Running With Wolves

“Sage,” He reached gently for her face, his large hands covering her cheeks as he gently pushed her away from him. He shook his head, “I can’t do this.”

“What?” She questioned momentarily stunned. “Can’t do what?”

He took a step away from her suddenly looking haunted. “This Sage, I can’t do this with you. I can’t just give in to this.”

“Why not?” She demanded anger flaring behind her eyes. “Isn’t this what you wanted? Cause right now I know its what I want.”

“Exactly,” he pursed his lips while shaking his head and cursed under his breath. “Right now this is what you want, but fifteen minutes from now? An hour? Tomorrow?” He looked away from her. “I deserve more than that and so do you.”

“You’re an ass.” His jaw locked and he nodded, if that was what it took than he would be that. She eyed him up and down before turning on her heels. He closed his eyes, deciding something in his head.

“Do you know how impossibly hard it is to try not to love you, Sage Wolfe? Because it is, it’s impossible for me not to love you and it has nothing to do with some fucking story.”

She froze but didn’t turn to look at him.

His eyes were dark and hard like twin lapis lazuli gemstones. “I love you because when we were seven and my turtle died we had a funeral in the back yard, just me and you. I love you because when I got chicken pox when we were ten and I was out of school you snuck into my room. You stayed with me all day and ended up with chicken pox yourself and we suffered together. I love you because when we were twelve you were so upset to hear about the starving kids in Africa you tried to sell lemonade to raise money. I love you because when we were thirteen and Maria, that blonde eighth grader on our bus, said she liked me, you threw a cup cake from the cafeteria in her face. I love you because when my mother died you cried just as hard as I did and you never left my side even when I got angry and wanted to be alone you wouldn’t let me. When Kerrick turned into an asshole and started running his mouth you broke his nose. I don’t love you because people tell us we are supposed to, I love you because you are you. Because you were my first friend, the first girl I ever kissed, and you’re the only one that really knows me.

And don’t you dare tell me you are not that girl anymore because you are that girl, you are that girl and more. I love you for your strength and your heart. I love you for your selflessness and your compassion.”

“I’m no angel, Luke, don’t put me on a pedestal.” She murmured turning around to face him.

“I don’t have you on a pedestal,” He assured, a soft smile on his lips and he shrugged. “I’m just partial to you.” Her eyes met his and for a moment neither said a word. “I know you aren’t an angel Sage, trust me I know.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Her arms crossed over her chest indignantly and in spite of everything he grinned.

“You are hard headed and argumentative. You’re just as likely to start throwing punches as you are to play peace keeper. You change your mind more often than anyone thinks and you have this habit of not being able to make the right choice until you have made all the wrong ones. You hold grudges longer than anyone I have ever met and justice and revenge go hand in hand with you. You attract trouble more than any other person I’ve ever met—its mind boggling really.” His eyes glittered as he spoke. “You have this kneejerk reaction to want to fight the world when someone crosses you. Somehow, and trust me I still cant make sense of this, you can be selfish and selfless all at once. You, Sage Cornelia Aurora Wolfe, are a head ache, your own worst enemy, and the biggest pain in my ass.”

She scowled at him, her lips pulled down into a deep frown as she tapped her foot in annoyance. She wanted to counter his words but she could not find any words say.

“Oh yeah!” She finally burst, her hands falling from her sides to wave around her, accentuating her words. “Well you’re no saint either Lukas Canis! You’re pushy and brooding and impossible and--and annoying!”

Lukas licked his lips and nodded patiently, his eyebrows pulling together into a look of intrigue but the glint in his eye gave way to amusement.

“You’re irritating and you argue with me on everything. You have an opinion on everything and you’re bossy!”

“You’re calling me bossy?”

“Yes!”

a short laugh left his lips. “okay, anything else?”

“You read me like a book. Sometimes I just want to be mad and you wont let me be, sometimes I want to be alone but you insist upon being my shadow. Sometimes I don’t want to talk and yet you talk to me anyway unless…”She trailed off lost in thought, suddenly seeing through him.

the amusement on Lukas’ lips slid away and he grew more serious. “unless?” he coaxed.

“Unless its about my family.” She wasn’t quite looking at him anymore but something in her mind’s eye. “When I don’t say anything neither do you. You just sit next to me and say nothing and somehow that is better than any words. You always bring me mint tea because you know it’s my favorite. You always let me sit to the right of you because you know it is just my spot beside you. Sometimes you let me make you a punching bag and it’s not fair to you. Sometimes I just need to argue and so you will argue with me…I don’t know why you let me do those things to you…”She trailed off into a whisper.

“Yes you do,” he whispered and suddenly her eyes focused on him again.

She blinked and nodded swallowing hard, some strange sense of fear coating her sea foam orbs as she blinked and looked away. “you know that I don’t like to spill my guts, ever, so you wait and you wait until I’m ready to talk—you have the patience of a saint. Some times I say and do things that other people cannot make sense of so you translate my actions so I don’t seem like a crazy person.” Lukas took a quiet step toward her and at the closer proximity he realized it was not fear in her eyes but vulnerability. “You are the only thing that keeps me from being a crazy person.” She swallowed. “I need you because I need to be reminded that I’m not crazy, that I’m more than a Wolfe, or an Alpha, or tragedy driven revenge filled woman.”

Lukas took another quiet step toward her, now they were breathing the same air and Lukas could see the dilation of her eyes and the shortening of her breath. “say it.” He whispered.

Her head tilted to the side as she gazed up at him. “I love you Lukas. I love you with all that I am, I always have…but you already knew that.”

He nodded slowly. “I did,” He agreed. “but I think you needed some reminding.”

Sadness flashed unexplainably across her eyes. “I’ve been cruel to you Luke, really I have, and yet here you are right where you’ve always been.” Tears welled up in her eyes no matter how hard Sage tried to fight them back.

“Not cruel,” He disagreed in a whisper, the back of his hand ghosting over her cheek to wipe away a stray tear. “Scared, perhaps terrified even, but you were never cruel.”

“I’m sorry.”

He shook his head, his lips a mere inch from her lips. “Don’t apologize,” He breathed. Sage became supernaturally still, Were still, and she said nothing as she waited for him to make the next move. “You have to tell me what you want here.” He explained, his words no more than an exhale of breath. Lukas himself was as statue still as his counterpart and it took all the restraint in the world to do it.

“Kiss me.” It was part request, part plea and Lukas was the last person who would ever deny her.

Nothing more than a subtle tilt of his head and their lips met. Her lips were soft against his, warm and sure. Her arms snaked up and around his neck, her fingers burying themselves in his short hair and for the first time that clichéd missing part of both of them felt whole. The cold, emptiness in Sage that left her feeling hallow and alone was suddenly warm, like standing in front of a fire on a cold night; it made her whole body tingle.

Sage pressed herself closer to him, nearly willing herself to just be absorb into his very being; into his warmth and his heart, loyalty, and bravery. She wanted all of him and just to exist inside of his goodness for a while; vacation from the harsh cold world she had grown to understand.

His hand slid around her body, pressing her toward him where they fit perfectly together. Lukas could not help but think how perfectly she fit against him, how perfectly she had always fit against him. He supposed that perhaps that was a part of what it meant to be a soulmate but most of him just felt lucky and marveled at how perfect she was to him. He had imagined this moment a million times in his head but no mere conjured up idea could ever equate to what this moment really was.

His lips began to separate from hers for only a moment to catch his breath but Sage caught his lower lip between her teeth, refusing to let him go. He growled and his lips moved over hers, kissing her back harder. His tongue flicked out against her closed mouth and they seemed to open on their own. His tongue met hers hot and wet and she gasped into his mouth. Her hands gripped his t-shirt, pulling him impossibly closer, and yet even when they were both flushed against each other she refused to let go of him. Her hands knotted in his shirt reminding her that he was real and true against her; this wasn’t some figment of her imagination.

An over whelming aching took over her as though all the years she had gone without allowing herself to miss Lukas flooded her, leaving her gasping for air.

She could have gone on like that forever, Sage decided, pressed against Lukas, but like all things moments come and go quicker than many would like.