by Cynthia Eden
“Shh. We don’t want anyone to hear.”
His lips closed over her throat. The edge of his teeth scored her skin. “I don’t give a damn who hears.”
Well, if that was the way he felt—
Her hand wedged between their bodies. Brushed against the curling thatch of black hair at the top of his thighs. “You didn’t let me finish before.” He’d taken her to orgasm with his mouth, turnabout would only be fair.
Besides, she wanted to savor his release on her tongue. She had a feeling it would be even sweeter than his blood. “Lay back,” she ordered softly.
Adam growled, but slowly obeyed. His hair brushed against the pillow.
Her hand closed over his shaft.
The heat of his arousal nearly singed her hand.
She wanted him inside her. Thrusting, driving them both to the edge of sanity and the dark paradise of release.
Soon.
But first…her fist tightened and she pumped her hand up and down. Squeezing that thick length, not too hard—not too soft—but with a strong, steady pressure.
“Maya!”
He didn’t care if they were overheard. Neither did she.
Up and down, she stroked. Again and again. Tightening, releasing. His breath grew ragged. His body slickened with sweat. “Don’t wanna…come like this…” he snarled. “Want in…side you!”
And that was what she wanted. But she hadn’t touched enough yet.
She released his cock with one last, lingering stroke. He reached for her, but she slipped just out of his reach. Maya put her hands on his legs, enjoying the feel of the resilient muscle beneath her hands. Her fingertips moved over him, smoothing over his powerful thighs and down to the heels that dug into the mattress.
“Maya.”
She crouched between his spread thighs. His cock stretched straight into the air, the wide tip dark red and glistening with a bead of moisture. She murmured as she leaned forward, her mouth open and hungry. Her lips closed over him, greedy for that small drop.
He cursed and his fingers clenched in her hair.
Her tongue swirled over him, circling the head of his cock. Maya had known she liked the flavor of his blood, and his cum was just as good. Sweet, with a spice of tang. She sucked on his length, wanting more, more.
He grabbed her under the arms, pulled her up. “In…you.” His face was red. His eyes blazed. “Not in your mouth, damn…tempting though it is.” He swallowed and his eyes fell to the jeans she still wore. “Get out of them, and let me in.”
She’d wanted to savor him.
Now, she just wanted to fuck him.
Maya rolled away, darting from the bed. She needed a minute to get her control back. Just a minute…
Her fingers shook as she unsnapped the button at her waist and then fumbled with the zipper.
Just a minute.
The jeans hit the floor.
Her fingers caught the edge of her cotton panties.
And Adam caught her.
His hands closed over her hips, and he shoved her back against the nearby door. “Can’t wait.” His cock pulsed against her stomach.
Definitely healed.
Her thighs clenched.
And so did her sex as anticipation filled her.
His fingers pushed between her legs, slipped under the panties, and drove up into her core.
“Adam!” Okay, screw trying to take it slow. She wanted him inside.
“You’re ready and you smell so…damn…good.” His fingers withdrew, and he jerked the crotch of her panties to the side. “I need to take you, now.”
Her hips rocked forward.
He snarled and caught his cock in one big fist. His left hand positioned her and then that hot length drove into her.
Yes! Adam caught her legs, lifted them as he thrust his cock deep inside her.
So full.
Her legs wrapped around his hips. Her claws dug into his ass. She didn’t worry about hurting him with her strength, not anymore. She knew Adam could take whatever she had to give.
Her back rapped against the door as he plunged into her. Plunging deep and forcing that cock straight to the tip of her womb.
Her inner muscles closed over him eagerly, gripping his shaft, holding tight as he thrust.
His fingers dug into her hips and he yanked her away from the door. “Deeper.” She could barely understand him. Didn’t really care what he was saying.
His cock slipped over her clit and she moaned.
“In…deeper.” They fell onto the bed. His cock drove balls-deep inside her. Again, again.
She thrashed beneath him, fighting for the release that was just out of reach.
But so temptingly close.
He raised her legs, pushing her thighs against his shoulders, and shoved deep.
The bed rocked beneath them. Squeaked.
She clenched her teeth, turned her head away from him, and fought the sudden, desperate urge to bite.
His shaft withdrew, plunged. His rhythm was fast, hard.
Perfect.
Maya’s orgasm hit her. White-hot pleasure blasted through every inch of her body.
She tasted blood in her mouth, realized it was her own, that her fangs had pierced her bottom lip.
Adam shuddered against her, called her name on a long, fierce groan.
As the waves of release pulsated in her sex, Maya turned her head and pressed a kiss against his cheek.
No, definitely not human.
As if there had ever been any doubt.
“So…” Maya began, her voice a slow drawl, “I think it might be time we had that little talk of ours.”
She was lying in bed beside him, propped up on one elbow. Her eyes were blue again, not the burning black they’d changed to during her orgasm.
And, damn, but she was something else.
His heart still pounded like a drum, and his thighs actually shook.
Sex with Maya was freaking great.
The best of his very long life.
He’d never planned to get involved with her. To care.
But he’d learned long ago that great plans often went to shit.
“Adam?” A frown narrowed her eyes.
“Give me a minute,” he said and decided to tell her, quite truthfully, “I’m still trying to recover.”
For a moment, one brief split second in time, she smiled. Actually smiled at him. A real smile, not one of those sarcastic, kiss-my-ass grins she usually wore. No, this smile was different. Her face softened, changed from pretty to—
Beautiful.
Oh, shit.
But then the smile vanished, disappearing as if it had never been there, and she studied him with a slightly distant expression in her eyes. “So what are you?”
A strange conversation to have in bed. Probably not the right place. They were both also still naked, which served to make him horny as hell, but when Maya heard what he had to say, well, he doubted she’d be feeling a return of her lust.
Maybe that’s why I needed her so much. I wanted one more time with her, before—
“Not a demon. Although when I caught the scent of smoke around you a few times, I thought you might be an L10.”
He’d learned to mask his scent over the years, but sometimes, if he became angry enough, the beast inside overpowered even the strong chemicals in his system.
“Figured at first you were a shifter. Maybe a wolf or a bear.”
Adam climbed from the bed. Rifled through the closet until he found a pair of his jeans.
“Huh.” He glanced over his shoulder and saw that Maya had sat up in bed. She hadn’t bothered to cover her breasts or any part of her sexy little body. With an effort he managed to look at her face.
Her head tilted slightly to the left. “Must be bad if you’re jumping out of bed.”
No, the move had just been a way to fight the temptation to jump her again.
Business first.
Pleasure, if she’d have him again, later.<
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“I am a shifter,” he told her, pacing toward the bed. “Of a sort.” A very ancient sort.
“Go on.”
He hadn’t shared this secret with many. The first had been his childhood friend Richard.
The same friend who’d tried to butcher him twelve short days later.
The second, well, that had been his intended bride, Isabella. He’d shared his secret many, many years after the bloody encounter with Richard. He’d thought of not telling her, but if the woman was planning to spend every night of her life with him, he figured she’d deserved to know.
Isabella had thrown herself from the cliffs near his home. Her body had never been recovered. He’d grieved her for years. Wished he’d kept his dark secret.
No, definitely not a good track record.
But Maya wasn’t really in a position to judge. She wasn’t exactly normal, either.
Yet Maya had once been human. While he—
“Look, Slick, unlike you, I didn’t spend the last two days sleeping.” Her mouth split open into a wide yawn, one she actually tried to cover this time. “So do you think you might could hurry this little tale of yours along?”
Screw it. “I’m a Wyvern.”
Her brows drew low. “What the hell is that?”
“You…don’t know?”
A shrug.
Well, hell. So much for being the terror of the century. “I’m a dragon,” he said, voice hard.
Maya snorted. “Bullshit.”
He didn’t quite know how to respond to that. “I assure you,” he finally managed, “I’m telling the truth.”
“Prove it.” One brow arched. “If you’re a shifter, then shift.” She waved a hand before him. “Change into a dragon.”
He glanced around the room. Gauged the distance from floor to ceiling. “Not enough room in here.”
“’Course not.” She climbed from the bed. “’Cause that’d be just too much to ask for, huh? I mean, I’ve only saved your ass here, if you don’t want to trust me with the truth about yourself—”
He grabbed her arms, pulling her close. “This is the truth.”
“The stories all say your kind were wiped out a long time ago. I mean, I haven’t so much as heard a whisper about a dragon shifter still being around—and, you know what, Slick? I’d think it would be pretty hard to keep something as big as a dragon secret.”
Not as hard as she might expect. “You’re still new to the supernatural world, Maya.” A baby, really. Just five years in his realm. “Trust me on this one. You need to accept the fact that there are literally thousands of creatures out there that you don’t hear about.”
Everyone knew of the vampires and the wolf shifters, the werewolves. Those two just couldn’t seem to keep low enough profiles. Sure, most supernaturals also knew about demons—because those guys were always going around stirring up trouble.
But the really smart beings, they stayed in the shadows, and they let the vamps and the wolves draw all the fire from the humans—in their books, their movies, even in their nightmares.
“I’m new, huh? Okay, I’ll buy that. But what about you, Slick? Just how new to this game are you?”
Truth time. “I’m a little over a thousand years old.”
Her eyes widened. “How is that possible? Shifters age—wolves, panthers, bears. Hell, that’s the reason they’re always selling out to the vamps—looking for that promised you’ll-live-forever magic.”
He let her arms go, stepped back. Mostly because the sight of her breasts with the tight pink nipples was really distracting him at a point when he needed to stay focused. “Could you…get dressed?” Hard to say. So very hard. But they needed to talk, and if she didn’t cover up, he figured the talking would be stopping very, very soon and the hot sex would be starting.
She frowned at him, but marched over to her bag and pulled out a black bra and another T-shirt. As he watched, helpless to look away, she covered those touch-me breasts, slipped into a matching black pair of panties, then jerked up her discarded jeans. “Satisfied?”
He had been, but—
“You were telling me how a guy who claims to be a thousand looks like he’s thirty.” Her foot began to tap against the carpet. “Focus here, Slick.”
He swallowed. “Wyverns are different.” Ancient blood, ancient power. “We don’t age. Every time we transform, it renews us, almost as if we’re regenerating.” Adam hesitated. Tricky part. “Don’t get me wrong, we can die.” They could also heal, fast. “But—”
“But like the L10s, you’re just tough to kill,” she finished, her gaze sliding over him.
Yeah, that was pretty much the case. Because when he was in dragon form, well, he usually just toasted his enemies.
Burned them to ash.
“So how come you’re not the big bad bastards that everyone whispers about? If Wyvers—”
“Wyverns,” he corrected, jaw clenched.
“Whatever. If you’re so bad, then I should have known your kind was still out there. Everyone should.”
Well, some did know about him. That was why Cammie had been taken.
As for everyone knowing—that was not what he wanted. Adam didn’t want to spend his days killing fools who came to prove how powerful they were by going up against a dragon. “Let’s just say that when I change, I don’t exactly leave witnesses around to spread the word about me.”
Maya huffed out a hard breath. “I want to believe you. I really do, but—hell, can’t you do something? Breathe some fire. Grow some scales, something?”
Yeah, he could do something. He paced toward her. Held out his hand, palm up. “I can’t change fully here, the room is too small.” And, honestly, he didn’t want her to see him in his true form. Not exactly sexy.
He didn’t just get sharper teeth like she did. His eyes didn’t go all smoky and black and his nails didn’t sharpen.
He went primal.
The monster inside roared free. His entire body transformed in a maelstrom of rage and fire.
Not a very pretty sight.
He wanted Maya to keep thinking of him as a man. A man she wanted. Not some disgusting, fire-breathing beast who smelled of death.
“Uh, yeah, I see your arm.” Vague impatience filled her tone.
He almost rolled his eyes. The woman just couldn’t wait for anything. “Give me a second.” He lowered his lashes. Looked inside the fire dwelling in his soul.
Not letting you out of the cage. Just need a sample.
“Well, damn.” A little breathless.
His eyes opened. He stared down at his arm. An arm that was covered in dark green scales. Impenetrable scales that could cut through skin and bone.
Maya lifted her hand, her fingers hesitating over him.
“No, don’t—”
Too late. She touched him and blood trickled from her fingertips.
She never cried out. Just kept her bloody fingers pressed against his scales.
He found her gaze. Held it.
A slow smile curved her lips. “You feel warm.”
She had no idea.
“All right, dragon.” Her hand lifted.
The scales vanished. Flesh and hair returned.
“I believe you.” Still holding his gaze, she murmured, “And the way I figure it, this is sure as hell gonna change up our battle plans.”
Their plans? Adam blinked. The woman already had new plans worked out? “You’re accepting this rather well.” Better than he’d expected. Much better than anyone else.
A little shrug. “Well, not like I can really judge, now can I? I mean, I’m a vampire and I’m a killer. I figure that pretty much makes us even.”
Not even close.
“Besides, as long as you don’t get all Wyver hungry—”
“Wyvern.”
“—and try to eat me, I figure things will be fine.”
His gaze automatically dropped to her thighs and he licked his lips. So tempting.
“The girl, Cammie
—she’s like you, huh?”
A nod.
“I felt different after I took your blood,” she said, her voice thoughtful. “Stronger. I healed faster.” Her lips twisted for a moment, not into a real smile, but rather a quirking of her mouth. “I didn’t realize my new power came from dragon’s blood.”
“My blood, Wyvern blood, is very, very strong.” Strong enough to heal a near-dead vampire. Strong enough to restore all the Born Master’s powers. “My kind was hunted to near extinction in the 1500s because the vampires wanted our blood to enhance their powers.”
Because his blood was twenty times more powerful than a human’s.
“So if you’re a vampire who was nearly staked and beheaded and you’d spent the last five years in the ground with the worms and the ants, the surefire way to get you back to normal would be—”
“To drain the blood of a dragon.”
“But a big guy like you—you’d put up a fight.” She turned away, began to pace the room in fast strides. “If the vamps were lucky enough to stumble onto a child of your kind…” She gave a hollow laugh. “They’d think they hit the mother-lode.”
Pretty much his thoughts.
She stopped, freezing near the foot of the bed. “That’s why the woman’s arm was burned. Not from the candles. From little Cammie.”
If the girl had been older, nothing would have been left of the woman, but he nodded.
“Got her uncle’s temper, does she?”
Perhaps. For her sake, he hoped not.
“What—was her mom or her dad like you?”
“Her father.”
She grunted. “You told me he was dead. Did the vampires get him, too? Jeez, no wonder you’re not overly fond of my kind.”
His head snapped up at that. “They’re not your kind.” They were nothing like her. “You aren’t one of them.”
“Uh, hate to break this to you, but as you’ve pointed out, I’ve got the fangs, the claws, the blood hunger. I am most definitely one of them.”
Why did her words sound like a warning?
He swallowed back the angry words that rose to his lips. “Her father—killed himself after her mother died.”
He expected her sympathy. Instead, he got—
“What the hell? You mean the guy just kissed his life good-bye and left the kid on her own?” She didn’t wait for his answer. Just started pacing again, muttering about selfish bastards under her breath.