“Come on. Let’s have some fun. I’m not ready to go to bed yet.”
He felt a shiver of excitement go through him. “What exactly do you mean?”
“You must have some crazy fun things to do here in this huge mansion. What do you do for entertainment?”
Mope. Think about fulfilling the bargain. Think about what to do if it falls through. And more recently, try to find a reason for living.
“I don’t know.”
“Oh, come on. If you have your kind of money and you aren’t having fun, you aren’t doing it right.”
“I have fun,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “We just might not have the same definition.”
“Do you have a game room?”
He thought for a moment. “Actually, I do. Do you play billiards?”
She grinned, and a dimple showed at the right of her full lips. “I play pool.”
“Good enough,” he said. “We could engage in a couple hours of that if it would suit you.”
“Sure,” she said, rolling up her sleeves. She’d changed into a long-sleeved tee shirt and jeans when they’d been at her place, and her hair was pulled back into a loose, casual ponytail. “You’re on.”
So Nathan led the way up to his “game” room, wondering what he should request as his prize when he inevitably beat this human at pool.
Chapter 8
Damn, he was good at pool.
But then of course he was. He was Nathan freaking Lancaster. He was good at everything, and after a full day together, she was still no closer to finding his weak spot.
As he leaned over to take another shot, a bit of black chest hair peeked out from his collar where he’d undone several buttons as the game went on. He’d also served himself scotch and offered her some, but she’d declined, as she was usually a lightweight.
And she needed to keep her wits about her when hanging out with Nathan.
There was a smooth power about him, in every movement he made, every look to calculate the trajectory of the ball, every smirk he sent her way when he was triumphant.
And after three games, she was pretty sure he’d be triumphant every time.
She grabbed some chalk and rubbed it on her stick a little too hard in frustration. Whether that frustration was from losing or from watching one of the world’s hottest men become more and more unbuttoned as the night went on, she didn’t know.
Or maybe she did.
He was hot. She couldn’t deny it. It was even harder to ignore now that she had to admit he actually seemed like a good person.
Have you ever thought that I could be helping?
When he’d asked her that, it sounded absurd. But after he’d stopped the robbery in such a calm, efficient way, putting his own life in danger, was it really not plausible?
His dark-blue eyes, almost black in this light, stared at her as he stood up, pausing in taking his shot. He put the end of his stick on the ground and leaned on it with both hands, looking impossibly tall and suave. “Is something wrong?”
“Just… you’re not what I expected.”
He flashed his wolfish grin. “I thought you said you had me figured out.”
“I thought I did.” She leaned against the table, resting the pool stick between folded arms. “I guess maybe everyone is right. Maybe you’re just some boring, rich guy.”
He frowned at that, and his hard face appeared carved by marble as it was hit by moonlight from the window. He looked like someone who could have been in movies; his face was so strikingly handsome. Yet it changed from moment to moment, completely different depending on what emotion he was showing.
At times he seemed so transparent, so why did it still seem he had something to hide?
“Should we up the stakes on this?” he asked, standing back up and chalking his stick. He quickly made his shot, knocking the last of the balls in as if he did this professionally.
“Why would I do that? I’m already losing.”
“What if I said that you only had to get one in before me. Just one, the whole game.”
“Interesting. What are the stakes?” She might not be good at this compared to him, but she had a few tricks up her sleeve.
“Kiss me.”
She coughed and nearly tripped over her own pool stick. “What?”
“If I win, I get a kiss.”
“Why?” She leaned against the table, cocking her head at him in confusion. “I thought we’d already been over this. You can have your pick of women, and—”
He stared at her calmly. “You can say no.”
Her eyes moved up his body. All that masculine heat, a slight hint of dark stubble on his sharp jaw. Those piercing eyes. Lips with a defined upper indent and the perfect fullness below.
Everything about him was refined, and he looked like a man who really knew how to show a woman the world in a kiss.
“Up to you.” He leaned on the table casually, and she looked down the long, muscular lines of his body, the forearms roped with muscle that were bared by his rolled-up cuffs. His hard quads pressing against perfectly tailored dress pants. Even his feet in his socks looked perfect.
“Fine,” she said. “But what do I get if I win?”
“You can ask me a question.”
“And you’ll answer it without being tricky?”
“Any question but one.”
She pouted. “That’s no fun.”
“Take it or leave it.”
“Fine.” She chalked her cue aggressively, though she already had. “Rack the balls.”
He did, setting them up and offering her the break. She took it and groaned when not a single ball went in from the get-go.
“Damn.”
“My turn,” he said with a smile.
“I don’t even know why you want to kiss me,” she said as he began to sink balls in pocket after pocket.
“Beats me, but I want to.”
She began to panic as she saw him rounding the table to the second-to-last ball. She ran around to the other side of the table so she was in his line of sight and then impulsively lifted her shirt, showing him her bra.
His gaze lifted, and one side of his smile quirked up. “Nice.” Then he focused right back in on the table and sank the last two balls.
The bastard.
She sighed and lowered her shirt as he walked around the table, stalking like some kind of predator, if not for the relaxed look on his face.
Even if he was some kind of predator, she guessed he usually hunted bigger prey than her.
“So my prize?” His hands came down on either side of her, trapping her against the table.
“You love trapping me, don’t you?”
“Maybe I like a captive audience.”
“Maybe I’m going to wind up chopped up in your basement.”
He laughed, his face even more radiant as the constant, rigid control he had over himself slipped just a little. Apparently, he had a dark sense of humor.
“Wouldn’t your roommate have something to say about that?”
“That’s true.” Her heart was racing. No, it was sprinting like a gazelle in front of a cheetah. With him that close, so dazzlingly handsome, it was hard to breathe.
Even thoughts of her news clippings about him couldn’t snap her out of the sudden fog of lust that was overcoming her at this moment.
“Now for my kiss.” His hand caught her chin gently, tilting her face up for his perusal.
“But why? You could have anyone. Why me?”
“You intrigue me,” he said quietly. “And I think I intrigue you.”
She was quiet for a moment and felt as if her heart were going to break out of her chest in the silence. “Yes.”
“Beyond the news story.”
“Damn you, yes.”
A grin quirked his lips, and he leaned in closer so they were only a hair’s breadth apart. “Good.”
Then his lips closed over hers, and there was a second’s delay of shock before liquid heat rushed through he
r, threatening to melt her straight into the floor.
His lips parted hers and his tongue slid in adroitly, exploring the depths of her mouth as though he were desperate to know everything about her, feel every part of where they were joined.
And it was doing funny things to her, making her knees wobble, making her core hot, making wetness pool between her legs as his tongue stroked and explored.
He was dominant, but in a quiet, persistent way that said he had all day to make her fall totally under his power. She braced her hands on the table, hoping not to fall, and felt his arm come around her back, pulling her in tightly against him so she could relax into the kiss.
But it wasn’t exactly the kind of kiss one could just relax for. It was hot, silky, and hinted of promises and secrets and the dark.
She’d never felt anything like it before, and when he pulled back, his face shaded by moonlight, she wondered if she would ever be the same after this moment.
“There.” He said it as if he thought she could actually be finished.
She jumped forward into his arms, her heart leaping wildly, and pressed her lips over his.
He grunted softly, then adjusted to the kiss, slanting his lips over hers and catching her under her thighs, lifting her easily into his arms.
She wasn’t a small girl, and he was a lean type of muscular, but he lifted her as if she were nothing at all. She felt totally supported as she kissed him back with everything she had, and the insatiable heat inside her continued to build.
As they pulled apart and she kissed down his neck and he captured her lips again, making her groan, she knew she was never going to get enough of this. Not until they’d gone all the way.
She couldn’t help thinking she’d totally thrown away her journalistic standards, but at this moment, she didn’t care. Kissing Nathan Lancaster was the hottest thing she’d ever experienced, and she was nothing if not a creature of impulse.
She was so absorbed in the kiss she barely noticed when a clock chimed downstairs.
But Nathan did, jerking back from her with kiss-swollen lips as his eyes widened in shock and then alarm.
“Damn.”
And then he was pulling away from her, setting her abruptly on the table and nearly running from the room in his hurry to get away from her.
She ran after him, pulling out her phone to check the time. She sighed when she saw the problem.
“Nathan,” she called after him. “Wait.”
But he was already down the stairs, hurrying in the direction of what was probably his bedroom, as the clock continued to chime. “You can spend your time as you like. Anything in the house is yours. I’ll see you in the morning.”
And then he was opening the door to his room, ready to leave her.
Her heart was still overworking itself, her body still heated and wet and expectant from their kiss. She felt almost desperate for him to stay, but even more than that, she felt curious.
“Nathan, why can’t I see you after midnight?”
He looked at her sternly, just for a second. “You didn’t win so you don’t get to ask a question.”
And then he shut the door in her face.
* * *
Nathan gasped as he leaned with his back against the door, feeling the transformation taking over.
That had been close.
Too close.
And all because the little human had utterly seduced him with the way she responded to his kiss. He’d never known humans could be so sensitive. That they could moan and tense and curl around him like that.
It was intoxicating. More addictive than any scotch. He rubbed his stubble as he remembered each second of the kiss, savoring them and storing them in his memory for later.
He walked forward and felt the change taking hold and cursed as he leaned on the bed while it happened. When it was over, he walked to the window and looked out.
His body still hadn’t calmed from his little interlude with Lillian. Why she had insisted on playing a game she was so bad at, he wasn’t sure.
Why he was so regretting leaving her, he wasn’t sure either. He only knew he’d been obsessed with her from nearly the moment he met her, and this was just another extension of that.
Other shifters had mates. Humans had mates. Did his kind have anything like that? If so, he was pretty sure Lillian was it.
When he’d kissed her, he still felt the swirling darkness. But he’d also felt something else, something like light. It had been warm, threading through him and threatening to become all-encompassing, and he didn’t know what to make of what it was.
If only he’d had a little more time.
He looked up at the moon with a grimace. Now he would never be normal. No one would ever be able to accept this, and he would never be allowed to let anyone find out who or what he was.
Neither his creator’s world nor the human one could countenance it, so he knew even as much as he enjoyed Lillian, he was doomed to be alone.
She would have fun with him, try to get a story from him, and then probably move on to a successful life with a normal human man and start a family.
Everything humans usually wanted.
But the thought of her with another male made him want to crush entire buildings, made him want to hunt until totally sated and even longer for fun.
He walked to the bathroom to take out his contacts, and this time he didn’t smile when they were removed. He was no longer amused by the thought of Lillian seeing his other side. He was bitter that he would always have to hide who he was.
Blood-red eyes stared back at him, daring him to go outside and fulfill his dark purpose.
But he didn’t dare hunt and leave Lillian alone at his mansion. After all, someone was still after her, and he wanted to be here to make sure she was safe. At least until her roommate could stay there.
The darkness would just have to wait for one night, and besides, what was the point in fighting anymore?
No matter how close he was able to get to Lillian, he would never be able to be with her like a normal being. No matter what they had, it would always have to end by midnight.
No one, human or shifter, would want to spend eternity with someone like him.
Chapter 9
Lillian was an early riser. She always had been. So the next morning when she woke in the unfamiliar guest room, she wasn’t surprised that the rest of the house was totally quiet.
She had expected servants or housekeeping. How could someone just live in this huge house alone?
But that was something she was starting to figure out about Nathan. Despite the photos she’d seen of him with models on his arm at hospital openings, he really didn’t seem like the playboy type.
If anything, he seemed to just want to have his space to himself.
She pulled a robe over her pajamas and peeked out of her room. When she saw nothing, she looked out of the ceiling-high windows at the back of the living room and saw it was just barely dawn.
A thought struck her, and for a moment, she felt guilty.
She should let Nathan sleep. She shouldn’t bother him.
But then again, he’d clearly rushed off last night as though he were hiding a secret and didn’t want to be seen. Perhaps she should go wake him up and see what he was hiding.
After all, she was his guest and she couldn’t just roam his house alone.
Besides, this whole thing played into the mystery of Nathan Lancaster, and maybe she could solve one more piece of it right now.
When she reached the door that led to his bedroom, she raised her hand to knock, out of habit.
Then she didn’t and instead put a hand to the doorknob. It wasn’t locked.
For someone who liked to hide after midnight, he was pretty trusting. She gently turned the handle and pushed open the door.
A myriad of possibilities ran through her mind, and she had no idea what to expect as she stepped inside and focused her eyes on the bed, holding her breath as she did.
&nbs
p; He was in bed. She could see his dark, tousled hair on a white pillow, his body ensconced in sheets, except for one tanned, muscular arm and shoulder and two perfectly toned calves.
The rest of him lay covered by the sheet, and she longed to go over and lift it, to solve yet another mystery.
But she was already overstepping her bounds and knew it, so she simply cleared her throat.
He whipped around, instantly waking, yet the bleary look in his eyes told her he’d definitely just been asleep.
Nathan Lancaster struck her as the kind of man with a rigid need for control, and she was sure he wouldn’t like this situation with her coming across him half, or maybe all, naked.
But she was surprised when he rolled onto his back, relief in his eyes at seeing her, and simply raised one arm behind his head in a languid motion. It was still dim in the room, but his eyes held a wicked sparkle.
“Come to finish what we started already?” He stretched slightly, and the sheet slipped a little lower, revealing taut abs and toned Ken doll lines. “You’re more impatient than I’d guessed.”
“No, I—” She felt a blush work its way up her face as she realized if he wriggled just a little bit more, she could see what Nathan Lancaster was really packing.
She hastily averted her eyes, disgusted by her own thoughts. Last night had been a slipup. She hadn’t been professional. It had been a good thing he’d run from her so they could both come to their senses.
She definitely wasn’t here to continue.
So then why was it so hard to stop staring at his abs and walk away?
She turned her back to him, facing the doorway. “I’m your guest. I didn’t think I should go wandering. Besides, you never mentioned how much time you need to yourself after morning.”
“Sunrise is fine,” he said, and she heard rustling from behind her that meant he was getting out of bed. “I’ll mention if I need privacy otherwise.”
Oh wow, she wanted to look. She really wanted to look.
With more self-control than she thought she had, she managed to resist.
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