Fated Magic (Claimed by Wolves #1) - Callie Rose Page 0,40

naked dudes fast enough.

I’m not entirely comfortable with her running into the cabin alone before one of us checks it for wild animals or interlopers, but she doesn’t immediately scream bloody murder, so I consider that proof the cabin is safe. I’ll do a more thorough check in a second, but first…

I step ahead of Trystan and Archer to stop them before they go inside.

“We need to make something clear,” I say, pitching my voice low so Sable doesn’t accidentally hear me.

Trystan crosses his arms, his face turning to stone. “What? You trying to make some kind of ‘I found her first’ claim? Tell that to my wolf. We each have an equal chance here, fuckface.”

I clench my fists against the urge to break his stupid nose. “No, jackass. About Sable’s state of mind.”

“She’s been hurt badly before. Physically and emotionally. I can tell.” Archer speaks up, adjusting his pack on his shoulders.

“She has. Anyone with eyes can see she’s traumatized.” I glance toward the cabin, seeing the network of scars on Sable’s pale flesh in my mind’s eye. “I don’t know the details, but we gotta be gentle with her. She’s not used to this. Any of it. Nobody push her beyond what she can handle.”

Archer nods. “It’s more important that we respect her trauma than it is to urge her wolf to come out. We have to let her do this at her own pace.”

Trystan scoffs. “Thank you, Doctor Phil.”

I jam a finger into the man’s broad chest. “Play. Fucking. Nice. This is your only warning. If you so much as give her a nightmare, I’ll eat your entrails and feed the rest to the vultures. Got it?”

Trystan’s jaw clenches so tight I think he might break a few teeth off. But he finally nods, taking a step away from my finger. His eyes burn with annoyance as he glares at me, but his expression softens as he glances toward the small cabin. A hint of worry crosses his face, and he nods.

“Yeah. I got it.”

17

Sable

I press my forehead to the wall just inside the front door, letting all the weight of my body ooze against the cool wooden planks. My knees damn sure can’t hold me up anymore.

The cabin is dim and musty, as if the windows haven’t been opened for months. I’m in what seems to be a living room area, although I didn’t take much time to look at it when I walked in.

My skin is flushed and hot as if I have a fever, and I consider going to see if there’s a freezer I can shove my head in. Pressing my hands to my cheeks, I focus on taking a couple of deep breaths and calming the fluttering in my stomach.

I can’t seem to catch my breath, and I feel hot and achy all over in a way I’ve never experienced before. I can’t get the sight of Ridge’s body out of my mind. Every single part of him is etched in my memory, and the feeling curling between my legs begs me to keep replaying that memory over and over.

Even when I tried to look away, to drag my gaze away from him… there were Trystan and Archer, both just as magnificent and just as damn naked.

The one true string of luck I had in my miserable life was that my uncle never abused me sexually. Clint liked the power of hurting me physically—lording his strength over me with pain, keeping me quiet and pliant with threats of knives and lashes and “accidents.” Even his gross friends who came over every once in a while never hurt me like that. There was one man who got creepy with me a few times, and I lived in absolute terror that he might one day lose control and try to…

But he didn’t.

I know about sex, but I’ve never done it before. I’ve never even kissed anyone, and everything I know about the subject was gleaned from books and movies and unpleasant conversations between my uncle and his buddies that I wish I hadn’t heard.

But this?

I don’t know anything about this. I’m not familiar with the kind of need that seeps through my bones and makes every nerve-ending seem to come alive. So this aching, throbbing heat between my legs is as newly bizarre as it is decadent.

Jesus, the three of them were as perfect as pictures I’ve seen of Greek god statues. Every muscle might as well have been chiseled out of stone with