by Entangled
He settled the small fire, safely contained in a metal box, on the stump and admired how the light and shadow danced over her lovely face. Beauty that made his insides hurt.
He wanted to touch her fire-hair, now glowing even brighter in the light of the dancing flames. The coils of it spilled in luminous tangles over her ivory shoulder and onto the sleeping place. But he didn’t wish to disturb her. He could watch over her, and she would sleep in peace.
If she slept, she trusted him.
The scent of her—the musky, sweet, special essence—filled his nostrils and would permeate the place she slept. He would have that memory of her after she was gone from here. Her fingers relaxed, curled under her cheek. Her breathing changed, slowing and deepening. Her lips, crushed against her hand, eased into the shape of a soft, tempting flower bud.
He wanted to press his mouth to hers. He had tasted her before, there, in that sweet, warm, slick place between her legs…but now he knew he wanted to touch her lips. And all the other parts of her.
Beneath the antelope skin he wore around his waist, Zaren’s rod shifted and swelled at the idea. He frowned down at it and turned his thoughts elsewhere. He had no patience, no time for that now.
He had much to think about. He wasn’t certain he understood what happened this day.
It seemed that the light-skinned man, the one who was new to the area, belonged to Jane.
Zaren saw, watching from his usual high perch among the thick leaves. He understood the language of bodies in all types of animals, and when Jane and the new man came together in an embrace, he recognized that they knew each other. They belonged together. She was overjoyed to see him, clinging to his arm as if she would never let him leave.
The other man, the one who had tried to mate with Jane when she didn’t want to, watched from a distance. His expression was empty, but the way he stood was not. Zaren thought he knew how he felt.
Zaren went away after that, swinging too fast and too hard through the trees. He misjudged once and fell the distance of a python before grabbing a solid enough vine to stop his tumble. He hadn’t made a mistake like that since he was a young cub, showing off for his wolf siblings. But something inside his chest hurt, burned, and he was angry enough at himself, at the woman and her mate, to hurtle off a high branch into the cold, deep river instead of wading in.
He emerged from the icy water with nothing but a scraped knee and bruised shoulder, then narrowly missed being attacked by a crocodile. Its jaws snapped closed behind his heel just as Zaren yanked himself up and out of the water using a low branch. Foolish. Foolish and blind as a snake, he’d been.
It was then he knew he mustn’t blame the woman. He wasn’t angry with her. She belonged with the new man. He was her mate, and mates stayed together until one of them died. Just as the wolves who raised him had done.
Still, Zaren had been curious, and later that night, unable to sleep in his cool, dark cave, he emerged. He meant to look on her one more time. And to see if the mate slept with her. He wondered how he would feel, seeing the mate’s body curved around the soft, curvy, sweet-scented skin he’d come to crave.
The image rose in his mind and it made Zaren both hot and chilled.
But when he reached her nest—the same place he battled a rock snake last night—it was empty. Perched in the window, he sniffed the air, but the new man’s scent was not mingled with Jane’s. He had not been in the nest.
It was simple for Zaren to find her after that. But when he looked down at the clearing with the hot, bubbling pool of water, she was sleeping on the ground. Her mate was with the other light-skinned man, the non-mate. And they were talking, looking at a paper.
The scents on the air told him what had happened: mating. But he was confused by the three strong scents, and that of the lystra plant mingled with it all. How could three mate together? It wasn’t possible. That wasn’t how it was done. Only one male and one female.
He watched for a time, trying to understand, watching the men and watching…Jane. She rose and joined them at the fire, sitting near her mate. But there was something wrong about the men and the scene below.
He sniffed, listened, watched…but he couldn’t understand what bothered him.
And then moments later, the leopard made her appearance, and Zaren took the opportunity to help the woman…Jane…escape. He realized he felt no compulsion to return and ensure the mate and non-mate were safe. They had fire, and one of them had the loud stick. They could evade the leopard if they were careful and smart.
He cared only for Jane’s safety.
Now, he settled on the floor next to the…bed…yes, that was the word. He listened, sniffed, and looked around the small place. With the light flickering soft yellow and orange, sending gentle shadows dancing, it was warm and cozy and safe. He remembered…something…something like this….
But his head hurt. The sharp pain chased the hovering memory away and instead, he closed his eyes. He could rest as well.
The slightest sound, the barest shift in the wind, even the most gentle waft of a change of scent, would awaken him. She was safe, and he, for the first time, slept, breathing the comfort and pleasure of her essence.
— VI —
When Jane opened her eyes, it was to daylight…and a very intense blue gaze looking down at her.
“Zaren,” she said, and reached for his hand when he would have moved it away.
“Jane,” he whispered, and left his fingers on the edge of the bed, covered by hers.
She looked down, lifting his hand to examine it. Tanned deep brown, rough, sprinkled with hair on the back. Wide, callused, the underside broad and tough and slightly more pale. His nails clean and short, one of them black from an injury. Scratches, some new, some healed. His fingers…long and elegant. One of them had been up inside her. She shivered.
Jane looked back up at him and their eyes met again. Heat raged between them and her insides fluttered and seemed to take flight. He seemed to be drinking in the sight of her as he did every time they were together. She wished she knew what he was thinking. She wished she could speak with him.
She might have reached for him. She almost did, pulling him to her…but then he moved away, like a skittish cat. How could such a strong, powerful man be so uncertain?
But when he looked at her, the expression in his eyes wasn’t uncertain. It was enough to make her melt into a puddle of hot lantern oil.
And why was she thinking about him that way? She had a fiancé. Jonathan. Whom she loved. She truly, truly loved.
Zaren had turned away, and now he offered her a small cup and two small bowls carved from wood. Water? No. She sniffed the contents of the cup. Tea? She frowned and sniffed again. The liquid was warm, and it had a scent to it. Some sort of jungle tea. Had he heated the water with his small fire, or had he found natural water from the hot springs? She wished she knew how to ask; she was becoming more curious about this man every moment.
She sipped the tea and tasted cinnamon and other fresh, astringent flavors. It made her mouth feel clean and alive. The other two bowls contained berries and nuts. Jane realized she was hungry. She glanced at him.
Shy and thoughtful.
To her relief, he didn’t watch her eat. She feared he would sit and gaze at her like she was an animal in a zoo. Instead, he drank from another cup, tossed a handful of berries into his own mouth, then turned and walked across the small room.
Jane watched him, realizing she’d never seen him actually walk. And he didn’t precisely walk. He…strode. No, he…stalked. Prowled. Like a cat. With smooth and precise movements, covering the small space in four masterful strides.
He had long hair that reached past his shoulder blades, and it was in a style she’d never seen before encountering him. Long, soft coils. Springy to the touch, about the width of a finger. His body, though very muscular, was nevertheless lean. And although he was covered from the waist down, she had a view of his broad shoulders and the sleek muscles of his ba
ck.
When he turned, she realized he’d been digging in one of the trunks she’d noticed last night. And now he held a…book. He looked at her, and the expression in his face nearly broke her heart.
It was a combination of apprehension and hope. Fear and determination. Question and trust. His eyes were so blue.
Jane sat up, holding the blanket modestly over her breasts. “What is it?” she asked, uncertain what caused such a range of emotion. “Is that yours?”
He brought the book and sat next to her on the bed. His warm skin brushed against her arm and Jane had to draw in a steadying breath when his touch seemed to sear into her, leaving a residual mark.
The book was old, filled with large images and simple words. A child’s pictorial dictionary. Jane noticed his knuckles were white as he held the book open in his lap, and felt intensity quivering from his very being. Apprehension? Hope? What was it?
He pointed to the drawing of a woman. “Woman,” he said, his voice low and rumbly. Then he pointed to a man. “Man,” he said with more confidence.
Jane nodded next to him; they had already established his mastery of those words. Man. Woman.
Zaren. Jane.
Man fuck woman. The phrase popped into her head suddenly and she almost gasped at her mind’s inappropriate waywardness. Zaren fuck Jane. Oh, yesss….She closed her eyes for a moment to control her heightened breathing.
She didn’t think the word fuck would appear in the child’s book. But she was certain it wouldn’t be difficult to communicate that, at least.
He pointed to another picture, then looked at her. “Woof.” There was question in his blue eyes now.
The word under the picture said dog. Jane pointed to the drawing and said, “Dog.” Then she made a barking sound, like a woof. Zaren looked at her, quizzically, then, humor in his eyes, he barked back at her.
His sounded much more authentic. So much so that she looked around to make certain there wasn’t a real dog in the vicinity.
Then, his sensual lips still quirked with humor, he looked back down at the book. “Dawg. Dog. Woof?” Then he turned quickly through the pages of the book, which had clearly been thumbed through many times. She caught flashes of birds, beetles and butterflies, apples, bananas, beds, elephants, tigers, and…a wolf.
Zaren pointed at the picture of a wolf. “Woof. Dog.”
Now she understood. The pictures were similar and yet different. She pointed to the trees growing around the wolf, the impression of a rugged environment. Then she traced a finger around the animal itself. “Wolf.” She turned the pages of the book back to the picture of the dog, which stood next to a family. “Dog.” She gestured to the father, mother and child next to their pet.
Zaren frowned at the pictures for a long while, flipping back and forth, murmuring the two different words. Then at last he looked at her, comprehension shining in his blue eyes. He made a gruntlike sound that sounded like an affirmative.
She smiled at him, and for a moment, she thought she might simply tumble into his gaze and stay there forever. Her pulse pounded in her throat, surely audible to him. Then, as if by some instinct, they both turned back to the book. She began to point out more words for him, drawing imaginary lines between the figures to indicate their relationship.
“Man. Father. Woman. Mother. Boy. Son.”
He repeated all of the words, clearly becoming more confident as they went on. It became easier for him to speak the word correctly the first time, and on the very last picture, he actually said it with her.
“Fam-ly.”
Jane looked at him in surprise as shock registered on his own face. Then he smiled with delight, a great, wide beaming grin that crinkled the corners of his eyes and made a gentle crease along one side of his lips. His eyes danced with triumph and Jane’s mouth went dry. This man….
She had the overwhelming urge to reach for him, to curl her fingers around that solid warm arm brushing against hers and pull him to her. Pleasure and lust shot in a hot rush down between her legs, and she suddenly felt hot and prickly and aware.
Zaren stilled for a moment, his slender nostrils lifting, then flaring slightly as if catching a scent on the air. His fingers tightened over the book, shifting it almost imperceptibly, and she felt the muscles in his arm tighten next to hers.
She was close enough to see the hard pulse pounding in his golden throat, and the faint sheen over his skin. Something warm and male filled the air, the scent of him. Her nipples tightened and heat flushed over her chest, spreading down to where she was already swelling and dampening.
He held the book in his lap, and Jane reached for it, clumsily. He jolted when she brushed against the rigid cock that rose beneath the book and his loincloth. His mouth tightened, outlined with white tension, and he stared down at the book that now rested more on her lap than his. He even pointed to the drawing of a cat.
“Cat,” she said. Puss. Pussy. She swallowed hard. Someone’s pussy is getting wet. Her face was hot. Her breathing unsteady. Her nipples tight and ready.
“Cat,” he repeated, somehow ignoring the upright pitch in the center of his loincloth.
Jane wasn’t looking at the pictures any longer. She pulled the book from his hands and set it on the floor. And then, giving herself no chance to reconsider, she knelt in front of him, between his legs.
Zaren’s eyes went round with shock, and then dark as his irises sprang wide and black. His body stilled; she’d never felt anyone become so instantly still. He didn’t breathe. She swore even his pulse stopped as she pulled the soft hide away from him. Not a hair quivered, not an eyelash flickered as he looked down at her hands as they settled at the juncture of his thighs, bracketing his turgid cock and tight, hot sac.
Jane’s mouth watered, and her quim was full and wet to match. She pressed her knees together and felt tiny throbbing pulses of the little pearl in her damp heat. They shuddered up through her body.
He was magnificent. Everything a man like him should be: thick and hard, a beautiful, ready purple-red, smooth and bulging with veins. Fairly quivering with attention. A shiny drop hung from the tip and Jane leaned forward to swipe it away with a quick, light flick.
When her tongue touched the salty drop, Zaren gave a low, tortured gasp, and all at once he was alive again. Moving, breathing, his pulse raging through his veins, his skin shivering and his muscles quivering…all of this beneath her hands, against her arms propped on his bent thighs. She heard his expulsion of breath in relief and pleasure and felt a sharp ripple go through him.
She looked up at him now. His eyes were shining, dark orbs fiercely focused on her…no, on his cock. Still framed by her hands, still proud and turgid and trembling. His cheeks were flushed, his lips parted.
And then she noticed his fingers. Curled into the edge of the bed, taut and white and rigid, so tight they trembled. The tendons in his hands and arms stood out in sharp relief.
Emboldened and filled with lust, Jane smoothed her hands closer together, cupping his quivering cock. He was hot and hard, and she grasped him, able to fit her fingers around his girth with only a little overlap. Heat surged through her as she imagined the sensation of this massive rod filling her. Her tiny pearl gave an urgent little pulse, remembering his busy, sleek tongue teasing it. She slid her other hand under the tight, warm sac and lightly brushed her fingers through the hair springing from it.
All of her attention was on the magnificent tool in her hands, and she stroked him once, then a second time, her hand moving long and slow along the velvety length, enjoying the heat and vibration, the length and the texture. She felt him surge beneath her fingers, the veins swelling and filling, semen hurtling up toward the head, filling his cock, ready to shoot free. His thighs vibrated against her torso. Then, fairly drooling with anticipation, she swallowed back her desire and curved both hands around his cock and closed tightly. Fisted hard around him, she made him gasp and still once more. Then, with one more tight, sharp stroke from base to head, she
brought him up and over. He cried out as his rod exploded, spurting over her arms and onto her bare chest.
He pulsed and surged in her hand, his body relaxing back onto his elbows, his desperate grip loosening from the bed. His eyes were closed, his head sagged back, exposing his long, strong throat. His pulse pounded there, his warm skin glistened, his chest heaved, thick coils of hair clung to his skin. Beautiful. Edible. Jane moaned.
And then all at once, he moved. One moment, he was collapsed, sated, on the bed…the next, he was there. Jane hardly had a moment to catch her breath, to recognize the change in him before she was flung onto the bed, whipped up and onto her back with a sudden whoosh. He was there, hard and strong and powerful, over her. His hands covered her body, cupping her jaw, sliding down over her shoulders to fill themselves with her breasts. His mouth tasted, licked, nibbled, hot and rough and ravenous. His weight was heavy, solid, pinning her to the bed, his legs twined with hers.
He was everywhere, powerful and dangerous, the animal unleashed. Even the sounds he made…low, primal growls and rumbles he made from deep in his chest…were wild. Primitive. And they touched her, titillated her. The simple, feral timbre vibrated in her ear, shivering in delicious, deep licks down her spine as she realized how untamed this man was.
And that she had set him free.
For a moment, fear mingled with wild, hot pleasure as she imagined him impaling her with his massive self, slamming into her, filling her, riding her. She groaned in desperation and desire. Yes. Please. Her quim pulsed with need, swollen and dripping. Zaren…fuck…Jane.
Hot and strong, he bent over her, forcing her in place as his mouth sucked on a nipple, drawing it deep into his mouth while she writhed beneath him, arching up, twisting, for more. The sharp sensation jolted through her, pleasure hot and sharp jagged down to her belly, tightening her quim painfully. She cried out in desperation, shifting her hips, curling her legs around his waist, trying to bring him back down to her. Down there. There, where the fire raged.
