Midnight Wolves

Chapter Twenty Two: Sleep

Later that night as Kennedy slept soundlessly beside the fading fire, Callie sat on a fallen tree, Vik next to her. He held a twig to the flame, watching it sizzle and smoke under the heat of the fire.

Vik had been quiet since they left and Callie felt his absence. "Everything OK?" she asked the fire, unwilling to look at him.

He let out a long breath. "I'm worried. About seeing my parents, the pack...it's been a long time."

Callie nodded. "You know, you don't have to come. I can go alone, I-"

"No."

She waited.

"I-I want to be there. With you. And I want to see them, I think."

Callie shuddered as the wind picked up, sending a scattering of leaves over their feet. Vik shuffled closer to her and put an arm around her shoulders, tucking her into his side. He gently leaned down and placed a small, chaste kiss to the top of her head. Callie closed her eyes and sighed, contently.

"The moment you want to go, we'll leave," she whispered.

She felt him shake his head. "The moment we've got the truth, we'll leave. Not before."

He squeezed her tighter for a moment and then released her, her wolf growled out loud making him chuckle. "We need to get some sleep," he said quietly, glancing at Kennedy as she rolled over in her sleep, starfishing in the undergrowth.

He paused for a moment, glancing between Kennedy and Callie. "Why bring her, anyway?"

"Wanted me all to yourself?" she said, her tone light and teasing.

His response was not.

His wolf glowed in his eyes, fixing her with a stare that made her shudder.

"Yes," his wolf growled from human lips.

She could barely move enough to give him a small smile. Her throat was dry and she swallowed hard. "She has nowhere to go," she said, distracted.

He took a step towards her, then another. Her chest tightened, her breathing shallow. All she could see was him.

He paused in front of her, barely an arms width away. He reached up, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear and her heartbeat skittered in her chest.

"What is this?" he asked quietly, his eyes dropping down to her lips and back to her eyes, before dropping back down again as though he couldn't bear to look away. She knew he didn't mean Kennedy or the lock of hair he'd just moved - no, he meant this airlessness that existed between them. The tug that repeatedly pulled them towards one another.

Callie shook her head. "I don't know. If I hadn't had my moonmate I'd think..."

"Same," he whispered back, raising a hand to rest on the side of her cheek. She leant into the warmth of his touch.

"We should get some sleep," Callie whispered.

He nodded but didn't move. His eyes still flicking to her lips. "We should," he whispered. "But first..."

Closing the distance between them, he leaned down and kissed her. Softly at first, but desperation soon coloured his every move, his hands grasping at her clothes, her skin. Her arms wrapping around him, dragging and tangling in his hair, tugging him closer until there was nothing between them.

She'd never felt need like this. She thought she'd die from it. Spontaneously combust. Was that possible? To want someone so much that you spontaneously combust? It felt like that's what was going to happen.

There wasn't enough air in the world. Wasn't enough of him.

They tore apart, breathless and panting. "Sleep," she panted. "We need sleep."

"Sleep," he echoed, just as effected as she was.

Breaking apart but neither turning their back, they walked either side of the fire and headed to where they'd each dropped their bags earlier. At a distance, with Kennedy in between. A choice. An intentional choice. Because she needed space and she needed air, and she needed to get a hold of herself.

But she also didn't think she would be able to fall asleep without him. Which was ridiculous, she reminded herself, because she'd spent years of her life falling asleep alone. A few days and suddenly she couldn't exist without him?

It was frustrating, she'd decided on the long run here. Annoying. She felt pathetic, useless, weak, and yet... There was something about him. Something that made her want to spend her every waking moment beside him, and every sleeping moment beside him too.

Her wolf was in agreement, and she already knew that his was. From the moment their wolves had stared at one another over his packland on her first day here, there had been something between them.

And her wolf, she'd noted, hadn't woken her in the middle of the night. She hadn't tried to force every pack in the vicinity to submit to her. With him, her wolf was under control. With him, she felt safe.

Safe. What a strange word. Callie wasn't sure she trusted it. She'd thought she was safe with her parents and then she'd been dumped in the middle of a forest. She'd thought she was safe with J and Rootbridge, and then her moonmate had attacked her. She thought she was safe with Vik, but was she?

She couldn't sleep. Her body tossing and turning until she'd dug a groove into the earth beneath her. She sighed irritably and watched as the sky began to lighten at the edges. Dawn was coming and she hadn't slept yet.

She stilled as her wolf sensed something. Her world in monochrome as she searched the darkness for whatever had set her senses off. Yet it wasn't until his arm wrapped around her and his body tucked into hers, that she realised it was Vik. She hadn't seen him, and was sure she'd looked in the direction he came from and yet...

"How do you do that?" she whispered.

"Go to sleep," he murmured, burying his head into her hair. His breathing evened out and his body relaxed, a dead weight at her back. She sighed softly and placed her hands on top of his, letting her eyes slide closed.