The same wrenching fear he’d seen in her eyes two weeks ago shone there again before she masked it behind the calm, collected physician. “Zander, I don’t think—”
He cut her off. He had a feeling if he let her fears close her off now, he might never draw her out again, and he needed the wildness in her as much as he thought she needed it, too. “It’s been weeks, sugar. That might not be long enough for a human to heal, but we both know I’m fine. Why are you stalling?”
She pressed her lips together, a troubled look flashed through her gaze, and a stubborn angle tilted her jaw. “I’m not stalling.”
Arching a brow, he said nothing. She was going to have to work this out herself, but he wasn’t going to let her slide by and not deal with it.
“All right, so maybe I am.” She looked away and closed her eyes. “I just—everything changed so fast, and we mated, and my family, and…then you got hurt.” Her voice caught. “Oh, God. I don’t think I could lose you, Zander.”
“Scary as hell, isn’t it?” He lifted the hands they had over her belly and kissed her fingers. He knew exactly what she meant. The idea of her being hurt was enough to kill him. He could only hope that she was never in that kind of danger again, but since they’d been unable to discover who had hired the assassin, he’d had Nico beef up security around the resort. Zander wasn’t taking any chances. She was too important to him.
Tears welled in her gray eyes when she opened them again. She swallowed audibly. “Yeah. Scary’s a good word for it.”
“I love you.” He spoke the words baldly, his gaze locked with hers. Cupping a hand around her chin, he tilted her face toward him. “Come here, sugar. I need you.”
Her gaze softened, and a sweet smile curved her lips. Twisting at the waist, she offered him her mouth. He took it, sliding his tongue along the seam of her lips before he pushed inside. He shoved away the sheet around his hips so that the only thing separating him from her was her clothing.
Sliding one arm under her torso, he reached up to flick his fingers over her nipples through her thin cotton shirt. He wanted her so badly his hands shook with it, and his cock ached. He had a feeling the need would never be quenched, and he didn’t want it to be. Her tongue twined with his, and she nipped at his lower lip. The sweet sting made him growl low in his throat.
Her breath hissed out as she broke her mouth from his, her fangs emerging. Sliding his hand down her midriff, he popped the button on her shorts and eased them along with her panties down her legs. She lifted her hips to help him and kicked them away. He bunched her shirt in his fist and ripped it to the waist. Her breasts spilled out, and he cupped his hands around them, her hard nipples stabbing into his palms.
He lifted his leg over hers, trapping her. He coasted one hand down to caress her taut buttocks. She whimpered and wriggled against him. “I can’t…I can’t move. I need to move.”
“Not just yet.” Pushing her forward slightly at the waist, he stroked her wet pussy from behind. God, he couldn’t wait. He needed her. Grasping his rigid cock, he rubbed the head against her sex before he pushed in. Thrusting his hips, he worked himself into her one slow inch at a time until he was seated to the hilt. He rolled his hips and couldn’t hold back a harsh groan. The way his thigh held her legs together made the fit incredibly tight.
“Oh, God, Zander,” she breathed. Her claws slid out to rip into the sheets. “You’re so deep.”
“Yesss,” he hissed, the leopard within him clawing for supremacy, demanding he take his mate hard and fast. His fangs elongated as he struggled to stay in control. “That’s so fucking perfect. I love the feel of you. You’re so tight around me, Lyra.” He slipped his hand over the soft swell of her belly, dipping to stroke the dampness between her legs. He flicked her clit, making her thighs jerk. He grinned, loving her responsiveness. Pulling his hand free, he licked her wetness from his fingertips. “Mmm. Still sweet as sugar.”
She choked, whimpering as she watched him over her shoulder. Her pupils dilated, and she panted, her eyes burning to molten silver.
“You’re so beautiful.” He smiled down at her, and let the endless desire he had for her show on his face. There was nothing he’d keep back from her, she could have it all. And he wanted everything she had to give. “I’m going to make you scream before I’m done with you, sugar.”
She shivered. She fisted her fingers in his hair, her body writhing against him. “Stop talking and fuck me already.”
“Oh, I will.” He chuckled, thrusting his hips to drive himself inside her in slow, deep strokes, knowing it wouldn’t push her as hard or as fast as she wanted.
She tried to twist, but he held her down, flexing his thigh over hers. He kept the rhythm at the measured pace he wanted, didn’t allow her to speed him up. He wanted to draw this out as long as possible, to savor the feel of her in his arms. He wanted her to know to her bones that she could never be apart from him.
“Zander.” She moaned his name, and he loved the sound of it on her lips. “Please. More. I need you.”
A purr soughed from his throat, and he closed his mouth over the mate mark on her neck. His. She was all his. Her breath caught when he licked the bite. He could feel her pulse pounding under her soft, soft skin. He arched his hips, matching his thrusts to the rhythm of his tongue. Faster and faster, giving her exactly what she asked for. More. He rolled her nipples between his fingers, plucking at the hard tips. Wetness soaked his cock as she cried out, and the scent of her drove him wild.
“Mine.” He sank his fangs into her again, needing that connection. She would never leave him—he couldn’t live without her. Mates.
“Yes! Zander, Zander, Zander.” She screamed when he sucked on the bite. The slickness of her sheath, so tight around his cock, made his skull feel like it was going to explode.
“Tell me. I want to hear it.” Yes, he needed the same words he’d given her. That final, unbreakable bond.
A sob erupted from her as she bowed in his arms, her pussy flexing around his cock. She raked her nails up his arm, and she twisted helplessly in his embrace. “I love you. I love you so much, Zander.”
Some tightness he hadn’t even known was banding his chest snapped free. His orgasm slammed into him like a riptide, dragging him under. His body locked in hard shudders as he came. He didn’t know how it had happened so fast, but he was so grateful that he’d found her. She filled up a void inside him that he’d grown so used to he almost didn’t notice it anymore.
With her, he had hope for the future again, and a quiet joy that life could once more be as bright as it was before his family had shattered. He’d survived losing them, but he didn’t think he could ever survive losing her. He would make sure she knew it, too. Every day. He would never push her away as her family had done. She was…everything to him now. All the pretty words he’d ever used couldn’t capture how precious she was, but he did his best.
“I love you, Lyra.”
About the Author
Crystal Jordan began writing romance after she finished graduate school and needed something to fill the hours that used to be eaten away by homework. Currently, she serves as a librarian at a university in California, but has lived and worked all over the United States. She writes paranormal, futuristic and erotic romance.
To learn more about Crystal please visit www.crystaljordan.com. Send an email to Crystal at [email protected] or join her Yahoo! group to join in the fun with other readers as well as Crystal! http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crystal-jordan
Look for these titles by Crystal Jordan
Now Available:
Wasteland: The Wanderer
Treasured
Unbelievable
If You Believe
Believe in Me
In the Heat of the Night
Total Eclipse of the Heart
Big Girls Don’t Die
It’s Raining Men
Crazy Little Thing Called Love
Coming Soon:
Fleetin
g Passions
“I will always love you.” Not just a figure of speech when you're undead.
Big Girls Don’t Die
© 2009 Crystal Jordan
In the Heat of the Night, Book Two
Six months ago, Andre St. James committed the ultimate one-night-stand party foul by turning Cynthiana into the spawn of Satan…also known as a vampire. He insisted he knew they were meant to be together forever and ever, so why wait for her to be on the same page with him to suck the life out of her?
What. Ever. The only thing the two of them share is chemistry that blasts off the charts. So she drop kicked him out of her life and told him to never come back. He listened. Until now.
Andre knows Cyn has trouble dealing with his take-no-prisoners approach to life, and that turning her against her will was a mistake. But he’s got patience born of centuries of immortality, and he’ll do whatever it takes to get back into her good graces and stay there forever. Including wait until she has no choice but to turn to him.
After all, no one understands forever like a vampire. He’s loved her from the moment he saw her…and he always will.
Enjoy the following excerpt for Big Girls Don’t Die:
My hands clenched on the steering wheel. I had to get to my cousin. That’s all I could think. Please, please let Desi be okay. I loved that little girl so much. I was going crazy right now. Worry gnawed at me like a hungry werewolf. One quick look at the speedometer told me that I was about ten miles over the speed limit. They wouldn’t pull me over for that, would they? I pushed my convertible Mini Cooper a little faster.
Flicking a glance down while I punched the speed-dial, I tried to get Misty on the phone for a progress report on Desi. It was a few hours to Las Vegas from Los Angeles, but if I hurried I could be inside the hospital before dawn. Something else to get pissed at Andre for. No reflection, no sunlight.
My stomach rumbled. Oh, yeah. Cravings for blood. Another lovely side effect. When was the last time I had fed? I meant to have something substantial before I went to Eclipse, but Andre had sort of interrupted that plan. I’d barely taken any blood from him, so my stomach felt as if it was digesting itself right now.
“Hi, this is Misty and Desiree, leave us a message—”
“Damn it.” I huffed out a breath and tossed my cell phone on the passenger seat.
My gaze swept the barren landscape along I-15. There wasn’t anything for as far as I could see except dirt and stars and a few ragged Joshua trees. When I glanced back at the road, a large white jackrabbit hopped in front of my car.
“Shit.” I jerked the wheel and swerved to miss it, but the crunch of bone sounded as it bounced against the underside of my car. “Oh, that is just nasty.”
And then my tire blew up. Rubber popped. The Mini Cooper’s back end spun out. My heart stuttered as my pretty little car made grinding noises when the metal of my tire rim hit pavement.
“Shit, piss, motherfucker. Oh God. Oh God.”
Skidding off onto the soft shoulder of the road, the car finally came to a stop. I sat there and panted while my heart rate galloped. My knuckles showed white on the wheel, and I had to force myself to relax my grip and reach down to shift into park. My hands shook on the door handle when I hauled myself out to go look at my tire. I walked around the car to the passenger side and kept an eye out for crazy-ass drivers who might be too blind or stupid to see the emergency flashers on my car and hit me. Oh, yeah. That was the flattest tire I’d ever seen. Little bits of rubber hung off it and flopped on the ground.
“Spare tire, Cyn. Put it on and get the hell to Vegas.” Popping my trunk, I—What the hell?—Where were the jack and tire iron? I had forgotten to check for them in this car when I bought it from the used car dealership last week. Now that I needed ’em, they were nowhere to be found. Fan-damn-tastic. Time to call in reinforcements.
I opened the passenger door and fished around for my cell phone. Please, please, please let me have cell phone service. I was in the middle of bumfuck nowhere. I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment, not daring to look. My breath whooshed out when I saw I had full bars. I pulled in a deep breath while I dialed my roadside assistance number. The number was programmed into my phone, just in case. You never knew when a Rambo-wannabe jackrabbit would hang on to your bumper and use his last breath to shred your tire. Fucking bunny.
I punched in all the appropriate numbers and listened to a recorded voice tell me to call 911 if it was a life threatening emergency. Well, duh. “Hello? I have a flat tire, and I need someone to come put on my spare—”
The woman dispatcher’s professionally concerned voice cut me off. “Okay, ma’am. Are you in a safe area?”
I looked around at the miles and miles of dirt. “I’m kind of in the middle of nowhere, but I guess I’m safe.”
“Good. Now where are you exactly?”
“I’m not sure. I’m eastbound on I-15 about a hundred miles west of Las Vegas. I don’t see a call box or any mile markers.”
“So, you’re east of Las Vegas—”
“No, I’m west of Vegas going east toward Vegas.” I rolled my eyes.
“What city did you just pass?”
Did I just speak English? I swear I’d told this woman I had no idea where I was. I was worried about Desi, not about where I might pop a tire. “I’m not sure. I know I’m about a hundred miles west of Vegas.”
“All right, ma’am. We’ll dispatch someone, and they should be there in about twenty to thirty minutes.”
“Thank you!” I could be with Desi soon, then. I shivered as the cold desert night air hit my bare shoulders and legs. Hurrying back to the driver’s side, I slid into my seat.
Twenty minutes later, my phone rang. Oh, good. Must be the tow truck driver.
“Hello?”
An older female voice responded, “Hi, Ms. Trent. I’m sorry, but we won’t be able to dispatch anyone until we know your location. Can you tell me exactly where you are?”
I blinked. “Um. I already told the last lady I talked to.”
“Can you tell me again?”
Okay, stay calm. I’d only been on the side of the road for about half an hour. Everything was fine. “Sure. I’m not one hundred percent sure of where I am, but I’m eastbound on I-15 about a hundred miles west of Las Vegas.”
“Are there any mile makers nearby?”
“No.” And I sure as hell wouldn’t wander around in the frigid ass desert to look for one.
She was silent for a long moment. “Um. All right, ma’am. We’ll dispatch someone, and they should be there in about twenty to thirty minutes.”
“Sounds good.” I sighed and dropped the phone on my lap.
Twenty minutes later, my phone rang.
“Hello?”
A pleasant male voice answered. “Hi, Ms. Trent. I’m sorry, but we won’t be able to dispatch anyone until we know your location. Can you tell me exactly where you are?”
She ran straight into love’s arms…and he isn’t letting her go a second time.
Passions Recalled
© 2010 Loribelle Hunt
Forbidden Passions, Book 2
When his mate and his father died in a freak accident, Jason Leonidas left home and became a park ranger in the Florida Panhandle. The distance and solitude suit him. After all, the less he cares, the less he hurts.
As a hurricane bears down on the coast, he races to secure and evacuate the park before conditions worsen. Just as that point of no return passes he discovers an injured and unconscious visitor. Celeste Lykaios, his mate…who died over a year ago.
Truth has turned Celeste’s world upside down. Not only did her family lie to Jason about her survival, they lied to her about his abandonment. And the new boyfriend she’d trusted is trying to kill her. Her only hope was to race into the teeth of the storm to find Jason. She almost made it.
As she and Jason unravel the betrayal that split them apart, the ragged strands reconnect, forming a fragile hope that their love can
be salvaged. Out in the storm, the killer waits for a chance to make Celeste the stunning finale in a plan to over throw the Lycan alpha…
Enjoy the following excerpt for Passions Recalled:
There were jackhammers in her head. Even moaning hurt. Funny, she didn’t remember partying last night. She frowned, and it made the pain worse. Actually she didn’t remember last night at all. Rolling over, she pressed her forehead into the pillow and was immediately swamped by Jason’s smell. Oh, God. Where was she?
She couldn’t think past the pounding behind her eyes, but when the room shook with a crack of thunder she jerked her head up, wincing for her trouble. She hated storms. There was one window, and outside it a palm tree whipped back and forth.
Definitely not in Kansas anymore. Or Atlanta. Whatever.
Rolling back over, she took stock. Her head hurt like hell, but everything else seemed fine. Only one way to know for sure. Gingerly, she pushed up on her elbows, cursing the pounding headache that spread over her face with the strain. She sat up, gasping, and looked around the room. To call it bare was generous. It contained the bed and a dresser. The walls were empty. There was nothing to identify its owner but the scent of the sheets on which she lay.
But that didn’t make sense. She looked out the window again as another gust of wind buffeted the house. Rain tapped the roof, and she cocked her head, pressing her hand to the side that throbbed the most. The sound echoed loudly in the room, and her headache seemed to pick up the rhythm, pulsing in time to the rain. It was familiar. Tin would be her guess, and that at least helped her narrow down her location to probably somewhere in the South where in recent years tin roofs had become all the rage. She wasn’t sure if she was relieved or disappointed. Not the Southwest, so not Jason’s home. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and set her feet firmly on the floor.
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