Predator

by Vonna Harper

  Walking barefoot over forest debris had already become as easy as standing on plush carpet. With each step she felt stronger, renewed, her sex-wounded body humming and alive. She loved her nudity, tangled hair and aching breasts. Her body remembered the feel of Stark’s flesh against it. Most of all, her core comprehended.

  “You believe you’ve done it, don’t you?” she asked when she and Cougar Spirit stood inches apart. “Taken control of me.”

  I need you. And him.

  Not trusting herself to look back at Stark, she focused on the animal. “I know what you’re capable of. You’re the most powerful animal in the forest, top of the food chain.”

  Not me, man is.

  Much as she hated hearing that, he was right. A well-placed bullet would end any predator’s life. Cougar Spirit might be immune to man’s weapons, but not deer and elk, bear and eagle. Only man—and woman—could hope to defend them.

  “I have a career just as Stark once did.”

  I know.

  “But you got him to turn his back on that and everything else that was once his life.”

  Yes.

  This time she lacked the strength to battle her need to look at Stark. He’d stood up but had made no move toward her, the distance between them letting her know he understood her need for time alone with Cougar Spirit. Just the same, she took note of how the wilderness surrounded and embraced Stark. He’d told her a little about his existence before coming to Cougar Mountain, the job he’d been questioning, the lack of a meaningful personal life. Still, leaving the familiar must have been hard.

  But he’d done so because he’d heard Cougar Spirit’s plea through every fiber of his being. The mountain and the creatures who called it home had become more important to him than his own life.

  “I can’t just stay here,” she told Cougar Spirit. “If I do, people will come looking for me.”

  I know.

  What had Stark done, she wondered. Had he turned in his resignation, told his landlord he wasn’t coming back, sold his possessions? Could she do the same?

  Stark.

  Beyond tears, she retraced her steps but stopped when she was still out of Stark’s reach. “You made incredible sacrifices,” she told him.

  “I didn’t see it that way; I still don’t.”

  In other words, his commitment would remain steadfast whether or not she willingly joined him.

  “I saw one poacher today, but there are more, aren’t there?”

  “And timber thieves. And those who leave campfires burning. And others who tear up the ground with their machinery and vehicles.”

  “Cougar Mountain isn’t the only place that happens.”

  “I have to start somewhere.”

  “Violence isn’t the only option.”

  Not a sound, not a movement, simply the sense that his entire being was focused on her. She hadn’t simply given fantasy free rein when she likened Stark to Cougar Spirit. Whether the otherworldly being was responsible or Stark had already carried the essence of what he’d become in him didn’t matter. The end result was that he was part of this forest.

  “You said—you told me that there isn’t the necessary manpower to go after poachers.”

  “Yes.”

  “Because poaching is an attack on one animal at a time. But what if what’s under attack is an entire stand of trees?” Forcing herself, she glanced at Cougar Spirit. “I have some idea what those operations are like. It takes a number of men, heavy equipment, time, and noise.”

  Positioning herself so she could easily look from Stark to Cougar Spirit, she continued. “How did the two of you propose to put an end to that?”

  Head back, Stark focused on the predator.

  Kill! Cougar Spirit insisted. Tear out their throats. Spill their blood over the earth.

  “And then what?” she asked despite her repulsion. “Even you can’t get to every timber thief out there. And if Stark does the attacking, he’s risking his own life. How will you continue if he’s killed?”

  Fighting a wave of terror at the thought, she locked her gaze on Cougar Spirit. “What?” she demanded. “Haven’t you thought about that?”

  If he dies, I’ll find others.

  For an instant, she hated Cougar Spirit for what he’d just said, but how could she blame him for thinking like an animal; that’s what he was.

  “You don’t have to. Not if—if we—Stark and I handle things the way they should be.”

  “Tell me.”

  Grateful to have Stark to talk to, she dismissed Cougar Spirit. “There are laws against what those so-called loggers are doing. And against those who use the forest to grow illegal crops. If we use those laws—”

  “How?”

  “I’m not sure, yet. But if we had pictures, or even better, video of the operations we find or Cougar Spirit leads us to—do you understand what I’m saying?” Excitement quickened her words.

  “Not killing?”

  “No,” she whispered. Then she took hold of Stark’s hand and pressed it against her breasts. “Ours are human hearts full of humanity, not just animal instinct. Cougar Spirit selected us to do what he can’t, but that doesn’t mean we become like him.”

  An intellect she hadn’t noted before bloomed in Stark’s gaze. The change reminded her of the look in her nephew’s eyes when he realized he didn’t need training wheels. At that moment, a dependent child had embraced independence. Stark had long embraced his independence, but Cougar Spirit had taken some of that from him.

  It was time for him to make his own decisions again.

  To join her in a task that excited her as she’d never been excited.

  “You have a friend who is a local ranger, right?” she asked. “If you went to him with proof—”

  “Not just him, law enforcement too.”

  “And the media.” She laughed. “Think of the possibilities, the press, the pressure on government to adequately fund—”

  He silenced her by pulling her close. And when she lifted her head, he covered her mouth with his, his lips strong and yet gentle on hers. Warm. Alive. His mouth opened; so did hers. Tongues touched, heated, danced together.

  A long time later they broke free, but by then his cock had been fed, and her cunt sang.

  “You’re staying, then?” he asked.

  “Yes. Yes.”

  “Willing to put Cougar Mountain’s needs ahead of yours?”

  “It won’t be like that,” she told the man she knew she’d spend the rest of her life with. “Just as you’ve become part of this mountain, so have I.”

  “Because of Cougar Spirit?”

  “No, not just him,” she said and laughed again. Laughed and brushed her breasts over his chest. “Because of you.”

  About the Author

  A fast-fingered writer of erotica, Vonna Harper loves penning stories set in remote locations where her characters can give into primitive impulse. Throw in a little capture and/or bondage and she’s a happy camper. Her website is www.VonnaHarper.com. She’s also on Twitter and Facebook and loves connecting with readers.

  Look for these titles by Vonna Harper

  Now Available:

  Blood Hunter

  Coming Soon:

  Night Hunter

  Loves lies behind the eyes of a predator.

  Bloodhunter

  © 2008 Vonna Harper

  The longer Dana Mallon studies the magnificent jaguar confined to a nature preserve, the greater her sense that forces beyond her comprehension are at work. Looking into the eyes of the big cat stirs something in her heart and heats the jaguar tattoo on her hip, stimulating visions of a fierce, naked man.

  Instead of fleeing the vision’s blatant sexuality, she follows the primal urge of her body into his arms. With his touch, her very existence shifts, and a lifetime of loneliness fades beneath the power of their sexual union.

  Nacon is determined to learn how this woman freed him from centuries in limbo. There’s only one way to learn the t
ruth—take her back with him to the past. And force her to embrace the incomprehensible.

  Warning: Fangs, claws and great sex!

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Bloodhunter:

  Heat seeped up from the earth to caress Dana’s bare toes. All around unseen insects whispered their secrets, and the lush vegetation kept hidden the location of countless animals, snakes and frogs. Although she acknowledged the hidden creatures’ presence, they mattered little. Her journey, this instinctive placing of one foot ahead of the other, claimed her full attention. And yet she didn’t know where she was going, where she’d been when she started walking, even who she was. She was naked, her arms empty. Her eyes adjusted to the scant illumination offered by stars and moon. Weariness, thirst, even questions didn’t touch her mind. She walked because that was her task, her passion.

  Counting distracted her from what she was doing, but a skimming sensation along her shoulders brought her head up.

  She slowed then stopped, somehow knowing she’d reached where she was supposed to be. Her arms settled along her sides and started working her hips, fingers caressing exercise-heated skin. Although she wanted to work her way to her core, the sudden need for answers kept them on safer territory.

  The trail ahead of her snaked into a great thicket, making her wonder if it ended there. This was her destination?

  “Am I alone?” she asked the night.

  “No.”

  A voice like a distant and lonely guitar played by a master. A male voice.

  “Are you waiting for me?”

  “I believe— Yes.”

  The dangerous words burned her nerve endings and sent her to trembling. Her cunt’s demands became harder to deny. Unable to speak for the dry knot in her throat, she widened her stance. She became as wild as the land she was in.

  Now the male voice spoke to her without words, the weight and warmth of him straightening her spine and hardening her nipples. Her breasts throbbed and memories of countless fuckings pooled around her labia. “I’m sex,” he was telling her in that secret language they shared. “I may be other things to other people, but to you, nothing except what my cock offers your cunt matters.”

  “How arrogant you are! To think that’s the only thing I care about.”

  “It is, Dana, it is. Put your hands on your breasts,” he said in his silent way. “Massage them and accept that those fingers belong to me, not you, and that you need this to live.”

  “How do you know so much about me?”

  “Because I now know I’ve been looking for you for thousands of years.”

  He didn’t mean that; he couldn’t! But how could she tell him when her breasts were so hungry and she might climax if she so much as pressed her legs together? He wanted her to massage her breasts, so she did, sometimes courting pain, sometimes barely touching herself with butterfly fingers. These weren’t her fingers, she told herself. They belonged to him. Her back arched, and her mouth parted. She heard herself breathing, quick and loud and heavy with need.

  Need! Clawing and crying need for whatever the stranger granted her.

  “So many years of searching, but I found you. Even when I didn’t know what I was searching for.”

  Ah, back to using his seductive voice again. “How did you find me?”

  “A million ways, whispers and light, the smell of you.”

  She smelled of her hot juices, primal scents that aroused and demanded. “What do you want from me?”

  “To believe in me. And once you have, to travel with me.”

  “Travel? Where?” Closing her thumbs and fingers around her nubs, she squeezed. No pain, just more of the melting heat in her core. “Where do you want to take me?”

  “To where the answers lie.”

  A spark of something she couldn’t name struck the base of her throat only to quickly spread down and out. His voice, his damnable voice was responsible! As the ever-growing ember crawled over her belly and sent lightning fingers along her inner tissues, she lost all interest in their conversation and the finger of fear that had briefly touched her. One thing and one thing only mattered. Seeing him. Touching him. Claiming and being claimed.

  Infused with this single all-encompassing reason for living, she stepped toward the thicket. With her second step, she knew without a doubt that he was in there, waiting for her, challenging.

  Promising?

  No fear now. No hesitation. Nothing except sex-scent in the air and hot explosions threatening to turn her into an animal in heat. Cupping her breasts, she held them up as gifts. They were so heavy, heavy like the weight and warmth between her legs. Animals fucked and mated. When nature’s primal need controlled them, they knew nothing of restraint or embarrassment. They needed to mate, only mate. They sought and demanded sex.

  She’d do that. Pull the man behind the voice out of the brush and throw him down and mount him. With her teeth on his throat and her hands hard on his sex, she’d demand her rights. Ride him. Ride him until he had nothing left to give her and she’d screamed out her release.

  Naked, he’d be naked. Erect and aroused with a staying power to match hers, and animal lust coursing through his veins.

  Nearly insane with a power she couldn’t comprehend or control, she reached the great vegetation. But before she could plunge into it, everything went still. Waiting. The world was waiting.

  Not the naked male animal she craved after all. Instead, the tall, strong creature emerging from his hiding place wore a cape that caressed and cradled him from shoulders to mid thighs. The instant she saw the cape, she knew what it was made from, but revulsion and disbelief came before unwanted but necessary acceptance.

  A jaguar pelt. Beautiful and awful. Stripped of the big cat’s living heat.

  Screaming out her rage, she tore the pelt off its owner and pummeled his chest. Then, sobbing, she clutched the pungent smelling skin with its whisper-soft fur to her breasts.

  “You killed it! You bastard, you damned bastard, you killed it!”

  No denial. No words at all. Instead he stood with his arms at his sides as she’d done earlier, with his head high and his hard, hot, uncircumcised cock thrusting toward her.

  “Accept me. Believe in me.”

  “No, I can’t! I won’t.”

  “Yes, you will.”

  Screaming again, she turned and ran.

  Dana was on her feet beside the bed. With the dream still gripping her, she couldn’t put her mind to the question of what she intended to accomplish so she stood while circulation returned to her legs and clarity to her mind.

  That’s all it had been, a dream, albeit a vivid and disturbing one, especially the part about the jaguar skin and the detail about him not having been circumcised. But there was no reason why life as she’d always known it should cease to exist. All she needed to do was become clear-headed again. Maybe a trip to the bathroom followed by a drink of water followed by…what?

  The more she thought about it, the more the bathroom seemed like the logical starting point. Fortunately, the cabin was so small that that task called for taking only took a few steps. After tending to nature’s needs, she ran the water and cupped her hands under the cold flow. Once she’d satisfied her thirst, she ran her dripping hands over her face and shivered.

  Animal attraction is the essence of their power.

  Shifters’ Captive

  © 2010 Bonnie Dee

  Magical Ménages, Book 1

  Waitress Sherrie Stolz never thought she’d need her chatting-up skills to play along with a hot, sexy kidnapper who rants about were-animals and psychic possession. Then he proves his story by changing into a wolf before her eyes.

  Human contact never interested John Walker, but his mission is desperate. The pack seer insists Sherrie is the only one who can save his pack from a rash of mysterious comas. His connection with Sherrie is instant, powerful and beyond rational explanation…until a third piece of the puzzle enters the picture.

  Grant Perron follows his instincts
only to find his prize in the hands of his rival. He’s poised for battle—until he learns his panther shifter clan suffers the same fate as John’s pack. And there’s more. When the three of them touch, the primal, erotic power surge swells like the waves of an earthquake.

  Sherrie’s hands—and bed—are suddenly full, figuring out how to manage two snarling alpha males without giving in to the urge to knock their heads together. And channel her new-found power before a villain uses it to destroy them all…

  Warning: Contains abduction, m/f/m ménage, oral & anal sex, rough sex, wilderness sex, astral projection sex and plain old sex in the bedroom—times three.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Shifters’ Captive:

  “We’re trapped.” Sherrie stated the obvious as she craned her neck to look up the wall of rock. Somewhere at the top was the cave where their nemesis lived. Was this avalanche a coincidence or had he meant to kill or capture them?

  John moved around the perimeter, pacing the limits of their enclosure. Perron got to his feet, tossing the bloodied T-shirt aside and scaled a pile of stony rubble. He attempted to climb over the boulder that had nearly crushed him.

  “Damn it!” he roared in frustration as he fell back and landed on his feet.

  “I told you rushing into this was a bad idea,” John said. “Now we’re trapped. I’m sure it’s no accident.”

  Grant scowled and started to take off his shirt. “You can stand here and complain about being stuck. I’m shifting and finding a way out.”

  Without another word, Walker followed his example, quickly stripping. Once again their bodies rippled. Charged static electricity lifted Sherrie’s hair and made her arms prickle. Suddenly, she longed fiercely to be able to shift too. Into what form she had no clue, but the idea of releasing the primitive animal inside her to howl and run was deeply seductive.