Little Red

Part 3

'Jane,' a voice called to her from inside her mind, a masculine voice whose call was so absolute it allowed no arguments. 'Jane, come to me… Jane…'

Jane Foster did her best to block out the sound and focus on caring for her ailing grandmother during the day, but at night – oh, at night – the call became so much stronger, so much less ignorable, she nearly lost herself to it countless times. She'd find herself awake at night, her body shaking from all her effort to dismiss the voice that spoke to her. Jane had always considered herself brighter than most, pushing away superstitions and blind religious faith for her science, but this… Oh, it had to be the very devil the good book talked of!

"The devil has cursed me," she mumbled to herself one morning, a week after she'd first arrived at her grandmother's cabin to care for her, "but why has God allowed it?" In her innocents, Jane could only assume it was punishment for the perversity she'd bared witness to in the Wilkerson's barn between William and Darcy Lewis, or perhaps it was punishment for the things she'd felt afterwards? For it was then, she recalled, that the dreams began. Erotic dreams of passion and heated desire between her and a man whose only feature she could make out in the darkness was yellow eyes. He'd take her until she was possessed with lust and, as they climaxed together, he'd sink his teeth into her neck. Then she'd see her reflection, whether in a window's glass or the river's water, her own yellow eyes staring back at her. It was always enough, on the few occasions she did sleep anymore, to wake her – heart beating wildly, left arm burning, and sweat coating her body.

Sif had come to visit her once, two days after she'd first arrived to see to their grandmother, and given the state of the elderly woman's health, encouraged Jane to stay.

"Frigga Odinson's nephew from Blithe is staying with her while the other menfolk are off in the hunting party," her sister had said kindly. "I'll see if he wouldn't mind lending you some extra firewood until she's well."

Jane was going to argue, but a tiny knot of desperation tightened in her stomach as her gaze cast towards her grandmother's room. "I'll fix him lunch," were the words that left her mouth instead.

So it was, a day later Loki Laufeyson wondered out to the little cabin in the woods, and knocked gently on its door. His grey eyes seemed to take Jane in before a smirk somewhere between friendly and lecherous pulled at his lips. Her first instinct was the slam the door in his face, or maybe slap him, she wasn't certain, but Jane instead fell back on her social graces and opened the door wider for him. It took him three trips outside the cabin and back to pile all the wood he'd brought in a corner by the hearth.

Conversation that first visit was minimal, despite how handsome Jane found him and how obviously charming he was being. She found she had an irresistible urge to tell him anything and everything but her stubbornness made her hold her tongue. The next time he arrived, however, he spun fascinating tells of his travels and of life in the city of Blithe. He told her of his love and loss of his mother, and of his loving but strict father. He told her of his friends and then he revealed his father's secret hope for sending him to Snow Haven to find a bride.

"A wife," Jane questioned in disbelief as they sat in front of the living room's fireplace. On that particular day it had decided to snow, and so Jane had offered for Loki to stay a bit after lunch to warm himself before heading back into the village. Currently, they were seated before the hearth, barely an inch apart, on top of some old bear and elk furs, a blue knitted woolen blanket wrapped around their shoulders.

Loki nodded his head, staring into the fire and swallowing thickly before chancing a glance back at the girl next to him. "Forgive me if this is too forward," he said, his eyes suddenly very intense as he locked them with hers, "but I think you're that girl, Jane."

"What," she sputtered out in shock.

"Marry me," he almost demanded, his large, slender hands reaching out to claim hers with their warmth. "Please, Jane," he said softly, with something desperate in his eyes that made her sacred regions clench.

"I," she started but faltered. "There is another who has asked for my hand," Jane revealed reluctantly. "He went off with the hunting party before I could answer." Before she was ever officially asked, more like, but she wasn't about to claim semantics. "I believe I should properly reply to his proposal before I accept yours."

Loki's eyes had dimmed, then began to harden as she'd talked, but upon reaching the end of her explanation, his grey orbs had brightened and snapped back to hers. "Accept," a true smile stretching across his face. "Do you really mean it, Jane?"

She found his happiness infectious, her own lips spreading into a wide grin as she nodded her head. "I do," she all but giggled. The faint sound of her grandmother's cough from the next room sobered her quickly from her giddiness. "Loki," she started, not certain what she was going to ask when the swift movement of his tongue wetting his lips caught her attention.

"Yes, Jane?"

She swallowed, her eyes not moving from his lips as she desperately fought back the brazen impulse that had suddenly seemed to possess her.

"Ja-" he'd began to question again, only to be cut off as her lips collided with his own.

She was kissing him.

His mate.

His Jane.

His.

Loki groaned, his hands moving to wrap one around her waist, and the other in her hair. He temporarily lost himself in the smell of her, the feel of her, the taste… Saints preserve him, the taste of her! Already, he could tell his little spit fire was accepting their bound, was ready for him to claim her even. Her little hands, even now, were pulling him down on top of her as she laid back against the furs before the hearth, her legs unconsciously bending to hook around his hips to align their clothed arousals.

"Jane," he whispered huskily between hungry kisses, his insides turning with fear at the moment he'd need to open his eyes again. The wolf was too close to the surface, there was no way for him to disguise their lupine glow. "Jane."

"Hmm," she murmured distractedly in responds, her lips trailing down his neck, her teeth nipping playfully. He made a noise, somewhere between a growl and a purr, his hips bucking against her once of their own accord. She moaned, his name ripped from her throat as her head fell back, exposing her neck to him. The whole thing was so surreal, so erotic, Loki feared he might embarrass himself. Then her eyes opened, those lovely deep pools of melted chocolate, and looked into his own and widened.

"You," she exclaimed. "You're the man with the yellow eyes!"

Loki felt instantly sobered, and pulled back to observe her with a forced coldness. "I am," he stated plainly, mentally preparing himself for the heartache that was bound to come from her refusal of him. Of course she wouldn't marry him now, he thought bitterly. Why settle for a beast when she could marry his handsome oaf of a cousin? He wouldn't stop her, he decided, he loved her too much to intentionally cause her any form of distress.

"You're…you're the wolf," her soft voice question, shock evident as she spoke. "Wolf's Time isn't just a silly superstition then?"

"It was made during the time of my grandfather and father," he admitted. "And no, no one save you knows what I am. Well, no mortals on any account."

"But you've told me," she asked.

He nodded, forcing himself to stand when all he wanted to do was bury himself again in her warm, soft heat. "And this is where I leave you, Jane Foster," his said, his voice sounding too hard even to his own ears.

"Wait," she called after him as he left her there in her grandmother's cabin. "Loki, wait!"

He heard her voice, the sheer panic in it, but forced himself to turn away and ran as fast as his legs would carry him before his transformation. The wolf was wild that night, and fierce. He killed every sacrifice left for him, and even decimated a few flocks of sheep left unattended in the fields, stopping only when he realized he wasn't angry. No, he admitted as he transformed back and washed the blood away in the river, he was heartbroken.

A/N: Am currently working on the next (and final) part. Hopefully it will be up sometime between later today and Monday. You guys have been amazing. Thanks for reading, and if you see any typos let me know and I'll fix them!