by Jane Kindred
Rafe laughed softly. “Yeah, you are.” He hoisted her up for a firmer grip, still inside her, and carried her to the bedroom. This man was a god.
“I think we scared Puddleglum.” He tucked his wings back like it was second nature already as he sat on the bed with her in his lap. “Think I should go check on him?”
Phoebe began to laugh, the motion causing little tingling waves of fleeting contractions deep inside her. “God, I love you,” she gasped, trying to get her laughter under control.
Rafe lifted her chin and met her eyes with a hopeful smile. “Yeah?”
Phoebe giggled. “Yeah.”
He grinned. “Well, that’s a damn relief, because I love you, too.” He kissed her, holding her face with both hands, and Phoebe squirmed in his lap, rising up on her knees, already wanting him again.
He chuckled as he let go of her mouth. “I might need a little time.”
“That’s okay.” She sighed and softened into him. “I’ll be right here.”
After a moment Rafe rolled with her onto his side and held her gaze like he had something important to say. “I should probably take off my pants. And my shoes.”
Phoebe laughed again, collapsing into semi-hysterical giggles as Rafe extricated himself and slid his pants down to his ankles before realizing they were too narrow to go over his boots and he’d have to take them off first.
“You seem to be finding this awfully amusing.”
She grinned up at him. “You’re like this insanely hot dork. It’s adorable.”
“I’m not sure I want to be adorable.” Finally naked, he climbed onto the bed and reclined beside her with his head propped in his hand. Phoebe moved up beside him and he gave her a soft kiss. “Maybe I can make you stop laughing at my ‘adorkableness.’” He kissed her throat then eased her onto her belly.
Phoebe turned her head and rested it on the pillow. “What are you doing?”
“Getting rid of unnecessary things.” Rafe slipped the straps of her unbuttoned camisole top sensuously down her arms and tossed it on the floor before moving to undo the bra strap. As it came away, slid gently from beneath her while he cupped her breasts, Rafe stopped with the bra dangling from his hand. “Phoebe...what’s this?”
“What’s what?” She turned her head but couldn’t tell what he was looking at.
“When did you get this tattoo?”
“Oh.” She’d almost forgotten. Phoebe crossed her arms under her cheek. “This is going to sound weird, but—Rhea did it that night while you were...” She shrugged at the unspoken end of the sentence.
Rafe was silent for a moment. “You got a tattoo while I was being tortured by that asshole?”
Phoebe rolled onto her back. “I told you it would sound weird. Rhea’s taken up tattooing and she does a sort of pictomancy with it.”
“Pictomancy?”
“She reads the ink of the tattoos she’s done, like a psychic reading. I didn’t know how to find you, and she showed me how it worked on Theia, so I thought it was worth a try.”
Rafe’s brows drew together. “You had your sister tattoo you—to find me?”
“I didn’t know what else to do. And it worked. Somewhat. We knew you were at your father’s house, but we didn’t know the address. That’s when I tried to get it from Ione and found out she was dating Carter. She hung up on me, thinking we were pranking her, and then wouldn’t answer her phone. Luckily, Jacob came along and showed me where the house was.”
Something flickered in his eyes, but Rafe didn’t say anything, just nudged her to roll over. “Let me see it again.”
Phoebe turned onto her stomach once more and felt Rafe’s fingers moving over the soft, newly healed skin. “Good thing the knife missed it.” The fresh scar was just to the left of it. “I would have been pissed if he’d messed it up.”
“Not to mention he would have punctured a lung.” Rafe traced the outline. “Is this—is it a resplendent quetzal tail feather?” His tone was somewhat incredulous.
Phoebe smiled and nodded. “Rhea will be pleased you recognized it. She’s really pretty amazing. She’s going to do some more detail on it later.”
“You’re pretty amazing. I can’t believe you did this for me.”
“I was going to get the whole bird, but Thei and Rhe convinced me not to.” Phoebe turned her head and looked up at him with a shy smile. “In case you didn’t feel the same way about me as I felt about you. They didn’t want me to regret it.”
Rafe wrapped his arms around her, resting his weight on her, and kissed the top of the tattoo. And the scar beside it. “About Jacob. There’s something I should have told you.”
Phoebe did her best to give him the stink-eye from beneath him. “You’d better not say he’s been inhabiting you since that night and you’re not really you.”
Rafe laughed and it sounded suspiciously like nervous laughter. “No. No, I’m all me. I’m not about to allow him in without my permission. I’m the necromancer now, remember. Not that I want to be. But I can see the shades, as well as spirits that have crossed. And I could compel them if I were a jack-hole like Carter Hanson Hamilton.” He uttered the name with all due contempt.
Phoebe lay back on the pillow. “Then what did you need to tell me?”
“Yeah.” Rafe swallowed. “That. I may have promised Jacob he and Lila could, uh...consummate...their unfulfilled love affair. Please don’t leave me,” he added hurriedly. “I was a little desperate and high on pulque at the time.”
Phoebe breathed a sigh of relief and couldn’t help breaking into another mini fit of giggles.
“Now what’s funny?”
She swallowed the laughter and caught her breath. “I may have promised Lila the same thing to get her to help me. I wasn’t sure how to break that to you.”
“Wow.” Rafe relaxed against her, resting his cheek between her shoulders. “I think we may just deserve each other.”
They lay quietly for a few minutes, enjoying the novelty of being alone together, until Phoebe felt her ears pop with the changing air pressure of a shade’s presence. “Um, speak of the devil. I think Lila’s here.”
Rafe nodded against her. “She is. And Jacob.”
“Should we...?”
“I’m not sure I can accommodate Jacob quite yet, but...” Rafe paused, and Phoebe felt him become rather firmly accommodating against her. “Apparently, Jacob can take care of that.”
Head pounding with Lila’s insistence, Phoebe sighed and let down her defenses against her, letting Lila rush in. “Just this once.” Phoebe was firm. “That was the deal.”
“Don’t worry, sweetheart.” Rafe’s voice was modulated with Jacob’s slow and sensuous intonation. “I’ll make it one to remember.”
Lila deepened Phoebe’s voice. “You had better be talking to me.”
Jacob closed Rafe’s hands hard around Phoebe’s breasts. “Of course I’m talking to you, my love.” He eased back a moment and flipped Phoebe’s body over with Rafe’s powerful musculature, dark eyes glinting with hunger as he hovered on all fours above her.
Lila reached for him, dragging Phoebe’s nails down Rafe’s chest. Phoebe could feel her own desire for Rafe tangling with Lila’s need for Jacob, making her heart beat rapidly. The sense of having been denied the one she loved for so long was overwhelming, even though Phoebe herself had just been intimate with Rafe.
“You were a fool to leave me.” Her husky voice was a mixture of scolding and sorrow.
“I know. But I have been with you every moment since my death—until your own. And then I haunted your shade, trying to connect with you, but Tezcatlipoca kept you from me.”
As Lila reached for him, Jacob grabbed her wrists and held them against the bed, teasing her with his mouth. He took his time, tasting her from the tips of her breasts to
the apex of her sex, until Phoebe was moaning and writhing along with Lila and begging to be entered.
As Rafe’s body lowered onto her, Jacob’s desire was potent in his eyes. “You bargained with me once, quetzal, to bring things to a swifter close. This time I intend to prolong them.”
As if with the lingering essence of the coyote she’d recently inhabited, Lila let out a primitive howl as they came together.
Their coupling was frantic and wild, and yet fraught with deep passion and tenderness, until at last Phoebe’s body surrendered to a shattering release, though it was clearly Lila’s, long held and finally granted her.
They kissed as Jacob’s release followed, and Jacob held Lila in his arms, crooning and lightly rocking her. “You are my love, my only love, and I will never leave your side. Whether heaven or hell tries to come between us.” Once more, Phoebe found tears running down her cheeks. With a sigh of satisfaction, Lila was gone.
Rafe pressed his lips to her throat. “Everything all right, love?” It was definitely Rafe again.
Phoebe wrapped her arms around him, hugging him against her, every inch of her skin between them feeling the warmth of his.
She smiled and breathed in his petrichor scent. “Absolutely perfect.”
* * * * *
Keep reading for an excerpt from WARRIOR UNTAMED by Shannon Curtis.
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Warrior Untamed
by Shannon Curtis
Prologue
He heard the grate of a key in a lock, followed by the creak and clang as the gate at the far end of the corridor was slowly opened. He kept his eyes closed, bending and working the blazing colors in his mind like a fiery kaleidoscope. The warmth and light in his mind kept the dark chill at bay, the cold stone against his back and beneath his buttocks a sensation he’d learned to ignore.
He heard the whispers, the rough slide of regulation boots on stone floor, felt the faint stir in the air currents as one—no, two people made their way toward his cell. It was her scent, though, that caught his attention. Something light, floral...he could almost sense the innocence, the naïveté—the gullibility. He resisted the urge to smile. No sense in giving anything away.
The peephole in his cell door slid open, the noise an annoying squeal in the silence of the tomb—for this was a tomb. There was no other word for it. It was where they hoped he’d spend the rest of his lifetime, and the next.
“What’s he doing?” He heard the woman whisper. He couldn’t tell much from the soft sound, but her scent was now stronger, laced with a tired curiosity. Like a wilted frangipani.
“Dunno. Meditating. Plotting. Maybe just losing his sanity. He’s like that all the time.” He knew that voice, had become quite practiced at ignoring it, but this morning—or was it evening—he decided to give it his attention.
“He doesn’t do anything else?” Her voice was raspy, as though even the question taxed her reserves. She sounded fatigued. Drained.
She didn’t know the meaning of that word. Drained. But she would.
“Nope. Pretty easy duty, I must admit.”
“Why is he locked all the way down here? There’s nobody else in this block.”
“The lights. There is no natural light in here, so it’s fluorescent lighting.”
He knew they couldn’t see the clenching of his shoulder muscles beneath the rough fabric of his prison uniform, but he still tried to mask it with a deep inhalation. He needed something to relax him whenever he thought of his current circumstances, the weakness that even now leeched the energy from his limbs. He needed light. Or something. And he wasn’t getting it down in the bowels of this prison, thanks largely to his sons.
White-hot rage welled inside him whenever he thought of their betrayal. Ryder, he could understand. That kid had always been ungrateful. But Hunter—his son’s betrayal stung the most. Hunter had worked diligently by his side for years, just like a sheep, following his every command. Until that last night... The cold kiss of fury snaked down his back. He hadn’t seen that betrayal coming. He’d always believed that if it came down to it, Hunter would choose his father over his brother, but his son had surprised him. Just like his mother.
He exhaled, expelling the tension. But he would have his due. The light, floral, stale scent of the prison guard teased his senses again. And soon.
“What do the lights have to do with anything?” he heard her whisper.
The rustle of fabric told him the guard was shrugging his shoulders. “Who the hell knows? We’re just here to make sure he rots where he sits. He organized the murder of an Alpha Prime. He deserves everything coming his way.”
There was a brief silence, and he found himself waiting for her response.
“I heard about that. He supposedly conspired with the Woodland Pack?”
“Yeah, with the Woodland Alpha Prime. But seeing as that was pack against pack, that case has been handed over to Alpine Pack under tribal jurisdiction.”
“Well, it was their Alpha Prime who was murdered. But wasn’t he murdered in some dentist’s chair? Why is this guy here?”
He took another slow breath in. She was asking questions. Good. She had doubts. He was going to exploit that, and he was going to enjoy it.
“This guy organized the poison to be delivered. The dentist knew nothing about it. Get this—the dentist was his son.”
His jaw muscles clenched. Well, Ryder had deserved it. Pulling away from the family like that, ignoring them. He’d ceased to be his son the day he started using his trust fund on his own practice—that would be in competition with the family’s medical center. Hell. What did Ryder think would happen, that he’d actually give his blessing? He almost shook his head in disbelief, but kept himself still. What Ryder had done, well, it was to be expected. Hunter, though—that stung. That really, really stung. He thought he’d raised him better than that.
“But why is he here? He hasn’t had a trial yet. I thought everyone was innocent until proven guilty?”
“Good grief, how long have you been working for Reform?” The male guard wheezed with laughter. “There’s no such thing as innocence here.”
“I just thought—”
“Don’t. Don’t think he can be saved, don’t think he’s decent and don’t pity the bastard. Just look in on him once in a while, make sure he hasn’t strung himself up with his bedsheets—or if he has, make sure he’s good and dead befor
e you call anyone.”
There was a hesitation, then finally a sigh. “Sure. What else is there to do?”
“I’ll show you the break room. It’s going to be where you spend most of your time—the screen in there is awesome.”
He heard the snick as the peephole was closed, then the soft shuffle of footsteps until they reached the gate at the end of the corridor. It wasn’t until the gate had opened and closed, the keys had clinked as they turned in the lock and the scent had faded, that he let the sly smile lift his lips.
Arthur Armstrong opened his eyes slowly. They had no idea who they were dealing with.
Chapter 1
Melissa Carter tried to be patient. Really. But it wasn’t her strongest personality trait. Actually, most would argue she didn’t possess it at all. And she hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep in so long. “Anytime this century, Lexi.”
Lexi glanced up and frowned. “If I have to wear this day in, day out, then I need to make sure it’s right.”
Melissa pursed her lips but refrained from comment as she let the young woman scan her rings for the fourth time. It was fine. She could handle this without screaming. She could prove her mother wrong and be patient.
“And it has to be a ring? Not a necklace?” Lexi asked wistfully, eyeing an intricately woven Celtic knot pendant on a stand behind the counter.
Melissa kept her expression neutral as she heard that same question for the third time. She shook her head. “No. You’re likely to change a necklace depending on the outfit. Or it might get snagged—or yanked. A ring is more likely to stay on, and that’s what we want for you, Lexi. Something to stay with you.” Her irritation died as she remembered the reason for this, and she kept the sympathy out of her eyes, out of her voice. Lexi didn’t need sympathy. There were times when she thought Lexi needed a smack upside the head, but she’d leave that to Lexi’s older brother, Lance. For now, she just wanted to make Lexi safe, and if Lexi had come to her, it meant the young woman had come to the same realization—she was out of her depth and needed help. The fact she’d come to Melissa, well, perhaps that required some sympathy, but Melissa preferred action to the warm and fuzzies.
