by Nadine Mutas
“I also need pain and pleasure.” He kept his voice low and caressing, and brushed his power against her mental senses again, a teasing, flirtatious touch. “We could restart the search faster…” A kiss on her hammering heartbeat. “…if you allow me take all three from you.” He let his words hang in the air. And while his skin prickled with anticipation, he became hunting quiet.
“Not pain,” Merle said, her voice trembling.
She shifted, and he moved back far enough so she could turn around and face him.
Head tilted up, she set her mouth in a firm line. “I won’t give you that.”
He raised his right hand to her throat, closed it in a gentle grasp while holding her gaze. “Pain,” he said very quietly, his lips curving into a smile filled with sensual knowledge, “can be pleasurable if done right.”
Her breathing went erratic. Her scent exploded into a myriad of intriguing nuances. One of them, he knew well—it was the one fragrance he’d always pick up. His smile widened.
Merle cleared her throat, the movement underneath his hand spurring him to caress her silken skin. “Not going to happen.” Her voice trembled more than before, had taken on a husky note doing all sorts of sinful things to his already overactive sexual imagination. “You will have to take that from someone else.”
Close, so close.
His thumb stroked over the side of her throat, and her aura flared with excitement. “Anyone specific you’d like me to hurt? A cheating ex-boyfriend of yours, maybe?”
She blinked, stared at him. The corners of her mouth twitched upwards.
“Why, Merle mine,” he said, an unfamiliar joy bursting inside his chest, “is that a smile?”
She pressed her lips together, but her eyes sparkled with amusement—and he wanted to kiss her so badly right now, it hurt. When she took a deep breath, her breasts brushed against his chest, and it nearly did him in.
“Take it from someone who deserves it,” she said. “No one innocent.”
He clucked his tongue in reprimand. “I don’t hurt innocents.”
“Oh? But you like debauching them.”
He chuckled, and it was as much a teasing as the stroke of his hand down from her throat to the neckline of her sweater. “Ah, but debauchery only hurts the frigid minds of religious prudes.” His index finger traced the swell of her breast, found her nipple, and circled it. “Everyone else seems to enjoy it.”
Her escalating heartbeat was music to his ears. He leaned down to nip at the curve of her neck and found her pressing herself oh-so-slightly against him. Yes. More.
“Now,” he murmured, his fangs tingling with anticipation, “may I feed?”
She made a sound close to a whimper, then managed to steady herself. “If you want to chase me again, forget it, I’m not feeling up for a run.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I have something different in mind.” Taking her hand, he tugged at it for her to come along.
The fact she didn’t hesitate, didn’t question him, simply followed his lead, it did something to him. He breathed past the tight knot in his chest and led her to the living room, stopped in front of the large couch.
She glanced at the couch, then at him. “I will not—”
“…sleep with me, I know. Fine. You don’t have to. But this time, your clothes come off.” When she started to protest, he cut her off. “I’ve been wanting,” he said, lowering his voice to a timbre he knew would shake her aura, “to lick you inch for luscious inch, and that’s what I’m going to do. I promise you’ll be rewarded with the most intense sexual pleasure you’ve ever felt.”
Her breathing hitched, a small sound so erotic, his whole body hardened in response.
“You are incredibly arrogant,” she whispered, her cheeks flushed pink.
“No, my little Merle, I am simply well aware of my skills.”
Something flashed in her eyes then, and her aura pulsed with anger—no, not anger, but a related emotion. “All right.” Lips pursed, she regarded him with narrowed eyes. “Show me.”
Ah, defiance. Rhun grinned as he recognized the emotion in her aura. His grin slipped, however, in a wave of astonishment when Merle pulled off her sweater without much further ado and threw it to the side. Heat rolled through him, blood boiling at the sensual sight of Merle in her bra, skin creamy perfection and beckoning to be kissed. Licked. Nipped at.
“Well?” Hands on her hips, she met his gaze with a challenge in her eyes—and an unapologetic flare of lust in her energy pattern. “Let’s get started. I expect to be well-pleasured.”
He blinked, stumped for a moment by the change in her attitude. Seemed like his little witch had shed all pretense of shyness, reluctance or modesty, and instead jumped right into enjoying feeding him. And damn if it wasn’t like a shot of aphrodisiac straight into his veins, the way she unabashedly sought her pleasure.
He moved forward and nudged her onto the couch and was on top of her a second later. She gasped, her eyes wide, dark blue with desire, her heartbeat a thrumming wild rhythm. Leisurely, he claimed every bit of skin not covered by her bra with his hands, his lips, his tongue. Licked, caressed, tasted her. Just like he’d craved.
She was soft, silken, and she smelled so fucking good, it was all he could do not to rub himself all over her like a brainless dog. Well, he did rub a little, and buried his nose in the supple swell of her belly—he liked a woman with curves—which earned him a delighted moan from his favorite little witch volcano.
Sliding his hand underneath her back, he lifted her torso toward him, licked a line from her throat to the sweet valley between her breasts, and unhooked her bra. He pushed the straps down one by one, following the movements with playful strokes of his tongue, a little nip here and there.
Merle watched him with rapt attention, her eyes glazed with lust, her lips parted. She looked so deliciously kissable, he had to fight—fight fucking hard—not to claim her mouth and do with it what it was so clearly made for.
She must have picked up on his intention, because she cringed and said—in that husky voice that was so damn sexy it would make him go nuts—“Don’t kiss me again.”
He suppressed a disapproving growl, instead gave her a look laden with sensual promise. “Not on the mouth, no.” He tore away her bra. “But on every other damn spot I deem kissable.”
She might have tried to say something in response, but she never got the chance. He’d gone for her breasts before she could voice any thought.
He sucked her nipple into his mouth, circled it with his tongue, groaning at the taste of her, and reveled in Merle’s answering moan. Closing his right hand over her neglected breast, he squeezed. It had the perfect size, a good handful, and it molded into his palm as if made for it. He found he liked the feel so much, he tore his mouth away from her other breast and then cupped it too, squeezed and rubbed and stroked, a demon in the mood to play. Underneath his hands, Merle melted into his touch, undulating, her skin heating. Her rising pleasure colored the air.
It was a thing of beauty.
Fine tendrils of her power curled and writhed, and her aura pulsed with deep streaks of desire, a display of feminine sexual rapture. He soaked up the waves of her pleasure, his own power meshing with hers, electrifying the air between them.
He opened her jeans then, pulled them off, and then covered every inch of her he laid bare with licks, kisses and nips, drowning in the taste and feel of her skin, her scent, her heat. He made sure to graze her with his fangs every so often, making her gasp. When he crawled back up her legs, she trembled with the force of her excitement, panting, her fingers dug into the cushion of the couch.
He traced the lines of her panties, brushed the fabric over her core, found it was soaking wet. Suppressing the urge to pounce on her, he pulled off her panties, his patience running thin.
He had to finish this soon, or else he’d lose control and be inside her. Take her. Hard, fast, feeling her clench tight around him in ecstasy while he spent himself in her heat. And t
hen take her again, and again, until neither of them would be able to walk for a week. As his vision hazed over with desire, he had more and more trouble reminding himself that would not be a good move. Not yet.
His hands tightened around her hips as he fought the force of his desire. Merle’s shocked gasp and the spike of fear in her aura brought him back a little. Reining in his consuming need, he spread her thighs and had just settled her legs on his arms when she gave a startled cry.
Rhun stopped and looked at her, heart skipping a beat. “What’s wrong?”
“You—you’re not going to do…that, are you?” Her eyes were wide, her face as red as he’d never seen it before, her aura trembling with embarrassment.
His gaze flicked to the triangle of ginger curls between her legs, to the tempting pink flesh underneath, glistening with her arousal. He looked back at her face. “Do what? Eat you up like a delicious dessert?”
She squealed and squirmed, delightfully bashful again.
He bit back a grin. “I want to taste you. And not just your blood.” Brushing her mind with a wave of pure sexual intent, he ran his hands down the sensitive inside of her thighs, to her entrance, grazed it with his fingers.
She panted even faster.
He traced the curve of her swollen nether lips, slick with her desire. “I am going to lick you…” He pushed one finger inside her. “…until you scream with pleasure.” Cock twitching at the erotic feel of her—hot, wet, tight—he stroked her, rotated his finger inside, found the spot that made her buck and push her hips toward his hand.
A strangled moan escaped Merle’s throat. Her energy rippled with waves of lust.
“Give in,” he murmured against her intimate flesh.
And she did. Closing her eyes, she relaxed and let her head fall back against the couch. She was all his.
It drove a thunderbolt through his entire system.
He tamped down the fire burning in his veins and made good on his promise. With sensual cruelty he teased her, swiping his tongue along her sensitive skin, licking and sucking just short of the most pleasurable spot, until she writhed and pressed herself against him. Her desire was a palpable force in the air, swirling, strong and demanding, and damn straight delectable.
“Rhun, please.”
It was a murmur, the sound of his name on her lips so intimate, a caress he felt deep inside.
He intensified his strokes, and she groaned and pushed even harder toward him. Gripping her writhing hips, he steadied her. Her moan of protest turned to a cry of pure delight when he finally licked her clit. He sucked it in and flicked it with his tongue. Once. Twice.
Her aura exploded in a dazzling burst of pleasure.
“Gods, yes!” She dug her nails in the cushion. The fabric broke.
Still she writhed, bucked underneath him, and still he licked, relentlessly.
“Rhun!”
Another orgasm hit her hard and lit her energy up like a supernova. Pleasure, unbridled, raw and powerful, flowed from her and suffused the air, and Rhun drank it all in. She was supreme in her abandon. The taste of her, it drove him insane, fire and spice, the heat of summer.
She came again, and when she moaned, her voice broke from the strain of it. He released her but replaced his mouth with his fingers, stroking her down with erotic care, while he kissed his way to the inside of her thigh, where her blood rushed through the femoral artery.
And that was where he bit.
Merle was apparently past cries of pleasure by now, but as he sucked, hard and hungrily, her aura shattered into a thousand sparks of ecstasy.
The rich flavor of her blood filled his mouth, intoxicating, lush and heavy with passion. He continued stroking her while he drank, and the combined stimulation of his touch and the sexual high his feeding induced had her climaxing again.
It was a feast for his senses.
He soaked up her pleasure at the same time as he took her blood, drank it all in until his hunger for both was quenched. Licking over the puncture marks on her thigh, he sealed the wounds, and looked up at Merle. Her skin was bathed in sweat, her eyes closed, her breathing still shallow and fast.
“Merle?”
She uttered a sound somewhere between a wheeze and a moan, then sighed, so deeply, deeply satisfied, it made him preen with pure, masculine pride. Then her power curled inwards, receded as it did when she fell asleep.
He stopped short. She wasn’t going to…?
Sagging into the cushions, she snored softly.
“You have got to be kidding me,” he muttered.
There she lay, soft, soaked, spent and sweaty, satisfied into unconscious bliss, and he was still hard as granite, to the point of pain. And not the good kind of pain.
Gritting his teeth, he was about to get up from the couch so he could go jerk off and then take a cold, cold shower, as she reached for him. He froze and stared at her. She had her eyes closed, her power dimmed inside her, and from all he could tell she was half-asleep, but her hand had curled around his arm, drowsily tried to tug him closer. With sluggish movements, she wriggled toward him, half-consciously seeking his nearness.
He remained frozen for a few seconds, indecisive how to act. Then he swore a blue streak under his breath and lay down beside her. As soon as he pulled her into his arms, she relaxed into him and uttered a sound of unadulterated contentment.
He took a deep breath, inhaling her scent. She smelled like everything good, sweet and innately feminine, and she was soft in all the right places, a perfect match for the hard planes of his body.
He was still fighting the implications of how right she felt there in his arms, as it happened.
“Rhun,” Merle whispered in her sleep, and it fucking broke him.
Chapter 8
The mattress underneath Merle was kind of bumpy. A bit hard, too. Strange, that. She couldn’t remember falling asleep on the floor. Well, for that matter, she couldn’t remember falling asleep at all. Still drowsy, her mind just reconfiguring into a conscious state, she wiggled her body trying to find a more comfortable position. Damn lumpy pillow. Her eyes still closed, she punched the cushion—which was way too hard to deserve that name—and…it grunted.
Her eyes fluttered open. An arm blocked her sight. More specifically, an upper arm with a well-defined biceps. Her mind geared up into full consciousness and she realized the impressively muscled arm was attached to an even more impressive male body—which she currently used as a mattress.
Oh, gods.
She whipped her head up and stared into a face of cutting beauty. Recognition sank in. Rhun.
He watched her with calm attention, his blue-green eyes regarding her with disconcerting intensity. His one hand loosely tangled in her hair, he’d laid the other one on the bare skin of her lower back, underneath the blanket covering them both. He’d put one foot down on the floor, resting his other leg half-bent against the back of the couch, and Merle sprawled on top of him with her legs between his. The heat of his body seared her even through his clothes, and his scent surrounded her, a tantalizing embrace of her senses. It kicked her heartbeat up a notch, and stirred all sorts of warm, fuzzy feelings inside her.
One side of his mouth tipped up. “Hey there, pretty witch.”
“Hey,” she managed to reply. Her gaze was glued to his lips, her mind flipping through a catalog of vivid suggestions of how to use her mouth and tongue on his.
“Two things,” Rhun said, and she felt his deep voice rumble in his chest from where her head rested. “First, I don’t mind you wiggling on top of me. In fact, feel free to do that as often and as much as you’d like.” His sly smile made her curl her fingers into his T-shirt to keep from tracing his lips. “Second, if you try to punch me into pillow shape again, I’m going to drop your delectable butt on the floor.”
“Well,” she said, in the mood to tease, “it’s not my fault you’re all hard and lumpy.”
He raised one eyebrow, and in that instant, she realized what she’d said. A wa
ve of heat rolled up to her cheeks. With his hand on her lower back, he pressed her closer, and—even though covered by his jeans—there was no ignoring that prominent hardness nudging at her hips.
“I beg to differ, little witch of mine. That right here…” He made it twitch. “…is very much your fault.”
Lightning shot through her body, her nerve endings flaring awake, one by one, until every part of her touching him felt on fire. Gods, being splayed on top of him like this, with his arms around her, his sizzling energy brushing over her skin like a dark whisper, his gaze intent on hers, it was sinfully pleasurable. And it made it tempting, so very tempting, to enjoy him even further, to explore that rigid length pressing into her hips…
He curled a lock of her hair around his finger, tugged a little, and watched it uncurl again as he let it go, smiling with delight. “Sleep well?”
It took her a moment to realize he’d asked her a question. That insidiously kissable mouth of his had monopolized her attention again. “Um, yeah.”
“You know, I’ve decided to take it as a compliment to my overwhelming talent in the oral arts that you fell asleep snoring after I’d lavished my amazing skills on you.”
With a flash of scorching heat, she remembered what he’d done to her—and how she’d reacted to it. By the Powers That Be, she’d never come so hard in her life, and never, ever, had she been that loud. She flinched. Holy hell, she’d not only moaned his name, she’d screamed it. Embarrassment and newly-sparked arousal vied inside her for the position of Most Overpowering Emotion. She ignored both and went with annoyance instead.
“I do not snore.”
“Yes, you do. And adorably so, if I may say. It’s like a soft purr turning into an endearing wheeze when someone holds your nose.”
She gaped at him. “You didn’t!”
Rhun grinned. “To salvage your dignity, you do not drool.”
She swatted his chest. “Of course I don’t!”
His eyes held a warm glint as he said, “But you curl your toes when I do this.” He slid his hand to the back of her head and massaged her scalp.
