Resigned to being too exposed for the moment, she splayed her hand over the side of her leg and stared out the window. Thoughts of Lucas came to mind, but she was distracted from tormenting herself over him by Deandre’s overpowering cheap cologne.
“Mind if I roll the window down a bit?” she asked him.
He ran a gentle hand down the side of her face and caressed her lips with the pad of his thumb. She fought not to pull away.
“Go right ahead, baby. Anything for you.”
She lowered the window and closed her eyes. At last, Deandre returned his hand to the steering wheel, and the breeze rushed in to clear the air in the car and to clear her head. Only a hint of the scent remained. At this level, it seemed familiar, like she had smelled it before. Of course she would have. Deandre had been sniffing around her for a few weeks now. But the thought that she had smelled the cologne earlier in the restaurant at lunch time slid into her mind. That’s ridiculous. He wasn’t there. Only my perfect lover, my insane ex-lover, Lucas.
* * * *
Irritation rose inside Lucas making him feel like his head would explode at any second. Nita had made her position plain regarding him. There was no more need of torturing himself over the woman, and yet, when he had picked up her scent on his way out of town to put her, Gloria, and every other woman that tempted him out of his head, he couldn’t help stopping to check on her.
Since that single bite on her shoulder, Lucas had been free of the crushing hurt in his chest that he had lived with ever since the night he caught Gloria in bed with another man. Now when he thought of Gloria, he felt nothing but disgust. In a single evening of making love to Nita, he had been freed. That had not been the case with any of his former lovers. Could it be because she was human? Was there something special about them after all?
No, he couldn’t believe that, and yet here he was, obsessing over her. He wanted to get a glimpse of that sweet face, those wide brown eyes. Never had he once desired to bed a black woman. It just didn’t enter his mind. And he’d seen several today alone who were beautiful, but the craving he had was for Nita.
He growled, slamming his fist against the center of his steering wheel. “Nita.”
His staff grew hard almost to the point of pain. Tugging his pants to give himself room that no longer existed did little good. “This is just lust,” he told himself. “Nothing more.” With a sigh, he slid out of the car and stood alongside it. “One look. A single look at her cannot hurt anything.”
Weaving through the oncoming traffic with horns blaring at him, Lucas crossed the street to stop in front of an Italian restaurant where he had caught Nita’s scent. Rather than step into the lobby where he would be too conspicuous, he moved to the side of the building where there were more windows through which he could look in. The glare from the lights, though low, would allow him to see in but make it hard for the patrons to see out unless they pressed their faces close to the glass.
At a table in the back of the room, he spotted her, with the guy who had no scent other than that disgusting cologne he wore. Lucas picked up on the lust mirrored in the man’s eyes as he seemed to stare down at Nita’s cleavage. A growl started in Lucas’ chest. He felt the shift in his eyes, knowing they had turned black, but he fought not to change any more. Nita wasn’t exactly his. She had made that plain on the phone.
He watched her twisting her hands on the edge of the table and staring down at them. Was she still uncomfortable with men? After all that they had done together, her even taking the initiative to lick him and suck his shaft into her mouth, then later riding him to abandon, he thought the shyness would have passed somewhat.
Lucas sniffed. Along with her normal scent, he picked up something else, something he couldn’t identify. She wasn’t happy, maybe even sad. The tension around her mouth and eyes spoke volumes, and not only that the date wasn’t going well. He had said he would leave town for a while, but remembering that he was the Alpha leader of his pack now, and that he couldn’t just abandon everyone, he waited. Protecting his pack and watching Nita had nothing to do with one another, but he had no intension of admitting that to himself right now. She filled his senses, and was all he wanted to focus on.
At ten, the couple stood and moved toward the exit after Deandre had settled the bill and tip. Lucas hadn’t missed how he stiffed the waitress on the amount he gave her for her services. The growl in his throat escalated to a snarl when Deandre rested a hand on Nita’s waist, his fingers splayed too much in an obvious attempt to fondle her ass.
Lucas was gratified when she sidled out of his hold and walked ahead. Out on the street, he hid in the shadows not too far from them and picked up on the conversation.
“Why don’t we go back to my place, Nita? We can talk, get to know each other better.” Deandre smiled, a hopeful look in his eyes.
Nita shook her head. “I’m sorry. I’m just not good company today, Deandre. Something happened earlier that...well I don’t want to talk about it.” She laid a small hand on his chest. “Can I call you? We can do this again when I’m feeling better. I think I’m going to walk down to Stacy’s work place. She’s just a block over, and I know she told me she would be late leaving there tonight for some reason. I can catch a ride with her, probably stay at her place tonight.”
Deandre chuckled. “Just what kind of relationship do the two of you have with you spending the night at her apartment all the time?”
Nita’s eyes widened. “You’re not serious, are you?”
Lucas suppressed a laugh of his own. Idiot should keep his mind on the sweet woman in front of him instead of fantasizing about two women together, which a fool could figure out was exactly what Deandre was imagining.
“Naw, baby,” Deandre joked. “I was just joshing you. Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow, I hope. Let’s do something then. I think you’re really special, Nita, and I want to build something good with you.”
She backed up a step, her hands raised. “Slow down. I’m not sure I’m ready for that, and we don’t know how compatible we are. I just...like I said, something bad happened, and I’m trying to deal with it. I’ll call you.”
With that, she turned and headed south along the street. Lucas had no intension of letting her walk at night alone, even if she was on a busy street where several stores lined the walk, and people were coming and going. He reminded himself that she was his priority and not the man staring at her ass with his mouth slack and the front of his pants tented. Lucas would deal with Deandre later.
When Deandre had jumped in his car and peeled out of his parking space in the opposite direction, Lucas fell into step behind Nita. He too wanted to watch her swaying hips he realized, but he pushed his desires aside. She was upset, and he wanted to know why. If someone had hurt her, they would pay.
Chapter Ten
Nita became aware that someone was following her, and her heart began to pound in her chest. When she reached inside her purse for the pepper spray she kept there, he spoke up.
“Easy, Nita. I’m not going to hurt you.”
She gasped and turned around. Lucas stood there bold as anything after what he had done to her earlier in the day. “W-What are you doing here? Did you follow me?”
He nodded with no shame. “Yes, I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“No thanks to you!” she snapped. Her heart continued to pound, but now it was because he was close and all she wanted to do was run into his arms, to taste his mouth again, to feel the hard muscles of his body pressed against hers. This was ridiculous. The man had threatened her, had left bruises on her arms, and she did not bruise easily. “Get out of here, Lucas. I never want to see you or talk to you again.”
“Why are you so mad at me?” he grumbled. “You are the one who dismissed me.”
“Before you could do it to me.” She rested her hands on her hips. “Admit it. You would have. You’ve probably done it to countless women in the past, leaving broken hearts all over the city.”
“So
your heart is involved?”
She squinted at him and rolled her eyes. Deciding he wasn’t about to attack, she turned and continued her walk. He fell into step beside her, and she sighed. The man would not be dismissed easily. That much was obvious. She should pull out her cell and call Zandrea and Brant, but she hesitated. Doubts had assailed her all day long, and she wanted to get to the bottom of one particular one before she turned him into his people, or whoever.
“What do you want with me?” she asked him.
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“Oh here we go, you back to your normal cold-heartedness. Do you think that acting that way will win me over? Or is it your way of protecting yourself?”
“What about you? You stay in school year after year, with no major, no direction.”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Tell me why,” he insisted.
At first she wasn’t going to answer, but she hadn’t even told Zandrea and Stacy the reasons behind her perpetual schooling. Her inheritance had stipulated that her school bills be paid for as long as she was in school. Back when she was eighteen just entering college, she had realized that the wording would allow her to delay life for as long as the money lasted. And if what her trustees said was true, it could conceivably last for several lifetimes.
She sucked in a deep breath and blew it out. Her fingers curled into her palms like they always did when she thought of her parents, even after all these years. “From a baby, my parents loved to party. It was their life. They couldn’t get enough, and they were devoted to one another.” She hesitated, not wanting to sound self-pitying but wanting to be truthful to how she thought of her mother and father. “Their love for one another produced me, but it did not extend to me.”
His eyes widened. She thought they were very dark again tonight, but didn’t put too much in it. When the normal coldness seemed to drain from his face, and he reached across to take her hand, she let him. Relief that he didn’t offer empty assurances that her parents did love her in their own way made her go on.
“They dumped me in boarding school as quickly as they could and jetsetted around the world, from one upscale party to the next. The club you like to attend is partly owned by an old friend of theirs and another guy I don’t know. Anyway, one time when I was twelve, they had picked me up from school and spent the weekend with me. It was not a good experience to say the least. Their drunken friends weren’t the friendliest. Anyway, my parents blamed me for the incident and dumped me back at school early.” The pain restricted her heart. She rushed on.
“That same weekend at a party they attended, a parcel bomb went off and killed almost everyone in the place, including my parents. In an instant I was left an orphan, raised mostly by my trustees who made every decision in my life, except one. School.”
Lucas pulled her to a stop and turned her into his arms. At first Nita resisted, but she needed to feel his strength. She melted against him and breathed in his pure animal scent, something she couldn’t exactly identify, but that seemed erotic and untamed. A lump grew in her throat, and her eyes moistened. Lucas murmured words she couldn’t understand with his mouth buried in her hair, but their tone was soothing.
“I made the decision to stay in school where it was safe,” she muttered. “Stupid, I know, but there’s no accounting for how a psyche pushed to its limits will react.”
Lucas drew back with his hands resting on her shoulders and a smile on his lips. “Learn that in school?”
She grinned and wiped away the tears. “Yes. Sometimes I get all school marmie, according to my friends.”
“Feeling a little better?” he asked.
She did a mental check of herself and had to admit that she did feel better. Admitting to someone the real reason why she had hidden away from the world for so long was liberating in a way. It loosened the grip that fear had wrapped around her since her parents’ deaths.
While logically she knew that just participating in the world in a real way would not destroy her in some way, the fear had still bound her. Nita didn’t feel like calling up her school and telling them she was dropping out, but she was pretty sure, there would be some changes.
“Yes, I guess I am feeling better. Admitting how my parents’ deaths affected me was a huge step. I had been in denial for a long time. I won’t pretend I’m cured, but I can take steps in that direction.” She smiled up at him. “Thank you for that, Lucas.”
He lowered his head and pressed his lips against hers. She should have resisted him, but she didn’t. She wanted more. Opening her mouth, she let his tongue slide between her lips. A moan escaped her when he caressed the warm walls of her mouth with his tongue and teased the tip of hers with his.
After a few greedy kisses where they clung together and moaned out their pleasure, he drew back. “Come to my house.”
Her memories flood back, and she swallowed. “If I say no....”
He frowned. “I get the impression that you’re expecting me to react a certain way. What happened to you earlier that you referred to when you were talking to your date?”
She gasped. He had heard them? And didn’t he remember the way he had behaved when he grabbed her and threatened to beat her? She licked her lips. Lucas caught the action, and the desire that flared in his eyes was no less than what roared inside her, despite what it all seemed to be. She should be terrified of Lucas, running for her life from him, and yet she didn’t want to. Stacy would cuss her out if she knew.
“If I say no to you, Lucas, and mean it. What will you do? If I say I prefer Deandre, the guy I went out with tonight, to you, what will you say to that?”
Lucas let her go so fast she almost lost her balance. He turned away stuffing his hands in his pockets. Confusion clouded her mind. Was he trying to reign in his violent temper?
“Are you trying to play me for a fool, Nita?” he growled. “I’ve been there, done that. I don’t share my women.”
She placed her hands on her hips. “Oh, that’s rich because you damn sure don’t have a problem with women sharing you.”
“You don’t know anything about me!”
She spun on the ball of one foot. “Go fuck yourself.”
He caught her by the waist, whipped her around and lifted her up so that her eyes met his and her feet dangled above the ground. “I don’t want to fuck myself. I want to fuck you.”
Her breath caught in her throat. Not with fear, but with desire.
“I want to fuck you,” he said again. “No hearts. No promises. Just sex. Great, hot, sweaty, exhausting sex. Nita,” he groaned almost desperately.
“Yes.” She panted. “Let’s go.”
Chapter Eleven
There was much between them. Lucas suspected she didn’t trust him not to hurt her, although he couldn’t figure out why she would feel that way. She had maintained control of the relationship, such that it was, from the beginning. He was just going along for the incredible ride. And although he should stop long enough to demand why she was behaving the way she was with him, as if he had done something wrong, he didn’t want to. Not now. First he had to have her. Just this once, maybe the last time.
He had taken her to his home again, another mistake but he couldn’t see taking a woman like Nita to a motel, not when she had freed his heart, had healed him to a certain degree. He carried her across the threshold of his home, and with her legs wrapped around his waist and his lips molded to hers, he directed them both toward the bedroom.
Her dress was pretty with its black and white print and its low cut to show off her cleavage, but it needed to come off. He knew a bit of frustration when he fumbled for a zipper in the back and found none. “Where the hell is it?” he growled against her lips.
She laughed and pulled his hand to her side. The zipper was there with a button-and-eye closure at the top. He fought to keep from ripping it off as he lowered her to the bed. When he had gently stripped his lover and then himself, he leaned up to stare down at her sexy bo
dy. Her soft creamy brown skin made him hard as a rock, and he thought he could come just looking at her alone.
Her dark chocolate nipples were tight buds that beckoned for his mouth, and he licked his lips before lowering his head to have a taste. She cried out at first contact and arched her back while pulling his head closer.
“Lucas,” she moaned. “Suck my nipples, please. Make me come. I can’t get enough of you. All night and day is not enough!”
“For me as well, my love,” he whispered and could have kicked himself for calling her his love, and yet, it sounded right on his lips. He sucked harder at her nipple before moving to the other and tracing the path down her belly to the curls at her apex. His shaft jumped knowing he was so close to the place it ached to merge with.
She was soaking wet, her cream dripping down on his fingers as he sought to bury them inside her tunnel. She raised her legs and pleaded for more. He didn’t want to deny her anything. While the first time, he knew he had pleased her, his mind had been filled with thoughts of pleasing himself. Now, all he wanted was to make her come, to watch her face while she exploded at his touch. She liked it slow sometimes and then hard at others. He wanted to pick up on her wavelength and fulfill all of her fantasies.
Sinking his fingers into her, he watched her eyes moisten with tears. He would have pulled back, but she grabbed his hand and drove him deeper. “Don’t,” she begged. “Don’t stop. I need it.”
Had he thought she weakened him with need? She was just as vulnerable with him, he noted, and for once in all his sexual escapades it didn’t make him swell with pride, but with gratitude, that such a perfect woman would find her pleasure with him. Damn, he was doing it again. Falling in love. What a fool, and he went willingly.
“Nita.” He lifted her higher on the bed and followed with his body above hers. He positioned his knees beneath her lovely thighs and then pushed his erection into her. His wolf’s roar was torn from his throat at the feel of her enclosing around him, welcoming every inch of his shaft with warm delight. “Damn, you feel incredible. Hold on. No. Don’t move.”
City Wolf 2 Page 5
