Unleashing the Storm

by Sydney Croft

  “Is this what you want, Kira?” he murmured against her center, his voice buzzing through her labia, his hot breath searing her core. “Do you want me to make you come with my mouth, or with my cock?”

  Oh, he was entirely too aware of what she wanted, that her greedy self wanted it all.

  Stepping back, she dropped to all fours so she faced him, her mouth a mere inch from his, which glistened with her juices. He watched her warily as she moved closer, avoided his mouth, and rubbed her cheek against his. Rough whiskers scratched her skin, but she didn’t care. It felt too good to touch him.

  She dragged her lips across his ear, his cheekbone, then nibbled at his jawline, working her way toward his mouth. His muscles tensed as she drew close, and she knew he’d pull back if she kissed him; his kisses were doled out on his terms. Instead, she flicked her tongue over his lips, tasted herself on him.

  “Enough.” His voice was rough, hard, as he hooked her leg and dragged her around so he could mount her.

  She felt the dig of his fingers in her hips, the hot prod of his cock against her buttocks. The carpet bit into her knees.

  “Tom, please,” she whispered. “Let me love you.”

  His entire body rocked back. She took advantage of his moment of stunned silence and spun, brought her hand down on his head and sank her teeth into the back of his neck, pressing him back down on his hands and knees, head bowed.

  Never had she seen his body go as taut as it was now, the muscles bulging, straining under the skin. His breathing went harsh, deep and even. Battle-mode. He was thinking this through, staying calm even though his body wanted to act.

  He could break her hold with little effort, but maybe he felt what she felt, a need to make a powerful connection with this mating.

  Slowly, as though gentling a stallion that threatened to balk, she stroked his back, worked her way to his flank and then to his jutting erection. Taking his shaft in her palm, she caressed him until his breathing grew less controlled, until the tight cords in his neck relaxed and then began to tighten again for a different reason.

  She released her bite on his neck, soothed with her tongue the indentations she’d made with her teeth. Then she fastened her mouth to the pulse in his throat and let it pound into her. Her clit pulsed in time to his heartbeat, and she squeezed her thighs together to relieve the ache there.

  Tom froze, and she knew he felt the connection too, the one that seemed to tie them together via an invisible artery from his body to her very womb.

  Mine.

  She sucked lightly, wondering if he’d have a hickey on his neck later, and then she kissed her way across his collarbone.

  Visions of being with him like this permanently, not just until he took her to ACRO, ran through her mind as she massaged his shoulders, ran her hands down his arms, traced his straining muscles.

  “You’re so beautiful,” she said against the skin between his shoulder blades. “Physically perfect. Powerful. Strong.” She smoothed her tongue along his spine, all the way to his tailbone. “What every female wants in a mate.”

  He groaned, remained motionless as she skimmed her fingers over every part she could reach. Opening her mouth over his hipbone, she bit down. Not hard, but enough to hold him there, to show him without words that she wanted to hold him in every way. She released him, licked the bitten area tenderly.

  The sounds of his quickening breaths were like little slaps on her skin, each one making her wild, making her remember how he’d spanked her with the horse crop in the barn, and later with his bare hand.

  Creamy wetness spilled between her thighs, because God, she was so ready for him, but not yet. This was about him. She wanted to worship his body and show him what he meant to her.

  She moved behind him, and this time he held his breath as her palms squeezed and massaged his buttocks. Her thumbs dropped lower, skimmed the crevice of his ass. The first light touch of her fingers on his testicles made him lurch forward, but she caught him around the thigh with one hand while she put her mouth where her fingers had been.

  The musky scent of aroused male heightened her hunger, drew a soft moan from her as she sucked his firm balls between her lips and scraped the tight sac lightly with her teeth.

  “Kira…sweet damn…”

  Insanely aroused by his reaction, she lapped, licked between his legs and up to the smooth, sensitive place behind his balls. When she pushed her tongue into the seam there, separating his testicles, a ragged, guttural groan ripped from deep in his chest.

  She could have stayed there all day. Instead, she scattered kisses along the backs of his thighs while his muscles quivered and his breath came in shallow gasps.

  “I love how you taste, Tommy. Like danger and sex, like you fought a battle to win me.”

  A shudder shifted his entire body toward her. She nibbled, tiny love bites across his waist. Then she bent her head, went beneath him, and he whispered her name as her tongue flicked over the head of his brutal erection.

  She’d never seen him so engorged, his head so ripe and hot that she could feel the pulse beat against her lips.

  She teased, licked, dipped the tip of her tongue into the weeping slit. He arched his back to slip his cock into her mouth, but she angled her head away, rubbed her cheek against it, something close to a purr welling up inside her.

  “What’s the matter, baby?” The taunt made him grind his teeth so hard she heard the click of bone on bone. “Is this what you want?”

  She flicked her tongue along the ridge of the sensitive head, and then took him deep, until he knocked on the back of her throat. He pulsed inside her, spilling a few drops of cum, which she took greedily.

  “Oh, yeah,” he murmured. “Suck it hard.”

  She hummed around his length, and he pumped his hips, fucking her mouth. So good. She’d never been so turned on from giving oral sex, had never been on the verge of orgasm without a man even touching her. Unable to wait, she fingered herself as she sucked him.

  “Kira,” he rasped harshly. “You’d better stop. I can’t hold it.”

  She applied serious suction, wanting to drink him in, to take his life-giving seed in the most intimate way possible. He cursed, tried to withdraw, but she stopped pleasuring herself to reach between his legs and tug gently on his balls to hold him. Straining and bucking, he roared out her name, gushing into her mouth.

  She loved the sound of his groans, of his rasping breaths. His body began to jerk as his climax faded, and she gently swirled her tongue around his softening flesh, until she felt his fingers trail down her thigh.

  He dragged his hand up to her sex, dipped two fingers into her slick core. “I need a minute before I can take care of you.”

  Then his tongue joined his fingers, and she cried out, because he could take all the time he needed.

  CHAPTER

  Twenty-one

  Ender snapped his cell phone shut and leaned back against the old tree trunk on the south side of his property.

  He’d made another call he shouldn’t have and found out things he hadn’t wanted to know. Typical of his life lately. But he knew Kira was panicked about what was happening to her animals, and besides, there was only so much he could watch as she rearranged his whole life and put herself directly in the center. Because what was going to happen when she left?

  She didn’t see that consequence, obviously, didn’t see that she was going to leave behind a big, gaping hole.

  But he had things to worry about other than himself.

  Apparently, the only one who knew what the hell they were doing at the animal refuge had been Kira. Suddenly Rafi was in a cage because there was no one who could control the pretty lynx, and Luke, the monster German shepherd who’d nearly killed him and then helped save him, hadn’t eaten in weeks. Babs was just wandering around listless and Shamal refused to leave her stall.

  For a second, he saw his yard filled with dogs and tigers and God knows what else, all of them surrounding Kira.

 
He imagined Babs snuggling up next to him and realized that he’d probably lost his fucking mind. This much sex couldn’t be good for anyone’s brain cells.

  Except he knew, deep down, that this much sex wasn’t necessary—hadn’t been for days. No, Kira’s heat cycle was over. He could tell the difference when he took her, the way she was able to enjoy the buildup more, the way she wasn’t as frantic, even though she played it well.

  Why she was doing so wasn’t that big of a mystery—she was putting off going to ACRO. He didn’t let himself believe she was faking it to stay with him.

  “Hey, I was looking for you.” Kira circled the old oak and stood in front of him. She’d confiscated his favorite T-shirt and cut it to fit her. She’d done the same with a pair of his old camouflage shorts and he had to admit, grudgingly, they looked a lot better on her than they ever did on him. “Why are you shaking your head like that? And muttering? You’ve been doing that a lot lately.”

  “I wasn’t hiding,” he said. Man, he was tired. He’d been doubling up on the protein bars to make up for the fact that it had been almost two weeks since he’d eaten any kind of steak or burger, but it wasn’t the same kind of fuel at all. He was still dragging. “I’ve, ah, got to talk to you about something. Why don’t you sit?”

  She sank gracefully to the ground in front of him, stretching out on the grass next to his jean-clad legs. She rested a cheek on his thigh and he wondered how things had gotten this far, this fast.

  He sighed and told her about the phone call to the refuge.

  “Tommy, I’ve got to go back there.” She would’ve been on her feet and on a dead run toward his car if he hadn’t put a hand on her arm.

  “Calm down, Kira. Please.”

  “I can’t stay here knowing that they’re hurting.”

  “And if you go back there, Itor will have you in no time. How will that help?” he asked. She bit her bottom lip and her resistance to his grip faded. She put her head back down on his legs, tears welled in her eyes, and for a few minutes they both just stared up at the beautiful blue sky.

  “What do I do, Tommy?”

  “I can’t make your decisions for you.”

  “Did you walk into ACRO on your own terms?”

  His head started to throb, and if he thought about it really hard, he could hear the bars of his cell door slamming behind him. “No. I wasn’t given that choice.”

  “Do you regret that?”

  “I regret an awful lot of things,” he said quietly. “But this isn’t about me.”

  She sat up and faced him again. “If I go to ACRO, they’ll let me ship the animals here?”

  “Yes. I already talked with Zach about that,” he said, and she just stared at him. Her whole face softened. “What?”

  “You’ve been calling the refuge a lot, haven’t you? Even though you told me it wasn’t possible.”

  He refused to admit that this was his third call to the damned place. A man had to keep some pride.

  She didn’t force anything more from him, though, and for that, he was grateful.

  “I want to go in on my own terms,” she said. “On my own. Without you escorting me there.”

  “Me escorting you is for your own safety.”

  “I can make it there on my own.”

  “Not an option.”

  “Your car is fast—”

  “No,” he said and she sighed heavily, but it wasn’t with defeat. It was the how-can-I-convince-Tommy sigh.

  “I know! I can take Zorro.”

  “What the hell are you talking about, woman?”

  “Zorro,” she said patiently as she pointed though the trees. His neighbor’s animal was a mile away, and thanks to the protein deficit, fuzzier than it should have been at ten times the distance. He didn’t realize that she’d been that far over on his property and he sorely needed to stop underestimating her.

  She stood and whistled, and in a matter of moments, the pretty black horse had jumped the fence and was stomping and whinnying in front of them.

  “No one will be able to catch me. I’ll be there in under twenty minutes.”

  “I guess you’re going to have to get used to doing things on your own,” he said finally, knowing full well he’d follow her and the horse in secret, just in case. She’d never have to know that.

  “I’m not sure I want to.”

  “But you just said you’d join.”

  “Not ACRO. I’m not sure I want to do things on my own anymore. I mean, are there rules against ACRO people being together?”

  “You mean, like you and me?”

  “Well, I certainly don’t mean me and Zach,” she said, and he growled without realizing it. “Of course I mean you, Tommy.”

  “I don’t know if I know how to do this,” he said. “I’ve never let anyone in.”

  “I haven’t either,” she said. “Maybe we could both try?”

  “Try what?”

  She rolled her eyes, and dammit if she and Zorro didn’t both shake their heads at him. “This. You. Me. Together.”

  “Are you going to keep rearranging my stuff?”

  “Well, yeah,” she said.

  He nodded, thought for a second about waking up with the sun warming his bed and Kira warming him.

  The order to kill her if she didn’t cooperate still hadn’t been lifted; that was something that broke into his thoughts late at night while Kira lay sleeping contentedly next to him after yet another round of sex.

  He’d never not followed through on an order from ACRO. There had been times when he had to postpone assassinations due to unforeseen events. Usually his order had nothing to do with killing men or women who were like him.

  No, he hadn’t done that since the military.

  Ender wasn’t sure if it was all one big test or not, but if it was, he was hovering precariously along the pass-fail line.

  But as he watched Kira communicating with Zorro while she stood in the sun, smiling, her hair tumbling softly down her back, suddenly nothing seemed like a problem. She was going into ACRO on her own terms.

  “I’ll drive you there. Just to the gate. You can walk in on your own,” he said finally. She turned to him and nodded her assent and he knew he had to have her, right here and now.

  It had only been two hours since her last feigned heat, and despite the fact that he was tired, he wanted her. Badly.

  “Come here, Kira,” he said. It came out more like an order, but she didn’t hesitate, left the horse and moved catlike toward him. When she knelt in front of him, he pulled her close, kissed her on her full, pink lips, and within seconds he had his answer to the question she’d asked before. This was a real kiss, not one of dominance or anger, but a full-blown, all-out, romantic-as-hell kiss.

  Yes, they were going to try this.

  “Tommy, it’s not time yet,” she whispered after he’d pulled back.

  “I know. But can’t a man have a chance to seduce his woman on his terms?” he asked, went right along with her lie, watched as her eyes began to glow that beautiful golden amber.

  “That’s never happened.”

  “Well, it’s about to. Maybe you should start getting used to it,” he murmured as he pulled her close and kissed her again. It went on and on, her hands around his neck and the two of them rolling around on the ground like they had all the time in the world to lie around and neck. His balls tightened, his gut tensed as his thighs rubbed hers—and how did she always smell so good, like honey and cloves and sunshine?

  She’d begun to peel off his jeans before he could stop her—didn’t want to, really, until the snort reminded him that they weren’t alone.

  “Hey, is that horse going to watch us the whole time?” he asked.

  She laughed, gave a light whistle, and Zorro bristled for a second before turning his back on them. “He said to tell you that you don’t have anything he hasn’t seen before. Although you’re much bigger than most humans he’s seen.”

  “The horse has seen me naked?”
he asked, with a shake of his head. She pushed his jeans down his hips, raked his ass lightly with her nails.

  “Oh, yeah. And I have to agree with him on the big part,” she said, her hand brushing lightly over his now-freed cock, which jumped at her touch.

  “Yeah, you’d better agree,” he said, his voice a rasp as she stroked him up and down.

  In return, he sucked her nipple though her shirt until the cotton was soaking wet and her nipple was hard and her moans traveled through the yard over the soft rustle of the trees. Her hands ran through his hair as she murmured, “Nice, so nice, Tommy.”

  It had to have been the first time they’d ever taken it slow during sex, and he planned to make it last as long as he could hold out.

  He made short work of her shirt. Leisurely, his tongue ringed the dark pink areola, then swiped her nipple until she was shaking her head from side to side and arching her back toward him.

  “Mmmmmm, nice,” she murmured. “More…want more.”

  He suckled her nipple between his teeth and tongue, teasing the tight bud in a way he’d never had time to before this. His other hand trailed down between her legs, where he stroked her leisurely through the shorts, until she began to buck impatiently underneath him.

  “Tommy—”

  “Yes, baby,” he murmured before he could stop himself. He kept his face buried by her breast, because when the hell did he start using terms of endearment?

  “Baby. I like that,” she said. “But I have something to tell you.”

  “Right now? I’m a little busy,” he said, taking her nipple into his mouth again. She moaned, but it didn’t deter her.

  “Yes, right now.”

  He propped himself up on his elbow. “Go ahead.”

  “My heat…it’s over.”

  He stared at her, knowing he should be more angry about the deception, when instead he was oddly comforted. “Yeah, I know.”

  “Then you know we don’t have to…” She pointed between their bodies.

  “Yes, I know that. But I want to.”