Nadia heard him say, “Not at all,” in his deep drawl, but she didn’t look back towards him. Instead, she kept her gaze firmly on Renee as she started to propel her towards the house. She saw Cole standing with some businessmen on the patio, engaged in deep conversation, so she didn’t stop, but kept right on walking until she stopped at her Land Rover. She could call him in the morning and tell him her ‘Thank you’ then. Right now all she felt like doing was getting home where she would be able to dissect every moment of that dance with Drake.
Renee was a wonderful friend and Nadia was glad she had brought her along, even if they hadn’t spent anytime together at the party. Nadia learned that Cole had asked Renee on a date and it was unusual to see Renee so exuberant over a man, but Nadia was happy that Cole was focusing his attentions on someone beside her.
The drive was not that long, and Nadia pulled into her driveway around midnight. She had almost made it to her back entrance, when a rustle in the bushes beside her house made her jump. Looking towards those bushes with wide eyes, she grasped the small light on her keychain and shown it in that direction. Small, yellow eyes stared back at her. The leaves rustled once more and the small hawk flexed its wings and twitched its head directly at her. Nadia had the distinct feeling that it would understand if she spoke to it.
Okay, those long hours are catching up with you honey. You need to get inside and go to bed.
But she continued to stand there, transfixed with the small, regal looking little hawk. Moments later it chirped out a little sound then took flight, causing Nadia to jump and shake her head as she went inside, muttering to herself about talking to animals when she knew they couldn’t talk back.
***
Drake hung up the phone after confirming with his pilot that he would indeed fly out at 8:00 a.m. tomorrow morning. The trip to New York couldn’t be put off. And since his mind and body were still in shock, he figured the event he was flying out for would take his mind off of what he had just learned. But he still had his doubts about that.
Sliding open his French doors that led out to his deck behind the large home, he inhaled the early morning air, and let the soothing qualities sink into his bones. The back of his home faced nothing but woods and Ridge Lake, something that he was immensely fond of. This was the one spot where he could do or say anything and no one would know about it. Since he was constantly catalogued in the real world, by his every movement, it was nice to know that no one could scale the large fence he had erected around his property and get in his private domain.
The night air was humid, but still comforting as Drake stood there in his jeans, barefoot, and let the sounds of wildlife cascade over him.
A small sound hit his ears. He turned towards the west and saw the little nighthawk make her way into a graceful landing on the railing that surrounded his deck. She preened for him, lifting her wings, spreading her feathers and Drake smiled at her show. Her intelligent, yellow eyes looked directly at him and she set her head into something that resembled a nod.
Ah, so Nadia had made it home okay.
“Thank you, honey. I appreciate the fine job you did.”
She gave a little trill of sound and then fluffed her wings before taking off into the night sky. Drake watched her go until she disappeared from sight. Even after all this time, it was still amazing to him that he could converse with animals almost as easily as if they were human and holding a conversation with each other.
Ever since his change at twenty-five, he had been gifted with a particular specialty. That was one of his main abilities, among a few others that every Amber Druid had. Each Druid had their own special skill, their calling card of charms, so to speak.
Ramsey McMurray was a master of touch and could charm, sooth, and even kill with that power alone. Brenan McKinnon was telekinetic, able to move objects with his mind. Traven Campbell could spark electricity from his fingertips. Little Liana, who was like a sister to Drake, could walk through walls. Kale Morgan was one of the most powerful Druids that Drake had ever met. His abilities were almost endless, mind reading, stopping blood flow, and his skill at healing was absolute. The list of Druids and their powers went on and on.
Thinking of his powers caused him to rehash the scene from the barbeque earlier.
The conversation that had popped up between him and Nadia had been interesting, but what really caught his attention was what happened when they had started dancing. He never would have guessed that touching her would have answered all of his questions. He was used to assessing the situation without having to touch anyone or anything. To say he had been surprised was an understatement. Now he remembered the fire that arced from her and sent heat flaring inside his body.
Pure sexual desire had smashed into him the instant he had pulled her body within inches of his. He hadn’t been expecting it and it had caught him off guard, but just as immediately he stopped any reaction of his. The last thing he had wanted was to send her running away from him, even when he knew that is what he should have done at that moment. The hot trail of lust slipped under his radar and slapped him into reality.
At first his mind couldn’t contain all the information she was sending him. This is what she felt every time he came into view. This burning, all consuming want that radiated off of her in waves had left him pole axed, and he barely continued dancing, knowing that at every moment, every time he was in her sight, this is how she felt.
How could she stand it?
The pulse of sexual yearning in her body was a number of things he had sensed, another one was the need she had to touch him. The slight huffs of breath against his shirt, her fingers clenching against the back of his neck and his hand, the rushing of blood to her core, were other clues. He knew without having to use his powers, that she was slick with want. He had practically felt the heat rising from her body. He could almost taste the spiciness of her on his tongue at that moment.
To know that this young woman, the same young woman he had thought of as nothing more than a family friend for the past thirteen years, now wanted him as she might want a lover, sent a shiver down his spine and his fangs threatening to expand, along with other parts of his anatomy. It had been hellish to hold in all of those things on that dance floor. He still had no idea how he’d done it. Thing was, she didn’t even comprehend that he had had this realization. If she did, her embarrassment might be too much for her to handle. Drake could sense the importance she placed on her emotions.
Night sounds interrupted his thoughts. Just what in the hell was he going to do now? He knew that he could never have some random relationship with Nadia. And never would he have more than that. Casual sex was his thing, his code, and the women he did it with were more than understanding, which is of course why he picked them. They knew the game and how to play it. Keeping his Amber Druid status secret was the first thing he worried about with women. No one knew what he was. He wanted to keep it that way.
Nadia would never be casual sex, never.
Her parents had raised her with morals and values that Drake knew she used in everyday life. She had an invisible sign above her that screamed “marriage material.” Drake knew better than to get caught up in that. Plus, they shared a past, something tangible and real that he could never sweep under the rug. And even if he wanted to ignore her, he couldn’t. Her life and his were intertwined by their business acumen. They both were leading members of Texas society, and they both were firmly cemented in that grasp.
The only thing to do was to act like nothing had ever happened, like he had never felt that electricity shooting from her emotions, or the sweet zap of energy that she had charged him with when she touched him. Those things would be locked away, hopefully forgotten along with almost two hundred years of other sacrifices that he had made because of his honor.
He would keep thoughts of her when she was a teenager with braids in her hair, along with images of her and her family coming to Christmas parties at the Haven together. He would remember her father an
d just how down to earth he had been. He wouldn’t confuse what happened on the dance floor with what she was to him. There was no reason to ruin his image of her with thoughts of her small body pressing close to his, her small hands reaching out to touch him, and those pink tinted, lush lips, opening on a soundless scream as he brought pleasure to her body.
No. None of that would happen. Nadia would forever remain nothing but a casual acquaintance to him. He would do his best to keep it that way. His honor demanded it.
Chapter 6
Drake Thompson, one of Texas’s leading wealthy bachelors lights up the red carpet with Lorelei Winfield on his arm. The dashing southern devil is wearing Armani, and the lovely Lorelei is draped by none other than a vintage Valentino masterpiece. They were among many celebrities, and newsworthy people attending the gala World Wildlife Federation fundraiser in New York, Tuesday night.
The headline screamed out, silently grabbing Nadia’s attention from the shelves at the Wal-Mart in Beaumont. She couldn’t stop her hands from picking up the latest weekly copy of the social magazine, Social News Weekly. It was a conglomeration of the many social happenings in all the major cities across the U.S.
The picture under the heading was of good size, and Nadia knew if she ever had the opportunity to shoot pictures of Drake and put them in her magazines, she would make them of decent size so that the consumer could see every luscious detail of the large, attractive man in full color. Sometimes when she looked at pictures that had been taken of him they were hazy and unfocused, but this one was alarmingly clear.
“Miss, the total is $78.05.”
The voice of the woman working the register was annoyed, but it snapped Nadia out of her reverie of Drake and the luscious redhead that he was with in the picture.
“Sorry,” she told the woman, and then paid for her purchases and left, leaving the tempting picture behind on the shelves at the checkout. She sure as hell didn’t need to bring it home with her and drool over it depressingly.
The past week had been harsh. She had fallen behind in the magazine ratings. Three of the models from the firm she used had become infected with a virus, and all Nadia heard at work from Renee was how amazing Cole was. Maybe she should have dated the man. Hell, the way Renee went on about him, he sounded absolutely fantastic. Renee had informed her that Cole was taking her on a weekend date to the Cayman Islands, and no matter how hard Nadia tried not to be jealous, it was tough to be around someone who was actually having a great life right now.
A while later she was unloading her groceries when her phone rang. After maneuvering around all of her packages she finally managed to grip the handheld.
“Hello?”
“Ms. Morales?”
“Yes, this is Nadia.”
“I’m Chase, from Safe Haven Animal Shelter. We have a border collie here that has your name and other personal information on her call sheet. I understand that you were to adopt her soon. Am I right?”
Nadia’s heart tripped to a stop in her chest. “Yes, I’m waiting for her to heal properly before bringing her home.” Dread bled thickly through her limbs and veins. “Is something wrong?”
When he took a deep breath, Nadia steeled herself for bad news. “An infection set in probably two days ago. We are doing our best, but she is fading fast, Nadia. I called you out of courtesy before any drastic measures are taken to give her peace.”
Give her peace? No, oh no! This wasn’t supposed to happen!
Nadia gripped the phone harder, squeezed her eyes shut against an acute pain for an animal she barely knew, but cared for. She spoke into the phone, “I can be there in about thirty minutes.”
“I’m deeply sorry for such bad news,” he told her, then hung up the phone.
Seconds passed, the dead line started beeping, and Nadia shut it off without conscious thought. Little black spots danced before her eyes as she stared at her fenced in backyard that she could make out through her back window. Belle would have come and lived with her in probably three more weeks. The large fenced yard and quiet, low traffic country living would have suited her fine, and after visiting her numerous times, Nadia knew that firmly.
A fine mist covered her eyes, but Nadia refused to cry. Her life was crappy; this just certified it for her. Everything she touched fell apart.
Even though she knew she was acting irrational, she couldn’t stop one thought from forming in her mind. If Drake would have known about this, he would have done everything in his power to save that animal.
But you know he has the best people working for him.
Still, she centered that pain, and the motherly instinct that she hadn’t been able to show the injured animal, onto his shoulders. He was the one that had saved that dog for her. He was the one that told her Belle needed her as much as she needed Belle. He was also the one that was gallivanting around New York with Ms. Vintage Valentino right now as her world was slowly disintegrating. Her world that had become the way it was because of him and the way she felt about him-her world that she didn’t even know how to live in anymore.
He had known weeks ago that she needed a distraction, some form of distance from her job and Donavan. He had offered Belle, and she had taken that offer. But now his option was being torn from her before she had the chance to care for it and love it like it deserved. And even though it wasn’t precisely Drake’s fault, Nadia was projecting her pain and anger onto the one man that she needed to keep her defenses around.
As she finished with her groceries, tried to control her tears, and finally made her way out the door, Nadia silently fed the antagonism and hurt, pushing it to the back of her mind where all of her thoughts and feelings for Drake were cemented. She had prayed for a way to make him not so enthralling to her. She would use anything to make that happen, anything.
***
“Mmm…you taste amazing.”
Lorelei’s wine-scented breath brushed across his jaw, and Drake clenched every muscle in his body as her tongue crept out and licked another path from his ear to his collarbone.
This had started when they walked in her door. Usually sexual dalliances were no problem for him, neither was keeping the woman happy, sated, and delightfully numb when he finally left her bed. But for some reason, the sugary sweet smell of Lorelei’s perfume, her artfully coiffed red hair along with the tight, extremely short black dress, was throwing any thoughts of having sex out the door, just as it had Tuesday night after the gala.
Now, even with all of that, Drake could still admire a fine body when it was pressed up in his face. With all of the plastic surgery around these days, Drake had to admit that Lorelei’s breasts were her own, and they were delightfully bouncy and perfectly round as they dangled in front of his face, her pert nipples flushed a raspberry red with arousal. She had pushed the top of her clingy dress down so that he could feast on her skin like she was doing to him. He just hadn’t bit the bullet, so to speak.
Her fingers were making short work of his shirt buttons as he sat there and basically let her undress him. Still, he felt not a damn thing when she pulled open the offending material, and then slid down between his legs, her hot eyes fixed on the prize, the prize that was at the moment only half-hard, and still needed some attention before he could reach any state that would satisfy the witch in front of him.
“So submissive, but I like being in control, makes me all the more ready to work you until you scream my name.”
Drake rolled his eyes as she opened his trousers. He didn’t stop her from pulling the two pieces of material open, and she saw how uninspired he was, but for some reason he got a smile from that.
“I see I will need to do a little more for you before we move on to the main course, but that’s okay. I’ll make it so hard for you baby that you won’t ever want me to stop.”
He chuckled at that, but she ignored him. That was when the truth hit him. This shouldn’t be happening. He was an Amber Druid. Members of that class had certain more primal urges than most humans. There
was no reason why he shouldn’t be sporting a hard on so amazingly rigid that even Lorelei would seem anxious about it. There was no reason why he was sitting submissively in front of her right now and not doing anything with her stiff nipples which were pushed up from her dress being pulled down, the redness of them winking at him enticingly in the low light of the room.
Drake considered himself a connoisseur of women. He loved a sweet, slow seduction, but rarely had the time for it. He loved all women, no matter their sizes, shapes, colors or personalities. He adored the way he could make them smile shyly at him when he turned on his Texas, good ole boy charm. Every inch of their skin held numerous erogenous zones. When tasted, caressed, or licked, he could turn even the frostiest of women into nothing more than a blubbering mass of want. He prided himself on doing that to every woman he had the chance to sleep with.
For some reason he was losing his patience with this woman, who was at the moment, on her knees about to take his half flaccid cock into her wet mouth. The damndest thing was, he should be as hard as a rock, and he wasn’t. Even when her fingers brushed the sensitive area underneath the head, still not one whisper of a zing moved through him.
Drake peered across the room, towards the wall and began to feel a spiking of rage flow through his system. He knew why this was happening, and he didn’t like it one fucking bit. The rage built and built, rising to a level that was deadly, and not what he needed. When his emotions reached the limit, or when he picked up anger from a human, his change started. Right now he could feel the heat of his eyes shifting from brown to amber, and one move of his tongue caught the edge of a fang slipping into a point. Damn.
Lorelei’s mouth was an inch away from his cock, her breath staining his skin, and he still didn’t feel any spark of lust for her. Instead he shoved her away, watching from under lowered lids, her breasts bouncing, as she landed on her ass on the floor. He got up and started buttoning and zipping his clothing back into a decent state.
Her Druid Desire (The Amber Druid Series) Page 8
