no meaning in this new reality. Acid veins have given way to bottomless, aching, emptiness.
My body, wracked with illness, is begging to be filled.
The sheets are damp, my nipples are painful points and Jax is asleep in a chair he’s dragged into the hall just outside my door. I see the gesture for what it is, he wants to watch over me, but give me space. The tiniest ’hmm’ escapes my throat, that’s all it takes for him to sit upright.
Any relief I felt earlier, or five seconds ago evaporates into atoms when our eyes meet. I scrunch my lids shut as low in my stomach cramps, bends me double in the bed as fresh fire licks at my heels.
"Frankie," Jax keens.
I know what my body wants even as my mind rebels. What it needs. I need him, them. I need them on me, in me, all over me. Between my thighs is soaked, so much for a few mortifying moments I think I’ve peed myself.
A deafening, piercing whistle sounds and I slam my hands over my already oversensitive ears, eyes flying open. He’s already up and moving toward me, nostrils flared and pupils blown wide.
Four figures materialise in the doorway before Jax has reached me. None of them hesitate. Without a word they climb on the bed one by one. The frame groans under their weight, the mattress dips and shifts and before I can think to run or scream or lock the door they’re around me and I’m pinned by scent and heat and the collective intensity of the five.
Corrian settles at my head, lifts it and places it in his lap. Jax takes my left, moulding his body against mine. Leo does the same on my right. Ezra and River take a leg each. There isn’t a part of me not under, or touched by one of them. I arch off the mattress as something in my chest aches, a muscle pulling too tight.
"Look at me." Corrian’s voice is gentle.
I do. His brown eyes are dark enough to drown in. I can smell him, the first layer of every other scent I’ve ever noticed has peeled away to reveal something underneath, something that makes my mouth water and my stomach clench at the same time.
"I’m leaking," My voice comes out wrong, higher than usual, and I hate it.
Corrian’s thumb strokes my cheek. Every place he touches leaves a trail of need in its wake. But he doesn’t speak, none of them do. I can see the restraint, the physical holding back of information, of any action at all.
I’ve never wanted to be fucked more in my life. I’m fighting an illness and all I need, all I can think about is a writhing pile of bodies. Biologically, I know the truth, that’s the only thing to heal me.
The wetness between my legs is thick now. Viscous. I can smell it too, a musky sweet scent that makes Leo’s nostrils flare and makes Jax’s pupils blow wide until his irises nearly vanish.
"Fuck me," I say. "Please Corrian, I need you."
Words are happening independent of my brain, being pulled from a place I cannot control. They aren’t my words, my words are vicious and accusing.
He looks at the others. For a second there, the five of them exchange a glance and Leo opens his mouth to say something, but Corrian shakes his head slightly, and Leo closes it again. fɾeeweɓnѳveɭ.com
"Frankie," Corrian’s hand moves from my cheek to my neck. His thumb finds the pulse point. "You don’t want that, not really."
"Why not?" I’m not trying to be coy. I’m genuinely asking. "I’m dripping wet, I’m so horny, I need it."
"You’re not in a state to understand what you’re saying," He carefully explains. "Taking anything from you now would be a violation."
"Not taking," I whine, squirming against them, squeezing my thighs together hunting for release. "I’m giving freely."
Each of them is stroking, petting, but never going further. Every place their hands touch sends a jolt through my nervous system, I’m being electrocuted by pleasure and nothings happened.
"I’m in pain," I keen. And I am. The ache in my lower belly is relentless. My breasts are sensitive enough that Leo’s hand on my waist is both relief and torture.
Jax shifts beside me. His hand has found my knee and he’s not moving it, though I can feel him holding himself back from doing more. He’s tense. "Corrian,"
"I’m begging you all to fuck me," I declare.
The air in the room changes. My twitchy, desperate energy leaking into the atmosphere, grimy and sticky against whatever it touches.
"No," Corrian says again.
My chest cracks open. Frustration crests and I’m shaking, crying, trying to crawl away and under their skin. I start throwing their hands off, kick at them, anything to release the tension I know will destroy me.
"We can help her," I’m surprised that Ezra’s the voice of reason, even if that voice sounds stretched thin.
"Please," I say. The word is small and doesn’t feel a thing like me.
Corrian looks at Ezra for a long time, never stopping the rhythmic movement of his fingers across my hair, my face, my throat. With a single nod at Jax, they move in sync.
Corrian finally says, "You’re suffering, little wolf." He leans down so we’re eye to eye. "Tell me you want us to help you."
I nod, it’s all I can manage.
"Words baby, we need to hear you."
"Yes, yes, please."
Jax’s hand moves from my knee to my hip. His other hand grips my thigh and pushes my leg up, bending my knee toward my chest. I’m on my back, he’s positioned between my legs, and I can feel the heat radiating off him, it’s like standing next to an oven door.
"Shh, little one." Leo’s voice is gravel. "You’re safe. Let us take care of you."
"Can I touch you here, sweetheart?" Jax’s finger is on my lower belly. I nod.
"Here?" He drops his hand to my pussy.
I’m nodding too fast, probably, though my body feels like it’s moving on its own, responding to every question, my mind is a radio that can only pick up one station.
He slides his hand down and pushes my soaked panties down past my hips, the cool air hits between my thighs and I hiss through my teeth.
I’m exposed, lay between them completely naked, they all take me in, hands still moving leaving no patch of burning skin untouched. Jax spreads me wide open, displayed.
Two huge fingers slip inside me, slow and steady. I’m so soaked the sounds are obscene, only slightly drowned out by my panting. I gasp as the heel of his hand goes to my clit, my entire pussy clenches around his fingers.
Leo makes a sound. It’s barely audible, a low exhalation, but it stops everyone. Corrian’s hand on my neck. River’s breath catching. Ezra’s hand on my ankle. Five men, all touching, all feeling what Jax feels. They’re feeding off each other, and I’m the source, and the heat in the room thickens until I can’t tell where my skin ends and the air begins.
Jax curls his fingers and starts to massage my G-spot, I scream. I’m being ripped open, it’s everything but not enough. He circles my clit with his thumb, my hand is in his hair and I’m pulling and he’s pushing deeper and my hips are bucking and Corrian’s hand on my chest and Leo’s mouth on my shoulder and River’s fingers on my wrist and Ezra stroking my foot and all of them touching, all of them present, and the pressure builds behind my eyes and in my pelvis and in my spine and somewhere above my skull where I didn’t know I could store feeling.
I sob as pleasure spikes, my body clamping around his fingers when he thrusts inside, curling against that sweet, swollen spot. Ezra’s mouth closes over one nipple, Leo’s teeth grazing the other, and River’s hands roam my trembling stomach, my thighs. Every inch of me is worshipped, touched, claimed.
"Jax," I say. I don’t know what I’m saying. "Please, I--"
"You’re perfect," he murmurs, circling my clit with maddening precision. "Just let go."
The orgasm rips through me, my back bowing as I scream. Thighs shaking, hips locking and my fingers claw into Jax’s hair as he holds me through it and strokes my clit extending the explosion, coaxing juices from me that soak him, the sheets, the mattress.
There’s praise in the room, Corrian whispering my name, River calls me beautiful, Ezra telling me I’m perfect, Leo saying a prayer, all of them feeding me with their voices as my body empties itself and I feel wet and slick and exhausted and new, like something has cracked open inside me and there’s nothing left to seal shut.
When the world stops spinning, I’m limp, boneless, their hands still tracing lazy patterns over my spent body.
The aftershocks pulse through me, weaker now but insistent, my body refusing to settle even after the blinding pleasure Jax wrung from me.
"So needy," Ezra murmurs against my hip, his tongue darting out to taste the salt of my skin.
Corrian presses a kiss to my forehead. "Rest now."
My soul finally releases its crushing hold and grants me reprieve enough that I can sink into the haze of their murmurs, their hands still petting me softly as the heat finally, finally ebbs.
The last thing I feel is Corrian’s teeth grazing my throat.
