by J. K Harper
"Another piece of evidence. Damn, Jordyn. We make a good team."
He swept her into an abrupt, brain-melting kiss. Startled both by what he'd said as well as the unexpected gift of feeling his lips against hers, she melted herself against him again for long moments. She only had so many of his kisses left. She wanted to enjoy every single one of them.
Long, heady moments later, Tanner slowly loosened his grasp on her. Pulling away just far enough that they could gaze into one another's faces without going cross-eyed, she thought she saw the shadows of regret briefly slip over his expression.
"We do make a good team." His voice was low. "You know that as well as I do. And I know," he added, his voice simultaneously wary yet sure, "that you feel the same way."
A faint breeze stirred the damp charcoal dust, sending its acrid scent to both of them.
Shutting his eyes, leaning his head against hers, Tanner gently stroked the back of Jordyn's neck with his fingers. "But you and I are too alike." True regret framed his words. "We've both been hurt in different ways. Neither one of us wants to risk it again. I honestly believe you and I both genuinely care for one another enough to not want to do that. Am I right?"
His last words were rough. Harsh. Yet the truth in them resonated through her as well, despite her wolf's howling. It was all he had to give.
The brutal truth was that it was all she had to give, too.
Simply nodding against his head, closing her own eyes, she squeezed her arms around him. They stood there, together, the dank breeze beginning to threaten more rain. After several more heartbeats, Tanner pressed a kiss against her forehead, then pulled away to head back toward the truck. "Come on, she-wolf. Let's get back so we can tell Zach about this evidence. At least one good thing can come out of this day."
Taking a few deep breaths to center herself, feeling her wolf's mournful acceptance of the truth of Jordyn's own brokenness when faced with Tanner's brokenness, she followed him back. They returned to town in silence, the whole time during which she bit the inside of her cheek raw to banish the tears that wanted to flood out.
8
One week after his sanction, Tanner was losing his mind. Without the fights, all he had to keep the raging demons at bay were fighting fires—and spending every other available free minute with Jordyn. Without this woman, he thought as he looked into her soft brown eyes right now, he already would have fallen over the edge of sanity.
Need her. Need balance. Need mate. His wolf's tone had begun to turn implacable lately. As if Tanner's wilder side was done putting up with his more rational side.
I’m with her right now, Tanner muttered back, his body already sizzling in anticipation of the next few hours. They'd had dinner together earlier and now were back in Jordyn's little apartment. Both of them were firmly, securely wrapped into their magical lust spell, which they’d built on during dinner, sharing quiet laughter at the silly term. A silly term for something big and powerful, Tanner thought now.
Must be with her always, his wolf insisted. Must be with mate always.
Not my mate. And just being here with her for now is good enough. It has to be. Tanner held onto the thought despite the hollow ache inside.
Pushing it aside, he focused on the woman and the moment. Right now, his world was narrowing to her and her alone. “Come here," he said. He heard the low timbre of his wolf's voice growled through his voice as he spoke.
Jordyn's eyes darkened as a slow, sensual smile played on those lips of hers that he loved feasting on. "Oh, is it going to be like that?" Her voice teased back in a deep, sultry register, although he heard the slight flicker of pain race through it as well. Feeling something wrench deep inside him, he simply nodded, opening his arms. She stepped toward him, into his embrace.
"Yes," he murmured back, letting the sweet need of his arousal stir into bright flames in her presence. "I want to taste you, touch you, travel every inch of your body, Jordyn. I need to carry the memory of you etched into my skin."
He felt her swallow, then her head nodded against his neck. "Yes," she whispered. "Me, too." She began kissing his neck, trailing her lips along his skin like hot brands.
Tanner tipped his head back, exposing his neck to her and letting her kiss and nibble and lick at it. He bared himself to her that way. Made himself vulnerable to her. He would let everything drop away and allow her in.
It still didn't mean he could be good for her. Not forever.
Inside, his wolf said with increasing firmness, She is mine. Mate. Always.
Jordyn gently kissed her way down his neck and over his collarbones, the top of his chest. Her hands light but quick, she began unbuttoning his shirt, letting her fingers swirl over his pecs and then his hard nipples as she went. This time he sucked in a loud gasp, letting her name groan past his lips. He felt her smile where she kissed him as she undid the last button and gently shrugged his shirt off his shoulders. He helped by tugging it past his hands, blindly throwing it behind him to the floor. Holding her tight and close, now he let his hands travel down over the silky top she wore. Fingers coming to the sweet swell of her hips, the soft roundness of her ass, he stroked and squeezed, eliciting gasps from her that rippled throughout the room.
Quickly, he shucked off his pants and kicked them aside so that he was fully naked. Then he growled, "My turn to lead, gorgeous." With that, he abruptly hoisted her into his arms. She sharply inhaled again, her eyes darkening even more with her need as she twined her hands behind his neck. Not looking away from him as he strode over to her bed, she felt entirely relaxed in his arms. Just as trusting and vulnerable with him as he was with her.
Pushing aside the ache that centered in his chest and swept through his body, he focused on the excitement of knowing that within moments, her beautifully naked body would be beside his. Gently, he lowered her to the bed, then reached for her clothes, intending to tear them from her.
But she shook her head with a smile, hands going to her own buttons. "Let me do it." Her voice was deep. Roughened with the sound of her own wolf and desire. "Let me strip them off so you can watch."
Breath stuttering out as the flames of arousal intensified in him, Tanner just nodded. Jordyn slowly unbuttoned the flattering dark pink blouse he'd so admired during dinner, letting her gaze travel over his naked body as she stripped. Smiling again, letting her tongue dip out the corner of her mouth, which made his already heavy cock tighten even more, she drank in the sight of his body from tip to toe and back again. Looking back into his eyes, she finished unbuttoning her blouse and let it slip off her shoulders to land in a silky puddle beside her on the bed. "If you know how much it turns me on to see you watching me like that while I do this..." Her voice trailed off as she spoke, although her breathing had increased.
Voice still a low growl, feeling the blood throbbing into his cock, Tanner answered, "Damn straight it does. It's half killing me to stand here watching you do that and not touching you."
The velvet stroke of her laughter wrapped around him. "Good. That was the intended effect."
With that, she lay back on the bed to unbutton and then unzip the soft gray pants she wore. Gently shimmying them down her hips and off her feet, when she was done she leaned over onto her side, cocking one leg in front of her and resting her head on her hand like a pinup model. "What do you think now, my sexy firefighter wolf?"
He thought he might swallow his tongue was what. Jordyn's succulent breasts beautifully filled the lacy white bra she wore. Matching panties hugged her hips, the whole of her so damned gorgeous Tanner's breath quickened even as his cock hardened and lengthened. How well he knew her glorious body. How familiar he was with it, how sure he was of his ability to draw soft moans of delight and sweet cries of bliss from her. He knew just how to touch her, exactly where, at just what rhythm.
The same way she knew exactly how to touch him. The same way she knew everything about him.
"I think," he finally managed to growl, the soft burn of pleasurable anticip
ation lighting through him, "that you're stunning."
Jordyn's eyes darkened even more. Her lips fell slightly open, her pulse beating hard in her neck. Carefully, Tanner stepped onto the bed and straddled her with his knees. Caught on her side, she started to roll over onto her back. But he shook his head. Leaning down for a long, slow kiss, one in which he pressed into her mouth with his tongue, he tasted her rich spices, feeling the heat of her mouth sear his.
"Wait," he murmured. "I want to kiss you all down the side of your body. Stay just like this for a minute longer."
Just the sweetly hissing inhale of her breath told him how much she liked that idea. He started with her ear, gently nibbling the shell before kissing and sucking on the soft lobe. With one hand, he reached around to slip his fingers into her bra and gently stroke her breasts, first one, then the other. The nipples tightened immediately beneath his touch, and she slightly arched her back. An appreciative moan slipped out of her mouth. With his other hand, he reached around to unclasp her bra. Gently tugging the straps over her arms, he tossed it to the edge of the bed and let the beautiful bounty of her freed breasts fill both his hands. Slowly sliding his body down alongside of hers, he licked and kissed his way down her neck, over her shoulder, down her taut, fit biceps. He moved his head to kiss and nibble along her ribs, gently pushing her arm out of the way. She moved it so eagerly he laughed, enjoying the fact that as always, she loved him touching her.
For his part, he felt the molten heat slipping like liquid through his body merely from being right beside her. From touching her. From breathing in her intoxicating scent of sweet, musky jasmine.
"Keep going," she urged him in a throaty voice. The one that told him how aroused she was.
Smiling against her sweet, bare skin, he kept moving downward until his lips tipped over the curve of her waist, up along the gorgeous swell of her hip. The bare nothing of her underpants met his mouth. Moving his hands down so he could slightly brace them against the bed, he gripped the light slip of fabric with his teeth and tugged it down her leg. She helped by pushing it down on the other side. As he went, he trailed his fingers along her long, smooth thigh, down to her toes.
She giggled suddenly. "Don't you dare kiss those feet of mine. I think they smell like feet.”
He huffed out an amused bark of laughter. This was one of the many things he loved about her. Her sense of humor, even during—
Pausing slightly just before he pulled her panties all the way off her feet, his mind tripped over the word he'd been about to think. Lovemaking.
Love.
Yes, his wolf murmured at him, completely in the moment with him. Love mate. Love Jordyn.
A small shock of conflict roared into him once again. Jordyn, sensing his hesitation, turned on her back and leaned up on her elbows to give him a quizzical look. "Everything okay down there, fire wolf? Is the smell of my delicate tootsies giving you the vapors?"
This time, a genuine peal of laughter snorted out of him. He tossed the pretty lacy panties aside and shook his head. Damn, she knew how to make him smile. "Never," he assured her. "I was actually just thinking about how much I love the way you can make me laugh even in our most intimate moments."
He gazed up at her from his position down by her feet, feeling as though he worshiped at the feet of a goddess. She looked back down at him, silken strands of her hair caught up on one cheek, face slightly rosy in what was another one of her signs of arousal. Her gorgeous nutmeg-brown eyes had the added sheen to them that meant her wolf was just as present as his. As they looked at one another, he felt all the desire racing and tumbling back through him, carrying him along in a growing inferno he welcomed.
Voice a deep, growled whisper, he said, "Spread your legs for me, babe. I need to taste you right now."
***
As soon as Tanner said that, Jordyn was lost. Something deep had stirred in his eyes just a moment before he spoke. Inside, her wolf murmured at her, Mine. My Tanner. Jordyn let the truth of that flare over her, lighting her senses with a sizzling zap. She felt electric. About ready to pop off into dazzling fireworks.
Tanner always did this to her. Always.
Silently, just looking at him, she let first one leg, then the other slide open over her bedspread. A dark, desirous smile spread over Tanner's face. The smile of a man being gifted the most incredible thing he could imagine. Barely breathing the words, he said, "So damn beautiful, Jordyn. You are so damn beautiful."
Then he slid himself up, nestled his face between her legs, and ran a long, dragging stroke of his tongue through her damp folds. Jordyn didn't even bother to stop the ragged groan that tore out of her mouth at his touch. Every nerve ending she had down there immediately responded, the feeling crackling through her like wildfire. Their long, flirtatious foreplay during dinner had primed her body. That, combined with the deep knowledge that she needed to enjoy every single second she had left with this man, made the wildfire he started with his touch instantly turn into an explosive inferno.
"Oh, Tanner, I—now!" she commanded, breath heaving.
Another long, slow drag of his tongue down, then back up to all her slicked spots of need. She exploded into what felt like a million shooting stars beneath his tongue and lips. Bucking her hips into him, reaching down to press his face into her, she let a wild cry rip out of her throat as the orgasm exploded through her. He kept licking, swirling his tongue up and down, back and forth, with rhythmic intensity as she arched against him again and again from the force of it.
Finally, boneless, spent, she fell back onto the bed, gasping for breath, relaxing what she belatedly realized had been a death grip on his head. He gave her a long last taste before moving his head back. "Ah, babe, you taste so good. Just listening to you come made me so hard I was about to lose it right then." His voice was a rugged, cracking whisper of barely held back desire.
She managed to blink open her eyes and focus on his face. She caught her breath at the utterly focused, feral expression he wore.
Oh, yes. She knew that look. She knew exactly what it meant.
He didn't disappoint her.
"Turn over and get onto all fours, Jordyn." His order was pure gravel that mere human ears would not have been able to understand. "Now, babe. Please." That last, ragged word was still an order, but the shaking need beneath it tugged at both her molten core and her hammering heart.
Feeling her pulse slamming in her neck, a new wave of excitement thundering between her legs and arms making her dizzy with renewed need, she swiftly obeyed. Getting on all fours, turning her back to him, she leaned her head down on her arms and nestled her rear toward him. His answering groan shivered through the room.
Without another word, he reached forward, grasped her hips to pull her back even closer to him, and plunged his steel-hard length deep inside her.
* * *
Tanner thought his head might shoot off his body the second he thrust himself into Jordyn's slick center. Her sweet heat enveloped him just as her soft cry did, mingling with his own rough groan. She looked up at him from her head nestled on her arms, her eyes dark and smoky, her lips parted as her breath came in pants between her own groans. "With me," she whispered, her movements already matching his. “With me, Tanner."
Her soft command rattled through him, shoving aside all reason, all thoughts, all concerns and inner conflict. Their bodies melded in tandem so that they could erupt at the same time. Higher and faster, like the winds whipping the flames of the fire between them that he never wanted to go out, they spiraled up with one another. Eyes locked with hers the whole time, slamming into her willing caress and being met stroke for stroke, he felt his climax shatter out of him in a crashing burst at the same time she shuddered and tightened and spasmed wildly.
His bellow of joyful release echoed off the walls of her room, matched in harmony by her long, keening cry of bliss.
He stroked into her with almost desperate final thrusts, riding the sensations until the very end. Utterly l
ost in the fiery detonation of euphoria that happened each time he was with this woman. Each time he let go when he was with her.
Each time trusting her, his wolf whispered in the back of his mind. Each time letting her trust me.
His mind totally scrambled, knowing that he was exactly where he was meant to be and that everything in this world was right, Tanner could only agree with his wolf.
Eventually, he slowly collapsed down on top of Jordyn, still nestled inside her. He rested his face against her neck, kissing her shoulder and reaching down with one hand to take her hand in his. They interlaced their fingers as he reached his other hand around to gently curve around her head, softly tangle in her hair.
Slowly, her breathing returned to normal. Slowly, he felt her heartbeat beneath his settle back into a quieter rhythm. Slowly, he became aware of the other noises he'd completely blocked out in the moments of passion with her. A car alarm going off somewhere in the distance, the slight whoosh of traffic coming from the main drag a few blocks down from Jordyn's apartment. The creaks and ticks of the building itself, which was one of the older ones in town.
All the things of which he'd been utterly unaware while he was wholly focused on Jordyn and her pleasure mingled with his.
Her hand squeezed his. "You take my breath away," she said simply.
He smiled against her neck. "Sounds like you have enough breath to talk right now," he teased back.
She giggled and halfheartedly flailed around with her other hand to try to slap him on the butt. She missed by a mile, amidst both their laughter.
Dammit. What the hell was he thinking, leaving this woman behind? His wolf immediately supported that line of thinking by rubbing up against the corners of his mind, giving a short bark of approval.