The Walls of Jericho

Becoming

Channing’s POV

I know it’s late when I wake because outside, the sun’s rays are dim and slanting almost horizontally beyond the windows. There are remnants of a storm breaking up on the horizon, and I can smell that it rained while I was sleeping. The air’s fresh with it.

Except the air around me.

The air around me smells like I rolled on a four-day’s dead squirrel. A squirrel whose last meal was rotten bologna. I’m stiff from laying in the same position so long, but the kinks and aches start working out fast as I sit up and look around me for the source of the rank odor.

That’s when I realize it’s coming from me.

My brand new Irish sweater reeks like a sealed room full of cow farts. Okay, maybe not cow farts. I guess technically, it’s sheep farts. No wonder Jericho’s gone and she cracked one of the balcony doors.

Rolling out of bed, I strip the covers off in a wad together, piling them to the side as close as I can get them to the open door and its merciful ventilation. Then I strip myself and wad my smelly clothes inside the sheets, hoping to squelch some of the stench until I can toss the whole bundle in the laundry with about three gallons of detergent.

I brush my teeth at my sink as the shower warms, my eyes lingering tenderly on the little vials and jars of lotions and make-up neatly arranged on a little spinning rack near Jericho’s sink. I’m so sick and damn tired of cheap hotel food, room key cards, scratchy bleach-scented sheets, dinky thin towels and plastic-wrapped plastic cups. I hate traveling.

No, that’s not true. Traveling can be a load of fun. In fact, I can imagine traveling with Jericho would be an absolute blast. What I hate is the traveling to strategize attack plans. All the stress of trying to find a way to beat the dragon. I especially hate being separated from my mate. If I never see the inside of a hotel room again, it’ll be too soon.

All the travel back and forth this last month or so has been hard. Stupidly hard. Even when I can manage phone calls and FaceTime, it’s not enough. Tapping my rinsed toothbrush, I put it back in the holder, then grab a fresh towel that’s roughly the size of a baseball outfield and marvelously soft. Hanging it on the shower door beside Jericho’s, I pause and bury my face in her towel, inhaling the dark, rich molasses and spice scent of her.

It smells like  home.

I’ve missed this scent. I’ve missed holding her in my arms. Missed the heat of her kisses. The feel of her velvety skin. The delicious taste of her desire on my tongue. The sounds of her pleasure make me feel like a superman—it’s been too long since I’ve heard them.

One of the countless drives between our hotel and the various research bases Avernus has in Northern Ireland, we passed through this little coastal town situated on an inlet—they call them ‘loughs’— from the English Channel. The kind of place that still has cobblestone streets and squat boxy buildings with converted gas lamps and hand-carved wooden signs that identify what the shops are. Quigley’s Grocery. McDermott’s Fainting Goat Pub. Law Office of Harkin, McDaid and Doherty. Cute place.

At the outskirts of town, we passed this two story farmhouse. It was old—like passed down through the family a few generations old. Needed a new roof and a fresh coat of paint on the covered entry. But what struck me dumb was the whole family was outside—four kids and their parents—playing a game of freeze tag together. Chasing and tumbling to the ground. Laughing. Loving. The image is stuck in my head. The hot water feels good and I linger in it longer than I normally might.

Plus it takes a couple hard scrubbings to completely remove the foul animal smell from my skin and hair. When it’s barely detectable to me, then I know Jericho won’t be able to smell it. That’s the curse of having a wolf’s nose.

I still feel jet lagged as I’m getting dressed in my closet. But now that I’m home, I’ve slept better than I have the last three days rolled together. Since I’m dressed, I open the balcony door wide to fully vent the room and remake the bed with fresh sheets and blankets. It’s as I stoop to pick up the ones I need to wash that I spy Jericho below me.

She’s asleep on an inflatable lounger, drifting on the sparkling water of the pool. One arm trails over the edge as the pool’s circulation pushes her around. I’ve seen far skimpier swimsuits on women than she’s wearing, but the mere fact that it’s on her makes its strappy black against all her creamy skin absolutely the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen. It picks out every perfect line and curve of her delectable little body. She’s wearing her sunglasses, big clunky things studded with a bunch of rhinestones on the frames. In combination with her dyed blonde hair, she looks like a Hollywood starlet. I want to eat her up.

Jericho’s always turned heads, whether she knew it or not. Esteban knew what he was doing when he hired her. He knew that even wearing her worn-out hoodies and faded leggings, she brought in customers. Shallow guys like me who think if I’m going to have to eat crappy food anyway, it may as well be while I’m looking at a pretty girl.

As I’m thinking about it now, my chest feels tight. What would she do if another man came onto her? Someone suaver than me. Someone with more time to devote to her. I don’t like how that thought feels.

I gather the pile of bedding and take it downstairs. It takes a couple minutes to start it washing, then I’m on my way out to the pool to collect my mate. I get side-tracked when I get to the kitchen. There’s cold pizza from my favorite mom-and-pop pizzeria sitting on the granite counter, and I realize suddenly that I’m starved.

Pizza is one of those beautifully simple things I find irresistible. Just dough, pizza sauce and cheese, then if you’re the type, whatever toppings you prefer. I suppose if you’re a sick individual like Jericho or Adriani, you can top it with vegetables. But in my humble opinion, pizza is meant to be topped with meat, and lots of it.

Grabbing a plate, I open the first box and find a few slices missing of the vegetarian pizza. I close that quickly and push it aside, delighted to find the second box is a carnivore delight, loaded with ten kinds of meat and multiple cheeses. There are two small slices missing, which means Rebecca ate—she eats like the puniest wolf that’s ever lived—which means the rest of this beautiful baby is all mine. My mouth’s watering before I even take my first bite.

God, I’ve missed being home.

All the toppings at this particular pizzeria are either imported from Italy or made in-house by a couple of Italian immigrants, which means the pepperoni, the Italian sausage and the bite-sized meatballs are especially spicy and to-die-for delicious. They make the meatballs by hand for the pastas they also serve, just a little on the dry side with sweet Italian sausage. When you add them to a pizza, they add immeasurably to the flavor mix, producing a meat-lovers paradise.

Both the bacon and the Soppressata salami are cut into one-inch pieces and pre-baked so they’re a bit crispy before they’re layered on, which keeps them from making the pizza greasy. Then they add a layer of Canadian bacon and a bit of prosciutto which gives each slice some nice chewiness, just the right touch of salt and a delicious smoky flavor. To really perk up those two tastes, they add bleu cheese to the cheese mix before they bake it.

Generally speaking, I want as much meat as I can get on a pizza, and the carnivore delight doesn’t disappoint. Though it doesn’t add a ton of flavor to the party, there’s ground beef on it too. And a layer of Buffalo-spiced chicken, and finally it’s topped off with anchovies, the mozzarella-bleu cheese-parmesan blend and baked to perfection. By the time I’ve finished mentally recounting what makes this pizza so damn spectacular, I’ve finished it, all while standing at the kitchen counter and eating directly out of the box.

I tuck the leftover herbivore pizza in the refrigerator and take the empty pizza box out to the trash, then move my laundry to the drier. Much to my surprise, Jericho’s still asleep floating around in the pool, which gives me an idea.

Taking the stairs two at a time, I go back into the bathroom, brush my teeth again, then change into my swim trunks. It takes no time at all to get back downstairs, then I angle an ear towards the cinema room. I hear screeching tires and gunfire, and an actor’s voice I recognize from the movies, so it’s a fair bet Adriani won’t be interrupting us and God knows Rebecca never talks to anyone.

I turn out all the outdoor lights and the ones in the pool, then ease myself into the warm water quietly so my splashing doesn’t wake my sleeping mate as I stalk her.

It’s easy enough to tug her raft into the deeper end where I’m tall enough to stand, but Jericho will have to cling to me to keep her head above the water. Despite the salt smell that’s strong off the pool, the spiced molasses fragrance of her is incredible. It makes me giddy and I can’t wait to touch her.

Squashing my excitement, I start with little kisses, working my way from her shoulder to her neck, along her jaw and then to her mouth. She wakes with a start, splashing water all over when my tongue teases along the seam between her lips, and yanks her sunglasses off in a panic.

“Channing!” she gasps, dropping her sunglasses into the pool, then obediently slides into the water when I pull her to me. She wraps her arms around my neck tightly. Her breath caresses over her mark in the hollow behind my collarbone and I’ve never been happier.

“Hi babydoll,” I murmur against her hair. “God, I missed you. I’m so sorry.”

She tries to hide it, but I can feel her soft sobs where her slim, slippery body’s pressed against me. “I missed you too. So much.”

“That’s my fault, Jericho. Let me make it up to you?”

Lifting her head, she meets my eyes with those hypnotic, amber-colored eyes of hers and all I can think about is pressing a kiss to each and every perfect little freckle across her nose and cheeks. That’s when she derails me.

“I want you to make me a werewolf.”

The water that flows into the space between us is cold as I hold her away so I can see her better. “What did you say?”

She swallows hard. “I want you to give me werewolf venom.”

“Jericho, there’s—there’s time. We don’t—there’s no rush for you to do that—.”

“I want it, Channing. Now. I don’t want to waste anymore minutes. Make me a werewolf. Claim me as your mate. Bind us to each other forever.”

**

There’s a long minute where Channing’s deep blue eyes bore into my tear-filled ones, searching for the driver for my request, the reason I pray he’ll never find. My heart knocks hard in my chest, and I’m positive he must feel it, that he must still smell dragon on me.

That he knows.

Then, much to my relief, the tiniest flare of white-blue stars starts in his eyes. The intensity grows, and soon they’re spinning in the slow whorls I love. The whorls that tell me he loves me.

“Please. Don’t tell me no.”

With one arm, he pulls me against the smooth warm strength of his body, and with the other, he strikes for the pool’s edge with a powerful stroke. It takes only a couple hard pulls and the kick of his strong legs, then we’re at the side. He lifts my by the waist, setting me on the edge and I shiver in the chill of the night air, water pouring off of me. With one flex of his arms, he surges up beside me.

“I can’t tell you no,” he says softly, getting to his feet. “We’ll go inside to do it. So you’re comfortable.”

I take his offered hand and he drags me to my feet, then scoops me into his arms. He stops only once on the way to the bedroom—at the outdoor shower, where he grabs a single towel and does a cursory job of drying the both of us with it, just so we’re not dripping on the tile floor.

I stop short, pulling him to a halt too, when we reach the bedroom. “You changed the sheets.”

He raises his brows. “I had to. I couldn’t stand the stench.”

“Your sweater smelled like ass.”

Laughing, he nods. “Yeah.” He cups his hands on my hips, tugging me into the bathroom with him. His fingers tremble as he removes my wet swimsuit and his. He hangs them both in the shower to dry, then leads me to the bed. “Get in.”

I’m scarcely breathing, because this definitely isn’t what I was expecting. I know I’ve washed, and even spent hours with my female bits submerged in the saltwater pool on the inflatable raft, but I’m still terrified of what I might give away if we make love. Somehow, I choke out a whisper, “Channing?”

In answer, he tangles a large paw gently in my hair. His grip tightens slowly, his fist brushing against my scalp, then he pulls his hand downward towards the pillow, forcing my head and body down on the bed. Channing climbs onto it with me, kneeling with his muscular thighs on either side of my hips. In the next instant, his lips are against mine, at first gentle, then demanding entrance to my mouth.

I slide my hands up his thighs, over his divine abs and smooth chest as he kisses me. There’s a strange, desperate ferocity to his wet, carnal passion, and in seconds, I’m lost in him. His warm lips and demanding, probing tongue answer the deep calling inside me—the same one that prompted me to ask that he make me a werewolf.

With his fingers still clenched in my hair, he keeps control of my mouth, but there’s no hiding his desire. His member swells and grows hard, pressing against my stomach and I want him now as much as he obviously wants me. He groans against my lips when my fingertips follow the line from his sternum to his navel, tracing the thin line of hair beneath until I brush against the rigid length of him.

His breath quickens, morphing into harsh pants as I massage his firm, hot hardness. Channing’s grip in my hair slips and he shudders fiercely when I spread the warm beading drops of his early arousal over the thick blunt head with tender circles of my fingers.

“Promise me that you’ll do what I asked, Channing.” With one hand, I stroke the engorged span from base to tip, while the other concentrates on the sensitive tip. “Promise me, Channing.”

“Yes,” he growls. “Just—oh, sweet Jesus!—it might—,” he exhales another groan, releasing my hair and sitting upright over me “—it might be painful.”

More fluid beads at his tip, slick and heavy. I use the lubrication on my palm, squeezing gently from the raised edge to the tip. When I increase the tempo, his head tips back and a low howl of pleasure escapes him.

“Distraction,” he pants, and when his head tips towards me again, I see his long wolf teeth have emerged. His tongue snakes out from between them, licking across his invisible mark in the hollow behind my collarbone. It sends a shudder through both of us.

My feminine core twists, growing feverish and wet. I arch to him shamelessly, grinding against whatever my trapped hips can find, but none of this is enough anymore. I want him inside me, to wash away the stains of my wrongdoing. Wriggling, I inch my upper body beneath his, then I lift my head and lick across his engorged head.

“Jesus, Jericho,” he gasps, his fists knotting in the sheets beside my head. His blue eyes are lit with the wildly twisting white-blue spirals and he licks his dry lips, panting through them. “Oh,” he breathes, when I open my mouth wider, tipping my head so he can push himself into my mouth.

Each short thrust sends an exquisite thrill to my quivering core. Channing’s desire pulses off of him in waves, and my desire for him ramps up to meet it, taking control and overpowering me with each stroke. When my neck begins to tire, he laces his fingers behind my head and supports it, his hips stuttering forward erratically as his self-discipline rapidly unravels.

Abruptly, he pulls himself out of my mouth, releasing my head so it rests against the mattress. There’s something dark and hungry staring back at me when I look into his eyes, and I want it and fear it, all at the same time.

Hoisting himself off of me, he growls, “On your knees.”

For a second, I stare at him, speechless. Did he intend to take me like an animal? How could he inject werewolf venom into me if—?

A feral grin spreads across his face as he reads my mind, then with one quick scoop, he flips me onto my stomach. With his arm still around my middle, he pulls me to my knees, so swiftly, so expediently, that there’s no doubt about his intention or the futility of resisting. His hot breath fans across my shoulders.

“That night on FaceTime,” he growls and the dark, threatening undertone burns through my entire body. “Seeing your hourglass curves as you pulled my shirt over your head,” he grabs each of my wrists, twisting them behind me and pinning them in the small of my back with one of his giant paws. “Watching your slender fingers move over your nubile body, I wanted to fill you with my come so badly that it hurt. Did you know that?”

“No,” I whimper helplessly. “But I want that too.”

Channing chuckles darkly. “Not yet you don’t, but you will.”

I gasp feeling his tongue slowly tracing the dripping petals of my exposed entrance, wiggling and digging itself into that tender tissue. I lurch forward with a shuddering cry, but he holds me firm.

“Hmmm, I’m not done yet.”

Again, his tongue makes another pass over that delicate flesh and he groans as I twitch and jerk against him, one second trying to escape the touch and the next, arching my back and spreading my legs wider, begging him for more in pants and incoherent babble. When he has my entire body shaking violently, he stops with a self-satisfied grunt. He kneels behind me. Then his thick fingers pry me open.  

“I watch your face, Jericho,” he murmurs, two fingers gliding into and out of my heated chamber, exploring and probing, and teasing the spongy bundle of nerves inside me. “Every time you climax. But that day, separated from you by thousands of miles, that day I realized something.”

I cry out when I feel the hot, rounded tip of him sliding along my soft folds, then gasp and arch as he enters me from behind, feeding his hot, filling length all the way into me. Leaning over me, he plants his fist in the mattress to support the bulk of his weight, then he whispers in my ear.

“That day, I wanted to f**k a baby into you, Jericho.” With my hands pinned against my back by his weight, he slides his other hand beneath me. His large fingers search my slick petals, stilling when I jerk as he glides over my swollen hooded bud. “I wanted to f**k my baby into your tight little body.”

He arches his back, burying himself to the hilt. I scream, feeling the exquisite pressure against my cervix. “More!”

“Do you feel that, babydoll?” he purrs at my ear, then draws back and presses in again as if just to make me scream. He rubs the sensitive little nub beneath his fingers to soothe me. “Do you feel me?”

“Yes!” I pant, words I could never imagine speaking tripping off of my tongue. “Please, Channing. Please, f**k me. I need you to f**k me.” He draws back again, then presses, this time harder and stars shoot across my vision. I arch my back, pushing against him and scream again, the discomfort mingling with my  pleasure driving me towards climax.

“That’s the door to your womb, Jericho,” he continues, his words coarse and menacing. “Right there. I’m going to bury myself in you like this, so good and deep.” This time when he draws back, he thrusts in faster and harder. “Every morning. Every night. Every time I can.”

Unconsciously, I edge forward a little, seeking to ease the pressure of him, hot and hard and stretching and pushing. He counters, wrapping strong fingers over my shoulder and holding me in place while he slams into me again with a harsh grunt, then a wild moan.

I cry out as he pumps several quick, rough strokes into me, but he doesn’t seem to hear. His breath sears over my shoulder. His hand at my hooded bud bruises the tender flesh with exquisite, ruthless circles. I thrash against his punishing thrusts, but that only seems to incite him.

My own excitement is bubbling up within me, roiling and writhing, overwhelming and yet so good I’m desperate for more. I gasp and whimper encouragements when Channing becomes more demanding, driving into me with a force that matches my desire, and groaning with unbearable pleasure when he slows the pace, forcing himself back from the brink and prolonging the agony.

“I want to hear you,” he growls, his fingers between my legs enhancing my pleasure to the point I think I might break. “I want to hear you beg to be filled, babydoll. Beg me to empty every drop of my seed into your tight little body, right into your womb. I want to feel you clinging to me, spasming and clenching, as I f**k you with every hard inch.”

“Please, Channing, please,” I beg, sobbing now, “don’t stop!” I flinch and cower when his thrusts renew and he rides me fiercely, and the tangled pain-pleasure becomes twice as strong. But when he slows again, pleasuring me only with his fingers, I plead with him, mindlessly, to give me more.

“Say it, Jericho,” he grunts between harsh breaths that singe across my shoulders. “Say what I need to hear.” His words add fuel to the fire that’s surging hot and deep within me, threatening to consume me, and I want his rough mating even more.

“Give it to me!” I cry out as he thrusts even harder against the front wall of my slick channel and a blistering pleasure pulses along my nerves. “I want you to f**k me! I need to feel you come inside me!”

Channing surges into me so hard, in seconds I’m hovering at the brink of orgasm. My hands have opened in the small of my back and my fingernails dig into the taut flesh over his straining abs. I ache and whimper at his aggressive thrusts, and I’m terrified it will end before I get enough of him.

Against my shoulder, his breath is so hot, I feel faint. He continues to pound into me, his fingers rubbing and rubbing Through the drugging, dizzying pleasure, the sharp sting of his wolf teeth drags along my flesh, but I push it aside, urgently needing his come inside me, my every sense awake and aroused, poised for that single sensation.

Crazed and frenzied, I feel his strong body, straining and desperate with the primal need to climax. Again, I plead, beg him to feel his wet heat pumping into me. To fill me. To own me. My body clutches him, spasming tightly taking every inch he has.

His raw animal sounds echo in our moonlit bedroom. “Look at me,” he husks out. “Watch me come inside you.”

I turn my head to face his, see the white-blue whorls twisting and tangling about his dilated pupils as his hard member hits the very end of me, then he jerks, erupting in hot spurts, his release triggering mine and ripping through us with a shared howl of contentment and ecstasy.

Through the spreading haze of my climax, I can’t process the sight of his mouth opening, his razor-sharp wolf teeth extended. Then a blinding pain shoots through me as they puncture the delicate skin of my neck, pouring the burning werewolf toxin into my exhausted body.