Seared [Pain & Love 1] (BookStrand Publishing Romance)

by Ashlei D. Hawley

  “I feel funny,” Reyna admitted.

  More than funny, she thought to herself as the colors in the room began to brighten even as the lights seemed to dim. She felt downright giddy—girlish, even. Though she’d at one point convinced herself that she’d loved her husband, Ronnie, she hadn’t felt instantaneous, burning attraction for him. Lovemaking had always been…acceptable, but nothing world-shaking. She’d often thought it was because she’d never had a fire of any kind for him.

  There was fire now. She felt it as Tyler cupped his hands around her jaw. His skin smelled faintly of the burn cream, and she wondered if his hands were naturally that soft or if the cream had served to make the fascinating flesh feel like silk against her cheek. He brushed his thumbs, one after the other, across her lower and then upper lip. Reyna shivered at the contact.

  Tyler stared at Reyna, drunk on her scent and the sight of her filling up his vision. He didn’t know exactly what would happen when they met, but now he was aware that the prolonged contact between the two of them was creating an inescapable amount of friction and attraction between them. He wouldn’t have been surprised if legitimate sparks began to fly between them, to sear the skin and forge the unbreakable bonds he knew were unavoidable for mates of his species.

  “Reyna,” Tyler breathed out. He’d intended to say that they should separate, but only got as far as her name before Reyna leaned in and kissed him.

  Tyler felt like his skin should ignite with all of the heat that bloomed between them. He’d thought so many times of what it would be like when he was finally with her, but he couldn’t have imagined the intensity of it.

  Reyna pushed Tyler out of the bathroom and toward her king-size bed. She didn’t use it for company on a regular basis, but she liked the space, and now she wanted it filled with Tyler.

  Tyler kept trying to get the words out that they should stop, or at least slow down. He knew the bond between them was causing Reyna to act different than she normally would, but even when her mouth wasn’t on his, plundering with passion and heat, he couldn’t bring his lips to make a word beyond her name.

  Picking Reyna up, Tyler cupped her ass and crushed her gorgeous body against his. She thrummed with energy and when he kissed and bit down on her neck, she growled in response like a feisty cat. He loved the sound and the arousal that speared him nearly drove him to his knees.

  Tyler tried once more to say anything besides his mate’s wonderful name, but Reyna dropped down and quickly helped him out of his pants and undergarments. Any fight Tyler might have had left in him was kicked aside as surely as his discarded clothing. Reyna pushed him onto the bed and was beautifully, perfectly naked in mere seconds. Tyler loved an efficient woman. He loved this woman, and had since the time she’d been born into this body. Several lifetimes of unconsummated lust filled him until he nearly burst with the all-consuming desire to have her, to possess her, to be hers and she his unconditionally for eternity.

  Reyna joined him on the bed and for a moment, it seemed she came back to herself, fighting against the bond that joined them irreversibly. What she touched when she put her hand out for support, however, was Tyler’s naked thigh, and that drove all thoughts of objection from her mind.

  Tyler had enough time to slip out of his shirt before Reyna flung herself on him. They kissed so hard Tyler expected Reyna’s fragile skin would be bruised by the morning. She cupped him fully in her hands and maddened him as she played her nails over that most sensitive skin and squeezed until he cried out for her.

  Reyna was take-charge in all aspects of her life, aggressive and driven. She wanted Tyler, and she wanted him her way. She slipped her mouth over his bulging member, stimulating him and wetting the impressive piece of flesh so she wouldn’t hurt herself when she took him inside of her.

  She loved the taste of him and felt she could stay as she was forever. The soft skin tasted ever so slightly of fresh rain, and beneath that was the undeniable flavor of maleness. He pushed against the back of her throat before she’d even taken all of him into her mouth, and her body trembled with delicious anticipation as she thought about that width and length being inside of her in another way. She’d never wanted anyone so badly. She had to have him in every way she could.

  Tyler nearly lost his grasp on reality and his body as Reyna confidently straddled him. The woman was a goddess of flame and beauty and when he guided his length into herself, he had to close his eyes so he wouldn’t spill himself into her instantly.

  Reyna tried to allow her body time to accommodate for Tyler’s size. She wanted to savor the feeling of him inside of her, but before she even realized it, she was moving on top of him, swaying in a desperate rhythm, aiming for a quick climax to try and alleviate what was nearly a painful heat between them. She gripped his strong shoulders and his hands found her hips, driving her onward. Even if she’d wanted to slow down, Tyler’s thrusting into her was sending coils of fire into her. She felt the weight building everywhere—her legs, her back, and especially where she was connected most intimately with Tyler. He stroked and stoked the fire inside, driving himself to the edge even as he forced her over. Reyna came violently, losing her rhythm and nearly sobbing with the power of her orgasm as Tyler joined her in ecstasy.

  Reyna couldn’t remember ever feeling anything so amazing. Tyler knew there was nothing on any world that could ever compare. The fire that had burned so brilliantly between them and had culminated in shared bliss began to die down as Reyna found herself drawn to sleep as inescapably as she’d been drawn to Tyler. They fell asleep together, Reyna feeling a niggling doubt that something was dreadfully wrong and Tyler finally happy for the first time in his long, long life.

  Chapter Three

  Reyna awakened with a start and was immediately assaulted with a multitude of emotions. Anger, shame, fear, shock, and confusion all washed through her, but the anger was what sank claws into her scattered mind and dug hard.

  “What in the hell are you doing in my bed?” she screeched at Tyler. Before he could answer, she shoved him off, using both her arms and legs to do so. No answer he could’ve given would have been acceptable, anyway.

  “What did you do?” she snarled as she flung herself out of bed and rounded on him, more pissed than she could remember being since she’d gone through the worst experience of her life.

  Tyler couldn’t right his brain or tongue successfully enough to respond to his furious mate—satisfactorily or not.

  “Please, calm down,” he was finally able to get out after he’d managed to untangle himself from Reyna’s multitude of blankets and sheets that had gone over the edge with him. It was undoubtedly one of the worst things that could have come out of his mouth at that moment.

  “Calm down?” she hollered. “Calm down? You fucking asshole! What did you do to me? Did you fucking roofie me?”

  Tyler stood and Reyna, not shy about nakedness, still felt like she should turn away from his. She resisted the urge.

  “I did not do anything intentionally to take you against your will, I swear it,” Tyler insisted.

  Reyna caught the important word and snapped, “Intentionally?”

  Tyler knew everything he was going to say would only make things worse, but he couldn’t help wanting to honestly explain things to Reyna.

  “Our energies reacted too strongly after being separated for so long,” Tyler told Reyna gently. “It caused consequences of a magnitude I could never have anticipated.”

  “Don’t give me that bullshit!” Reyna shrieked, and Tyler winced at the piercing tone of her furious voice. Reyna’s angry, agitated energy beat against Tyler like the wings of frenzied creatures bent on hurting him in some way. He knew his mate couldn’t know or control it, but he wanted to plead with her to calm herself so that she stopped lashing out at him.

  “Reyna, please,” Tyler said insistently. “I wanted nothing more than to ease you into this gently over time. If I hadn’t been shot out of the sky, if my ship hadn’t been malfunctio
ned, I would have worked my way into your life slowly, naturally. You would not have known my origins until we knew and trusted each other implicitly.”

  Reyna calmed like flipping a switch. One minute she was seething, the next she had become ice-cold. Tyler was momentarily reassured, but then suspicion flooded through him. When she opened her mouth next, Tyler knew what she was said was going to be bad.

  “So you planned on lying to me,” she said quietly. “You planned on having a whole relationship with me based on lies.”

  “No,” Tyler immediately refuted the accusation. “No. You misunderstand.”

  “What’s to misunderstand?” she asked stonily. “You were going to pretend to be someone or something else you weren’t in order to try to have a relationship with me—which wouldn’t have worked, by the way. Then, you were going to dump your E.T. bullshit on me. Are you mental? Did you escape from a psych ward or are you the world’s most fucked up serial killer?”

  Suddenly feeling that her nakedness contributed to her vulnerability, Reyna ordered Tyler to stay right where he was before turning and digging in her closet for a robe. She reconsidered in an instant, wanting to feel more covered than that. She pulled on undergarments, jeans, and a loose brown blouse that dipped down to her cleavage in a way that attracted plenty of male attention she never paid any mind to.

  After slipping into thick athletic socks and even donning a pair of her spare running shoes, Reyna felt minutely better. She faced Tyler with more confidence, seeing his nakedness as weakness when compared to her.

  Tyler eyed his mate warily, noting the new superiority she felt now that she was more covered. He was surprised that something as simple as clothing could cause the change. She was so beautiful, he thought her confidence should peak when she was nude, not dressed. Though he admitted the shirt did a fine job of hinting at what attributes where hidden by her clothing.

  “Stop staring at me,” Reyna snarled angrily, and Tyler averted his eyes. He was trying to plan a way to deal with her—to gain her trust in the smallest amount. That would be enough for the time being. Now that they’d been linked, he needed only to touch her and he could reveal everything about who he was, where he came from, who she was, and what it meant to both of them.

  “Reyna,” he began softly, but she held up a silencing hand heatedly.

  “Don’t talk to me,” she muttered. “I’m debating whether or not I can make a case if I called the cops.”

  “Only if they found drugs in your system to suggest a rape and I assure you, they wouldn’t,” Tyler retorted, his ire beginning to rise in response to Reyna being so damn difficult. “Perhaps if you’d listen to me, as I’ve been suggesting and you’ve been refusing since last night, we could make some progress. Otherwise, we’re at a stalemate where you are being unreasonably threatened by a naked man in your bedroom, and I have come all this way after abandoning my people to be stuck with a woman who won’t even consider hearing me out.”

  When Reyna hesitated instead of flinging some spiteful comment at him, Tyler was ever-so-slightly encouraged. Maintaining his moody tone, he added, “I died to come to your world. Do you think I’d do that for one night of sex neither of us even remembers very well?”

  Reyna bit her lip, and Tyler was shocked by the response his body had to that innocent, pondering gesture. Heat flooded through him and his member—previously uninterested in his conversation and surroundings—suddenly pumped and twitched with arousal. Reyna noticed the reaction and rolled her eyes. She tossed Tyler’s clothes to him and resolutely turned away.

  “Oh, get dressed,” she snapped. Tyler wasn’t offended by her agitated tone—he actually smiled. Instead of anger, it had been embarrassment that filled her voice. He liked that, he decided as she left the room and he pulled his clothes on. They were still damp and he wrinkled his nose at the discomfort. After convincing his mate that he was not a serial rapist or murderer, Tyler desperately hoped he could convince her to drive him to a mall.

  As Tyler dressed, Reyna paced in her kitchen. Her stomach was too twitchy for food, but she started a pot of coffee and willed it to finish quickly.

  Tyler was the strangest man she’d ever met, no doubt about it. Whether he was telling the truth or was completely insane, she wanted him out of her life. She’d already had enough from her previous experience with “love” to ever want to try another relationship. Soul mate from an alien world or not, she didn’t want to be with another man in her lifetime.

  Tracing two fingertips over her tattoo, as she was wont to do when she was very nervous or upset, Reyna tried not to think about the reasoning behind her aversion to love and the like. Her day was already filled with enough problems.

  The main issue picked that moment to enter her kitchen.

  Reyna couldn’t help or contain a kind of knee-jerk reaction that tightened her chest and put a flutter in her stomach and lower things. No matter what else could be said about the man, he was the most gorgeous creature she’d ever seen.

  “I need some new clothes,” Tyler announced upon entering the room where Reyna paced agitatedly. He’d hoped to throw her off with the statement and he succeeded.

  “Well,” she started with a puzzled frown. “I don’t have any guy clothes and I’m not a seamstress so…sorry.”

  “You could drive me to a store,” Tyler suggested easily. Reyna frowned harder, her eyes going stormy with irritation.

  “I’m not a damn chauffeur, either,” she muttered.

  Pulling out the wallet that had materialized along with all of the other trappings of his human life, Tyler nonchalantly tossed it to Reyna, who caught it on instinct.

  “Whatever you want within my means is yours,” he told her. “I’ll be at your mercy and that includes my money.”

  “I could almost believe you’re not human from that alone,” Reyna mumbled. Then, because her curiosity demanded it of her, she opened his wallet and peeked inside.

  Pulling out the bills in the main fold, she gave a low whistle when she saw more folded and tucked into other pockets. In her hand, she held a stack of hundreds and fifties. Flipping through it for a quick count, she saw he had almost two thousand dollars in cash on his person.

  “The cards have much more,” Tyler noted easily. “Less what I require for new clothing, you may have whatever you desire in exchange for the favor of driving me.”

  “Can’t you just”—Reyna waffled her hands in the air—“materialize new clothes for yourself like you did those and all this?” She held out the money. Tyler shrugged.

  “I did not. The males of my race who choose to come to Earth to recover their mates are always well-provided for. A whole history is created, as well as the means to be successful so we do not burden our mates.”

  “Convenient,” Reyna muttered as she tossed Tyler’s wallet back to him. He caught it and returned it to his pocket, waiting for her decision.

  “Will you go away and leave me alone if I drive you to the store?” she finally asked. Tyler debated, considering how he could answer without lying to or frightening Reyna.

  “If you allow me to speak with you on the drive and touch you once with no sexual obligation or undertone and you still wish for me to leave, I will,” Tyler answered her at last.

  “Why do you want to touch me?” Reyna questioned suspiciously.

  Tyler felt something inside of him tighten against his desire to say something ridiculous, such as, “because you are my heart, and I’ve been without you for so long.”

  Instead, he answered, “I am a being able to communicate through touch. If you think me insane, there is nothing to fear from me laying my hand on your cheek.”

  “I think you’re insane no matter what else you are,” Reyna told Tyler as the coffee finished brewing. “OK,” she continued. “Why not? I’ll grab a travel mug and we’ll go. You want one?”

  Tyler was quickly coming to love and long for coffee almost as much as his mate and readily agreed to a cup.

  As Reyna p
oured, Tyler began to feel something prickling along the edges of his skin. It was uncomfortable and held the distinct sensation of something that could easily become painful were its proximity increased.

  “We need to leave,” Tyler said. His tone implied the seriousness of the words, and Reyna looked at him curiously.

  “Why?” she asked, but she was already capping their coffees, handing him one and moving toward the door.

  “Something’s wrong,” he answered worriedly. “I can feel it against my skin.”

  Reyna didn’t want to admit it aloud, but she felt something as well. “Wrong” was about the best way to describe it. Her skin tingled like radiation waves were pulsing against it. It burned and felt distinctly uncomfortable.

  Instead of telling Tyler to man up—which would have been her go-to response, were she not experiencing the same disconcerting things—she grabbed her car keys.

  “Garage door,” she directed with a nod of her head as she grabbed a light jacket and Tyler slipped on his shoes.

  She didn’t argue or ridicule him, Tyler noted, and he realized either their energies were more merged than he’d anticipated or her soul was so unbalanced by its long exile on Earth that her human body was just as susceptible as Tyler’s. As a knowing and willing temporary outcast, he was still connected to his home world and therefore reacted accordingly to things that would bother one of his alien kinsmen.

  Which meant someone was looking for him, he realized. Someone who knew a remarkably successful way to smoke him out if it was able to affect him from such a distance.

  “Quickly,” Tyler urged as Reyna pressed the button on her key fob that unlocked her car doors. Tyler nearly ran around to the passenger side door. Perturbed at his obvious concern, Reyna hit the button for the garage door to open from the device that was attached to her visor before she was even seated. She popped the gearshift in reverse while she clicked her seatbelt in. The car started to roll backward while the garage door rose. Slipping the car beneath the rising door, Reyna hit the button again in order to return it to its closed position.