Wild Invitation: A Psy/Changeling Anthology (Psy-Changeling)

by Nalini Singh

  “My father knows everything about everyone. And a Ph.D. is a Ph.D..” She rapped a fist gently against his chest. “If you’d told me you had one, I wouldn’t have worried so much about my mother’s reaction—even she can’t argue against a doctorate.”

  “Your mother’s not the one whose opinion I care about. Does the Ph.D. matter to you, Annie?” The look in his eyes was guarded.

  The hint of unfamiliar vulnerability caught her unawares. “Zach, if degrees mattered to me,” she said honestly, “I’d have married the triple-Ph.D.’d physicist my mother picked out for me when I was twenty-two. Or the MD with more letters after his name than the alphabet. Or the multipublished grand pooh-bah who stared at nothing but my breasts for the entire meal.”

  His smile creased his cheeks. “The man had excellent taste.”

  “Stop making me blush.” But she wasn’t, not any longer—somehow, Zach Quinn had earned the trust of her vulnerable feminine heart.

  It startled her, made her afraid.

  But before the dark emotion could grow, Zach bent to brush his lips gently over hers, acting in the way of changelings, not caring that they had an audience. When he drew away, she leaned into him, fear—if not forgotten—then at least temporarily caged.

  Chapter 8

  TWO AND A half hours later, Zach found himself on the balcony sipping coffee while Annie stood inside, chatting with her cousin. God, but she was beautiful to him—all he wanted was to take her home, hold her safe, and keep her just for himself.

  It was an unalterable part of him, this possessiveness, coming from the cat and man both. But no matter his primitive instincts, he wouldn’t do that to Annie, wouldn’t contain her that way. Still, he needed to mark her—to take her until his scent was embedded so deep into her skin, no one would dare question his right to her. An animal desire. Yet often, the animal’s heart was far more pure, far more honest, than the thinking man’s.

  “Mr. Quinn.”

  He glanced at Kimberly Kildaire. “Please call me Zach.”

  “Zach.” A regal nod. “Let me get straight to the point—from the instant Angelica told me about you, I was prepared to dislike you.”

  “I guessed.”

  “I’ve changed my mind.”

  Zach raised an eyebrow. “The Ph.D.?”

  “No. In certain departments, any monkey can get a Ph.D.” It was a gauntlet.

  He picked it up. “Good thing I’m a leopard, then.”

  Her lips threatened to smile. “I’ve always pushed Annie toward men who are more cerebral than physical.”

  Zach waited with a predator’s quiet patience.

  “It was a conscious choice,” Kimberly said without apology, “my way of ensuring she would never again be put in harm’s way. I even rejected a brilliant engineer as a possible match because he frequently goes off to work on projects in remote locations. His humanity mattered less than the danger he might’ve exposed Annie to.”

  Her eyes met his. “To be quite blunt, changelings take that possible danger to the nth degree. Your very nature is one filled with the violence of the wild.”

  He was floored by her candor. “You’re very aware.”

  “I know others might say I’m intellectualizing away prejudice, but I’m no bigot.” She held his gaze with a strength he suspected had been honed by surviving a lifetime of hurt. “I simply want my daughter safe. I saw her almost die once—it’s not something I want to witness ever again.”

  His cat detected no lies in her. “I’ll keep her safe.”

  “I have a feeling you will. It seems I made a critical error—in thinking about how you could lead her into danger, I forgot that predatory changelings are also known for their willingness to protect to the death.” Her eyes—Annie’s eyes—clashed with his. “But that’s not why I’ve decided for you.”

  “Oh?”

  “It’s because of the way you look at her, Zach. As if she’s your sunshine.” Her voice caught. “I want that for my daughter. Don’t you ever stop looking at her that way.”

  Zach reached out and touched her lightly on the arm, sensing how very brittle her composure was at that moment. “I give you my promise.”

  A sharp nod. “Excuse me, I should go mingle.”

  As she walked away, Zach blew out a slow breath. It was becoming clear to him that he’d have a far harder road to travel with Annie than he’d initially thought. She’d grown up watching her mother love a man who, quite bluntly, didn’t love her the same way. After only one meeting, Zach knew that Erik Kildaire was devoted to his work, while Kimberly was devoted to him. The insouciance with which Erik had crushed his wife’s heart an hour ago—bussing her on the cheek and telling her he had something important to do at the lab—had angered Zach enough that he’d had to fight the urge to say something.

  Annie would never have to worry about that kind of hurt with him. Once the cat decided on a woman, it didn’t flinch. Devotion was almost obsession with those of his kind, and he was at peace with that. But words wouldn’t convince Annie—she’d have to be stroked into trusting him, into relying on him. Because not only was she wary of loving, she’d become almost mutinously independent in her desire to avoid opening herself up to pain.

  I like living alone. I intend to keep it that way.

  That, he thought, the cat rising to a hunting crouch, was just too damn bad. But even as the predator in him prepared for the hunt, a vicious vulnerability grew in his heart. He needed Annie’s trust, needed the surety of knowing she’d come to him no matter what. If she didn’t…No, he thought, jaw setting, that simply wasn’t an option. Annie was his. End of story.

  • • •

  “WHAT magic did you do with my mother?” Annie asked, letting them into her apartment.

  “That’s my secret.” He closed the door and prowled along behind her.

  Her heart went into hyperdrive.

  She was going to go to bed with him, with this man she’d met only yesterday. But it felt as if they’d never been strangers, it was so very easy being with him.

  Careful, Annie.

  Fear rose up in an insidious wave, showing her image after image of Kimberly’s face as she watched Erik walk away. Was that what awaited her? Did the question matter now that she’d decided to take the chance and weather the hurt when it came?

  “Hey.” Zach brought her to a halt, nuzzling at her neck from behind as his hands closed over her hips. “Stop thinking so hard.”

  “I can’t help it,” she whispered. “I’m not…” She bit her lip, trying to think of a way to say this without betraying how incredibly important he’d become to her in such a short time.

  “You’re not the kind to kiss and walk away as if it meant nothing,” he said, running his lips lightly over her skin, inducing a shiver. “Neither am I. This is no one-night stand.”

  “Changelings live by different rules.”

  He licked at her, and she felt her purse slip from her hand to drop to the floor. “Zach.” A whisper, perhaps a plea.

  He hugged her tighter against him. “We might be more tactile than humans, but it’s nothing casual. It’s about friendship, about pleasure, about trust.”

  “It sounds wonderful.”

  “It is.” Another kiss pressed to the sensitive skin of her neck. “Trust me, Annie. I won’t hurt you.”

  At that moment, she almost believed him. Closing her hands over his, she let her body melt into the hard masculine heat of his. “You make me feel beautiful.”

  “You’re more than beautiful,” he whispered, “you’re sexier than sin.”

  “You’re complaining?” She dropped her hands as he moved his to the side of her dress and tugged at the tie that held it up.

  The tie came loose. “I didn’t like the way Markson was undressing you with his eyes.”

  “He was not.” Feeling the dress fall open at the front, she shifted so he could pull the tie out of the inner loop. He did…and the fabric dropped.

  “Mmm.” It was a
murmur of utter pleasure as he began to pull the dress down over her arms. “I’m the only one allowed to undress you”—a kiss on her bare shoulder—“to pet you.”

  Pet.

  The word reminded her that he wasn’t human, wasn’t anything tame. “You’re very possessive.” Air hit her back, her breasts. Then the dress was falling over her fingertips to pool on the floor.

  Behind her, he made a sound strikingly close to a growl, one hand caressing the curve of her waist. “You already knew that, Annie.”

  Of course she had. A predatory changeling male, no matter how playful, had possessiveness built into his soul. For as long as she kept his interest, he would demand everything from her. She knew she’d give him what he wanted—everything but her faith. That, she thought, she no longer had to give. Her parents’ marriage had shattered her belief in forever a long time ago. Sadness might’ve beckoned, but then Zach slid his hand up to lie flat over her stomach, big, hot, and darkly possessive, and her thoughts fractured. “Zach?”

  “Shh. I’m looking.”

  The husky statement made her body clench inside, her thighs tremble. She was wearing black lace…for him.

  “Annie.” He groaned and reached up to unhook her bra. “I want to see.”

  An instant later, she found herself standing there in nothing but her panties and a pair of strappy sandals. She was in no way ready for the boldness with which he moved to cup her breast. “Oh!” She trembled at the touch, at the erotic sight of his hand on her. His skin was tanned, rawly masculine against her creamy flesh. When he squeezed, it was all she could do not to collapse.

  “You’re so pretty, Annie”—he spread the fingers of his other hand on her stomach—“I could lap you right up.”

  Completely in his thrall, she raised her hand to reach back and touch his face. He nipped at her with his teeth, chuckling when she jumped. “I want to be in bed. This is going to take some time.”

  Her brain turned to mush right then and there, and when he shifted to scoop her into his arms, she was so startled, she squeaked and grabbed on to his neck. “I’m too heavy, Zach. Put me down.”

  “Questioning my muscles?” A wicked smile. “Kiss me.”

  Unable to resist, she obeyed, not stopping until he laid her down on the bed and rose. His eyes glittered the green-gold of the cat, hunger in every stark line of his face. She watched, heart in her throat, as he stripped off his jacket, then removed his shirt. He was built sleek and powerful, a predator in human form.

  She sighed in unashamed pleasure and saw his eyes gleam as he bent down to get rid of his shoes and socks. “Now yours,” he said, moving to the bottom of the bed and tugging off her sandals one by one, following each removal with a long, slow look up her body.

  By the time he finally got on the bed beside her, she was so aroused that she rose to claim a kiss of her own. When he nipped at her lips as he seemed to like doing, she nipped back. He raised his head, his hand closing possessively over her breast. “Do that again.”

  Eyes wide, she did. He purred into her mouth. She broke the kiss to stare at him. “What was that?”

  A feline smile. “Nothing.” He reclaimed her lips, and a second later she felt that vibration again, that sign that he was something other, changeling to her human. It made her shudder with the need to crush her breasts against him.

  “You purr,” she accused when they parted.

  “So do you.” Coming over her, he began to kiss his way down the line of her neck. He seemed to get distracted between the curves of her breasts, leaving her to clutch at the sheets in unadulterated pleasure as he sucked and kissed. When teeth became involved, she cried out, feeling her body tighten into a fist so tight, a single touch would send her over.

  He blew his breath deliberately across one wet nipple.

  She shattered, and the pleasure was a tidal wave that demanded everything she had. When she finally resurfaced, Zach had recommenced his sensual exploration of her body, the dark strands of his hair sweeping over her like a thousand stroking fingers. She ran her hands through the rough silk of it, feeling sated and content. And happy.

  He looked up, a lazy smile in his eyes. “Yes?”

  “Come kiss me.” She’d never imagined she would one day make such a brazen demand, but Zach listened to her. Even if he didn’t always give her what she wanted.

  He shook his head. “After.”

  “After what?”

  His answer was to keep on kissing her, going steadily lower. When his lips pressed over black lace, she trembled. He did it again. Then she felt the whisper of something on her outer thighs—glancing down, she saw her panties being thrown off the side of the bed. “How?”

  The eyes that met hers were wild, exotic. “I used a claw to cut them off.”

  “Oh.” She looked at his human hand. “Like a very small shift?”

  “Hmm.” He wasn’t paying attention, more concerned with pushing apart her thighs and raising her legs to put them over his shoulders. She’d never felt so exposed, so vulnerable. She waited, stomach tight.

  But nothing could’ve prepared her for the ecstasy of his touch. Zach liked to take his time—he pushed her to insanity over and over. It might’ve terrified her except that he made no effort to hide his own arousal, murmuring his pleasure with every slow lick. “Sweet, pretty, Annie,” he said. “My Annie.”

  She discovered she was raising her body to his mouth, moving with a sensual bliss that was scandalous in its eroticism. He liked it. She knew, because he told her so, his voice close to a growl.

  “I am definitely going to bite,” he whispered. And then he did.

  By the time she could think again, he was getting off the bed. She exhaled in pleasure as he stripped off to reveal a body hard with arousal.

  “Look what you do to me,” he whispered, moving to kneel between her legs. He stroked his hands under her thighs. “Come here.”

  She swallowed at what he was asking, knowing it had far more to do with trust than sex. But she couldn’t refuse, had the strangest feeling that any hint of rejection from her would wound him incredibly deeply. Rising, she held on to his shoulders and let him support her bottom as her body brushed over the tip of his erection. “Zach,” she whispered, drowning in the intimacy of his eyes, “you undo me.”

  His eyes flickered from cat back to human. “Hold on to me, baby. I won’t let go.”

  Breath coming in jagged bursts, she lowered herself onto him. He stretched her to the limit. But she wanted him inside her, wanted to possess him as absolutely as he’d possessed her. She drove down and shuddered. “It’s too much.” The angle was deep, the penetration intense.

  He kissed her. “We’ll practice until you get used to it.” It was a husky promise as he laid her back down, bracing his body over hers using his hands.

  “How much practice?” She wrapped her legs around the lean beauty of his hips, no longer shy with this man who treated her as if she was a goddess.

  He groaned, pulled out a little, then thrust, as if he couldn’t help himself. “Lots.” Though sweat-damp hair hung over his forehead, and sexual need was an inferno in his eyes, he waited to give her time to adjust.

  She felt a violent tenderness grab hold of her heart. He was, quite simply, wonderful. Raising her arms, she pulled him down and kissed him, telling him without words that it was okay to let go.

  He groaned. And began to move.

  • • •

  ANNIE looked down at the male sprawled by her side the next morning and felt her body sigh. He was fast asleep and gilded dark gold by the sunlight sneaking in through the blinds. He’d kept her up half the night, loving her so thoroughly that she felt possessed. Taken. Branded.

  Refusing to surrender to panic, to give him up to protect herself, she reached out to trace the tattoo she’d discovered on his back sometime during the night.

  It linked to the one on his biceps, which was actually the stylized tail of a dragon. That dragon’s front claws rested on his left s
houlder, the mythical creature’s sinuous body stretching across his back. It was a stunning design…and another example of the wildness in him.

  That wildness brought her alive, made joy sear her blood.

  It also frightened her—the depth of what she felt. Finally, she truly understood why her mother had stayed with her father all these years. Her mind filled with the echo of Kimberly’s voice from a rainy night more than fifteen years ago.

  Your father used to call me his heaven.

  That time had passed long ago, as would Zach’s interest in her. Yet even after the spark faded, Annie now knew that the temptation to stay, to hope for another moment when he might look at her as he once used to, would be overwhelming. It was that futile hope that kept her mother tied to her father, but though she understood it, it wasn’t a path Annie would ever allow herself to follow.

  It would break her heart to see Zach look at her with disinterest in his eyes. She’d leave before that, at the first insidious signs of fading passion. It was bound to happen…but not yet, she prayed. Please not yet. Heart tight with a mixture of joy and pain, she lay down beside him, content to trail her fingertips over his tattoo and watch him sleep.

  That was when she noticed his lips were curved.

  “Zach.” A whisper.

  Cat eyes looking into hers. “Mmm?”

  “How long have you been awake?”

  Chapter 9

  “LONG ENOUGH TO enjoy you petting me.” Unrepentant mischief in his eyes. And desire. The desire was still there.

  Relief made her melt from the inside out. “You’re such a cat.”

  “Want to see?” he asked.

  “See what?”

  “My cat.”

  Her eyes went wide. “Really?”

  He yawned, every inch the indolent feline. “Hmm.” Without warning, color shimmered all around him, sparkles of light and shadow, beauty and eternity.

  She held her breath until it ended. The leopard lying on her bed looked at her with familiar eyes. Swallowing at her proximity to such a dangerous creature, she struggled up into a sitting position, sheet held to her breasts. The temptation to touch was blinding. She lifted a hesitant hand—it was one thing to know intellectually that this was Zach, quite another to believe it.