by Parker Foye
Rather than forcing Rez to accept him in a position that was threatening, his hands found Rez’s hair and their lips clashed. While they kissed, and fought for dominance with their teeth and tongues, Benjamin rolled until Rez was flat on his back beneath him.
“Is this better?” Benjamin asked.
Rez struggled in his hold, but he could break free if he’d really objected. Benjamin suspected the kelpie’s strength was as extraordinary as the heart and mind of the man he knew. Male. Whatever.
Benjamin kneed Rez’s legs apart and when he found Rez’s cock, he squeezed hard in warning.
Rez stopped struggling. “Yes.”
The thought of taking another man should’ve bothered Benjamin more than it did, but it was Rez. Someone who occupied a different place in his world, and who had always held a strange fascination for him. Benjamin wanted to see Rez’s surrender, but feeling it would have to suffice. He knew the kelpie was holding back, allowing this, and it humbled him.
Hands explored Rez’s muscled, scarred and intensely masculine body, and it was almost, almost as good as seeing. Benjamin remembered the cocky smile, the dark and disheveled hair, which was always a bit long for the military, but he’d gotten away with it. The ever-changing hazel eyes. The memories of Rez’s face might fade over time, but Benjamin could touch his hair, feel the smile with his fingers.
As he reached to trace those lips, he got a sharp nip for his efforts.
“Work faster, Benjamin. I won’t abide this submission for long.”
“Suck it, Rez,” Benjamin said as he pressed his stinging finger back into Rez’s wet, warm mouth.
On occasion, Rez could take orders. Benjamin marveled as Rez’s teeth teased his index finger, and took his middle finger as well.
“I’m going to taste you now, Rez,” and there was no fumbling as Benjamin took the head of Rez’s straining cock into his mouth. He licked, applied a bit of suction, amazed that it felt right, tasted right.
Rez groaned, then pulled away as Benjamin’s saliva-slicked fingers circled the entrance to his body. “Wait.”
Benjamin pressed a finger inside, deeper.
Rez panted. “Please.”
Sucking cock wasn’t something that Benjamin expected to ever do, much less enjoy—but he loved having Rez begging. He licked and stroked mercilessly as he inserted another finger into the incredible heat of Rez’s body.
Beneath the fight was a tenderness that Benjamin had never known or experienced. Tears gathered in his useless eyes. “This is not what I expected.”
* * *
Panic swelled inside Rez. Natural fear at being the one taken, a sort of claustrophobia, and also terror that Benjamin was about to reject him. “What do you mean, not what you expected?”
Rez still panted as Benjamin scissored his fingers inside, seeking. He looked past his fear and saw the expression on Benjamin’s face. It wasn’t rejection. It wasn’t disgust. The fight was over, and maybe the start of something more than friendship, something more than lust.
“You’re so much more than I deserve, than I dared to want. This isn’t about saving me, is it? It’s about saving you too.”
The ocean welled up within Rez, and the kelpie in him allowed for the emotion to spill over. He guided Benjamin’s hand to his face. “Yes, Benjamin.”
They kissed. For hours or seconds. They floated as Benjamin built the pleasure and the sweetness. It became a life raft that they both clung to.
For a blind man, Benjamin knew his way around Rez’s body pretty well. Benjamin didn’t leave him long enough to change his mind, to get lubricant or anything else. He teased his cock over Rez’s entrance and pushed in, letting friction and pain buffer the sweetness.
“God, yes,” Rez said. “I couldn’t have let you cover me like a mare, but this is perfect. I can look up into your eyes and wish you could see me.”
“I may not see you, but I know you, Rez. That’s even better.”
And it was true. Rez begged, then threatened, as Benjamin kept the stroking slow and deep. They nipped at each other and whispered obscenities. For someone new to a relationship outside his comfort zone, Benjamin handled it magnificently.
When they both lay sprawled on the floor, sticky, sweaty and exhausted, Rez knew that he’d been forgiven, though understanding might take longer.
“You know what else that excursion to the hospital proved, Benjamin?”
“What?”
“It proved that you aren’t helpless. You can go anywhere and do anything you need to do. It may be more difficult, it may take more work or preparation, but you infiltrated a military hospital and brought out your target. Blind. Alone. You were amazing. If I didn’t love you before that, I did when I saw how you could overcome this blindness and not let it keep you locked in a room, a house, for the rest of your safe, sheltered life.”
“I don’t feel all that amazing,” Benjamin said. His arm was thrown over his eyes. He seemed to cover them a lot.
Rez didn’t know if it was deliberate or not, but they’d work on one thing at a time.
Rez kissed him.
“And I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about love, Rez.”
Rez kissed him again, slowly. Deeply. “It’s okay. We can get to that. In the meantime, I’ve arranged for something to help with your adjustment. I can’t call this a gift because...well, because you’ll know in a moment. This is a pledge of my love and a promise to stand by you and help you as you heal.”
Rez whistled softly, and from the other room came a soft whicker and the tapping of small, fast hooves on the tile.
A tiny palomino mare entered the room. She’d been one of several miniature horses helping the abused and blind pony. She was a natural caretaker, Kjell had said, and when he explained her role and how she could help, she was very enthusiastic.
Rez gestured to Benjamin, and the little mare crossed the rug and pressed her teacup-sized muzzle into his hand. She lowered her head in a gesture of submission.
Benjamin reached up to feel the contours of her small, refined head with her tiny ears and enough mane and forelock for three standard-sized horses.
She put her nose up to his face and puffed her breath out at him.
“She’s introducing herself, Benjamin. Blow gently into her nostrils.”
Benjamin did, and a look of wonder came over his face when she puffed back at him.
“This is StarShine. The other little ones call her Bossy. She’s been sent to you to help guide you in the world, to keep you company when I cannot be with you, and to be your friend. She does this as a favor to me, but I expect in time, her loyalty will be all yours. With her, you can go anywhere you could with a seeing-eye dog, but her lifespan will be triple that of any canine—maybe longer due to her association with kelpies.”
Benjamin stroked her neck, her shoulders, then down to her tiny hooves. “Is this okay with you, StarShine?”
The little mare practically climbed into his lap.
“We may have to work on more human/horse interactions, but she looks at this task as a great honor.”
Benjamin smiled. “Thank you, Rez. She’s wonderful. So are you.”
* * *
Bossy nickered, and Benjamin returned to petting her. He couldn’t see it, but there was a future out there stretched beneath his feet. It might take a leap of faith, maybe more of a stumbling onto the path, but the hopelessness was ebbing.
He had a lover—a male, supernatural lover—who was also his best friend. It unbalanced and confused him, but there was such rightness to it.
He might be able to carve again, because the understanding of wood was a visceral thing. Touch could replace sight.
After a few minutes, Benjamin couldn’t hold all the possibilities inside anymore. With hope and purpose came the expansio
n of his spirit, his capacity to give himself to another. He’d struggle to adjust, but Rez would be there to help him. It was more than he’d imagined when he’d walked onto the beach. “I’ll think about the love thing and let you know.”
“I’m cool with that,” Rez said, and he kissed any doubts from Benjamin’s mind.
* * * * *
To learn more about K.L. White, please visit K.L. White’s website, klwhite.net.
Introducing the Carina Press Romance Promise!
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AT ATTENTION (Out of Uniform, book two)
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The Dragon Soul series by Sean Michael
Meet the Beteferoce brothers. Five dragon shifters, each with a strong elemental power. And each with a fierce desire to find his soul mate...
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Meet the Sassy Boyz, a group of androgynous dancers in New York City out to prove that even when life gets you down, love is out there waiting for you...
FIERCE & FABULOUS (Sassy Boyz, book one)
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The Boundaries Series by A.R. Barley
Featuring an enemies-to-lovers romance, a professor–student relationship and a silver fox who falls for a drag queen, this series is about testing—and breaking—all the boundaries.
OUT OF BOUNDS (The Boundaries Series, book one)
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OUTSIDE THE LINES (The Boundaries Series, book three)
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The Letting Go series by j. leigh bailey
These young men will have to let go of who they were to become all they can be.
NOBODY’S HERO (Letting Go, book one)
RECKLESS HOPE (Letting Go, book two)
FIGHT TO FORGIVE (Letting Go, book three)
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MATED: A Paranormal Romance Shifter Anthology is available now!
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ISBN-13: 9781488078514
Primal Need: A Sexy Male/Male Shifter Anthology
Copyright © 2017 by Harlequin Books S.A.
The publisher acknowledges the copyright holders of the individual works as follows:
Wolf in King’s Clothing
ISBN-13: 9781488078521
Copyright © 2017 by Parker Foye
The Alpha’s Claim
ISBN-13: 9781488078538
Copyright © 2017 by Holley Trent
Dark Water
ISBN-13: 9781488078545
Copyright © 2017 by Kelly L White
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario M3B 3K9, Canada.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and ™ are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office and in other countries.
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