Cade shook his head. “No. Not intentionally. I’m only afraid I’d be too rough with you. My wolf could take over when I was with you, and if it happened when we were mating, I wouldn’t be able to be gentle. You’re so little, so delicate.”
Jax felt his spine stiffen. “Delicate? Fuck that. I’m tougher than I look. I can take you on— just try me.”
“Jax,” he said, shaking his head. “You don’t understand.”
“I understand. You think I’m just some kid. Because of my size and my baby face, you think I’m weak. Well, I’m not. I’ve had to be strong for me and Mason both. You asked me if I know about Cain and Abel? I didn’t go to church much, but one summer when I was about Mason’s age, I went to this thing they called Bible school at the Baptist church in our neighborhood. They told us some Bible stories. They told us this one about David and Goliath. You ever heard that story?”
“Yes, Jax, of course, but…”
“No, listen to me. That’s how you fight monsters, you know. That’s how you stand up to them. You draw a line in the sand and say, this is it. This far and no farther. Then you wait for them to come to you—just like that David did. You draw them in close and then you smack them down, if you can. If you can… I’m not saying you’re a monster. I’m just saying I know a thing or two about monsters. And I can take care of myself—and Mason too. I’m not scared. Not anymore. There’s worse things than dying, you know.”
Cade moved toward him slowly, but the steps he took were purposeful, almost predatory. Jax stoodup beside the bed and waited for him. “You can take care of me, can you?”
“Yeah, I think so. Bring it on. I can handle you.”
Cade walked right up to him and put his hands on Jax’s waist. He bent low over his neck. Was he smelling him, for God’s sake? Jax trembled slightly, but stood his ground.
Cade murmured against his neck. “Thou—who art so lovely fair and smell so sweet that the senses ache at thee, would thou hadst ne’er been born.”
“What?” Jax said, pulling away. “What did you say?”
Cade shook his head. “Sorry. It’s a line from Shakespeare, from a play called Othello. It seemed to fit just then.”
“How do you remember that shit?”
“I played Othello in a high school play once. Some of it stuck.”
“Did you just say you wished I’d never been born?”
“I didn’t mean that exactly.” He ran a hand through his hair distractedly. “But I’m not ready for a soif de sang, Jax. No matter how beautiful you are, no matter how much your blood calls to me. I don’t know if I can do this.”
“How the hell old are you,anyway?”
“Twenty-eight.”
“That’s nine years older. Not so much.”
Cade pressed his lips together and shook his head.
“Look I heard what you said to your brother earlier, remember? You told him there was nothing good about this soif de sang, and it was—unspeakable.”
Cade dropped his hands from Jax’s waist and sat down on the bed. He shook his head. “Did I actually say that?” He smiled over at Jax, an ironic little twist to his lips. “A little over the top, wasn’t I? I have to warn you, Jax. I sometimes exaggerate for effect.”
“Were you exaggerating then? Is the idea of me being your mate so damn awful?”
“Of course not, Jax. It’s not you, it’s me.”
Jax groaned. “Shit, not the old it’s-not-you-but-me bullshit.”
“Jax, please listen. I need to be honest with you. I’m not ready to settle down, and you— you’re only a kid, and this takes both our choices away. Forever. Once we mate, we’ll have to be together. It’s not so bad if you’re already in love, but we barely know one another. What if you decide you made a terrible mistake somewhere down the road? It won’t matter, you know. You’ll still be stuck with me. You might wind up hating me.”
“Is that possible?”
“Absolutely. It happened with my grandparents. I told you this thing runs in families. By the time I was born, they were already pretty old, even for our kind. They’re gone now, and buried in Louisiana, but I remember how much they argued and fought. It was almost legendary. They had been the alpha pair, before my father took over as alpha, and they disagreed on pretty much everything. My mother told me once that my grandmother had been engaged to someone else before my grandfather came along. And though she still loved the other guy, she couldn’t resist the pull of the soif de sang. Her own body betrayed her, forced her to leave the one she loved to be with my grandfather.”
“So what happened to them?”
Cade smiled gently. “Nothing big or dramatic. They were drawn to each other not out of love, but out of this compulsion. My grandfather tried, I think, but he finally gave up when he saw she couldn’t or wouldn’t meet him halfway. They co-existed, nothing more.”
“You make it sound so awful. If you don’t want me, then fine. I don’t want anybody who doesn’t want me. Just take us with you to Georgia, and I’ll find a job. I’ll leave you alone.”
“No!” Cade yelled the word and reached out to grip Jax’s arms tightly. “You won’t leave me. I can’t lose you now.” He pulled Jax over to him so that Jax stood between his legs. He ran his hands over Jax’s body and pressed him against his chest. His body felt warm and hard, and almost at once, Jax felt his erection growing.
Jax laughed a shaky little laugh. “I got to tell you, Cade, you’re giving me some real mixed signals here.”
Cade looked down at his erection almost in surprise, then his gaze traveled back up to Jax’s face. His skin was pale and he looked strained and panicky. “I know. I feel like I’m going crazy. Jax, II don’t think I can wait. I need to…I have to be inside you.”
“Jesus, you’re a confusing person to talk to.” He shook his head and looked up to see Cade’s eyes sparkling.
“Yeah, I know,” he said softly. “All part of my charm.”
“Okay, then,” Jax said, his voice rough with the sudden surge of passion he was feeling. “If you want me so bad, do it. Take me, damn it.”
He slid his arms around Cade’s shoulders, and bent to taste his lips. The moment he pressed his lips against Cade’s a sensation swept over him, like drowning, like being overcome with something that stole all the oxygen from him and left him gasping. He felt Cade’s tongue slip between his lips and he tasted him, a faint, sweet taste that reminded him somehow of green forests and wild things. He lost track of his senses as Cade’s tongue explored his mouth, and pulled him closer and down into his lap, so that Jax was straddling him, his own hard cock snugged up against Cade’s rock-like bulge. Cade was pressing him against his chest so hard he could feel his heart beating, fast and steady and strong. Jax was losing track of the boundaries between them. The nipple ring was digging into Jax’s chest. Was that Cade’s heart or his own?
Jax fumbled with Cade’s jeans and got a hand inside. Cade groaned and pushed up hard against his hand. Jax could feel Cade’s cock twitching a little as he held it, and Cade made a sound that was like a moan and a growl all at once, picking Jax up with his hands under his arms and throwing him down on his back on the bed. A part of Jax thrilled at the rough treatment. Jax knew he wouldn’t break, and he wanted Cade to see that. He was a man and would be treated like one, despite the difference in their two sizes.
Cade came after him with a feral growl. The sound was deep and bestial, and it should have scared Jax, but it only excited him. He felt like growling himself, as a matter of fact. Jax had one small moment of panic, when he saw Cade’s beautiful face hovering over him. He was so big, so muscular. Then Cade leaned over and pulled off Jax’s underwear, just ripped them down and engulfed Jax’s cock in his mouth.
Never before had so many feelings rushed over Jax all at once. He felt the brush of Cade’s hair on his stomach and the rasp of his beard on his thighs. The velvety softness of his mouth and the wet heat of it combined to make him stop thinking anything coherent altogether. He could literally feel all the blood in his brain rush southward at a high rate of speed.
“Cade,” he screamed, and Cade murmured something he couldn’t understand. Or it could have been Cade humming—whatever it was, the vibration nearly drove him out of his mind. He wondered briefly if Cade was making the noise at all. It might have been his own blood, thrumming wildly through his veins.
“I’m going to come,” he said, in a panic, struggling not to embarrass himself. No one had ever done this to him before, and it was wonderful and terrifying and amazing all at once. Jax was carried away with his emotions that he couldn’t even think straight. Cade pulled off his dick with a wet plop and stared down at him.
“Come then, baby. Come in my mouth so I can taste you.”
“Oh, fuck.” A shudder ran through Jax so hard that it threatened to shake him off the bed, but Cade held him down with his broad fingers on the inside of his thighs. He bent his head to engulf him again and lick down the entire length of his shaft, then swiped his hot tongue down onto the place where his groin met his thigh and nuzzled there for a moment. He swept down over Jax’s balls and took one in his mouth. It was enough to send Jax over the edge, and he came so hard the world dissolved for a moment and then reformed around Cade. Cade caught some of his cum in his mouth and finished sucking him dry until it actually became unbearable, the stimulation just too much. Jax whimpered frantically and felt Cade pull off, his arms wrapping around him. Cade moved up then to kiss him so he could taste himself on Cade’s lips.
“Keep me with you,” Jax gasped in Cade’s ear. “Don’t leave me.”
“Never,” he said, his voice a deep, almost bestial sound. Without warning, Cade flipped Jax onto his stomach. Pulling Jax to his knees, he pried apart the cheeks of Jax’s ass and licked him there with his tongue. Jax arched his back and screamed his pleasure. He’d never even heard of anybody doing this before, and it was equal parts mortifying and thrilling to him. Cade was stroking Jax’s cock, only half hard now, the skin painful to the touch after how hard Jax had just come. Cade’s wicked tongue came back to thrust inside him again and again until Jax was nearly incoherent. He tried to move forward, in some instinctual move of self-preservation, but Cade pulled him back and licked him again, moving from his balls to the top of his cleft. Jax screamed, clutching the sheet in his fists.
