MakeMeWet

by Nara Malone

  Fact…

  Fuck a bunch of facts.

  Chapter Two

  Liquid diamonds decorated skin pale as moonlight, quivered on full breasts that swayed gently as she leaned over him. Ronin’s tongue twitched between the vise of his teeth.

  Women never leaped naked to his rescue. But the past three centuries had confirmed that what women would do was an ever-changing mystery. May the Goddess grant that aspect of the feminine never change.

  He savored the moment, watching from beneath his lashes as she bent, hair trailing like damp fingers over his skin, the crescent of her ear branding his chest. Her sigh released in a rush just before she lifted her head.

  Goddess, she was more than beautiful. A lean swimmer’s body, with the exception of those buoyant breasts. Midnight hair—a tumble of wild waves he wanted to twine around his fingers while he mounted and rode her through the night.

  Nervous as a sandpiper, she reached to touch then drew back, hands alighting on his ribs and taking off again in a flutter. He didn’t dare breathe for fear of scaring her off. Luminous gray eyes assessed him. So intent was her inspection it was as if she were touching him physically when her gaze brushed his face, a lingering caress over lips, over eyelids and holding there.

  Still holding there. Holding there a bit too long for comfort.

  She’d caught him peeking. Nothing to do now but stay the course. When she leaned in again, his fingers dug furrows in the wet sand, curled to fists around soggy clumps as he fought the urge to capture those hypnotic breasts.

  Ronin continued holding his breath. He’d hold it into eternity to bring her closer. The scent of her was a blend of wild and feminine that ignited desire like whiskey poured on a banked fire. There was no holding back the surge of blood and heat thickening his cock. But his shy little sandpiper found her courage. He nearly swallowed his tongue when her lips closed over his to steal a kiss.

  It was so easy. Too easy?

  Slick, sexy curves surfed his skin. Soft female sounds—more seductive than a mermaid’s song—quivered in her throat. His hands found her ass and squeezed, turning up the volume on her love music. Trailing one hand up her back to cup her head, he deepened the kiss.

  She tasted fragile, an aura of the earlier tears lingered.

  He tried to slow her down, ask her name, but his tongue tangled with her hers and it came out like a sea lion grunting.

  The initial stage of getting acquainted couldn’t be rushed. His last intended had zapped him with a Taser when he’d tried to join her via her bedroom window. She dialed the police while he twitched like a beached cod on her bedroom floor. Mercifully, the Goddess Mere intervened. If the word mercy could be applied to anything she did. Before the call had gone through, her spell cast him back to the bottom of the ocean.

  Her intervention canceled his shore leave before it had gotten started, sentencing him to fourteen years without a woman rather than the customary seven. He wanted inside this woman with a desperation that wasn’t good for either of them.

  The last mistake had harmed no one but Ronin. This time a mistake could break his intended. There’d been too many broken women in his worthless life.

  Ronin needed to get control.

  Of the sex.

  And the magick.

  Slow hands were happy hands, which lead to happy parts in other places. But happy parts and happy places were not something their sand- and salt-crusted bodies were going to deliver.

  He broke the kiss, nuzzling her neck as he rolled her under him.

  The world went into a tumbling spin, as if a wave had scooped them up. Only that wasn’t possible, because above the roaring in his ears he could make out her voice chirping panicky commands.

  “Are you okay? Talk to me. Open your eyes.”

  Opening one eye revealed the world still retained its nauseating spin, a lingering side effect of his head connecting with a rock during their swim.

  Ronin pressed his forehead to hers and the spinning subsided.

  Concern turned her volume up a notch. “Say something. What’s your name?”

  Small hands bracketed his face. He covered her hands with his, hoping the squeeze he gave them projected confidence rather than the desperate clutching at consciousness it was.

  “I’ve got you, sweetheart,” he mumbled. “All’s well.”

  “Got me?” With surprising strength she forced his head back to inspect him. “You look ready to pass out.”

  Well then, she’d completely missed his sexy-confident-take-charge-protector projection. He went for love-drunk-fool-who-is-also-confident-and-sexy instead.

  Angling his head—carefully—he pressed lips against the pulse in her wrist, summoning a bit of magick to soothe. He let his eyelids droop again. “Aye, you have my head spinning.”

  He paused long enough to take in her reaction. Saltwater dribbled from his hair to her skin. Passion misted her eyes. The slowing beat of her heart under his, a positive sign the selkie pheromones were working their magick.

  She asked again, a doubtful pitch at the end of the question, “You’re okay?”

  “More than okay.” Bending his head to his lover again, he licked and nipped, collaring her with a trail of kisses. Sealing magick into her skin while she sighed and squirmed, binding the spell that would render them inseparable as sea from shore until the dawn.

  She whimpered again, turning her head from side to side in the swirling shallows, thrusting hips against him. He planted the last kiss on her nape as the water receded, completing the circle.

  Her hair fanned out around her, a dark halo riding the currents. Manacling her wrists above her head with one hand, he gathered that luscious hair. Reeling in thick tresses, he angled her head to catch moonlight and get a better look at her. Her wild aquatic beauty and soulful stare threatened to unleash the beast in him. Her skill and grace in the water had been that of someone born to it, a child of the sea. A loner too, he’d wager. Kindred soul. Goddess, but he wanted her. Now.

  Now wasn’t possible. Waves could be gauged by their tone on a scale. One rolling toward them had a deep base that promised height and volume. A wave big enough to submerge them. Too close for escape.

  “Hold your breath,” he ordered.

  Without glancing toward the surf she drew a breath and closed her eyes as his mouth covered hers. Trust given on command. Delicious. Kissing her under the water. Purely erotic.

  The fact that she instantly caught the knack of letting him feed her air made him wish he dared to have her there, in the rolling surf—fucking where crests tossed them high and curls caressed their bodies with sandy fingers as they rocketed through the barrel, only to be lifted again on a new swell. That, unfortunately, was not a game mortals could safely play.

  He anchored her, pressing her into the sand as the receding wave pulled at them.

  When he opened his eyes, her gaze met his without fear or a hint of the shyness he’d detected in their first kiss. But the heavy-lidded, half-drugged haze had faded. In its place a probing awareness, curiosity maybe, even as her body undulated under his.

  He should say something. Even before he’d spent the better part of three centuries without the power of speech, he lacked the gift of gab. What etiquette applied?

  Taut nipples distracted, had his head dipping to deliver a little teasing from his teeth.

  A frustrated moan resonated in her throat as he lowered his head. Her sigh welcomed him when his teeth caught a nipple. His cock twitched between the slight parting of her thighs, nestled against the heat of her slit like a compass needle seeking north.

  “Please…” Her answering whisper was so full of longing that he knew she was just as aware of his rigid cock. Crisp curls tickled his length when she wriggled. The kiss of her heat drove him to the edge.

  Slow down. Slow hands.

  He released her hands. It was harder, but he managed to will his teeth to part and let her nipple free. Talk. Talking was the only way to get past the craving that de
manded he go right back to what he was doing.

  Propping himself on his elbows, he reined them both in. “Forgive my bad manners.” He paused to kiss the end of her cute little nose. “I’m Ronin Brennan. You?”

  He knew the answer, could pluck the name from her thoughts. Not as easily as he could with most humans—her thoughts came to him through a fog—but the answer was clear. Maille Shane. He waited for her to say it.

  “Maille Smith.”

  Really? Trusted him with her breath but with only half her name. Surely she had a bit of her own magick if she could hold on to caution at this point.

  Good. He loved a challenge. He dropped a line of nips and kisses from her breastbone on down to her belly.

  “Well then, Maille Smith, I’d like to thank you properly.” Her bellybutton snagged his attention. His tongue found and circled the hidden nub with the same care and attention he intended to deliver farther down.

  “Goddess,” she gasped.

  Water lapped and swirled around their bodies. He scooted lower. Parted her heated lips with his tongue. Blew a teasing stream of heat over her clit that brought it to full attention. That brought her up too, almost to sitting.

  “Please,” she panted.

  “With your permission, of course…” He paused, swirled his tongue over her clit and added, “I’d like to thank you somewhere more pleasant than a beach.”

  “Please…” She trailed off on a breathy whisper laced with erotic longing, fingers running through his hair, catching hold of his ears, dragging him down into her fragrant heat. Into heaven.

  He caged her clit with his teeth, used his thumbs to massage the sensitive muscles just between thighs and the heat of her begging pussy.

  “Please…finish. F-f-f—” She tried to twist free. Her struggle didn’t hide the thoughts from him. He caught it vibrating loud and clear.

  Fuck me. Fuck me hard. Fuck me long. Fuck me and don’t ever stop.

  Words he’d longed to hear these past fourteen years. Only the timing was off. Or, more accurately, the location. Baritone notes riffing toward shore demanded action. Drowning his intended was bound to annoy the Goddess.

  Scrambling to his feet, grabbing her hands, he pulled her up beside him.

  Annoyed. Proud. She shook him off and took a step back.

  Damn, but she had a will of iron. Fighting magick and hormones. Succeeding to a degree he’d never encountered.

  The wave flattened her.

  That was bound to be a mood killer.

  Her hand bumped his ankle then both grabbed tight. Ronin scooped her up before the current could pull her loose. The tide was coming in, and the goings-on up at Shadowling Manor weren’t doing anything to gentle the waters. He hugged Maille tight. She was his and nothing was taking her from him. For now.

  Rubbing at her eyes, Maille turned her face into his chest, still coughing, still gulping air. Each inhale would carry more pheromones into her system. He regretted that aspect of his enchantment. He wanted to believe his skill and her hunger for his touch would bring what came next.

  He nuzzled her cheek, felt her hunger for love in every cell of his being. He wished he could linger and be the one to satisfy the longing in her heart as well as the fever in her blood. He wished… What?

  To be her hero. That bashing his head took must have scrambled his brains. A selkie was as far from a hero as a man could get.

  Her coughing eased. She looked up at him.

  He tried to fix his lips into a reassuring smile. He was human so rarely he’d lost the knack. He must have managed well enough because she smiled back.

  “Tell me which way, love, and I’ll get you home.”

  “I can walk—”

  “Forget it.”

  The human form he took when coming ashore was always the intended’s fantasy man, a vision straight out of her wettest dream—guaranteed to make her weak-kneed and pliant. For Maille, a man big enough to carry her, a strong take-charge type to look after her, was part of that fantasy.

  She pointed toward a cottage up the beach, near the rising wall of cliffs.

  He marched between dunes and skirted saw grass. The scent of trampled beach heather mingled with the breeze. Something in a circle of dunes just the other side of a tide pool caught her attention and he had to scramble to keep from falling when she twisted suddenly in his arms.

  Ronin felt telepathically, rather than by any scent or sign, the presence of a mare. A stallion, atop dunes farther down the beach, stood guard. And while Maille was too far off for human ears to catch the greeting, Ronin was certain the quick tilt of Maille’s head in that direction meant the stallion’s welcoming nicker hadn’t escaped Maille’s notice.

  The stallion’s attention on Maille sent Ronin hustling through the loose sand. Like the wolves up on the cliffs, the stallion was a shifter. Shifters should be expected, he supposed, with Shadowling so close. They could take those seductive greetings elsewhere.

  The cottage sat on a rocky shelf in the shelter of the cliff. Maille directed him toward the backyard, rather than up the wide porch at the front. In the midst of a well-tended herb garden, a redwood structure with a stained-glass dome ceiling sat in the center of tiled paths.

  Maille squirmed and he put her down.

  “This is the sauna,” she said matter-of-factly. “There are probably fresh towels and robes just inside the door. There’s a lovely shower room behind the sauna, just follow the path around the back.”

  A sauna? It had the feel of a church or temple.

  Probably towels and robes? She didn’t know?

  She reached for the wrought iron latch on the door, but her hand stopped short. Her fingers curved over an emblem of a cresting wave carved on the door.

  “Maille?”

  Her hand dropped quickly to the latch and the door popped open. Her tour-guide voice was back. “Yes, sorry. Towels over there on the bench. Robes on the hooks here by the door.”

  She had the bored air of someone bent on making the unusual seem un-notable. As if it were ordinary to have black silk robes embroidered with silver crescents or purple velvet robes embroidered with gold six-pointed stars hanging in your sauna. As if everyone’s sauna had stacks of towels arranged in the perfect order—red to violet—of chakra colors. Surely a pentagram stained-glass ceiling was standard.

  Why fill a home with elements of magick when—if the hint of rose staining her neck and cheekbones were any indication—the sacred objects embarrassed her?

  It wasn’t his job to probe her beliefs. His assignment involved probing meant to be pleasant. Not that you could tell that from her eagerness to escape him. She’d started backing up as soon as he stepped inside the sauna. She hovered on the path, half turned toward the house. His little sandpiper was back. Passion had fled.

  “If there’s something you need that you can’t find, I’ll be inside. The kitchen door is just there.” She pointed to an area obscured by a rose trellis.

  He caught her wrist before she escaped and gave a gentle tug. “Come on, love. I’m feeling a bit dizzy yet. After that bashing around out there on the rocks, I’m sure I need watching. Can’t have me fainting in the shower, can you?”

  “Well…” She wouldn’t look at him. As if that could change course, undo what had already been set in motion.

  He trailed a finger along the sensitive skin where he’d sealed magick with kisses.

  She looked up into his eyes then. Hers were startlingly clear, as if she were somehow immune to his enchantments. With a shiver, she slipped her wrist from his grasp, threaded her fingers through his and turned to lead him to the garden shower.

  The “shower room” turned out to be an artful enclosure of barely frosted glass etched with scenes of ocean life. A bed of decorative colored stones, arranged in a rainbow serpent mosaic, circled the shower. Scents of sea lavender and mint wafted from clusters of greenery around the base. The entire garden exuded peace and power.

  Ronin held the door and Maille steppe
d in ahead of him, but she lingered at the door in full sandpiper mode.

  Ronin adjusted spray and temperature. Maille’s nervous dance from foot to foot slowed as he squirted his chest with herbal-scented shower gel and lathered, hands gliding down over his belly. She went completely still when he grasped his cock and lathered his balls. Her fingers curled reflexively. He had her full attention.

  Here in his element, he could work a spell that had nothing to do with magick. Catch her in the net of her own hunger.

  He pressed his advantage.

  With a graceful bow, he bent, catching her hand, brushing her knuckles with his lips. “May I have the honor of this dance, lady?”

  Ah, there it was, quick as the first green flash of dawn breaking the horizon, her smile appeared and vanished.

  With a practiced turn of wrist and twirl of bodies, he had her in his arms, a move that had served to bring many a coy female to his bed in the time before he was cursed. With a dip of knee she was arched over his arm and her body displayed—a feminine wonderland he’d had to fight through gowns and corsets to reach in the old days.

  Slow. The thought formed and faded as he surrendered to the compulsion to press lips against her arched throat. And then the taste of her skin consumed him, a combination of salt and sweet that had his greedy tongue painting a trail from the nook between her collarbones to the valley between her breasts.

  Her whimper, a soft animal sound that twisted his groin, submerged his brain in a dark tide. With effort his patience resurfaced. Lust simmered, barely controlled when he snatched her upright to stand in front of him. Their eyes locked as he started to turn, and turn, a slow waltz under the water.

  Clumsily she followed his lead, until she gave up watching her feet and just let her body connect with his, skin to skin. His cock pressed into the silky warmth of her belly. When she closed her eyes, tipped her head back, he longed to spill his seed over her glistening body.