The Claimed (Sin Hunters)

by Caridad Piñeiro

  He dropped his head and faced her, his eyes blazing with the neon brightness of his real spirit. The aura surrounding his body was a clean sapphire blue limned with silver, like the surface of the ocean on a sun-drenched summer day. Tendrils of white and navy calmly swam in the field of his life force.

  “Light Hunter pure,” Victoria faintly whispered and dropped her energy shield. Walking toward him, she released her own Hunter vitality until the edges of their auras touched.

  There was no stopping the melding of their energies. They rushed over the couple with the speed of a Hunter in flight along the winds of the cosmos.

  Christopher shook from the force of Victoria’s aura. From deep within him his own life force answered, yanking alive painful need. His body hardened and his erection swelled to near bursting beneath his jeans, but deep inside, he hoped for it to be about more than satisfying the physical.

  Laying his hand at her waist, he eased her near, and their fields of energy were as one, surrounding their bodies in a blaze of brilliant waves of shimmering aqua and sapphire as a testament to their common affinity. Her eyes gleamed with teal light, and as her gaze traveled over him, observing every inch of his body, it was as potent as any caress.

  But he needed more. He needed to touch her. And he suspected that after this joining was done, he would still want more from her. He would want her to declare her love, sensing she was unprepared to do it this night, much as he was not yet ready.

  He raised his hand to the neck of her light cotton tank top. Ran a finger along the line of it, watching with satisfaction as her nipples puckered into tight peaks.

  She drew in a shaky breath and whispered, “Touch me.”

  But Christopher couldn’t just touch. And he couldn’t wait, so great was his need to have her.

  Taking the fabric of her shirt and the lightweight bra in his hands, he tore them apart with one powerful tug, ripping them open to her waist. Spilling free her full breasts with their pebbled coral tips. With a tug of the hand at her waist, he pulled her forward until those breasts flattened against the hardness of his chest.

  Her sharp gasp attested to her shock at his actions. As their gazes locked, he saw the mirror of his passion in her eyes. At that realization, they released the hunger they had been containing.

  They tore at each other, removing clothing in their haste to have skin against skin. To allow every inch of their life forces to contact, creating a whirl of energy passing through their bodies.

  Christopher cupped her breasts as he brought his mouth down to hers, kissing her. Parting his lips to accept the dance of her tongue along his as she encircled him with one hand while cupping his balls with the other. He groaned at the smoothness of her skin and the heat of her hands.

  Her soft cries into his mouth drove him on and he ripped away from her to bend and taste those rock-hard nipples. He rolled his tongue around them and teethed the tips, eliciting a rough shudder from her that reverberated through his body.

  He nearly came and she knew. She rubbed that first drop of moisture along the head of his penis and then brought that finger between her legs, spreading the dampness along her cleft.

  “Sweet goddess,” he called out, and dropped to his knees, grasped her buttocks with his hands to keep her near as he dipped his tongue in to lick the center of her, wishing they were near a bed so he could lay her down and take his time exploring. But there would be no finesse this time. No waiting.

  She was salty sweet, drenched with the juices of their desire. He licked all along her sex before driving his tongue into her, preparing her.

  Urging her thighs apart with a nudge of his head, he slowly rose, kissing his way up her body as he trailed his erection along the smooth skin of her thighs to the center of her.

  He delayed then, the tip of him poised at her entrance, the heat and wet of her bathing him. He locked his gaze with hers and waited. He needed her to recognize her own want, which she did with a slow dip of her head before she lowered her hand and guided him into her.

  The tip of his erection sheathed in her created the first quiver of connection as their energies and bodies became one.

  They both shook and cried out, aware there was no turning back now.

  He drove into her and she lifted herself, burying him deep as she wrapped her legs around his waist. She encircled his shoulders with her arms and met his mouth with hers. As their energies combined, it sang along the synapses and sinews of their bodies. The power surged from one to the other as their forces formed a perfect circuit.

  Christopher staggered with her wrapped around him until her back rebounded against the living room wall as he sought stability. He brought his hands around to cradle her back from the hardness of the wall and eased out of her before driving back in. Each stroke created pleasurable friction and a sympathetic vibration at her core.

  Victoria pressed her hips down into him, striving for release. Needing to feel the explosion of the forces gathering in her center. She marveled at the shimmering field of aqua and sapphire surrounding them, streaming with bits of life.

  As her pleasure built with the shift of his hips, the threads of life quivered and danced in their auras. Slipped in and out of their bodies until the moment came, hanging brightly in her vision. Tightening her body like the string on a bow.

  He arched his back, lost in his own release as he shot his seed deep within her and she climaxed, drawing it in.

  Their auras surged outward like a supernova before being sucked back into their cores, and yet she still sensed their individual nature. Realized that although they had joined physically, they had not been bound by their Equinoxes.

  Bodies shaking and breath rough from the force of the union, they held each other and kissed. Gentled each other as the reality of what had just occurred settled in.

  Christopher didn’t want to leave the comfort of her body, but he could feel the weakness in both of them. He didn’t know how much longer he could stay on his feet. Tenderly, he eased from her and picked her up in his arms. At the question in his gaze, she said, “Outside. The hot tub is fed from the river.”

  With a nod, he took an unsteady step and then another, moving out the door to the balcony and then down the two flights of steps to the hot tub tucked privately close to the house.

  He eased her down carefully into the Jacuzzi. She hit a few buttons along the edge and the water began to swirl.

  He joined her, the side of his hip against hers. His arm draped around her as the two of them sank up to their necks in the heated water as it shifted around them. The liquid was alive with the energy of the minute life forces of the river within it, recharging them. Reawakening desire as Victoria rolled onto him, straddling his hips, and framing his face between her hands. She ran the smooth pads of her fingers against the rasp of his evening beard.

  “Why didn’t it happen?” she wondered aloud, and was surprised at the hint of disappointment in her voice. She had wanted him physically, but had been uncertain about bonding with him for that reason alone. Now that it hadn’t happened, she should have been glad, but instead…

  Christopher ran his hand along her hair, shook his head, and shrugged. “Maybe there is too much difference between us. Between our energies.”

  “You don’t believe that for a moment, do you?” How could he when from the very first moment they had come near each other their life forces had been pulling them together?

  He slipped his hand beneath the weight of her dampened hair and cupped her jaw, caressing the line of it with his thumb. His eyes were almost sad as he looked up at her and said, “Maybe it takes more than what exists between us.”

  CHAPTER

  17

  Rafael still could not believe that Mike was dead. No one was supposed to have been hurt. Maya had promised that their only interest had been in Adam Bruno, but his fellow cadre member had died protecting Victoria.

  Victoria, he thought, as he parked and rushed across the street to her home. She had been a
ngry with him for his absence at the compound and his very public challenge. Had he also detected a bit of mistrust in her posture?

  He had to make things right with her, but as he neared her yard, he sensed it—the pulse of immense Hunter power. Too great a mass of energy to be just Victoria alone.

  Was one of the other Quinchus with her? he wondered, approaching the gate to her yard, but as he did so, he heard voices.

  A man and a woman. Victoria. Christopher? he thought, his temper rising swiftly.

  He marched to the entrance to the fence closing off her backyard, but paused as the voices became more distinct, along with the uniqueness of their life forces. Their energy pulled at him with its strength, arousing not just desire, but ever greater anger and guilt.

  Christopher, he confirmed. A Shadow Hunter.

  On the night one of their own had died at the hands of the Darkness, Victoria was apparently sleeping with the enemy.

  Rage bubbled up within him. At Victoria. At himself.

  He had betrayed his people, but Victoria had betrayed them as well. Fists clenched, he reached for the gate, intending to seek revenge for Mike. For himself.

  But as he laid his hand on the wood, the sweetness of her was carried on a sea breeze to him and her life force sang within him. So caring and so pure.

  Despite his rage, he could not destroy such beauty. But he would not let the Shadow savor it either. He would have it for himself, Rafael thought.

  And he knew just the person who could make that possible.

  Maya. She owed him for messing up tonight’s plan. Besides, she wanted the tainted Shadow Christopher for her own and Rafael knew she wouldn’t stop until that was accomplished.

  Just as he wouldn’t stop until he had Victoria beneath him, calling out his name. Sharing her energy and Equinox with him so that the clan’s future would be secured.

  Racing away from the scene of her betrayal, Rafael planned what he would do and imagined how he would suck the life from the Dark One who had ruined Victoria.

  Victoria considered Christopher, wondering at what had prompted his statement.

  “I always knew the bonding between my parents was not as strong as it should be. I watched my mother wither away in a relationship that lacked love,” he said, opening himself up to her.

  Victoria welcomed his attempt at intimacy of a different kind, because whatever this was between them could not grow without honesty.

  “I was luckier. My parents cared for each other deeply and… that’s what I want for me. Not just a relationship based on obligation or necessity.”

  He grunted his agreement and stroked his thumb along her jaw once again with one hand while with the other he urged her close.

  “I want that, too,” he confessed, and she laid her head against his shoulder, their bodies plastered together as the revitalizing liquid washed over them. The water bore the lingering traces of heat from the long summer day, but nothing could compare to Christopher’s intense heat as he tucked her tight against him, the throb of his energy sparking her essence. Between her legs came the quiver of expectation and her nipples stiffened into pebbly peaks that brushed along the soft hair on his chest as she moved.

  His erection jerked beneath her belly and hardened.

  Despite all her misgivings, she wanted him again and let him know, covering him with her center as she braced her hands on his chest.

  “This feels right, doesn’t it?” he asked as he cupped her breasts and lazily stroked his thumbs back and forth across her nipples.

  “Yes, it does,” she replied and bit back a moan when he took each tip between thumb and forefinger and tenderly kneaded them.

  “It will take time to understand this. Understand each other,” he admitted, nuzzling her face with his before biting the tender skin just beneath her jaw. Then he licked the spot before opening his mouth and sucking the skin.

  He was marking her physically, much as he had already left his signature on her aura with the kiss of his power.

  Over and over he pulled at her skin with the suction of his mouth and each tug yanked at her center until she had to fill the emptiness. Reaching down, she guided him to her and eased down onto him.

  His breath exploded against her skin roughly and when he looked up, bits of neon glittered in his gaze. She could see the teal of her own eyes reflected back in his, but she reined in her Hunter power, wanting to savor his physical presence.

  As if understanding her reaction, he harnessed his energy. Running his hands down her sides to grasp her waist, he guided her movement as she rode him, her movements slow at first as she enjoyed the languid slide of flesh along flesh. Their skin warmed from the growing heat of the sexual friction.

  The waters lapped around them from the motion of her body. It splashed up onto his chest and she shifted her hands down across that slick skin and the hard brown nubs. She caressed them with her fingers and he smiled. “I like that,” he admitted, and she grinned, bent and bit the tip of one, earning a more powerful thrust of his hips into her.

  Christopher skimmed his hand up and held her head to him, tangling his fingers in the silky strands of her toffee-colored brown hair. Kissing her temple, he then whispered against the shell of her ear, “I’m not sure I’ll ever get enough of you.”

  Her body quaked and then she sat down, driving him deep into her. She cupped her own breasts and offered them up to Christopher, also wanting more of him.

  He surged upward, sitting so that he could kiss her nipples. Suck them into his mouth before licking all around them.

  Victoria wrapped her arms around his head, held him close as she began to move once again. Shifting her hips, she stroked him ever closer to climax as his body tightened and he shakily released a breath that cooled her skin.

  She was tiring, but he brought his big hands to her hips and helped her. He pumped up into her, forcing her to hang on to his shoulders for stability as her world wobbled with the strength of the orgasm building within her.

  Her breath was choppy, matched by his harsh breathing and the tension simmering beneath his skin, snaking along the big, beautiful muscles of his body until with one powerful thrust of his hips, he propelled them over the edge.

  She gripped him tight, murmuring his name along his lips before she kissed him once again. She accepted the spill of his breath uttering her name and the tender way he wrapped his arms around her.

  “Do you think this was meant to be?” Victoria asked as she bonelessly sank back onto his lap and tucked her head against his shoulder in a gesture so touching he felt his heart constrict.

  He had seen what had happened with his parents. The unhappiness and hatred that came from being irrevocably bound to someone when love didn’t last. The way his mother had disappeared, her spark of life gone. He wanted more than that for himself.

  “We can try, Victoria,” he promised, wanting this to develop into more.

  Together they could forge a new future for their clans. Light and Shadow Hunters united peacefully.

  Together they might find love with each other and experience the bonding that would unite them and produce the next generation of their people. A more powerful generation, thanks to the greater power that a binding would bring.

  With the brush of her kiss along his shoulder, she said, “Let’s go inside. Get some rest. We’ll need it to plan what to do next.”

  CHAPTER

  18

  Ryan didn’t knock as he threw open the door to Maya’s room. He was convinced that she would be missing since he had no doubt that she had been involved in the earlier incident that night. To his surprise she stood by her balcony doors, dressed in a revealing black peignoir that highlighted all of her womanly attributes.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked, one dark brow inching upward with annoyance at his abrupt entry.

  He pushed forward to stand before her. “Where were you tonight?”

  “Really?” she said, and gestured to the small table to one side of the roo
m where the remains of a half-eaten meal sat uninvitingly.

  “You’re telling me you’ve been here all night?” Ryan said with disbelief, although the guard outside the door had seen no one come and go except the maid. A new guard sat outside the balcony doors where Jason had been stationed earlier.

  “I’m here aren’t I?” she said, and strolled negligently to the table, picked up her nearly empty glass of wine, and refilled it. Holding the bottle over an empty glass, she asked, “Would you like some?”

  Was it his imagination or did her hand have a bit of a tremble? Ryan wondered. “A drink between friends? Why not?”

  There was no doubt about the tremor in her hand this time as she poured the wine.

  He strode over and opened up his senses, searching for signs of aberrant energy deposits around her. In much the same way that a gunshot left residue behind, if she had released an energy orb recently there would be traces of the blast along her life forces. Although her energy field was strong, attracting him to her, he could find no evidence of battle. Only the pull of her sex, so difficult to ignore.

  The sly smile and half glance she shot him as she handed him the glass acknowledged that she was aware of the fact that he was not immune to her charms. She ran her finger along the edge of her glass, playing the coquette. “Why do you deny yourself, Ryan? We could be quite good together.”

  Ryan had no hesitation about that. With Maya’s affinity, she could make any man a king, and he had been tempted more than once. Even when she had been Christopher’s fiancée she had fascinated him, maybe because he refused to believe anyone could be so amoral and selfish. Call him foolish, but he believed in the inherent goodness of people.

  He took a sip of the wine, needing to brace himself as she released a little more of her power, clearly caught up in her web of desire as well as her nipples hardened beneath the sheer fabric of the nightgown. The wine was tasteless in his mouth as he imagined suckling her. Feasting on all that luscious femininity.

  Maya was no fool. She could tell from the look in Ryan’s eyes that her bait had been swallowed.