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  Caleb whined again, the idea of debasing himself as difficult to resist as it was alarming. He hesitated again, but he probably wouldn’t make like Liam and leave him begging for too long.

  Probably.

  He’d better get more than belly rubs from this.

  He spread out as much as the restraints would let him, wishing he could really spread his legs and stretch. He barked as pathetically as he could, rolling to one side then back on the grass. The soft grass beneath him felt luscious and luxurious, and it only made his breath come harder as he stopped fighting the urge to fall down the rabbit hole.

  “Good boy.” The low words had Caleb closing his eyes as the hand on his thigh finally started closing the last few inches that he was desperate for. “You’ve been such a good pup, boy. Are you ready for your reward? Good pups get special rewards.”

  As those fingers drew closer to Caleb’s cock, his world narrowed down to the sound of the guy’s breathing and the feeling of the hands on his skin. One hand started moving up from his belly to start circling around his nipples as the other finally started caressing one finger along his cock.

  Tracing along the shaft with only the lightest touch, the guy didn’t seem to be in any hurry to give him the reward he’d been promising. Caleb’s hips thrust up and he whimpered again, not caring how he looked or sounded as long as it got him the orgasm his cock had been begging for.

  A low chuckle said that he hadn’t pissed the guy off, but he also didn’t move things the fuck along like Caleb wanted. The gentle exploration just continued as the maddening finger trailed over the head of his dick, running through the precum that had started dripping from his slit.

  “Such a good boy.” The now husky voice sent shivers through Caleb as the teasing continued. “Obedient pups get even better rewards.”

  As another pleading noise escaped Caleb, the single finger circling his sensitive slit changed to a rough hand that almost completely enveloped Caleb’s dick. When had the fucking dog walker’s hands gotten that big?

  “Is that what you want, Pup?”

  The low words had Caleb whimpering, and he thrust his hips up again, trying to beg for more.

  “Oh, I think you like your reward, Pup. Are you going to be good for me every time I visit? I think I can find lots of rewards for a sweet, obedient pup.”

  The hand around Caleb’s cock tightened and the low bark he’d been attempting to make got swallowed by the moan that escaped as WG finally pinched one nipple.

  “Yes, that’s a pretty pup.”

  As long as WG kept moving his hand faster, he could call him pretty pup all fucking day long. He pushed Caleb from desperate for more to right on the edge of exploding in seconds.

  Low, needy sounds filled the yard, and Caleb squirmed and begged for more. It didn’t even occur to him to do anything but whimper, to bark, to thrust wildly into that hand. There was nothing human about him in that moment.

  He had cast aside his pride, his…

  Not his identity, because right now, this was his identity, and he was so deep in the moment — tumbling over the edge when one final, deft twist of WG’s fingers hit just the right spot and made it impossible to do anything but—

  No, he wasn’t falling. He was flying, and his tail was doing its best to wag beneath him. The dog walker’s soft, pleased murmurings lost their meaning, understandable only through their tone… and his master — that wasn’t quite right, but he couldn’t bring himself to care — was pleased with him.

  “Good boy,” that enticing voice said again.

  Caleb lay there, panting, uncaring of the seed that had spilled across his stomach or over the man’s hand. As soon as he felt like he could move again, he ignored all of that, going straight in to nose at the guy’s crotch as his tail was finally given the freedom to really wag.

  The dog walker’s clean hand reached out and started running over Caleb’s head. “That’s a good boy.” His sticky hand moved to caress Caleb’s lower back and tail. “We’re going to need to clean you up again, Pup.”

  Caleb didn’t give a fuck if he needed to be cleaned up again or not. He let out a low bark, followed by a whine, then nudged again at the button of WG’s pants. He whined, sitting back on his heels, and held his paws — paws? Mitted hands? No. They were definitely paws — out like he was begging for a treat.

  And he was. He wanted this treat so badly that he impatiently head-butted the man’s leg. WG’s hands came up and pulled Caleb close. “Oh, Pup, I know what you want. But as much as I hate to say it, I think your master might kill me if I let it go that far.” WG’s fingers started stroking down Caleb’s back and through the fur on his tail. “Such a beautiful, sweet pup.”

  Caleb whined desperately, frustrated, and he nuzzled against him. How could his master—

  It was like he’d been slammed back into reality. There he was, covered in his own cum — with it now coating his back and fucking tail, no less — and begging to… What? Suck the werewolf’s dick?

  He let out a low growl as he started to return to himself, as he stopped drifting in that space where everything was perfect and wonderful and…

  Tears briefly sprang to the corners of his eyes, but he blinked them away.

  He’d almost lost himself with a stranger, just because the weird guy had been nice to him. Nice, but had treated him like a dog, too! Even more than Liam did, really, which made it even worse.

  He pulled back, the last waves of his pleasure still crashing against him even as he trembled and fought against them. He was briefly surprised when the guy didn’t try to do anything, didn’t try to grab him or chide him or gag him again, but he was grateful for it.

  For once, he was the one to head to the door — purposely ignoring the leash on the ground as he walked by it — and waited to be let in.

  He’d rather be asleep in the kennel than trying to come to terms with how thoroughly he’d just lost himself.

  How long would it be before there was no coming back from this?

  Chapter Four:

  Zain

  “Warning me might have been a good idea.” Zain sat down at the table and wrapped his fingers around the beer that Saria shoved in his direction.

  “Where’s the fun in that?” Her voice was cool, but her eyes showed the smirk she was trying to hide.

  Not sure what to say, Zain opened the can and took a long drink. Alcohol might not be the best solution, but he had to get his head wrapped around what had happened too fast to do it completely sober.

  “I have to go back in just a few hours. The vamp wants me to walk his… his puppy again.” Zain finally gave up pretending everything had been normal. “His dog was a guy. A naked guy with a tail.”

  One eyebrow went up. “A guy you did more than just walk, unless you stopped for a quickie on the way back.”

  Zain fought the urge to look away.

  Right. He’d forgotten that his pack would’ve been able to smell the sex and the cum and know exactly what he’d been up to.

  Sort of.

  He wasn’t sure what the hell had happened, but he wasn’t ashamed… just confused. Shrugging, he took another drink. “No quickie. Vamp wants him to have walks twice a day.”

  “Walks,” Brennan, one of the others, said with a smirk. “Can I get one of those walks?”

  “Am I going to have a vamp going off the rails on your ass for playing with his toy?” His pack leader, Aggie, cut in before taking a drink from her own beer.

  “Is that what’s going on over there? Caleb is just a toy for the vamp?” The thirty second meeting with the vamp hadn’t given him much of a chance to get a feel for the guy, but would he really hire a dog walker if it was something like that?

  Saria shrugged. “He’s the one who started the trend with the really fancy pets, the whole… changing them thing.” Her lips pursed, making it clear just what she thought about it. “At first, everyone thought it was a fad and that the guy would end up dead or sold in a week. No idea what’s
really going on, but rumor has it that he bought the house because he thought his pet needed more space than the penthouse of a hotel could provide.” A self-satisfied smile finally broke out over her face. “Or at least that’s what his real estate guy said.”

  Had this shit been front page news?

  Brennan must have seen the confusion on his face because he laughed and explained, “When vamps do anything new, it makes the rounds pretty fast. Other supes either want to copy it if it’s interesting or be able to run the other direction if they’re going batshit crazy.”

  “Even more batshit crazy,” Aggie muttered.

  “Do you think he did?” He was having a hard time wrapping his mind around some of it.

  “What? Buy the house for his pet?” Saria shrugged. “Probably. Sounds nuts, but that’s a house for a family… not a single guy who’s looking to party.”

  Zain had to agree with that, even though he wasn’t sure if Caleb did. The man-pup had given the impression that he was ashamed and weirded out by his own desires, and more than a little pissy with the way the vamp was treating him. Zain couldn’t blame him for that. The vamp obviously didn’t know how to treat a dog, which made the muttered comments about how Caleb was going to gnaw on Liam’s ankles or pee on his shoes understandable.

  He had to briefly wonder if the human actually wanted to be there, but nothing had really given him the impression that Caleb was fighting anything or anyone but himself. It was a given that supes could snatch any human they wanted off the streets, but he didn’t think the man-pup would’ve been that aroused if that had been the case.

  Besides, he heard couples threaten each other with worse every day. Hell, he got to hear Brennan and his girlfriend talk shit at each other on a regular basis through the thin pseudo-walls between their rooms. She’d even threatened to castrate him the night before if he looked at “that bitch” again.

  Zain was evidently the only one who thought that a werewolf calling some woman a bitch was funny, because he hadn’t heard any laughter, but he kept it to himself.

  “You didn’t actually answer my question. Is that vamp going to come after you?” Aggie leaned back in the chair and gave him a long look. “Vamps can get possessive.”

  “He told me to play with the dog.” He shrugged when she shook her head. “He wasn’t treating Caleb like a boyfriend, so I don’t think he’ll be pissed. It was more like… like I was there to entertain his pet and keep him happy.”

  That made what he’d done with Caleb sound… cold. Businesslike.

  It had been anything but that.

  When the pup had finally let himself relax, he’d been happy and wiggly and in desperate need of someone to give him attention. Zain wasn’t going to fool himself into thinking he was anything important beyond a person who played with him and accepted who he was, but it had meant a lot more to him than just some job or even jerking off a guy in a bar.

  Zain just wasn’t sure why.

  Why he was drawn to whatever they called it…

  Why the tail was so damn fascinating…

  Why he wanted to smile and pull Caleb down so he could pet him and watch him relax as a pup…

  “Whatever shit they’re into, you don’t have to play hooker to a vamp’s pet unless that’s what you’re into,” Brennan said. “The pack is strong enough that we don’t pander to just any supe who has a kinky streak.”

  Aggie nodded, the steely look on her face telling him she’d be behind him if he needed it, if he only said the words.

  Zain finally spoke, but it probably wasn’t what any of them had expected. “It’s good.”

  She wasn’t going to let Zain leave it at that. “So what, you like playing big bad werewolf to the human pup?”

  “No.” Caleb hadn’t cared one way or the other about him being a werewolf, and he hadn’t really flaunted it after he’d mentioned being one. “It’s more like… I don’t know. I like watching him forget all the shit that’s going on in the real world and just have fun. When I was taking care of him, it was all I had to think of too. It might sound strange, but it was relaxing.” Relaxing didn’t explain why he’d jerked Caleb off, but thankfully, they seemed content to let that go as long as it wasn’t something he’d been forced into doing.

  Aggie was quiet for a moment, but there was an edge to her voice as she asked, “You gonna get yourself a human pup too?”

  He didn’t even have to think about it. “No.”

  Picturing someone else besides Caleb seemed wrong. Zain knew Caleb wasn’t his, but something was pulling him toward the pup. He just hoped the vamp would understand. Zain wasn’t trying to get between them, but he couldn’t walk away. After his own family had turned their backs on him, he craved that connection. The pack that had taken him in after he’d turned helped, but he hadn’t connected with anyone.

  He wanted to connect with Caleb like that, and Caleb… Caleb needed someone to connect with him more than the vamp seemed to be able to do.

  Aggie seemed to be waiting for more, but when he didn’t volunteer anything else, she shook her head. “I don’t care what you’re into as long as it doesn’t come back and try to go after my pack. That’s when I’ll have an issue with whatever you’re doing with that human pet. Got it?”

  “Yes.” Zain wasn’t sure how to guarantee it all wouldn’t explode in his face, but he didn’t think it was a good idea to tell his alpha that — not that he thought he was fooling his pack leader.

  Most of that was up to the vamp, and he had no idea how Liam was going to react.

  The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur. A few more beers had smoothed over some of his concerns until he wasn’t just ready to go back, but actually looking forward to it. Watching the training in the main hall and having that reminder about how rough the real world was had been a good way to really let everything sink into his brain.

  Zain wasn’t going to worry about how odd it was, and he wasn’t going to let Caleb question it if he could help it either. As he made his way back over to the house, Zain tried to push everything else out of his head and just focus on the pup that was waiting for him — waiting in a kennel that was a little too small and a little too isolated for his taste.

  Puppies needed more stimulation than Liam was providing. They were going to have to talk about that — and the stupid choke collar.

  Knowing it might piss off the vamp, but still convinced he was right, Zain made a short detour before he went to the house. Spending his own money on a collar for someone else’s pet was ridiculous, but the one that Caleb was wearing was too harsh. Even if Zain hadn’t been worried about the physical injuries the collar could inflict, the rough way the collar pressed into Caleb’s neck pulled him out of his role too easily.

  Caleb might’ve liked being a pup when he let himself, but he didn’t seem to be into pain.

  As Zain let himself into the quiet house, his excitement grew. Caleb hadn’t been in the best headspace when he’d left earlier, so he wasn’t surprised by the silence that greeted him as he walked into the nearly empty room. Caleb might’ve still been upset, but Zain was going to do his best to fix that.

  “Hey, Pup, you ready to play?” Zain knew there were probably other pressing needs that the pup needed to take care of as well, but that had embarrassed the pup before. He was going to do his best not to bring up topics that made him feel bad… at least, not until he had to.

  The silence was so deafening that Zain knew it was going to be a long afternoon.

  *****

  Two hours later, Caleb had finally started to warm up to him again.

  It had been a long, somewhat painful two hours, but Zain was patient. He’d rewarded the pup with the new collar, and he’d even seen Caleb start to drop down into that space where he was a pup… the space that was so fascinating because it was so foreign to him. He knew dogs, but he’d never played the role of puppy before.

  He hadn’t managed to keep Caleb in the headspace for long. The stubborn pup kept pulling
out every time they made progress. But he persisted, and the next time Caleb relaxed into the headspace of pup, he stayed there.

  “That’s my good boy,” he praised, keeping his voice low and soothing as Caleb leaned into him. Getting the pup out of the kennel had taken a long time, but now that they were making their way down the hall, Caleb wasn’t in any mood to hurry. “Come on. We’re going to get you fed and run around and play some more.”

  Caleb huffed but started walking faster toward the kitchen. With his new collar, he didn’t seem to mind the leash as much, so it wasn’t as big a process as it had been the first time.

  As they reached the kitchen, Zain looked around, but he didn’t see a bed for Caleb. What was with that? The vamp wanted a pup but didn’t want to make him feel at home or give him safe spaces to curl up in?

  Frustrated, Zain led them both back out to the living room. “Let’s get you something to lay on.”

  Soothing touches and long caresses down Caleb’s body kept him in the right space as Zain grabbed a cushion off one of the chairs. He wasn’t going to feel guilty about using the vamp’s furniture either. If the genius wanted a dog, he needed to make sure he had everything a puppy would need. Caleb was a human puppy, but Zain had a feeling the rule would work for them too.

  Zain positioned the smooth cushion on the floor then pointed to it. “Lay down,” he said as he took the leash off.

  Caleb gave the cushion a long look and poked at it with his mitt-covered hand — his paw — before eventually crawling onto it. It wasn’t quite big enough for him to get comfortable, but it was better than having him sit on the cold floor while Zain got his dinner ready.

  Dinner turned out to be some kind of human-dog kibble that didn’t exactly smell bad but looked fairly unappetizing. Knowing his sense of smell had to be better than the pup’s though, he didn’t think it would be too bad for Caleb.

  When he moved to fill the dish on the floor, he paused and frowned again. Bigger dogs needed their bowls higher so they could eat more comfortably. “This guy needs a book or something. This is just ridiculous.”