"Anna?" said Charles. "What's wrong? Are you crying?" He moved in front of her and stopped, forcing her to stop walking, too.

She opened her mouth and his fingers touched her wet cheeks.

"Anna," he said, his body going still. "Call on your wolf."

"You should have someone stronger," she told him miserably. "Someone who could help you when you need it, instead of getting sent home because I can't endure what you have to do. If I weren't Omega, if I were dominant like Sage, I could have helped you."

"There is no one stronger," Charles told her. "It's the taint from the black magic. Call your wolf."

"You don't want me anymore," she whispered. And once the words were out she knew they were true. He would say the things that he thought she wanted to hear because he was a kind man. But they would be lies. The truth was in the way he closed down the bond between them so she wouldn't hear things that would hurt her. Charles was a dominant wolf and dominant wolves were driven to protect those weaker than themselves. And he saw her as so much weaker.

"I love you," he told her. "Now, call your wolf."

She ignored his order - he knew better than to give her orders. He said he loved her; it sounded like the truth. But he was old and clever and Anna knew that, when push came to shove, he could lie and make anyone believe it. Knew it because he lied to her now - and it sounded like the truth.

"I'm sorry," she told him. "I'll go away - "

And suddenly her back was against a tree and his face was a hairbreadth from hers. His long hot body was pressed against her from her knees to her chest - he'd have to bend to do that. He was a lot taller than her, though she wasn't short.

Anna shuddered as the warmth of his body started to penetrate the cold that had swallowed hers. Charles waited like a hunter, waited for her to wiggle and see that she was truly trapped. Waited while she caught her breath. Waited until she looked into his eyes.

Then he snarled at her. "You are not leaving me."

It was an order, and she didn't have to follow anyone's orders. That was part of being Omega instead of a regular werewolf - who might have had a snowball's chance in hell of being a proper mate.

"You need someone stronger," Anna told him again. "So you wouldn't have to hide when you're hurt. So you could trust your mate to take care of herself and help, damn it, instead of having to protect me from whatever you are hiding." She hated crying. Tears were weaknesses that could be exploited and they never solved a damned thing. Sobs gathered in her chest like a rushing tide and she needed to get away from him before she broke.

Instead of fighting his grip, she tried to slide out of it. "I need to go," she said to his chest. "I need - "

His mouth closed over hers, hot and hungry, warming her mouth as his body warmed her body.

"Me," Charles said, his voice dark and gravelly as if it had traveled up from the bottom of the earth, his eyes a bright gold. "You need me."

He kissed her again, his hands roaming from her jaw down her neck and shoulders. His hips pressed forward, and he released her mouth as he slid his body up until his sex pressed, hard and full, against hers. She jerked involuntarily, and he laughed in the same deep way that he had spoken. She growled at him, wolf to wolf.

"There you are, there you are," he said. "Are you just going to let me do this alone?"

He was talking too much when he should be feeling. She curled one leg up until the angle of their hips was better, climbing his body until she could bite down on his collarbone. He drew in his breath at the pain and she released him. Now his attention was on her instead of on making words, so she could be gentler. She licked the wound she'd made, feeling it heal under her tongue as she cleaned the iron-rich blood from his skin. She lunged upward and this time she caught the tendon in his neck gently, and his gasp had nothing to do pain.

She wiggled her hips, rubbing the seam of her jeans on him as she absorbed the heady smell that was her mate when he was aroused. She wanted to smell it better so she slipped down and rested her open mouth against his hardness, letting her hot breath caress him through his jeans. It had been so long since they'd touched.

His scent grew stronger: musk and forest, salt and bitter, with an indescribably delicious edge of sweetness.

"Anna," he said, a little desperately. "Isaac, Malcolm, and probably that damned fae can hear us."

She opened her mouth and bit - not hard, just enough to shut him up and to let him know that pushing her away was not an option.

Charles made a noise that might have been a laugh, but all she heard was the surrender in it, and then he let her knock him onto his back in the damp soil of the island and unzip his jeans until she could get to him. Once she had his bare skin in her hands, the frantic need lessened, partly assuaged by the clear evidence that he wanted her as much as she wanted him.

His skin was so soft to sheathe something so hard. She licked him delicately, loving the taste of him now seasoned by the ocean's salt. She loved him in all of his flavors, loved the noises he made as she pleasured him, loved the catch in his breath and the jerkiness of his movements - he who was always graceful.

She swallowed him down, claiming him, man and wolf, in the most basic way possible.

"I am yours," he said, a finger under her chin dislodging her claim. "And you" - he moved his hands under her shoulders and pulled until she was all the way on top - "are mine."

Her jeans were in the way so he rolled her to the side and stripped her shoes, pants, and underwear off in three quick motions. He pulled her back on top with hands that were more urgent than gentle and slid inside her.

She closed her eyes and absorbed the feel of the slow burn, the slick pressure and warm friction that meant he was hers. Then he grabbed her hips and asked, so she moved - and quit thinking altogether.

Limp and well loved, Anna panted on top of Charles. As the last tingles died down, she started to think again instead of just feel.

"Did we," she whispered, feeling the blush start at her toes and travel all the way out to her ears. "Did we really make love while everyone was listening? Right out in the open? When there might be a bad guy we can't see or hear watching?" She might have squeaked the last word.

Underneath her, Charles laughed, his belly bouncing her up and down. He felt resilient and relaxed, like a cat bathing in the sun. "All I was trying to do was get you to call up your wolf so she could fight off the black magic that was making you doubt yourself." He paused and the relaxation faded. "Making you doubt me." He rubbed her back. "I made you doubt me."