The Hunter

by Gennita Low

  Something dark and wanting arose in him. The feeling fed that hole inside, a fire in his gut. His whole focus was on the woman and he had to concentrate hard on what she was saying because there was a roar in his head drowning out all superfluous noise except for what his body and mind hungered for.

  Here was a woman who wasn’t captured, or underage, or begging for help. Here was someone who had cried outside the way he had cried inside at the sight of those girls being gang-raped. Here was someone he’d had to talk out of doing something that he had wanted to do for the last few months; he couldn’t forget the sight of her dangling on the side of the building with that weapon aimed at the crowd of men. There had been just enough light to see her expression as she willed herself to pull the trigger, one so fierce and sorrowful that he had wanted to hold her in his arms and comfort her, as he needed to be held and be comforted inside. Because he had understood what she was feeling and going through.

  Food. She thought that was what he wanted. He waited till she placed the dishes on the table, then grabbed her by the arm. She landed on his lap without resistance. He began devouring her lips.

  She was warm and soft, her lips opening willingly for his exploration. He pushed his tongue inside her mouth, tasting her. He couldn’t get enough, putting his hand behind her neck and pulling her even closer.

  He reached up with his other hand, caressing her jawline, her neck, then downward, until he cupped her breast. She jerked forward, a soft sound in her throat, as he ran a thumb across the thin material covering her nipple. She wasn’t wearing a bra. He pulled at the shirt impatiently, trying to find an opening to get what he wanted.

  Her hands stopped his progress. “Hawk,” she whispered. “People can come into my work kitchen.”

  “I don’t care. I want you now. Here, on this table. Upstairs. Somewhere, Amber. Take your pick.” His hand was still on her breast and he used his thumb to his advantage. He didn’t wait for her answer. Standing up with her in his arms, he started heading for the door that led upstairs. “You know, this is getting to be a habit. At least you’re conscious this time.”

  Her beautiful eyes narrowed. “I’m going to kick your ass.”

  “Afterward,” he said.

  “Afterward,” she agreed.

  13

  A thousand excuses to say no melted in the heat of Hawk’s gaze. There was a certain look a man gave that could make a woman weak in the knees. Determined. Focused. Undressing. The eyes of a predator on what was his to take. And plenty of time to do it. Hawk had that look in his eyes. A tingle of anticipation ran down Amber’s spine at the thought of the intent behind that gaze.

  There was something implacable in the way he held her in his arms, as if he had every right to do as he wanted. Each step echoed the drumbeat of her heart, up the stairs, through the small landing, past her kitchen, inexorably toward her bedroom door. He didn’t pause, his gaze holding hers captive, moving so nimbly as if she only weighed fifteen instead of a hundred and fifteen pounds, until he reached his goal. He nudged it open with a foot.

  Amber knew that once he stepped through the doorway, it would be too late to say no. And she should, she really should. A thousand excuses and none of them popped up on her lips as she stared into his golden eyes…that look banishing every one of them to some other place in her mind, replacing them with unspoken promises that quickened her breath.

  Hawk walked into her bedroom. Kicked the door shut.

  And she was right. There was no more time to think as his head dipped down and he started kissing her immediately. She had never been kissed this way before, seemingly in midair, her head tucked against a man’s heart as his lips locked on hers ferociously. Not releasing her lips, he slowly lowered her back onto her feet, her body sliding against his hard one, and she found her arms still around his neck as she stood on tiptoe. She gasped as his hands cupped her buttocks and molded them possessively, sexually. His fingers went between the cheeks, going lower, seeking intimately. She heard a distinct tear. His fingers were immediately inside her. Moving. Sliding. Going to the next target.

  Amber thought she was weak in the knees before. She was wrong. She was under siege. Her legs parted helplessly and she lost her already precarious footing. He ignored her as she tried to free her lips, stumbling about to find her balance. It only gave him easier access to what he wanted and she gasped again as his other hand moved to a frontal attack, tearing her pants apart like a piece of rag.

  “I like a woman who doesn’t wear underwear,” he said, his voice low and seductive, as he started walking her backward.

  He backed her into a nearby wall and she grabbed his shoulders in startled surprise as he lifted her up again. It occurred to her that he wasn’t just keeping her physically off balance; he was also doing it to her mentally. She was unable to think or say anything; she hung on and let him take over.

  “This is our position,” he murmured in her ear. She heard the sound of a zipper being undone. “I’m going to take you like this first. Teach you to do it right next time.”

  “Right?” That was all she managed as he pushed against her. Oh, Lord. She had felt that before. Only he had been semi-aroused then. He felt as big as he had looked that first time she had seen him naked in the dark. She gripped his arms, digging her fingers into the coiled muscles.

  “The right way to do it,” he said, penetrating her softness with slow accuracy, “is without anything on.”

  Amber wrapped her legs around his waist as he drove the point home. He slid in, settling his body between her open legs, pushing her hard against the wall. He was deep inside her at the first thrust, his hands holding her firmly around her waist. He pushed her higher up the wall, his hands sliding from her waist to her hips, warm against her thighs, his fingers invading the soft flesh of her labia, opening her wider.

  He slid out slightly. Thrust in again, his thumbs pressing down on her sensitive flesh in tandem with the glide of his thick penis.

  “Ohhhh!” Amber felt all her strength leave her as molten hot pleasure shot up through her system. Her hands fell away from his shoulders as he rocked into her again and again, relentless in his assault, teasing the sensitive flesh around her clitoris. As he brought her higher and higher, he felt impossibly bigger. She wrapped her legs as tight as she could, holding on for dear life, as he thrust hard inside her and trapped her against the wall.

  She heard another rip. He had torn off the front of her shirt. His head bent and she felt the brush of his hair against her cheek and caught his earthy masculine scent as he took her right nipple into his mouth and bit gently.

  Amber gave a cry, jerking forward. He was so deep inside her now. His mouth on her breast. One hand massaging the other nipple. His other hand still on her hip, moving in slow sensual circles, making her whimper every time he stopped. His hips undulating hard as he flexed inside her.

  His teeth caught her nipple again and she heard soft cries escaping her lips as she started coming, her whole body uncontrollably shuddering with a white-hot pleasure she had never felt before.

  When she opened her eyes, she was on her back on the floor. She couldn’t remember how she had gotten there. He looked so big from this angle. His golden eyes gleamed down at her as she stared up, her breath still hitching. She heard more than felt the rest of her pants being torn.

  “Second position,” he said, “except I think this time I want the taste of you in me instead of some drug.”

  Before her mind grasped his meaning, he had pulled out and his mouth was already between her legs, his tongue exactly where it should be. She reached out in helpless wonder as he opened her wider for his feasting. His rough stubble scraped the inside of her thighs as his tongue did things she hadn’t thought possible. His hands caressed her exposed tummy, the pads of his fingers finding every erogenous spot. Stretching down, she shaped his dark head between her hands, urging him to go faster. She gave a strangled cry when he scraped his teeth against the soft flesh, a gentle warning of
his current mood, that he was doing the taking.

  And he was taking his time as his tongue slowed to a frustrating glide, pushing her to the limits, only to flutter back down. Release. So close…. She urgently reached down again, then stopped when his mouth lifted away from that so important place.

  “I didn’t touch you while you looked at my body,” he whispered. “You aren’t allowed right now.”

  “I didn’t touch your body!” Amber managed to gasp out.

  “How would I know? I was out.” His tongue teased her in between sentences. “You could have been licking me all over.”

  “But…I…didn’t.” He had taken command of all her senses. She couldn’t think about anything but what he was doing to her.

  “Don’t believe you.” He bit her thigh, then ran his tongue tantalizingly closer to where she really wanted him to lick. She groaned when he paused. “I had a hard-on then, you know. I didn’t have one when I woke up. Did you do this? Or this?” He jerked away from her desperate hands. “No touching, or I stop.”

  Amber clawed at the carpet in desperation, using her legs to push her hips upward. Into his face. There. She groaned again when he just softly kissed her, somehow adding to the torment. She pushed up even higher, demanding more pressure. He peered up at her, his eyes glinting with deviltry, knowing what she wanted.

  “Was this what you did the other night, getting yourself all excited while I was on top of you?” His hands went under her hips and she gasped as he cupped her bottom roughly. “I remember those legs wrapped around me tightly before I fell on top of you. You couldn’t have moved without feeling some pleasure, honey.”

  His head dipped and he demonstrated what he meant. Amber squeezed the soft tufts of carpet on each side of her as his tongue and mouth kneaded her sensitive nub with the skill of a master at work at his craft. His fingers slid inside her deeply, even as his busy tongue imitated the upward movement, an arc of heat rising from her loins all the way into her chest.

  Amber could hear herself starting to beg for release, stopped herself, then, unable to stand it any longer, started again as those fingers and lips and tongue continued their intimate massage, moving in and out, over and downward. Half-formed words mingled with little gasps as she strained against his mouth, the heated pressure building into a kaleidoscope of sensation.

  Without warning, he jammed his tongue hard against her core. Amber’s mouth opened, a silent scream forming as the first orgasmic wave locked all her muscles. He pushed her legs higher with his shoulders and his tongue delved deeper into her, as if he could drink her whole soul as she gave herself.

  Hawk McMillan, Amber was discovering, knew a lot of different ways to make a woman weak in the knees.

  She was melting hot in his mouth, coming apart with the sweetest sounds to his ears. He had been hungry for this—a woman in the throes of real passion, letting him pleasure her any way he wanted. A real woman to make love to.

  That was what Hawk wanted. He couldn’t explain the tension pulling like an arrow stretched on a bow inside him. All he knew was that he needed a release, something that would take away the hurt inside. His control was at breaking point. If he didn’t do something, he would kill Dilaver and his men. In the darkest hour, between anger and loathing, Amber had called to him. And he wanted to be with her.

  It was so good to hear a woman scream in pleasure, rather than in fear. Hawk had missed having a woman with whom he could have the kind of sex he enjoyed—a little rough, a little kinky, and a lot foreplay. He had found her. He wasn’t going to relinquish her for a long while.

  Her thighs clamped around his neck and he forced them apart again with his shoulders, straightening her legs so she couldn’t use her strength. “Did you look at me like I’m looking at you now?” he murmured. She was wet and swollen, pink and aroused, and damn tempting. “Did you touch me, feel how hard I was?”

  Eyes closed, she shook her head restlessly and trembled when he touched her gently with a finger. He wanted her to come again. He needed to see her hot for him, moaning in pleasure. Part of him was taking an insane delight in exacting revenge for the way she had attacked him that first night; part of him was ridiculously happy to have a willing and satiated woman in his care. The coiled tension that had been growing inside him the last few days pulled at him still—

  He pushed away those dark images that rose up. Need. He ran his knuckles lightly over her swollen nub, pulling at the hood. Her body reacted immediately and her eyes opened wide, an electric blue fire that made him hot for her. And there wasn’t any hurt in them, just pure desire. He needed to see more of it.

  “Hawk…”

  His name came out like a caress. He gave her a slow smile as he continued playing with her, her wetness making it easy to glide his knuckles with long, slow strokes over and over. He had started out just needing her, but now he wanted her to need him, too. Her breathing was uneven again. Those beautiful blue eyes became pools of soft womanly need. No fear in them at all. He wanted to drown in them.

  “You do know what the third position is, don’t you?” he asked. She licked her lips nervously and he smiled. “Remember? You tied a note around my dick.”

  Still caressing her intimately, he climbed over her. “Looking for me?, you wrote in that note.” He nudged her intimately with the hard tip of his penis. She was so wet. The raging tension in him coiled in anticipation. “I believe I just found you, Amber.”

  His weight on one elbow, he sank into her slick heat slowly, wanting to feel her take him in. He stroked her with his knuckles and gave a hum of satisfaction as her hips undulated upward, her internal muscles milking him eagerly. Her eyes were mere slits, her mouth parted, her hair like bright sunshine against the dark carpet. She fit around him, tight as a glove.

  “Hmm. It feels good to be inside you. I’ve wanted you from the moment I saw you in the restaurant.”

  “Not in the dark the first time? You did have a hard-on,” she reminded him, a smile teasing her lips.

  “I was thinking of hamburgers.”

  “Hamburgers.” She laughed. “You’re turned on by meat?”

  He began thrusting into her in leisurely strokes. “Juicy meat.” He licked a corner of his mouth. “Delicious. Hot. Dripping with juice.”

  She stared at him. “You’re turning me on with all this talk about hamburger.”

  He grinned. “What were you doing a few minutes ago, darling? Reciting poetry?” He flexed deep inside her before withdrawing.

  He began to thrust in earnest, closing his eyes. Pressure building. Every push brought him unbearably close. It had been so long, he knew he couldn’t last the first time. He was too eager. Too desperate to be inside her. She deserved more than a sex-hungry fool trying to get months of pent-up emotion out of his system. He had intended to give her some more loving, but a man could only play so long without killing himself. He was close to losing all sense of control as it was, what with her coming so wild and sweet in his mouth. She tasted fine. Deep inside her now, she felt even finer.

  Trigger point. When all thought gushed like a mental stream of pleasure, gathered into a ball of energy suspended over some imaginary precipice, and time stood still, as his whole being balanced on the razor-sharp line of consciousness. Hawk gave one final complete thrust. Breath suspended somewhere between lung and throat. He groaned as release came. Tumbled over. Free at last, like a bird floating with the wind. He fell forward, lips finding Amber’s, and she tasted like the finest wine as he came hard into her.

  “You know, the last time you were on top of me like this, I needed help to turn you over,” Amber said, her mouth tasting salty male flesh.

  He was big and heavy, a satiated sexual animal still inside her. She didn’t know what to say; she had never had sex on the carpet before. Or against a wall. Or, she noted, in tattered clothes. He had touched and kissed her with such hunger; it made her shiver just remembering his mouth doing all those naughty things to her again.

  “Does
that mean we have to call Lily up here?” His voice was lazy now, as if he had momentarily satisfied that dangerous edge she had felt emanating from him. “Ow.”

  Amber had bitten him without thinking. The idea that Lily…No, no, she would never allow Lily to ever see him naked again. Hawk McMillan ought to be locked in a jar like a genie, to be summoned by she, and she alone. She ran a hand down his muscular back, shocked at her own possessiveness.

  “Never say another woman’s name while you’re naked with me,” she warned.

  “I’m not naked.”

  True. He hadn’t had his clothes torn apart by a sexual animal. She wanted to explore him as closely as he had her. “Easily remedied. A shower.”

  He finally lifted his head and she had to stop the sharp intake of breath. She had thought he sounded satiated, but he still had that look in his eyes. He sat back on his haunches, pulling his T-shirt over his head. “Okay, fourth position,” he said, voice muffled. He wadded the shirt into a ball and cocked his head. “What is it?”

  Amber closed her mouth and blinked. She couldn’t take her eyes away from what had caught her attention. Running through Hawk’s right nipple was a very thin but very real band of gold. She shifted her gaze upward and caught him watching her. The image fit him somehow—a secret pirate—and her eyes shifted back down again, this time a lot lower. With a very big bird boldly jutting out between the vee of his pants. She wanted to see the rest of him.

  “Just admiring,” she breathed out. He really was magnificent. His face might look like a male model’s, but that physique didn’t look gym-made. She held several belts in martial arts; she recognized a trained fighter’s body. From the muscle-corded arms, to the broad chest, to those amazing cuts on his stomach, he was, simply, a fantastic specimen of a man. And all she wanted was to get a closer look at that nipple ring.