by Lara Adrian
He cleared his throat, his mouth suddenly as parched as the Mojave outside.
“Better get cooking,” he muttered. “If Sam wakes up in the other room and smells chicken on the stove, you may have to fight him for your dinner.”
She laughed softly. “Okay. No dinner for you, but you’re sure you don’t want anything?”
“I didn’t say that.” He prowled toward her, unable to resist the need to be close to her. “I definitely see something I want.”
His arms circled her from behind and he stepped in close, groaning at the feel of her pressed against the front of his body. As small as she was compared to his immense size, he’d never felt anything more perfect than the soft warmth of her body leaning into his hardness. He moved his hips against her backside, his arousal on the verge of agony just to be near her.
She tipped her head back and sighed, slowly rocking to the music within the cage of his arms. “I’ve always loved this old song.”
He grunted. “I’ve never appreciated it more than right now.”
Her mouth curved as she gazed up at him from under the thick fringes of her lashes. “Dance with me.” She turned inside the circle of his loose embrace, until they were facing each other with no space between them. She moved fluidly, rotating her hips as she looped her arms around his neck and held his heated gaze. “You’re so stiff, Asher.”
“I’m not much of a dancer.”
“That’s not what I meant.” Rising up on her toes, she pulled his head down to her and slanted her mouth over his.
Her kiss exploded through his senses like gasoline thrown on a raging fire. He smoothed his hands down onto her rounded behind, squeezing her and drawing her up tight against his arousal. He wanted to be inside her, fused together with her. He would be, if not for the damnable barriers of their clothing.
“Whose brilliant idea was it to let you get dressed?” he snarled through fevered kisses. “Starting now, I only want to see you in my T-shirt or nothing at all.”
She smiled up at him. “Sounds like a plan to me.”
He kissed her again. “If you like that, just wait until you hear my other plans.”
“Maybe I should’ve picked up some energy drinks,” she said, sighing when he slipped his hands under her shirt and snapped the hooks on her bra. “Your Breed stamina’s going to kill me.”
“Are you complaining?”
“Not even close.” She yelped in surprise as he lifted her off the floor and set her atop the counter. Her hands caressed his back, then tangled in his hair as he palmed her knees and spread her legs wide. He moved into the V of her thighs and caught her possessively around the back of her neck, crushing her mouth in a bruising, heated joining of their lips and tongues.
He didn’t know how long they’d been kissing before his senses prickled with a niggling unease. He heard a sound outside—so faint he might have imagined it.
But he hadn’t; it was real. His Breed hearing was too acute to be mistaken.
Someone was outside the house, somewhere in the dark.
“What is it?” Naomi asked when he paused to listen closer, his hand still curved around her nape. “Asher?”
He put his index finger against her wet, parted lips. Her almond eyes went wide and anxious. Pulling her down off the counter, he set her on her feet and whispered into her ear. “Go to the bedroom and lock the door. Take Sam in with you.”
“Asher, what’s—”
“Do it, Naomi.” One of the horses whinnied in the paddock, a nervous sound that drew her attention toward the blackness on the other side of the back door. Asher gently caught her chin and brought her gaze back to him. “It’s probably nothing. The animals get spooked all the time. But I need to make sure, so do what I ask. Please.”
She gave him a faint nod, then left the kitchen.
Only after he heard the bedroom door close did Asher move. He stalked out of the house bare-handed, knowing if they had an intruder—especially the one he suspected—his best weapon was himself.
As he neared the horses’ paddock, a dark shape peeled away from the shadows.
“This certainly is a homey little spread you’ve got here, Asher.” Cain’s voice was devoid of emotion, impossible to read. “Never thought I’d find you playing house out here in buttfuck nowhere. Especially not with that thieving little female in there.” He chuckled low under his breath. “Apparently, you’re full of surprises lately.”
“If you’ve got any desire to keep breathing, Cain, you should get off my land.”
The former Hunter strode forward, his steps unrushed. “I didn’t come here to do battle with you, Asher. Not this time, anyway. After all, we both know each other well enough to realize that if it comes to that, neither one of us would give—or receive—an ounce of mercy from the other.”
Asher wasn’t about to deny it. “Then why are you here?”
“Curiosity,” he replied. “Not so much about you, but about her.”
“She’s none of your concern.” A growl worked its way up Asher’s throat before he could tamp it down. “If you touch her, make no mistake, Cain. I will kill you.”
The dark-haired assassin smirked and shook his head, silver eyes glinting. “I don’t have to touch her. She’s a dead woman already, considering she’s so hell-bent on screwing with Leo Slater.”
Asher leapt at him, his fangs punching out of his gums as he grabbed Cain by the throat. “Did he send you? That murdering motherfucker already sent three of his goons after her and I dealt with them. Tell me what you know, or you’re next.”
Cain grinned, but there was a note of uncertainty in his shrewd eyes. And dawning realization. “You care for her.” He chortled then. “Don’t tell me you’re attached to the little thief. I could understand why you had your hands all over her just now, but this is something more.”
Asher squeezed harder, then released his former comrade on a sharp curse.
Cain rubbed his throat absently. “What kind of game are you two playing here? What does a son of a bitch like you need with the kind of money she’s been stealing from Slater’s coffers for more than a year? Two-hundred grand doesn’t just get swept under the rug and forgiven. Particularly with a man like Slater.”
Holy hell. The steep figure shocked him, but he kept his expression schooled. And he hadn’t missed the fact that Cain was saying nothing about Michael’s win the other night.
“Slater’s got no room for holding grudges,” he replied. “If he takes a few hits on his coffers, he’s more than earned them.”
Cain shook his head. “What’s the matter, you weren’t lowlife enough before we escaped the program, now you’re a common thief too?”
He didn’t deny it. As long as Naomi was in Cain’s crosshairs, Asher wasn’t about to take the target off himself. Not even to give the other male the truth. “You’re one to judge, considering who you work for. You’re taking Slater’s money. The only difference is you’re doing it with blood on your hands.”
Now, Cain’s face hardened. “We’ve both got blood on our hands, Asher, and it’s never going to wash off. But at least I never killed my own brethren.”
“We killed whoever Dragos ordered us to kill.”
Cain shook his head. “You know damned well there’s a difference between you and me.”
“Then prove it. Walk away, and don’t come back.”
“I can’t do that. Slater pays me to take care of his interests. And nothing interests him more than his money. He’s going to want it back,” Cain added. “If he finds out it’s been her repeatedly hitting him, there won’t be any stopping him. And he won’t send a bunch of clowns after her the way he did the other night.”
The newsflash that Cain just let slip took Asher aback. Slater didn’t know it was Naomi gunning for him? All of her disguises, her patient strikes spread out over time as she methodically separated Slater from a couple hundred-thousand dollars.
To say nothing of the million-and-change that Michael walked away w
ith last night with her help.
And Slater didn’t know.
But Cain did, and that was equally dangerous—if not more so.
“Why did she do it?” the Hunter asked. “I’ve reviewed hours of surveillance footage. I’ve seen her operate. I know she’s clever and ballsy as hell. So, why keep provoking Slater? Tell me that much.”
As much as Asher needed an ally, he wasn’t going to kid himself that he’d find one in Cain. Nor in any of his other Hunter comrades. They had all been sired off the same Ancient bloodline in Dragos’s lab, but few of the former Hunters emerged from their enslavement with any bond of loyalty from their half-blooded brothers.
Least of all Asher.
He couldn’t stake Naomi’s life on the hope that Cain would give him that much consideration. But what other choice did he have?
“Slater killed her mother.”
Cain hardly blinked. “He’s killed a lot of people.”
“Well, this time someone’s come to collect on the debt.”
“She’s taken this shit too far. All she’s doing is digging her own grave. At some point Slater’s going to find out, and he’s going to tell me to put her in it.” At Asher’s low growl, the other Hunter stared at him for a long moment, considering him in silence. “Slater’s going to tell me to end her, and I’m going to do it because that’s my job. I’m sure you can relate to that, right?”
The jab shouldn’t have stung, but Asher had spent the better part of his life regretting everything he’d done at Dragos’s command. He’d relived the depth and breadth of his sins time and again, thanks to the curse of his unique gift.
Cain’s silver eyes narrowed. “The win last night at Moda—the big one on the slots. You were there with the woman. She didn’t have anything to do with that take, did she?”
Asher feigned confusion and shook his head. “From what I recall, the winner was some guy in a wheelchair. So, unless she’s one hell of a magician, I don’t know how you came up with that idea.”
Cain stared at him, menace in the sharp bones of his face. “If it turns out either of you are working with this guy—Michael Carson—it’s not going to end well for any of you.”
“Is that a threat?”
“No,” he scoffed. “Consider it a warning, although I don’t know why you deserve one.”
“I don’t,” Asher admitted. “But she does. She’s a Breedmate, Cain.”
A look of pure shock swept over the immense male. That revelation was the one thing powerful enough to stop even an ice-cold killer like him. Every Breed male, even the Hunters, knew their entire race owed their existence—and their future—to women bearing the teardrop-and-crescent-moon mark. Without Breedmates, there would be no more Breed. That alone made Naomi and the others like her more precious than any man’s riches.
Still, Cain barked out a curse, looking more suspicious than ever. “This Breedmate. Is she yours, then?”
Asher wasn’t sure how to answer that, so he settled on the truth. “Not in blood,” he said. “But make no mistake, she is mine. And as long as I breathe, she is under my protection.”
“Under your protection? A soulless bastard like you?” Cain raised his dark brows on a deep chuckle. “Then God help her if you’re all she’s got to count on.”
Cain left him standing there in the dark, the stealth assassin fading into the night in much the same way he’d appeared.
It took Asher several minutes before he headed back into the house. Naomi met him with a relieved gasp when he opened the bedroom door and told her everything was okay.
“What happened?” she asked, seeking the shelter of his arms. “Was it . . . was someone outside?”
“It was nothing.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her sleek black hair, hating himself for how easily the lie slipped off his tongue. “Probably just a coyote nosing around where it doesn’t belong. Don’t worry. If it comes back, I’ll deal with it.”
CHAPTER 15
He had insisted that everything was fine, but for the rest of the night Asher seemed distant, his attention remote. Naomi couldn’t penetrate the shadows that shuttered his handsome, troubled face. Nor did he allow her to.
He deflected all of her questions and allayed her fears with reassurances that he would let nothing—and no one—ever get close enough to do her harm. He didn’t have to say the words for her to know that Slater and the dangerous men who served him were foremost on his mind. Asher’s concern was broadcast in his grim silence, and in the soldier-like way he prowled the house, an air of coiled readiness rolling off him in waves.
It was only when he took her to bed a few hours later that she felt him return to her completely. Naked beneath him as he brought them both to a staggering release, she had watched his dark blue eyes burn with desire for her and his glyphs dance with color on his gleaming skin. Feeling him move inside her, his powerful strokes obliterating everything except pleasure, there had been no room for doubts or worries about Slater and whatever might wait for her outside the shelter of Asher’s arms.
He woke her in similar fashion that next morning.
With sleep still clinging to her and her body lax from a blissful exhaustion, Naomi moaned as she felt Asher’s mouth kissing a warm path over her belly and then down onto her hip. His breath fanned hot against her sex as he nipped and teased her mound.
When his tongue cleaved into her seam and found her clit, she arched up on a hissed gasp of sensation. She opened her lazy lids, catching her bottom lip with her teeth as he began to kiss and suckle her in earnest.
“Asher,” she whispered, already panting, melting for him all over again. “Wait. Let me clean up before you—”
“Lie back.” His gaze smoldered as he glanced up at her. With one big hand splayed across her stomach, he used the other to hold her in place beneath his mouth. “I want you just like this. I like tasting myself on you and knowing this is all mine to enjoy.”
He dipped his head back down to her as he spoke, lapping at her with unabashed carnality as he held her gaze. He caught the tight bud of her clit between his teeth and flicked his tongue over it, dizzying swirls that had her practically clawing at the sheets.
“Oh, God,” she whispered, shuddering in response to every wicked stroke. “So good.”
He groaned a low rumble of approval, rewarding her with another long, shameless lick into the cleft of her body. Flames danced along her skin as she arched into him. Had she ever felt so wanton before? She knew the answer, because she had never wanted any man the way she burned for him.
Her thoughts scattered as he continued to torment her with his tongue. “You’re driving me mad, Asher.”
His low chuckle vibrated against her tender flesh, but he showed her no mercy. Her orgasm shimmered at the edges of her consciousness, just out of reach. And he knew it, dammit. He knew exactly how to play her body and he was proving to be a master of control.
“Oh, fuck . . . let me come,” she snarled at him, not caring how ravenous she sounded. It was too late to pretend she was anything less. When they were together like this, she had no defenses. She simply wanted him. Needed the pleasure only he was able to give her.
His fingers closed over her thighs and spread them wider, his hands as rough as his tongue was gentle.
She shivered as he pulled back and his warm breath washed over her.
“You’re so beautiful here,” he murmured, his voice an unearthly rasp. “Silky soft. Sweet and hot. Who needs food when I have you to feast on?”
Gone was the tentative teasing now, in its place pure hunger as he ate her alive, licking and sucking, sending pulsing waves of heat from her fingertips to her toes.
She moved her hips against his mouth with abandon, the ache in her belly spreading and growing, deepening into a need she couldn’t contain.
“Please, Asher,” she begged, catching his thick brown hair in her fists as shudders rippled through her core. She wanted to make it last, but the pleasure was as sharp as a knife now, and
she was balanced precariously on the edge.
“You want to come, baby?” His low voice taunted her senses, his mouth still moving relentlessly over her inflamed flesh. His tongue dipped inside her and she groaned. “Come for me, Naomi. Give it to me now.”
She couldn’t hold back her release if she tried.
Her back bowed as he thrust two fingers deep into her body. The sudden invasion combined with the ecstasy of his clever tongue as he worked her clit in magical circles was more than she could withstand. Her climax built and swelled, until all she could do was cry out his name as she toppled from the precipice.
“Asher.”
Blood rushed to her head and light exploded behind her closed eyelids at the tremors rocked through her in an endless wave of release. Her bones were liquid, her limbs weightless. Her nerve endings had become electrified, her senses shimmering like tiny diamonds behind her closed eyelids as she held him tight against her with one hand, riding the crest of her orgasm to the very end.
It should have wiped her out, the intensity of how hard and how often he’d made her come since that first time they’d been naked together. But being with Asher did something wild to her. It had unleashed a craving that only seemed to deepen every moment she was with him.
She wanted to chalk it up to the fact that she’d gone so long without physical intimacy or desire. Or maybe it was the newness of being with a man as attractive and powerfully sexual as Asher.
For all she knew, this insatiable desire might have been an elemental response from the part of her that wasn’t quite mortal finally coming into contact with the part of him that was Breed.
But Naomi sensed a more profound connection than any of those things.
She was starting to care for him.
Impossible. They barely knew each other. This was all hot and thrilling and overwhelming because of the circumstances. Life and death. Danger at their heels. And the fact that he had stepped in to save her from it all like some dark knight she never dreamed might actually exist.
That’s what made being with him feel so damned exciting. That was the reason she felt so totally, gut-churningly wild for him, even after they’d scratched that initial itch.
