‘That’s what I’m doing here. Researching folk tales, trying to find out why we like to scare ourselves with stories about creatures who are part man, part wolf. If you ask me –’

And he hadn’t, wasn’t at all sure he liked where this conversation might be heading, feeling the wolf in him respond to some unspoken threat. His hackles had risen and his hands gripped at the table, like claws, but Neil seemed oblivious to the change in his posture.

‘We’re terrified of wolves and what they can do to us, but if we’d only admit it, deep down we envy their power, their grace,’ Neil said. ‘But you know what it’s like, don’t you, Logan? We always want what we can’t have …’

That, at least, he could agree with. He relaxed a little, feeling the immediate threat pass. ‘So you’re a writer?’

Neil shook his head. ‘I’m a lecturer in anthropology. I work at the University of Inverness. But you don’t want to hear about that.’ He rose from the table. ‘Can I get you another cup of tea, more toast?’

‘No, thanks. I’ve had plenty,’ he replied, guiltily aware he’d already eaten the best part of half a loaf.

‘Well, I haven’t had chance to find you any fresh clothes, so why don’t you come through to the bedroom and we can see what I have that might fit.’

As soon as he stepped into the bedroom, he knew he was lost. Neil’s scent, which pervaded the whole cottage, was strongest here, trapped in the fibres of the bedsheets and the clothes hanging in the wardrobe. His cock surged up, harder than ever. Seemingly oblivious to the effect it was having on his tormented senses, Neil rifled through shirts, jackets and trousers, pulling out a pair of jeans, faded to the palest blue through repeated washing. He tossed them onto the bed.

‘Here, I think these should fit you. Lucky we’re about the same size, eh?’

Those words only conjured up an image of their two bodies, twining together in the most intimate of ways, tongues licking bare skin, hands reaching for hard cocks. Heat inflamed his senses, and he bit back a whimper of lust. Please, he thought, watching Neil add a plain white T-shirt, undershorts and socks to the pile of clothes on the bed, give a sign. Let me know you want me the way I want you.

Neil turned, about to say something. He stopped, his gaze dropping to the front of the towel, and he licked his lips in a reflexive gesture.

‘Is … is that for me?’

He nodded. ‘This is what you do to me, Neil. I can’t help it. I want you like I’ve never wanted anyone before.’

‘But – but you don’t even know me.’ To his ears, the protest sound half-hearted. Everything about the other man’s body language told him their desire was mutual. If he wasn’t mistaken, the bulge in the front of Neil’s robe was just as prominent as his own, and the musky scent emanating from him had deepened, taking on a delicious, salty overtone.

‘Does that matter?’

‘No … No, I suppose it doesn’t.’

With that, Neil took a pace forward, then another, till their bodies were only inches apart. Now, there could be no delaying the inevitable. Instinct took over, and he almost threw himself at Neil, pinning the man to the bedroom wall and covering his face with hot, slobbering kisses. The response was equally passionate, Neil’s fingers twining in his still-damp curls and his lips seeking out Logan’s, so the kisses became deeper, drawing every ounce of breath from his body.

Somewhere in their lusty struggles, the knot in his towel had come undone and it had slithered to the floor, leaving him bare. He tugged at the fastening of Neil’s robe, desperate to get to what lay beneath the soft navy material. The front of the man’s shorts was already damp with precome, as he reached into the fly opening and wrapped his fingers around the hot, hard cock concealed there. Hearing Neil hiss between his teeth, the sound tense and urgent, it was all he could do not to let loose the howl that lurked in his own throat.

‘Need you naked,’ he muttered, aware that his words were becoming incoherent growls as his animal needs subsumed the human part of his brain. ‘Need to fuck you.’

Neil didn’t object, allowing himself to be bundled onto the bed with its crumpled, fragrant sheets and letting the robe be stripped from him. The shorts were tugged down so hastily they ripped along the seam. He made to toss them to the floor, but Neil’s sex-scent was strong on them, and he put the ruined underwear to his nose, breathing it in.

Then everything fled his mind but the need to be inside Neil, and he pushed his lover face down, feeling the strength of wolf and man combined surging through his veins as he held him in place.

‘God, you’re rough,’ Neil moaned beneath the weight of him, wriggling in what seemed to him a vain attempt to try and reassert some form of control, ‘but I can’t pretend I don’t like it.’

He didn’t reply, too busy licking and nipping a wet trail down the length of Neil’s back to the taut moons of his arse cheeks. He bit each one in turn, savouring the faint saltiness of his skin. This was the one he was meant to be with – every moment he spent touching him, tasting him, breathing him in only made him more certain of that, even though nothing he’d learnt from the rest of his pack had ever suggested that one of his kind was destined to mate with a human. But he wasn’t part of the pack any more; they couldn’t judge him as he buried his face in the crease between Neil’s buttocks, snuffling and lapping at the tight, dark hole there.