Feral (Wolf Ranch 3)

I wanted to shout up to her, but that would be foolish. Startling her while she was up there could be disastrous, even though she had to have heard me tear up her driveway. Instead, I checked out how she got up there. A ladder was on the roof of the wraparound porch, a window open right next to it, most likely her bedroom or the one next door. She either had no care for her safety or wanted to win the Darwin awards. The wooden ladder had to be older than I was and warped. It wasn’t braced or anything on the roof. And that was just how she got up on to the main roof, not the fact that she was there to begin with.

I hopped onto the porch, then climbed onto the railing, turned and faced the house and reached up to grab the porch roof. With a hop, I pulled myself up, then swung a leg onto the shingles. With a little sweat and a whole hell of a lot of swearing, I pushed to my feet, then checked the stability of the ladder before using it to join her.

“What are you doing up here?” She knelt by a decent sized hole in the shingles. It hadn’t been ripped off from the rain the night before, but maybe from the storms a few weeks ago, when one of our trees fell through the barn during Boyd’s and Audrey’s wedding reception.

“What the fuck are you doing up here?”

She waved the hammer she held in her left hand. “Fixing a leak.”

“The only way to fix it is put on a new roof.”

“Not happening.” She was squatting down, and she shifted slightly to face me. At least she had on jeans and sturdy leather boots. I wouldn’t have to punish her for wearing something stupid like flip flops. “I found a few shingles in the old barn. I’m giving it a patch for now.”

“I’m not arguing with you about what you’re doing, I’m arguing at the fact that you are doing it. It’s dangerous as fuck up here. You could have slipped off, and no one would have known.”

Her back stiffened, and her eyes narrowed. Her breathing picked up, and I couldn’t miss the way her breasts rose and fell beneath her white tank top. Or the fact that her skin had a sheen of perspiration or that I could scent that tang of sweat along with her sweet essence. She had on more clothes than I’d ever seen her in, but she was still stunning. And now she was as pissed as me. It was obvious she didn’t like to be told what to do. In a situation like this, thirty feet up? Too fucking bad.

“You’re not my keeper,” she practically growled, which made my wolf want to growl right back.

“It sure as fuck isn’t Markle,” I countered.

Her eyes narrowed, and her cheeks flushed. “It isn’t you.”

“It sure is, angel. Give me that hammer, and we’ll get this patched. Then you’re getting your hot little ass off this roof.”

“I can patch it just fine, thank you.” Her sass was supposed to piss me off. It only made me hard. Made me ache to sink balls deep inside her. But not up here on a fucking roof.

“You have two minutes to finish.” I didn’t move, just glared. Waited. My issue wasn’t with her ability to fix the roof—she could do the job. Once she was down though, I was going to destroy that ladder so she couldn’t get up here again.

She huffed, then slid one of the rectangular roofing sheets into place, hammered it along the top side. She did two more, covering the damaged area.

I held out my hand for the hammer. With a frown, she handed it to me.

“I’ll go down first. You follow. Then we’ll discuss your punishment.”

Her mouth fell open, and one brow lifted, but I stood and went to the ladder. She hadn’t moved.

“Punishment?”

I tipped my chin. “Bad girls get punished.”

It was a loaded statement, especially given to someone who was far from submissive. I’d had women run scared… literally and figuratively, at my aggressive ways. With sex, I liked it rough. Wild. Lately, I’d avoided women because I felt almost… feral with the need to take. To dominate. To fuck hard and long. I didn’t want Natalie to be afraid of me, but I needed to know how far she’d go with me. As my mate, I knew she wouldn’t be all vanilla and missionary. I’d seen the damn dildo. But how far would she go?

“Are you serious?”

If there was a button on Natalie labeled Fucking Pissed, I just pushed it. Except her nipples popped through her tank top, telling me how much she loved the idea.

“Did you seriously get on the roof alone?” I countered. “One of the ranch hands does something like this, he’d be shoveling manure for a month. You’ll only get your ass spanked.”