by Lisa Hughey
Shasa was wearing a pair of tight, faded blue jeans with a button fly and the seams worn white. Her top was a thin crinkled cotton with a white embroidered embellishment at the cuffs and the V neckline. The waist was defined by a series of elastic stitching that cinched her brown skin and left a small line of skin visible when she moved certain ways.
Her fingers moved to the brass button at her waist and she flicked the first one open with economical movements.
“What are you doing?” he rasped, his voice trapped in his throat by the lust that overwhelmed him. His heart boomed so hard that he could barely hear her response.
“The mark is….” She flicked open the second button.
His throat was so dry he needed to open his mouth and grab moisture from the gently pouring rain.
Her fingers were strong, tensile, her nails short and slightly discolored with a rainbow of paint colors beneath. With no nonsense moves, she pushed open the V to reveal the paler flesh of her belly. Scalloped white lace panties that matched the bra beneath her shirt peeked through her fingers until she pushed the delicate, sexy fabric out of the way. Her mark was low on her belly, right over the second chakra, the sacral chakra, a pleasure center. The three rings that resembled a target symbol were barely visible in the misty gray air.
Zach dropped to his knees.
He wouldn’t confess that for a moment, he’d gone weak. That his body refused to support him as all blood zoomed to his cock. The second chakra was the center of emotion, pleasure and sensuality. He gripped her hips in his hands, the damp jeans abraded his rough palms. He had to have close contact with her mark in order to do the final transfer of power. He hadn’t really thought through this situation because this particular issue had never been a problem before.
“What do you…have to do?” Her voice trembled.
“It will only take a minute. But I must touch you with my mouth.”
“Oh,” she said faintly as if she were as affected as he was.
Heat rose from her skin and seared him. Zach’s nose was mere inches away from her belly. He inhaled slowly, absorbing her lavender and pinon scent into his lungs, committing her unique smell to his memory. A lighter musk of arousal entwined with the aroma of her skin. Damn the Cosmos, she was as turned on as he was.
He couldn’t think about that right now.
Best to get this over with. Zach held back a groan as he pressed his lips to the mark and pushed the balance of her power into her body. The moment his mouth touched her soft skin, her muscles contracted at the contact.
A soft, “Oh,” broke the air.
The transfer was over but Zach couldn’t draw away from her. The lace from her panties scraped against his chin and he nuzzled her belly with his nose. The carnal urge to press his mouth to the spot and taste her skin, her essence beat in his pulse like a heavy bass.
“I need to taste you.” He’d spoken those words to her before. Long ago. Just like the last time, he went against all sensibility and gave in to his baser instincts.
He swirled his tongue once over her mark. The forbidden caress fired his blood. He was about to back away when her fingers twisted in his hair and pulled him tight against her skin. And she moaned.
The sound was barely there over the rushing river, the fall of rain on her mother’s tin roof, and the shush of tires on the wet pavement. But he heard the sensual groan as if she’d screamed from the top of the mountain.
His cock stiffened, beat against his zipper with frantic insistence.
Cosmos be damned, he knew he needed to stop. But three hundred years of abstinence tested his resolve.
He wanted to ravage her. To press her down to the patchy grass and lay his body over hers, ribcage to ribcage, her breasts pillowing his harder pectorals, their sexes aligned with a perfection he knew would be there. To tangle their legs together, like water seeking water, their bodies would mix perfectly.
He couldn’t resist her. Within an hour of seeing her again, Zach was acting against the tenets that had been in place for over a thousand years. Archangel and human were not supposed to have sexual congress. While he might have given his public support for Luci and Jed because she had loosened free something inside him, that didn’t mean that the Realm was on board with the sexual mix of Archangel and human. And yet, Zach wanted to worship her.
He might have given in to that urge. Except, Shasa’s knees buckled and she began to fall. Her consciousness stripped away by the lust that consumed them both.
***
Port Royal, Jamaica
1692
Shasa twirled around in the ocean, the sleek salt water caressed her skin and soaked her shift. The sun seared the top of her head. She wished that Zach were here.
He had kissed her!
Shasa held the memory tight, keeping the giddiness to herself, like a precious piece of candy waiting to be savored on Christmas morn. His lips had been soft, yet firm. The press of his mouth against hers had been shockingly intimate.
Shasa kicked onto her back, letting the hot sun sear her skin. She’d be even darker and Maman would yell at her but she didn’t care.
He’d kissed her. And she couldn’t wait until he did it again.
“What are you doing out here alone?” His voice was gruff in her ear.
Shasa shrieked and kicked away from him. He’d startled her yet again.
Her lashes spiked with seawater as she peered at him. “Zach.” His name came out breathy and with a squeak. She shivered with desire. She waved her arms forward and back as she tread water, careful not to let her skirts get caught up in her legs.
She was looking at him but his gaze wasn’t connecting with hers. His eyes were fixed elsewhere. Shasa glanced down to see what he was staring at, and saw her breasts, barely covered by the sheer, wet shift. The darker skin around her erect nipples was puckered and clearly visible in the midday sun.
“You...shouldn’t be out here like that.” He shifted his gaze to the shoreline, careful not to look at her again.
Was she so repulsive that he couldn’t even look at her bosoms? “Are you…are you so disgusted by my form then?” All the longing for him that she’d suppressed transformed into an aching void and invaded her joyous heart, weighting her down with sadness.
“What?” He whipped his gaze back to hers, brows arched down as he frowned. His deep rum eyes were hot with something, not disgust, and he devoured her with his attention. She’d seen that look in men’s eyes. Desire. So…she was not repulsive to him.
“You wouldn’t even look at me.” A fervent hope spread through her like the heat of a fine liquor. His gaze was intoxicating, and a sensual lethargy warmed her belly, spreading through her like molten fire.
“I’m trying to be respectful,” he countered.
“What if that isn’t what I want?” Anticipation blossomed into an innate aggressiveness. She didn’t want respect. She wanted passion.
“You’re a girl. You don’t know what you’re asking.”
Suddenly she remembered that power. The power she’d felt when they had kissed just yesterday. So instead of asking, she demanded, “Show me.”
“Show....” he trailed off, his gaze once more arrowing to her nearly exposed breasts.
Shasa kicked up just a little so that the bobbing globes would tempt him. “Please,” she whispered, licked her lips, prayed he would come closer.
Then he was there. His body giving off a heat that seared hotter than the intense Caribbean sun. Zach reached out a trembling hand until his palm hovered above her chilled and exposed mounds.
Shasa curled her fingers around his wrist and slowly brought his hand to her body. Leaning her head back, she closed her eyes against the bright sun. Vibrant colors burst behind her eyelids as liquid heat pooled in her nether regions. Zach had cupped her breast in his large palm, his thumb brushed back and forth over her painfully hard nipple, the sensation so exquisite she held her breath. Wonder and joy whipped through her like a hurricane.
S
he had wanted him for what felt like forever.
With her head back and her legs churning to hold her up, Shasa’s lower body eased closer to Zach’s. A swell pushed them together and something hard brushed against her belly.
Zach groaned and leaned down to brush a kiss on the plump flesh above the transparent cotton. Desire shimmied through her.
Shasa cupped his head as he licked along the edge of her shift. She threaded her fingers through his wet curls and held on tightly as unexpected sensations slithered through her body, heating her from the inside. Her private place tingled and the sense of being empty assailed her.
Was this desire? This building need that coursed through her seemed nothing like the rutting and coupling, grunts and groans and near violent thrusts, of the pirates in Port Royal.
Instead a longing for completion swelled inside her like the ocean in a storm. She needed something. She knew he could give it to her.
“What are you doing to me?” she whispered against his forehead.
With a groan, he pushed away from her.
“You’re right. You’re right.” Zach shoved his hand through his wet hair, slicking the strands away from his face and revealing his tortured gaze. “I shouldn’t touch you.”
Shasa reached for his hand again. “It was wonderful.” She boldly feathered a kiss across his lips. The waves were becoming increasingly rough and impelled her against that mysterious hardness again. “What is this?”
He laughed. His entire face lit up with a mischief, and his eyes sparkled like the sun on the waves. “My rod very much appreciates your sheer, revealing shift.”
Shasa held onto his shoulders, her eyes rounding in surprise. “But it feels so big.”
“You are certainly good for the ego.” Zach laughed again, a smile of wickedness quirked his lips.
She wanted to know what it felt like. Shasa ran her fingers down his bare chest and rippled stomach, marveling at his slick wet skin. She was momentarily distracted by how hard and smooth he was. His breeches sagged low on his hips and there at the waist she saw just the tip of his cock peeking through the edge of the material.
With naïve eagerness, she brushed her fingertip across the head curiously. Zach groaned again, and he sucked in his stomach.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No, sweet. That doesn’t hurt.”
As she ran her finger over the growing tip again, her own body clenched in response to his swelling erection. “It feels good then?”
“More than good.” But Zach was no longer watching her. He brought both hands up to cup her breasts, one in each hand, pushing her nature’s bounty up to his waiting mouth. “I need to taste you.”
The sheer longing in his throaty words had her nodding agreement. Before she could blink, he closed his lips around her nipple.
Shasa gasped as he sucked lightly on her breast. An answering tug jerked low in her belly. No wonder the people of Port Royal were always doing this. It felt amazing.
Shasa wanted to bring him pleasure. She thought about how good his hands felt on her body and decided to experiment. She cupped his cock through his breeches, rubbing her thumb over the tip while caressing the long hard length of him.
“Oh, my.” She panted as he sucked harder on her breast.
Her sex throbbed. A tumult of sensations tumbled through her. Love, arousal, happiness, and an aching emptiness that spread throughout her, reaching toward every nerve ending, bleeding through her skin, until she knew she needed him. Only him.
Only Zach could fill her and ease this yearning.
When their legs tangled together, her sex rubbed against his thick muscular thigh and the throbbing eased slightly.
“Oh.”
In a desperate twist, he slid his palms beneath her buttocks, lifting her higher along his massive thigh, increasing the pressure against her sex. His cock pulsed thick and hard against her belly, everywhere they touched sizzling hot.
Zach ran his tongue up the long line of her neck, with her head thrown back and his fingers digging into her buttocks she slid along his thigh, an odd tension gripping her.
“Zach.” She began to tremble as sensation after sensation soared through her body. She rocked against his naked chest, the wall of muscle hard against her breasts. The incredible pressure built and she felt as if with one small move, she would break apart into a thousand pieces and dissolve into a puddle of satisfaction.
Shasa closed her eyes, absorbing the scents and the sounds. The wet fabric of her shift abrading her sex with each slip and slide against his thigh. His breath hot on her neck, as he skimmed his mouth over any bare skin he could find. The harsh sound of their breaths. The soft shush of the waves, the squawk of the gulls overhead, the salt on his skin and in her hair.
With one final glide over his breech-clad leg, white lights exploded beneath her eyelids, her body going incandescent as she became deaf and dumb to everything but the sensation of his body rubbing against hers and the intimate caress of skin against skin, mouth against mouth.
His shout was hoarse, as his warm seed jetted against her stomach and then he captured her mouth in a passionate kiss.
Wonder filled her. She had almost lost her innocence.
Gods, she wanted it gone. She could tell from the last few moments that there was more. And she wanted to experience it all.
Zach’s forehead rested against the curve where her neck met her shoulder, his breath sawed in and out, the heaving puffs of air sprinkled goosebumps over her skin. He clasped her tight. Love gushed through her. She wanted to know what it felt like. What it was like to lie with a man. And he was the one who was going to show her.
“Dammit,” he groaned.
His obvious upset crushed her hopes. “Did I…do something wrong?”
He pushed her hair away from her face and pressed his lips to her forehead. “Of course not. You are the epitome of innocence. It’s I who have soiled you.”
“Soiled?” She understood soiled doves. But those women engaged in sordid encounters in filthy back rooms of raucous taverns. What she had done with Zach didn’t feel dirty.
“This was not wrong,” she said fiercely. Something so beautiful could not possibly be wrong.
“Of course not.” Zach curled his arms around her shoulders and squeezed her tight against his chest. “You could never be dirty. You are air and light and purity. I am the one who has sinned.”
An aching wound opened in her chest as she absorbed his disgust. She defended, “There was nothing ugly or sordid about what we just did.”
He pushed her out of his arms.
“You are beautiful.” The regret in his gaze wounded her deep inside where hope had lived. She hadn’t really believed they had a future, but every time he touched her it was as if the Universe settled into place. Everything became clearer. Everything became brighter. And her soul was happy, loved, at peace.
How could that be wrong?
Eight
Shasa’s head throbbed. The low murmur of the television in the background was merely white noise that pulsed along her nerve endings. She lay against the soft, well-worn wedding ring quilt on her mother’s guest room bed and took stock of the rest of her body. A low frequency of vitalizing energy hummed through her.
She blinked. She wasn’t nauseous. At all.
The constant roil of her stomach had been with her for so long that it took her a minute or two to figure out what was different. The sickness was gone. She stretched, pushing her hands above her head and pointing her toes toward the wall.
She felt…great.
For a second she wondered if Zach had been right. Had she been staying away from water all these years because of a misconception?
She still didn’t want to go anywhere near the river or any other large body of water. She was still terrified of drowning. But after being in the rain, she could almost feel herself drying out as she lay there. Experimentally she measured each area of her body, searching for aches, pains, hurts. Instead of a
ches, she felt….
Alive.
Vital.
She relived that moment when Zach had pressed his mouth to her belly and arousal hummed deep in her body, and then she’d passed out. The memory was visceral, intense.
Then, she’d had a new dream.
She’d been in the ocean again. Zach had been there. Her Zach. She shuddered because she knew he wasn’t hers and yet, she still couldn’t call him anything else.
The man here wasn’t exactly her Zach. He was similar, but not quite the same. In her dream his hair had been longer, befitting the time period the dream seemed to take place in.
She vividly remembered the colors, the feel of the water cradling her, the sensation of his arms around her. Remembered the sense of wonder, discovery, and the love that had bled from every pore of her being.
As if she conjured him, Zach leaned into her vision.
Shasa let out a little shriek. “Oh my God. You scared me.” Her heart banged against her ribcage. Hard.
“You okay?”
She pushed into sitting and rested against the decorative pillows on the bed in the guest bedroom her mom kept for her but that she never used. Because unlike dream girl, she hated being anywhere near water. She avoided Oregon at all costs.
“What happened?”
“You passed out.”
“That’s insane.”
Zach frowned. His dark brows slashed down, and concern darkened his eyes to a rich cocoa as he peered at her. “You feel better?”
Shasa nodded slowly. She didn’t think he realized how close he was. But she did. The ozone from the rain and the sharp scent of warm male overtook her senses making her dizzy again.
What was happening to her? Could he have drugged her?
She narrowed her gaze. “Did you slip me something in that cup of water?”
“What?” Zach jerked away from her, then dismissed her concerns. “We don’t have time for this nonsense. I need you operational.”
The one thing that fainting did for her was to get her system back on track and her mind away from his hypnotic persuasion. There was no way that story he spouted was true. “Why would the Archangel of Forgiveness have anything to do with stopping tsunamis?” She attacked, trying to find some weakness in his story, trying to trip him up.
