“Maybe I should leave,” she said faintly, turning to shuffle papers into innocuous positions on her desk. “Maybe someone else should do this research. Noah has so much more experience in this than I do. I can read the English texts, even the Latin ones, but I can’t read the works that are in whatever language that is. You have Demon scholars, and I’m just a human…”
“No. We need you.” His tone was as firm as stone.
“So you say. All I know is that I’m a distraction to you, Jacob. One you don’t need right now, from what I’ve been reading.”
“You will not leave.” It was a command, deep and forceful, filled with his frustration. Then he seemed to realize what he was saying and sighed, shoving his hand through his long, loose hair in agitation. “If you were out of the realm of my…my people’s protection, then you would see the meaning of the word distraction,” he promised her.
“There you go again. Is everything so extreme for you people?”
“Yes.” His hand came out to frame her face, turning her around to look up fully into his eyes, his fingertips moving in a soft, tantalizing massage at the spot in front of her ear where her hairline began. “I will tell you this, Isabella. In my very lengthy lifetime, I have been single-minded in my devotion to a great many things for a great many other people. But you…you are the first thing I feel compelled to be devoted to for myself and myself alone. Do not think it is the Hallowed moon that makes me talk this way. I assure you, it is something much deeper than that, something far more cogent than such astrological fickleness.”
“Jacob…” Isabella was breathless. Why couldn’t a normal male say things like that to her? Finally someone romantic, fascinating, and intelligent comes along, and he turns out to be not even of the same species. Just her luck.
Jacob smiled, a broad toothy grin.
“I am a normal male,” he insisted.
“Hey! Stop doing that!” She covered her head with both hands. “Don’t read my mind. That’s not fair.”
“Fair? What does fairness have to do with it? I do not know why I am able to sense your thoughts, but since I have the ability, it is practical to use it.”
“Well, it isn’t ethical!” Her hands popped onto her hips, making him smile. “Sometimes very private things go through my head, and you have no business snooping into them. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.”
“I understand that. However, you are the one who keeps tossing images at me when we are in public. Some of them quite disrespectful of my King and Elijah, I might point out.” His eyes were twinkling with suppressed amusement as she thrust up her chin stubbornly.
“Those were given, not taken. Do I take things out of your head without your permission?”
“I do wish you would,” he said softly, the suggestiveness of the simple statement sending a shiver up the back of her neck.
“Well”—she cleared her throat—“I’ll thank you to keep out of my head. And since you mention it, you are about as normal as a hurricane.”
“Yes, but there is even a time when hurricanes are considered normal.”
Jacob smiled when she released a frustrated little growl, the sound striking him more as sexy than petulant or dangerous, as she might have wished it to be. He reached out to touch her throat before he could curb the impulse, feeling it vibrate with the sound for all of a second before his touch startled her and made her gasp. He felt her swallow, felt her breathe. Such living, vital reflexes. He could feel her pulse. Felt it quicken. No sooner had her blood begun to rush than he was being filled with her scent again. It was toxic to him, like too much candy, making his world tilt just a little off its axis. That primitive part of him stirred, lifted its head out of its controlled slumber.
Isabella saw black fire leap into his dark chocolate eyes. She held her breath, momentarily entranced as hunger licked hotly through his irises, turning them completely black. Those lustrous eyes were skimming over her, devouring her without so much as a touch. She was acutely aware of his power, his strength, and all the things he could turn and bend to his will if he but concentrated hard enough. It was not lost on her that she was quickly becoming one of those things. Whenever he came near, she inevitably bowed to him like a flower seeking the sun.
“Like roots seeking nourishment from the soil,” he corrected, plucking her mental simile from her and turning it into one that suited him and his nature better. “But perhaps that would better describe myself, little flower.” His voice was as warm as sun-baked earth. “Whenever I see you, I am overcome with the urge to be rooted within you, to be buried deep so your body can nourish me.”
The imagery was like lightning coursing through her. It left Isabella panting gently for breath and brought slivers of quicksilver heat through her veins. Her head was bending backward, tilting her face up to his to meet the fractional lowering of his head. His eyes targeted the parted swell of her mouth.
She swayed closer to him, her body so raptly in tune with his that, if he shifted a shoulder forward, she would match the movement. She did this in such a way that, should they make contact, she would fit into the line of his body perfectly. Hunger clawed through Jacob relentlessly, his nostrils flaring as they filled with that exotic scent that was 100 percent Bella.
This time, Jacob’s mouth was infinitely tender when it contacted hers. So much so that if not for the sparkle of heat that flushed her lips, she would have felt no contact. He pressed himself onto her incrementally, smiling against her mouth when she made a little sound of frustration at his taunting pace. He let her decide when she was ready, held so still but for gentle, breathy rubs of his lips against hers. Her hands reached out and curled with unconscious longing into his shirt. She was trying to pull him closer, but he would not obey her.
Come to me, little flower, if you want me. Come to me.
Isabella’s blood was roaring in her ears so loudly that she almost didn’t hear the soft, beckoning voice in her mind. Either way, she had decided she was through with his toying. She surged up onto her toes, thrusting her body upward into his, her mouth capturing his greedily. He opened instantly for the aggressive sweep of her tongue, groaning low in his soul as she fluttered like a soft, sensual butterfly within his mouth.
Both of his hands swept up into her silky hair, capturing her delicate head, pulling her deeper into him. As aggression switched hands, Isabella’s body bowed backward, curving, fitting to his, and soaking up the hard heat he was giving off in great, stunning waves. Jacob’s hands flexed tight as she locked herself against him. His tongue swept over hers with obvious hunger. His breath rushed so hotly across her mouth and cheek that she felt scorched by it. Isabella returned the intensity by sliding her hands up the back of his neck and into the depths of his rich hair, holding him as tightly to the kiss as he was holding her.
Jacob felt the slight sharpness of her nails as they traveled up the sensitive length of his neck, and the recoil of response that sprang through his body was awesome in both heat and primitivity. They unfurled within him, flexing every muscle in anticipation until Isabella found herself clinging to a man made of granite. The contrasts to the soft workings of her beautifully seductive mouth were astounding. Clearly she didn’t mind that his mouth was the only relaxed part of his body. That is, if he could call his aggressive hunger as he devoured her sweet taste an exhibition of relaxation. She let him crush her against his stone-hard body, and she bent willingly beneath his intensity as he kissed her.
Her mouth was warm and lush, like a Brazilian jungle, and equally full of wondrous surprises. She kissed with wickedly adept skill, improving on herself every second. Somehow she always knew just how to match him, how to tantalize him further until he was groaning against her lips. Bella herself was gasping into his mouth, her clutching fingers in his hair urgent and demanding. Her petite, luxuriant body squirmed against his like a desert snake fitting itself into a tight cubby of rocks.
Violent, urgent demand clawed through him; it move
d with sharp fingers of ice in amongst the burning of his body, just to be sure he would feel it as acutely as possible, to secure his entire attention.
Jacob suddenly broke off, jerking Isabella back by the hair as if he would put her at a distance. She swayed in his grasp, suspended between his desires as a war raged in his obsidian eyes. His fingers were gripping her scalp in a desperate massage of conflicting needs. He was shaking, and she could feel it. So strong, so powerful, yet quaking as if conflicting plates of the Earth were rubbing each other raw.
The discord lasted all of a couple of heartbeats, and then wild nature took over. Isabella cried out as his arms circled her like bands of steel and jerked her relentlessly against his rock-hard body. His mouth returned to hers, devouring her deeply, tasting her as if she were a glutton’s favorite delicacy. His arousal was a palatable thing, and she savored it against her tongue, the bouquet of it as intoxicating as strong wine. He tasted of all the spices of the Earth combined in a heady flavor that sang like sensual music through her senses. Isabella felt his strong fingers molding to the curve of her back, sliding slowly over each contour, heading with purpose toward the bow of her waist, the flare of her hips. She pulled back ever so slightly to draw a breath, her lips glistening with the honey of their mouths. Jacob couldn’t bear the sight or the separation. It was too much like denial, and he was through with that. He reached to recapture her, his kiss punishing in power and dominance, a reprimand in passion for depriving him of her when she knew he couldn’t bear it.
Jacob groaned, the sound boiling up from the deepest regions of his body. He was being strangled by the restriction of his clothing, more so by the press of her body and her hands as they began to move over him with sudden liberty. He cupped her sweetly rounded bottom in both hands and she eagerly leapt up as he lifted her feet from the floor. She was so light, so tiny, like a precious, delicate fairy flying up against his towering body.
But the pixie had bite, as he soon was reminded. She slung one knee over his hip and nipped playfully at his lower lip in distraction. He wasn’t expecting her other leg to snake so quickly around him so that he was suddenly caught in the erotic vise of her legs. Her torso rose up high in his embrace, their mouths separating as she gripped the back of his head, pulling him toward the fullness of her breasts.
It was another scent, different and the same all at once. Pure, he thought hotly, as the sharp tang of musk drifted up from her skin. She shuddered violently in his hold. He felt her memories of their first encounter flitting through her mind, felt her yearn for a repeat of what it felt like to have his touch on her breasts. Her eager desire inundated him, and within seconds he had jerked her T-shirt up and over her head, flinging it aside carelessly.
She watched as he focused on her bare breasts, his gaze completely transfixed, his hand slowly skimming over the top of one, then traveling to the other. His touch was feather light and maddening. This curious exploration was nothing like the demand to claim her that had motivated him the last time, nothing like the more aggressive needs she could feel radiating from him now with every fiber of her being. She was not ignorant of the danger she was in. She couldn’t be any longer. She could feel it as he insinuated himself around all of her thoughts and emotions, and she around his. Inside each other. The actual joining of their physical bodies would be necessary to perfect them. That knowledge left a bereft place within her, as if she were hollowed out and incomplete because he wasn’t already within her.
Jacob’s touch narrowed to a single fingertip that skied down the slope of her left breast until it was just a lone fingernail that scraped over her rigid nipple. Isabella jerked sharply, unprepared for the spear of heat the simple touch sent rocketing through her. His mouth caught up her nipple the very next second, drawing it deep into the warm, wet home of his playful tongue. He suckled her and she moaned loudly, wriggling with frustration and pleasure in his single-armed embrace. A pulse of heat seeped down the center of her so hot and so wet that it burst the confines of her body. She was flooded with moisture, the beckoning nectar pooling hotly at the juncture of her thighs.
Jacob released her from his mouth, her sensitive body suddenly endangered by the need roaring through him as her fragrance swept his extraordinary senses. He jerked her forward against himself, his face burrowing beneath her hair where her neck met her shoulder. His teeth latched onto her with no warning whatsoever. He couldn’t help himself. She was his mate, and he had to make it known to her and all those who thought to come near her.
Isabella gasped loud and long as his teeth pierced her skin, serious enough to mark her but stopping before causing truly painful damage. His hand wrapped around her throat, holding her still as a bestial growl of possession boiled out of him. His thoughts, dark and primitive, swept fiercely through her.
I am Jacob the Enforcer, a Demon of the dominant Earth. I am every blade of grass, every song of life that is sung on the planet. I am what has been from the beginning of all time, both known and unknown. I am every predator, and like them, I make it known that this female is mine by leaving my mark upon her. My scent will bleed into hers, just as hers already becomes a part of mine. She will smell of my body, of my essence, and it will also mark her as mine.
Satisfied by this knowledge, Jacob released her, his tongue sweeping the wound he’d made before continuing up the line of her throat with voracious hunger for the taste of her skin and the scent of her body. Every so often his tongue would leave the path and his teeth would scrape her sensitive neck. Every time that happened, her small body clenched and expectant gooseflesh bubbled up all over her skin.
Then his hands were raising her up to his hungry mouth as he found the hollow of her throat, her collarbone, and the track of her breastbone. He broke away to chase a bead of perspiration that slipped down the valley between her breasts, catching it with the tip of his tongue. He dragged that velvet tool across her skin until he was drawing a thrusting nipple into his mouth.
Isabella was already half mindless with arousal as Jacob shifted his hold and footing. Still locked around his waist, she felt him press her back against an uneven surface. She realized they were leaning against the spines of rows of books stacked tightly onto the shelf that was behind her. Then his hands were at the snap of her jeans, and all of her attention shifted in shock.
Instinctively, her hands flew to cover his, but his mouth was devouring hers in that very second, making her go weak from head to toe, kissing her relentlessly until her hands dropped away nervelessly. All she could do was fumble for a hold on his shoulders, mindlessly responding to the passion that made her burn to kiss him with every ounce of her will and strength.
She felt his hand slide down over her bottom again, but this time he was even closer to her skin, having slipped his fingers past the loosened denim of her pants. The material slid lower, lower still. The fabric set her sensitive skin to screaming as it slid down her thighs. Her legs went lax as he supported all of her weight in a single hand, pushing the jeans from her body effortlessly and then urging her legs back to their embrace around his waist, not realizing in his haste and passion that his nails scored her in bright, feral red lines along her upper thigh. All the while, his mouth never separated from hers, and she was engaged beyond caring.
Jacob was suddenly free to touch her anywhere he wanted to, the lace of her panties the only barrier remaining between him and his ability to experience her skin. He splayed his fingers over the shuddering muscles of her belly.
“You are so soft,” he groaned, breaking from her mouth and burying his face into the side of her neck again. “Your scent, Bella. It intoxicates me.”
His voice was coarse even to his own ears. He opened his mouth on the side of her neck, sliding his hot tongue up its delicate length, dipping it into the hollow below her earlobe. His breath blew hot into her hair, over her skin, the speed chilling the sensitive back of her neck in spite of its heated temperature.
Jacob’s hand slid down her belly, and Isabe
lla was inundated with sensation coming from so many different places all at once. She had never known her senses could be so aroused, so tormented. Then his fingertips slid past the border of her panties, sliding silkily into the collection of curls hidden beneath the lace.
Her reaction was like tinder suddenly catching a flame. She made a wild, mewling sound, her hands flying out to her sides to suddenly grip whatever she could get hold of. Her fingers curled tightly around spines and tightly packed pages. Her whole body clenched violently, her hands jerking the books clean off the shelves. They slammed to the floor, dual bangs that marked the slip of first one finger, and then another, into wet, silky flesh.
Isabella was filled with an unexpected, wild terror. No one had ever touched her in this manner. In fact, no one had ever done half of the things to her that Jacob had been doing. As she gasped hysterically for breath and looked down at her body in his embrace, she realized that her wanton reactions would have never given that particular fact away.
“Jacob!” she cried, her hands scraping frantically at his shoulders as her fear mounted, choking off her ability to breathe.
“Shh, little flower, I will not hurt you.” The soothing tone of his voice washed over her, dulling every sharp edge of fear just slightly. “Just feel, Bella. Feel what my touch can create in you.”
His voice was hypnotic and seductive, as if he had Legna’s power to affect the will of others with it. She knew without a doubt that he spoke the truth. If she just relaxed, he would show her everything—every last thing she had dreamed of, and even things she could never have imagined. As she hesitated, as she was lured by that temptation, Jacob slid a long, seeking finger into the sheath of her body.
Bella gasped, the stuttering intake of sound reverberating loudly in the enormous library. Jacob exhaled a heated curse in his own language, the word clearly meant as an intense, expressive compliment. She laughed at him breathlessly, without knowing why. Probably because of the rise in sensation and frustration the intimate touch created.
Jacob Page 11