Wild Life Read online

  Addison nodded his head. “What, too fast for a second date? To have me cook twice in a row for you?” He glanced over at her and watched as Cassidy let out a heavy breath, her breasts rising and falling, quickly. Tread carefully his inner voice told him.

  “You like to cook?”

  “I grew up rather self sufficiently, so it became a habit.” Addison explained.

  “And the eating at midnight most nights, where did that come from?” Cassidy asked as Addison turned off onto a cross street.

  “Habit of the lifestyle. I tend live my life at night, for the most part.”

  “Ah, yeah, I hear ya. I am so not a morning person.” Cassidy said. “I hate morning people, they just roll out of bed and start operating, like it’s nothing.”

  “Like it’s normal.” Addison added on.

  “Like they’re on auto pilot.” Cassidy went on. They both looked at each other and laughed out loud. “Do you ever think morning people whinge about us night owls?”

  “Night owls,” Addison muttered and shaking his head no. “They’re already asleep before we’re even awake. We are so past their bedtime dandelion.” Addison said driving them into Alphabet City. And down a tree lined, brownstone lined street. Cassidy looked out under the front window at the houses lined up row by row.

  “Which one is your place?” She asked, looking at the fairly identical buildings. Addison pulled up into the parking spot out the front and killed the engine.

  “This one.” He said pointing it out to her.

  “Which window, the top, bottom or middle is your apartment?”

  Addison looked over at her. “It’s all mine dandelion. I own the whole building.” Cassidy looked surprised at him, it was a three story building. “Wow.” They got out of the car and headed indoors.

  “So what was it you said you did for work again?” She asked curiously.

  “I’m a consultant.” Addison stated unlocking the front door.

  “What does that mean?” Cassidy asked stepping in past him “And don’t say, you consult.” He closed the door behind them. Suddenly encasing them in utter darkness in the house. Cassidy gasped. Addison reached for her hand, as he walked past her in the narrow hallway His night vision, even with human eyes, was rather exceptional, he rarely put his house lights on. Another habit.

  “Strategic security consultant.” Addison answered her. It was his standard answer for anyone outside of the werewolf community who didn’t know that he was Paris’s enforcer. And it wasn’t exactly a lie.

  “Follow me, it’s okay, there’s nothing but floorboards and walls in the hallway.” He said leading her further into his place.

  “No light switches?” Cassidy asked nervously. “Or are you just being environmentally conscious?”

  “There are light switches, but I know my way around well enough to not have to use them.” Addison chuckled back at her. “The bottom floor was originally the apartment my mother bought and left to me in her will.” Addison explained as they reached a stairway. “Careful, step up,” He instructed still holding onto her hand as she stepped up after him and followed his lead. “I bought the second and third level apartments eight years after her death. They’ve been my continual project ever since.”

  “So your job pays pretty good then.”

  “Well enough. Hazard pay and all.” Addison said helping her up another stair.

  “Hazard pay? That sounds like you do dangerous stuff. You don’t like, carry a gun or weapon do you?” She asked stepping up another step and feeling his arm pull her up. He was strong, she could feel the strength in that one arm alone.

  “No weapons. I don’t believe in them being as effective as I can be.” Addison said, speaking the whole truth at her.

  Werewolves were lethal weapons if they honed enough of their natural born skills. Using man made weapons was like cheating in a fight. Not the werewolf way. They reached the second landing and a warm glow snuck out from a nearby room with an open doorway. Cassidy glanced over at Addison and back at the flickering glow from the room.

  “Come on.” He said still holding her hand and walking with her into the room. It was filled with fat white candles that were alight. The room was decked out in warm tones of blue, aqua, gold and purple. With throw cushions around a low, wide square table. Cassidy looked around the otherwise plain, dark panelled room. It had a Moroccan brass light fixture hanging from the ceiling.

  “How did you do this if you were driving me back here?” She asked, noting the standing wine stand with champagne in a bucket of ice, in an unused fireplace.

  “I might have had a little help.” He confessed watching her check out her surroundings with delight. Cassidy put her handbag down and dropped her bowler cap lightly on top of it.

  “It’s beautiful.”

  “I will tell my secret helper that you said so, since it wasn’t entirely my own idea.” Addison stated kicking off his shoes and shrugging off his jacket and throwing them in a far corner of the room unconsciously.

  “So you’re not a romantic at heart?” Cassidy asked curiously stretching her arms straight up above her head.

  Blue eyes tracked the length of her golden skin at the slowly graceful movement, she was unaware of doing. As Addison thought about her question momentarily. He’d never been romantic, never had cause for it. Never really known it being shown to him. So no, not a romantic at heart.

  “I’m wild at heart.” Addison stated walking around to her. Never a truer statement had he spoken to a woman before.

  Cassidy dropped her arms suddenly, the stretch over. Without thinking about what she was doing, she raised one foot, pulling her leg up into her chest. Standing perfectly still with utter balance on one leg, whilst she took off her high heel.

  He didn’t know anyone who could do that without at least wobbling slightly. She’d done it so smoothly and effortlessly too. He could feel the werewolf within him, sitting and watching her movements. Utterly intrigued by her.

  “Why do women wear these shoes, when they just know they’re going to suffer for the fashion of it?” Addison asked her, watching in fascination as she kept her balance on one, high heeled leg, and slipped off the shoe, holding it in her hand. Cassidy looked at the shoe and back at Addison quickly, dropping the shoeless foot quickly to the ground.

  “They make us tall of course.” Cassidy answered him softly, slightly self conscious of herself once again. Once again balancing on her now shoeless, flat foot, she flicked her other leg up behind her, pressing it perfectly against her back hamstring, as she removed the other shoe, whilst looking at Addison the whole time.

  Addison’s eyes narrowed, watching in silence as she again remained perfectly straight and centred before dropping the leg back down and now holding two red high heels in her hands.

  “Makes our legs look long, gives us a extra swing in our hips when we walk.” Cassidy commented noting the way he looked at her heatedly.

  “Ah the strut.” Addison murmured with appreciation Thinking of her ass’s movement. “Yeah, that is hella sexy.”

  “Actually, I just thought I was following your lead.” She said pointing to his bare feet, poking out from the rough edges of his jeans. He glanced down at his feet and wiggled his toes on the cushioning under them.

  Grinning back at her, before grabbed the front of his t-shirt. His grey t-shirt was tight around his biceps and emphasized his pecs and lean stomach through it’s cotton material. Cassidy figured she could make out what his chest look like even with it on. But she was wrong, she noted as he pulled it up and over his face, and off his body entirely, roughly.

  Addison stood before her, topless with a hard chest, of defined muscle and grooves. But what had Cassidy’s full attention apart from the beauty of the man before her, and his undeniable, physical presence, was the tattoo that covered one whole half of his upper torso and arm.

  Her eyes roamed over the black curves, and swirls and sharp points. It was a tribal design, that followed the lines and cur
ves of his muscles and definition perfectly. It went from his shoulder, down his entire left arm, to his wrist and covered his pectoral muscle and entire left side and front of his body.

  Effectively cutting his body in half. One half plain skin, the other, all tattooed ink. It was show stopping spectacular. Cassidy let out a slow breath. It made her want to trace all it’s lines and paths, with her fingers, her tongue. In a few swirling lines of black, there was writing in another language in a golden henna coloured ink.

  “Still following my lead?” He asked her cheekily, watching as her eyes took in the sight of him slowly. He felt her gaze warm his skin as it trailed over each groove and definition and looking at his otherwise perfectly smooth, and un-inked skin.

  “Admiring.” She murmured throatily, barely aware of saying the words, dropping the boots in her hands to the floor quickly.

  Addison took a step towards her slowly and stopped short when Cassidy’s head tilted up to look at him, from the side. She arched an eyebrow back at him, as her hands went the collar of her shirt and unbuttoned the two buttons holding the piece of white cotton in place. Cassidy smirked back at him and pulled the halter neck top off herself and dropped it beside her. Standing in front of him, topless.

  “No bra.”

  “It was built in.” She answered him, as his eyes slowly took in the sight of her full breasts, rosy nipples hardening in the air. Her slimline waist that moved outwards in a soft curving arc to her hips. Her washboard abdominal muscles, with lines and grooves, not as hard as his own, but there all the same.

  Addison’s werewolf paced inside him. Her stomach definition, a turn on. He’d always admired an athletic look. Liked a woman who looked after herself. Cassidy’s physique indicated she worked out. Addison closed the gap between them, stepping closer as her breathing became slightly heavier.

  “Did I pass the test?” She smirked holding his eye contact with a glint in her expression, that told him she’d just figured something out about him. Addison nodded his head slowly. “Pushy, aren’t you?” She said softly as he brushed up against her, so the tips of her breast were crushed against his chest. His hands on her hips lightly.

  Addison dipped his head to her neck. His wolf wanted a taste of what was before him. Cassidy felt his nose run up alongside the length of her neck, up to under her ear. “Not the easiest man to live with.” He said in that low tone of voice that had her somewhere between wondering how horny he was, how badly her body reacted to it and wether she was scared or not. As he planted a kiss on her ear lobe.

  Addison’s wolf hearing heard her heat beat pick up wildly and he inhaled her scent, past the synthetic spice of the perfume she wore, to her base scent of sunflowers as he pulled himself further into her body, pressing his hardness against her stomach.

  Cassidy sighed ever so lightly that it was barely audible. Addison’s hands skimming along her sides cupping her breasts in them. “Dinner at midnight, strategic security consultancy, champagne drinker who doesn’t think he’s fun. Yeah, so not easy to pick.” Cassidy said lightly as Addison dipped his head to her breast and took the neglected hard nipple in his mouth. Just the nipple, his tongue flicking out briefly to tease it again before drawing it back into his mouth and pulling it taunt.

  Cassidy whimpered, shaking slightly, she adjusted her leg stance, wider for more balance, as her eyes flickered between closed and open. Her arms reaching up to grab his wide, biceps for grounding. “Definitely not ordinary.” She muttered looking down at his head.

  Addison stilled momentarily and lifted his head, his eyes staring back at her, watching her next move. As if daring her to confirm what he was and watch the horror of it fill her beautiful face.

  “Did I mention I speak French?” Addison threw back at before continuing he sensual assault onto her other breast and playing with the nipple that pebbled under the flick of his tongue.

  “What’s ordinary anyway? You were at the same pack party I was the other night. You’re here now, starting a date at midnight with me.” He said between warmly wet kisses across her breasts. “Are you going to tell me that party is something you’d ordinarily go to?” He asked watching her as he straightened up, bringing his mouth inches within her.

  “Point taken.” She murmured lazily in response.

  He frowned at her comment. What would she think of the Werewolf clubs of New York on a lunar week then? Granted they were slightly more civilized than a pack party. Slightly.

  “You didn’t like the party did you?”

  Cassidy looked at him and dropped her eyes to his mouth. “Not at first. Not when I couldn’t find anyone I knew. When I was lost in the grounds. Bet you’ve never had to go to a party where you don’t know anyone and they don’t care to know you.” She said her eyes dropping to look over his chest.

  He pulled her into him further, pressing her breasts against his heated up skin, so he was almost flattening them. “Can’t say I have.” Addison answered honestly. Growing up a pack werewolf meant, he was almost always surrounded by pack. Being Paris’s second meant everyone knew his name. Knew of him.

  “I seriously doubt you have ever been hard pressed for making new friends. But it turned out okay in the end.” She said looking over back up at him. “Got a phone number, got a date out of it.” Her eyes met his again with a hint of defiance and challenge in them.

  That a girl, he thought. Don’t give in to nerves. Addison had never been truly attracted to a human woman before and he’d certainly never dated one before Cassidy. But he’d never gone out with weak women either. The woman attracted to him, tended to have a certain confidence about themselves. Cassidy was a first.

  Addison’s mouth tweaked to one side. And he felt her raise again, slowly on the full height of her toes to level herself with his mouth. Slanting it across his heavily, as her hands snaked their way up his arms, and across his shoulders, her fingers entwining the hair at the back of his neck as she kissed him.

  Addison’s werewolf circled him restlessly. He liked the feeling of the woman in his arms, her body against his skin. It was like a new wilderness. Waiting to be unleashed, by him.

  They slowly parted and Addison rested his forehead against hers. His eyes momentarily closed. “Have you spoken to your ungracious friends who abandoned you there since?”

  “I thought about leaving a message on Adam’s phone, but I figured it wasn’t worth it. Besides, you keep tying up my phone time.” Addison opened his eyes to look back at her, his mouth firm against hers. A hard kiss. Addison racked his brain for any Adam’s he knew. None instantly came to mind so he pushed it aside.

  “As it should be.” He said heavily, straightening up as Cassidy lowered herself back down to stand flat footed before him.

  “I know, habit of your lifestyle.” She said back at him with a cheeky wink.

  “So many habits.” Addison muttered slipping his hands around her waist. Still holding them chest to chest comfortably.

  “So little time.” Cassidy finished for him. Addison smiled.

  “Are you trying to rush me, or do you have somewhere you need to be right now?” He teased as his inner werewolf whined at him to do more than play with this woman in his arms.

  “No, I’m where I want to be. How about you?” Cassidy fired back at him brazenly.

  “Not exactly, where I want to be, but pretty damn close.” He said meaningfully, unable to help himself. It was too easy with Cassidy to tease her. “It’ll do for now.” He said, again claiming her mouth as his hands smoothed their way over her skin, feeling the roundness of her shapely ass. Cassidy’s arms clung to his neck as she found herself suddenly scooped up in two powerfully strong arms, holding her up as the kiss continued on.

  Slowly, with as much concentrated control as he could muster, Addison squatted down into a kneeling position, Cassidy in his arms as he lowered her to their soft, colourful ground of cushions and throw rugs. He only broke the kiss when she was laying back against the cushions, looking up at him.


  Cassidy noted the darkening in his eyes and heavy rise and fall of his chest as her eyes gazed upon him. “Hungry?” She asked.

  “Not for food. You?” He asked kneeling over her.

  “I ate before work.”

  “And yet,” He said looking at her hot pants. “You accepted my dinner invitation.” He said tugging the hotpants down. “Do you have ulterior motives dandelion?” He asked.

  “My motives are purely intentional.” Cassidy said, lifting her hips up slightly off the floor, allow him to pull the hotpants over her hips and down the full length of her legs.

  Addison discarded her clothing without further thought. Looking back down on her, laid out before him on the blue and purple hues around them in nothing but a pair of red gossamer panties. He moaned in his throat at the sight. They were sheer enough for him to see through them and straight at her neatly waxed patch of hair.

  “What about yours?” Cassidy asked with a small smile, as he angled his head one way and another, surveying her.

  “My intention’s are pure. You can be sure of that.” Addison uttered lowering himself down onto his hands, pushing his legs out behind him, so he pushed down into half a push up. Lowering his face to the gossamer panties.

  “Yeah, but purely what?” Cassidy asked looking down at him as Addison’s gaze raked over her body, looking back up at her.

  “Purely pleasurable.” He replied, lowering his mouth over the thin, sheer netted material and running his tongue along the heat coming from between her thighs. He inhaled the scent of her desire and again his werewolf stirred to life, pushing at him to take this woman.

  Still Addison held the urge at bay, as mouth sucked in the material and listened to the gasps coming from Cassidy turning into a tortured little moan.

  Addison knew that type of moan. He hooked his fingers under the underwear and pulled it hastily off her, causing Cassidy to open her legs further apart for him. Addison’s hands gripped her hips as his tongue delved into her wetness and lapped at her.

  Cassidy’s hips bucked with the sensation of him inside her, making her wetter as her own hands squeezed her breasts in urgency and she moved against him, moaning at the exquisite pleasure his tongue was bestowing on her.