“What are you looking for in a mate, Ivy?” Lukas’s voice is low and even, and as he speaks my name, he parts the cloak at my knees.
Shyness rattles through me as he exposes my legs from my thighs to my bare feet. “I thought you said you wouldn’t touch me unless I asked you to.”
“I’m not touching you. I’m opening your cloak.”
But he’s not going to stop there. How far will he want to go? Will he want to strip me down naked and take me on his giant bed? Pleasure me on the chair, or plunge his hard length into me in front of the fire, the way Reaper had earlier tonight?
God, Reaper.
He’s so different from his cousin, it’s staggering. Lukas might have relinquished control for the time being, but when I’m with Reaper there is no control. At all. Our connection is carnal and raw and undeniable. Lukas may be handsome and powerful, tempting me in ways I can’t explain, but it’s different, a slow burn rather than a passionate explosion, but intoxicating just the same.
A cool breeze sweeps up my legs—all the way up—dragging me back to the moment. From Lukas’s position on the floor, can he see…everything?
“What are you looking for in a mate?” he repeats, and this time, he ghosts his hand over my calf. He’s not touching me—not really. But I can feel the warmth of his palm as it hovers over my leg. The hint of his caress sweeps up my calf, over my knee, between my thighs. “Someone who can protect you?”
I shiver from head to toe. My heart drums wildly against my rib cage as I anticipate the feel of his hand. With a silent moan, I part my legs ever so slightly so he can continue his seduction.
Damn it, no.
I clamp my mouth shut and squeeze my thighs together. But I can’t ignore that my legs are quivering from the ghost of his touch. After sleeping with Reaper tonight, I shouldn’t be having a reaction to Lukas at all. But my body betrays me, rushing heat to my cheeks and wetness between my legs.
“No, I don’t need my mate to protect me.” I lick my lips to return their moisture, and feel his stare hone on my tongue as it lingers in the corner of my mouth. “I can get protection from the pack if I need it.”
“My pack,” he corrects as the chair shifts with his weight. He braces himself over me, resting his hands on either side. He’s careful not to touch me, but his spicy, masculine scent fills my nose until I can smell nothing but his natural fragrance. His cheek is softly grazing mine, and his lips are near my ear, and the closeness is driving me crazy. “Are you looking for stability?”
His voice is low and luscious, and I ache to hear him speak again. My eyelashes flutter against their cover as my heart pounds in a fierce rhythm.
My body wants him, even if my mind is gently tapping the brakes.
Has he had super-secret Alpha powers bestowed on him or something? Stronger than a dozen men. Faster than a speeding train. Melts defenses with a single smoldering glance. Seriously, I should be able to resist his charms but…I can’t.
And then something clicks, deep down inside me, and I fear I’ve known the truth all along.
I don’t want to resist him.
“No, stability is boring,” I say, though my voice pushes out in a purr. Against my control, I turn my cheek toward his, to increase the pressure, to feel the warmth of his face against mine. “I crave excitement and adventure.”
He anticipates the turn of my cheek and retreats to the other side, fanning hair away from my neck with a slow exhale. My body shivers from the promise of his touch and his mouth. Every one of his moves is insanely erotic, making me completely forget that I’m at his mercy with bound hands and no sight. His mouth hovers over my neck, a hairbreadth away from my skin.
“I can give you those things.” He whispers the words into my mouth as my lips part in a breathy sigh. “Excitement. Adventure. Sex. Everything you crave and more.”
God, yes. Please. The words nearly burst through me as I’m lost in a maelstrom of red-hot sensation.
“If it’s not protection you seek in a mate,” he says, pulling back the cloak as it falls around my bare breasts. He groans as cold air draws my nipples tight. “And it’s not stability…” His head descends to my chest. His lips skate over my nipples and float over my skin, threatening to circle my pebbled flesh. I arch into his mouth, craving pressure, tugging at the ropes binding my wrists and holding me to the chair. He makes a dismissive sound and pulls back, leaving me cold. “Then what are you searching for?”
“Passion. Plain and simple and in every aspect of my life.”
“Oh, sweet Ivy, I can give you that, too.”
He strips away my cloak completely, and the sound of tearing stitches rips the breath from my lungs. I’m bare. Vulnerable. He can see every trembling inch of me. My breath comes up shallow, and liquid heat pools between my legs. With the force of a bolt of lightning I remember that I have the control.
And I have to feel him and taste him, to see if the anticipation has built all of this up in my head. I can’t fight it anymore.
“Kiss me,” I force out.
I expect brutal contact—an assault on my lips that will match the war raging within me. But it doesn’t come. Instead, he lets out a pained moan as his lips graze mine. He parts his delicious mouth for my tongue to sweep inside. My body explodes with electricity as he matches me stroke for stroke. I writhe in the chair and fight against my bonds, kissing him fiercely. He holds back with iron-clad restraint, keeping his hands off my body as it shivers with desire.
He sucks on my tongue, pulls it into his mouth, and I can feel the rising need inside him as I slant my head to deepen the kiss. Without the use of my eyes, every other sense has come alive. I’m in tune with the air punching out of his lungs, the sound of our lips sliding against one another, and the heady taste of the brandy on his tongue.
“You want more,” he breathes against my mouth as he pulls away. “Tell me what you want, and I’ll give it to you.”
I can’t help but open up for him and silently beg for his touch. I feel drugged and lost in some kind of lust-filled haze. One thing I know for certain: Lukas has an indescribable sexually-charged charisma, a liquid-sex voice, and raw, unbridled-power. I recognize his magnetism fully now, as passion sweeps through me, tugging on something in my middle.
“Suck.” Blindly, I arch up, lifting my breasts into the open air, begging to feel the lash of his tongue against my nipples. “Hard.”
A growl erupts from deep within his chest as he lowers himself over me. I’m suspended. Weightless. Awaiting his touch. And then his mouth covers my breast and I’m jolted back to life, sparked with desire, burning under the cruelty of his mouth. He does what I commanded of him, sucking and pulling at my nipple until I’m crying out in pleasure and pain, and they’re mixed together, driving my hips off the chair.
“Lower.” Flames of desire lick across my skin and shoot between my legs. “Kiss me.”
Moving to my other breast, he sucks relentlessly and then gently rakes my nipple between his teeth. As pleasure spikes through my core, he lowers his mouth to my stomach and smudges a line of fevered kisses on my right hipbone, and then my left. He stalls there as my fever pitches, and I’m scrambling toward release.
“No, lower.” I yearn to claw my fingers over his skull-trim hair, grab the back of his head, and direct him between my legs. “I ache.”
“Tell me to tease your clit with my tongue.” The huskiness of his voice is so erotic, I nearly come from its rumble over my skin. “Tell me to eat your pussy.”
I’m shaking, breathing hard, my hips sliding over the seat as they reach toward his voice. I can’t go any further, have pulled the ropes as far as they will allow. In the darkness, I can visualize the way Lukas looks as he balances over me, his hungry gaze cutting through the shadows as he licks his lips and prepares to devour me with his tongue.
I open my mouth to repeat the exact words he’d said, but they won’t come. I’m not this person—the one who is verbal during sex. I’m not shy, to say the
least, but I’m not vocal. Not this way. I mean, I’ve said a few things in the heat of the moment, but nothing like that.
“I—I can’t.”
“You will before I’m through with you. Spread your legs,” he says, and I do what I’m told, quivering. “Do you want my tongue on you, sliding over your clit?”
I nod quickly, biting my lower lip as the heat from his mouth radiates over my swollen flesh. I’m throbbing, aching, desperate.
“God, your sex smells so good.” He blows softly over my girly bits, sending a shudder tingling through me. The sound of a zipper echoes through the silence, followed closely by the sound of shifting weight over the floor. He’s shoving down his pants. “Do you want my tongue here?” He blows again, and this time his breath is hot and moist and forces my eyes closed behind the blindfold. “Say it.”
“Lick me.” Any rational thoughts that might’ve been lingering in my head are obliterated. Blown away. My hips rear off the seat, fighting to reach his mouth and sweet release. “Right there.”
His tongue flicks out over my clit, one slow drag through my heat, and I sag against the chair as a desperate moan escapes my lips.
“Does that feel good?” he asks, licking through my folds. “Do you want more?”
“More,” I sigh, shuddering from the pure ecstasy of it all. “Don’t stop.”
On a groan, he spears my heat with his tongue and feasts on my clit, teasing and swirling until I’m arching back against the chair and bucking off the seat. Passion rises up like a wave, drowning me in sensations I’ve never known. I want him inside me, stretching me, his shaft pulsing against the walls of my sex. Even if I don’t know him, even if this will be over in an hour and I’ll never see him again, I need him inside me as much as air in my lungs and blood in my veins.
He growls as he pulls back, detaching from my core with a hot kiss. “With a pussy as sweet as yours, you’re always in control. Able to get whatever you want, whenever you want it.” He licks once. Twice. A slow, thick line through my center. “You want to come for me, don’t you, Ivy?”
A soft mewling sound escapes my lips as his tongue lingers over my clit.
“Tell me you want my finger inside you.”
“Please. Your finger. Inside.” It’s all I can muster in my delirious, sex-drunk haze. “Please, Lukas.”
On command, he plunges two fingers into my heat and curls them inside me, moaning as his palm meets my mound. His breathing quickens as if he’s ready to topple over the edge, and as he speeds his pace, his thumb swirls over my pleasure spot. He’s pounding all the way in, but it’s not deep enough. I spread my legs wider and arch into the chair as my hips begin to roll.
“That’s the way.” His voice is husky and filled with desire. “Tell me it’s not enough.”
“It’s not”—I gasp as tension coils in my middle—“enough.”
He thrusts his fingers deep. “Where do you want me to come?”
My hips undulate against his hand as my head falls back and a moan rips from the deepest part of me. I’m so close. Right there. The walls of my sex tremble, milking his fingers as they work me.
“On your tits?” The sound of his hand sliding over his shaft hits my ears, and as I focus on the fevered tempo, my own arousal spikes. He’s getting off to my pleasure, and the thought alone is beyond erotic. “Or in your pussy?”
I can’t speak. Desire robs me of my vocabulary as I’m gripped by carnal need. Tension builds, tightening every muscle in my body. And when his tongue slides through my heat, swirling in time with the fevered thrust of his fingers, I shatter apart, crying out as the hardest-hitting orgasm of my life rocks through me.
“Tell me where you want me.” He’s wound tight, his voice deepened with passion. “Tell me, and I’ll take you there again.”
As my center clenches and pulses, I gasp, fighting for air. “You…”
“Where?” He groans, and I know he’s close to his own release. “Tell me.”
“Lukas…” I can’t finish. The orgasm won’t let me go—it grips his finger as it plunges inside me, and there’s no end in sight. I’m crazed. Screaming. Writhing in pleasure as it tears through me.
With a guttural cry, his palm slams against my hips and his fingers drive deep. And as he screams my name into the darkness, he releases himself over my stomach and breasts, marking my skin. I fall back against the chair, breathless and weightless. Delirious. The room is filled with our heady scent—the mixing of my arousal and his release—and it stirs something inside me. Something that makes me crave to do it all over again, right from the beginning.
Wild and impulsive sex is one thing, but this—it’s so much more than I thought it would be. The anticipation heightened everything, and something tells me Lukas always knew it would. The burn of ecstasy is still simmering in my blood, firing up my senses, and my cravings are far from extinguished.
“You’re something else,” he says, as clothing rustles in front of me. He swipes something soft across my stomach and breasts to clean the mess. “Unlike anyone who has stepped foot in my chamber before.”
It strikes me that he’s getting dressed. Ending our time together. And I’m oddly saddened by the thought. My shoulders slump, though I raise my chin toward his voice.
“You can take this off now,” I say, closing my legs to hide the slickness lingering there. “And the ropes.”
“As you command.”
He removes the ropes first, and then peels the blindfold from my eyes. It’s dark, and the space is dimly lit by candlelight. A fire crackles beside me, fanning heat into the chamber. My cloak falls to either side of my chair, exposing me completely, as I’d thought. In front of me, an empty brandy glass sits near a pile of Lukas’s crumpled clothes.
Clutching the cloak around my shoulders, I stand and spin around, meeting his eyes. He’s standing behind me, arms at his sides, his enormously thick length bobbing in front of him. God, he’s huge. I’ve had other men who were generous in the dick department, but he’s—colossal.
As I stare disbelievingly, my mouth falling open, I realize one solid thrust from his Olympic-sized cock will stretch my delicate skin to the max. I know it from sight alone. Still, I can’t help but want to give it a try.
“Now that I’ve smelled you,” he says, stepping closer and jerking my cloak down my arms, “tasted you, and sampled you…” With a hungry gleam in his eye, he grasps my breasts in both hands and begins kneading roughly. “I’m going to consume you completely and wring every last orgasm from your body. I’m going to leave you empty and drained, a hollow sack of bones under melted muscle.”
I’m the brandy, I realize with a shudder.
And I suddenly don’t care that he’s taken women before me. I want nothing more than the Alpha to feast on me for the rest of the hour, and I’m on board with whatever that means. I don’t know what’s come over me, but the burning need to touch him is scorching across my skin like wildfire. Every cell in my body has come alive with the desire to smell him, lick him, and stroke him until he’s straining with the force of his release.
“Lie down,” he growls, and I do what he says, leaving my cloak on the floor behind me. “I’m in control this time.”
My clit throbs in anticipation as I shuffle onto the bed and lay back. Looking up, I stare at my reflection in the mirror fastened to the ceiling as lust stirs in my belly. What will Lukas look like when he’s bracing himself over me, his back muscles flexing and twitching as he drives deep?
I can’t wait to find out.
He descends over the top of me, poising the blunt head of his shaft at my entrance. Curious how we look together, I glance up, gasping at the sight of his sculpted back muscles as two hard knocks pound against his chamber door.
“Go away,” he bites out, dragging his attention from my breasts. “I’m not finished with her yet.” When his eyes meet mine again, determination burns in their dark depths. “Ivy, by the time the ceremony starts and you’re bonded to another, you
won’t have any passion left to give him. I will have taken it all.”
God, he makes himself out to be a giver—of brandy and pleasure alike—but he’s a master at taking.
“Sir,” a gruff voice hollers back. “I wouldn’t disturb you unless this was important. The Omega requests a word with you in her chamber.”
He pulls back, licking a hot line down my neck as he dismounts. “The whole goddamn castle better be on fire.”
“She wants to talk to you about your cousin. She says it’s urgent.”
“Damn it.” Exhaling heavily, he nails me to the bed with an impassioned glare. “Don’t move your sexy ass one inch. I’ll be back.”
And then, after wrapping himself in a black silk robe, he exits the chamber, leaving me alone with a hollow ache between my legs and a hard pounding of my heart.
Chapter Two
Lukas
Always something, isn’t it?
As I stride down the long hall toward the Omega’s private quarters, I can’t help but feel as if she’s doing this on purpose. Summoning me at the exact moment I was going to sink balls-deep into the hottest woman ever to step foot in my chamber. The Omega is always meddling in my business, questioning my ability to rule the pack.
Dearest fucking grandmother.
A few months ago, after I transferred money from one pack account to another to fund pay increases for the guards, she grilled me about my accounting ability. She insisted there was no need to increase their pay, even when they put their lives on the line to keep our pack secret from the rest of the world. When I received information that a pack from southern Oregon was increasing their numbers, I paid scouts to do the same. They spread word about our pack and brought in new, productive werewolves who contribute to our society.
Every single thing I’ve done since becoming Alpha has been challenged. Overlooked. Overshadowed by a cousin hell-bent on living a continent away—a cousin who fucking abandoned his packmates to avenge his dead parents.
Dominating Red Page 2