by Kate Douglas
Startled, she turned and looked directly into Jake’s unusual eyes. Glowing amber in the reflected light from the parking lot, their primitive heat and bestial intensity reminded Shannon how precarious her position truly was.
Naked, on the run from some unknown threat, trusting her life to a total stranger with the eyes of a wolf and sex appeal beyond belief. Wondering if any of this would ever make sense, Shannon unlocked the car door.
How a woman with tangled hair, dressed in cheap, black, men’s sweats and leather moccasin slippers could give him a hard-on went beyond Jake’s imagination, but his cock had come to attention the minute Shannon Murphy stepped out of the car wearing the clothes he’d bought for her.
Jake hadn’t realized how tall she was, but standing beside him she was nearly eye level, which put her at almost six feet tall to his six four. He’d seen her naked and unconscious, wrapped her nude body in that old blanket and thought she was pretty, but standing here, looking him in the eye with that sexy grin and those gorgeous green eyes, Shannon just about put him over the edge.
Green eyes? Not amber, not like Tia’s. Maybe she wasn’t Chanku after all. Weren’t the eyes the giveaway? Jake felt a little of the air whoosh out of his lungs, but when Shannon turned away to walk toward the store, his cock begged him to follow.
Chanku or not, she was gorgeous. There was something untamed about her, something savage and ruthless, and it called to him, made him hunger. Tall, loose-limbed and athletic, she had the build of a swimmer with broad shoulders, a small waist, and a sexy flare to her slim hips. Jake pictured her in leather, her perfect little ass encased in smooth black leather cupped close against her cheeks, defining the line between them.
He practically groaned, imagining her kneeling in front of him, her ass in the air, her long, dark red hair sweeping her shoulders as she peered back at him over one naked shoulder.
Shannon turned just then, glancing back over her shoulder, a twinkle in her eyes. Something slammed Jake in the gut, that knowing look, as if she read his thoughts, as if she knew every fantasy swirling around his horny brain.
Jake smiled back, then followed Shannon into the brightly lit store. An idea was forming in his mind…one that would get Shannon in leather and the two of them far away from whoever threatened her safety.
Of course, his plan didn’t take into account the threat Shannon posed to Jake. It had been a long time since a woman left him this unsettled. A very long time.
As in never.
Shannon grabbed a cart and headed toward the back of the store. Jake followed, content to watch the smooth flow of her hips under the clinging knit pants. Shannon reached for a bottle of shampoo and another of conditioner. She held a large size and a small one, as if weighing her purchase.
Jake cleared his throat. It was now or never. “Think minimal, okay? I want to dump the car as soon as we can, get off the beaten track. I’m thinking motorcycle. Are you okay with traveling on a bike? It’s not all that far to the cabin. They’re not going to be looking for us on a bike. The drawback is, we won’t be able to carry as much stuff.”
Shannon looked at Jake and set the larger bottle back on the shelf. She had a huge, mind-boggling, gut-wrenching smile on her face. “I love it. I’ll need jeans and boots and a coat, though.”
“Wait until we get to the dealership. There’s one north of Portland and they’ll have gear. Leather’s safer.” And a hell of a lot sexier.
What the hell was he thinking? Someone was trying to kidnap her, and all Jake could think of was the sweet curve of her ass in tight, black leather pants. What it would be like to peel those pants down over her muscular thighs, bury himself deep inside her welcoming heat.
As if she’d welcome him in the first place. Damn. There was only one way to find out. He had to get her in leather.
Shannon nodded, agreeing with Jake as he continued, selling himself on the idea as much as Shannon. “Let’s just pick up the basics for now, find a place to get some sleep for a couple hours. Tomorrow we ditch the car and buy a bike.”
“Just like that? You think we can do it that fast? Just walk in and pick out a motorcycle and go?”
Jake thought of the Pack Dynamics credit card in his wallet. Virtually untraceable, credit unlimited. “When you’ve got the money, you can do just about anything you want. C’mon. Let’s get the stuff we absolutely need for tonight, then find a place to sleep. I don’t know about you, but I’m exhausted.”
Shannon had assumed Jake meant to sleep in the car. Instead he pulled into a small, neatly landscaped hotel parking lot south of Portland, Maine. While Jake got a room, Shannon gathered up the bags with their purchases. Jake walked back to the car, grabbed the heaviest of the sacks along with a leather overnight bag, and carried them up the outside stairwell to the second floor.
Shannon realized her heart was pounding, and it wasn’t from the short climb up a flight of stairs. Jake had gotten one room, but how many beds? She watched him insert the card key in the lock with what should have been a sense of dread, but instead was pure anticipation.
Jake flipped the handle when the lock clicked and opened the door, but he paused and looked back over his shoulder. For the briefest of moments, Shannon saw something flicker in his eyes, some emotion she’d not seen before, a question? A sense of vulnerability, as if he expected her to turn and run away?
Turning away was the last thing on her mind. Shannon smiled and stepped through the doorway ahead of Jake. The room was small and clean, dominated by one huge bed covered in a thick down comforter.
Shannon’s pussy clenched. Her suddenly erect nipples tingled against the soft knit fabric of her sweatshirt. She piled her bags on a small table in one corner and took a deep breath. “This was a good idea. I’m exhausted.”
That wasn’t all, but how do you tell a total stranger how turned on you are? That he makes you so damned hot all you can think of is stripping off your clothes and tackling him? After she peed. Some things couldn’t be ignored. Embarrassed now, Shannon experienced a moment’s shyness. “I need to use the bathroom, then it’s all yours.”
Jake nodded. He grabbed the remote for the TV and flipped it on, giving Shannon more privacy. She found a toothbrush and some paste in one of the bags and went into the small bathroom. The moment she closed the door behind her, she leaned back against the solid wood. Why, when she had absolutely no compunction about picking up a relative stranger in a bar did her attraction to Jake leave her feeling so rattled?
It made no sense. He was a man. It was obvious he was interested in her. Hell, for some reason most men were, though Shannon really couldn’t understand why. She didn’t flirt, didn’t go out of her way to hunt for a man. They just seemed to gravitate her way, each of them as desperate as she was.
Some she took home, others she ignored. Lately, she’d taken home a few she should have ignored, but they’d seemed so needy.
Maybe that was Jake’s difference. Maybe, for the first time Shannon could recall, she was the one who needed. Jake seemed totally self contained. Other than that brief glimpse she’d had, he came across as a man used to getting what he wanted. Used to being in control. Tia, with all her dreams of wolves, would have called him an alpha male.
“Damn, Tia. What the fuck have you gotten me into now?” Grinning at her own sense of drama, Shannon used the toilet, then checked to see if her legs felt smooth. At least she’d showered and shaved them before her kidnapping. Good Lord. She should be giving thanks she was still alive, not worrying about hairy legs and body odor!
Still wearing her warm sweats, Shannon quietly slipped back into the room. Her dreams of hot sex with Jacob Trent slipped away on a smile. Partially propped up against a mound of pillows, Jake lay stretched out on the king-size bed. He slept, one hand clutching the remote control resting on his flat belly, the other flung over his head. He’d taken off his shirt and partially unzipped his jeans. A large white bandage covered the left side of Jake’s throat and Shannon wondered briefly wh
at injury it hid. She hadn’t noticed it before. His feet were bare. Like his chest, they were dusted with dark hair.
In sleep, the harsh angles of Jake’s face had softened, the worried frown between his eyes relaxed. His light brown hair glowed like old gold in the soft light from the bedside lamp.
It was three in the morning. He’d arrived late in the evening from California, which meant he’d probably been awake close to twenty-four hours.
Shannon slipped the remote out of Jake’s hand and turned off the TV. She lifted his legs to pull the blankets free of their substantial weight, then covered Jake with the quilt. He mumbled something, then slipped lower into the pile of pillows.
Shannon turned off the light and crawled carefully into bed beside him. Jake’s soft breathing soothed her, the warmth of his strong body next to hers gave Shannon a sense of comfort she’d not felt before. She lay there in the darkness, sadly aware she couldn’t remember the last time she’d actually slept with a man. Uncountable numbers had come to her bed for sex, but she’d always asked them to leave when they were done.
This entire day had been one strange episode following another. First Tia’s frantic call, then the kidnapping, then rescue, then flight…now this, whatever this was. Jake’s arm snaked around Shannon’s body and he pulled her close, fitting her ass into the cradle of his thighs. He grunted, buried his nose in her hair and settled back into sleep.
Not the wild and steaming sex she’d imagined just a few minutes ago, but definitely satisfying. Smiling in the darkness, Shannon gave in to her overwhelming need for rest.
Strange dreams followed her into sleep. Amber eyes glowed out of the darkness and a wolf howled close by. At some point she felt too warm and stripped off the heavy sweats. Later, Shannon might have heard a shower running, or was it the rush of a woodland stream flowing over worn rock? She dreamed of dark paths in damp woods, of racing naked through wet grass and tangled willows, leaping streams with a sense of freedom, a strength she’d never experienced. Her heart swelled with joy so pure, so all-consuming, it affected her sensually, filled her soul with passion, made Shannon, for the first time in her life, feel whole.
As if that final, unknown part which had forever been missing had somehow slipped itself into place and completed the puzzle that was Shannon Murphy.
A sound woke her, or maybe it was the quiet. Shannon blinked sleepily and gradually came more awake. Stretching, her body tingling and aroused as if she’d just reached climax, Shannon slowly opened her eyes. Jake stood at the end of the bed, his wet hair combed back from his forehead, lean hips barely covered by a white towel, and his eyes…his eyes glowed amber like the wolf in her dreams. Glowed with desire matched only by Shannon’s.
She’d only known him a few hours. She’d known him all her life. Without hesitation, Shannon lifted the blankets aside and made a space for Jake in the bed next to her. His long fingers loosened the knotted towel and let it slowly fall from his lean hips.
He was only partially erect, his tumescent cock swelling out of a dark nest of hair even as she watched. Shannon licked her lips, imagining that perfect, uncut cock slipping into her mouth. Imagined the taste and texture of Jake’s balls, the feel of his swollen penis moving slowly down her throat. Stretching her lips, teasing her senses with the taste of man. She swallowed and the sound seemed loud in the silence stretching between them.
Jake moved as if he were caught in the same web of fantasy holding Shannon. Slowly stretching out over the end of the bed, he rested one knee on the mattress. His left hand hovered for an endless moment over her leg.
The tension between them built, stretched thinner, tighter. When he finally touched her, Shannon gasped. Her head jerked up. Jake stared directly into her eyes for a mere second, then he looked back down at her leg, at the point where his hand rested just below her knee.
Did Jake feel it? Did his palm tingle with the sense of power racing between them? He had to know what she felt, had to realize something magical was happening. He leaned over and placed a soft kiss on the inside of her leg, next to his palm.
A shiver raced up Shannon’s inner thigh, directly to her clit. She felt a moan catch in her throat, a needy whimper yearning to break free.
Raising his head, maintaining eye contact, Jake crept closer, crawling the length of Shannon’s body, his hand sliding oh, so slowly along her thigh to the swell of her hip. He carefully slipped into the warm indentation of the mattress where Shannon’s body had been, gliding against her until Shannon felt his heat surround her, from the spot where his toes touched the bottoms of her feet to the warm pressure of his chest against her breasts…to her lips.
His breath carried the minted scent of toothpaste, an ordinary, pleasing aroma. Familiar. His body’s essence, though, was something more, something ancient and long forgotten, a primal scent that stirred Shannon in a manner she’d never experienced. Once again she thought of the forest, wondered at the memories that couldn’t be, memories drifting from beyond her understanding.
Questions she’d not known to ask somehow gave her the courage to bridge the small distance between her mouth and Jake’s. Trembling, aware of him as she’d never been aware of any other partner, male or female, Shannon pressed her lips against Jake’s mouth.
She felt his warm sigh, the hardening of his body as his arms wrapped her in a tight embrace. Jake devoured her mouth, slowly but surely finding every sensitive spot with his tongue, his teeth, his lips.
She’d never had anyone make love to her mouth before. Not like this, with such thorough, single-minded attention. Jake’s tongue explored the full interior of Shannon’s mouth, his teeth nipped at her lips and he suckled her tongue in an open invitation to do the same to his.
Moaning, Shannon pressed her hips close to Jake’s, felt his cock swell against her belly. Breathing slowly and surely, he kissed the corner of her mouth, then carefully worked his way along her jaw, paying close attention to the length of her throat, the sharp line of her collarbone. Moving lower, Jake licked just the tip of her left nipple, teasing Shannon with the briefest of strokes.
She arched her hips and whimpered. His hands swept the length of her torso, tangled in her small thatch of pubic hair and tugged. Jake’s lips tightened on her nipple, sucking hard and pressing the swollen tip against the roof of his mouth. He moved across her chest with tiny, sucking kisses and repeated the process, slowly suckling and licking Shannon’s other breast, then moving lower, kissing the sensitive flesh over her ribcage, dipping his tongue into her navel.
His long fingers slipped carefully into her sex, spreading her fluids up and over her sensitive clit, gently torturing that tiny bundle of nerves. Shannon bit the inside of her lip, fighting the sensations as she reveled in Jake’s skillful touch.
Her skin burned but her body shivered. Her womb ached and the muscles in her vagina clenched with each beat of her heart, each thrust of his fingers. She clutched at Jake’s shoulders, tilted her hips high to force his fingers deeper. Instead, he slowly dragged his fingers out of her warm and wanting pussy and knelt between her legs. He lifted her buttocks, holding her cheeks in his big hands, lifting her higher, closer to his mouth.
She felt the rough glide of Jake’s fingers over the bruises Richard’s clutching fingers had left, felt the warm breeze of Jake’s breath between her legs. Twining her fingers in the wrinkled sheets, Shannon closed her eyes. She whimpered again, a strangled cry deep in her throat.
Jake sat back on his heels and raised Shannon’s legs over his shoulders. She opened her eyes, shocked he would hold her so high, hold her up to his mouth like some carnal feast so that only her shoulders rested on the bed. Jake stared back at her for a moment. His eyes gleamed in the darkness and he licked his lips, as if savoring her taste.
There was a look of wonder on his face, an expression that confused Shannon. What did he feel when he looked at her like this? Why did he affect her so deeply, make her want him so much? What was it about Jacob Trent that seemed to know wha
t was missing in Shannon’s life? Could Jake fill the emptiness she’d known for so long?
Then his big hands lightly massaged her bruised and sore buttocks. He lifted her even higher. Jake dipped his head, his tongue lightly caressed her clit, one thick finger rubbed back and forth across her sensitive anus, and Shannon bit her lips to keep from crying out in ecstasy.
Tasting Shannon Murphy’s intimate flavors was the equivalent of taking communion with whatever gods had suddenly blessed his life. Jake’s tongue dipped into her creamy nectar and he actually felt the sting of tears behind his eyes.
Damn, but he’d gone down on hundreds of women, enjoyed their myriad flavors and tastes, yet never, not once, had he felt this powerful connection, this rush of sensual need, of almost painful arousal. Breathing deeply he drew her scent into his lungs and felt his cock stretch beyond its already hard length.
Shannon moaned when he tongued her clit. The needy sound turned him on even more, so he gently suckled the erect bud between his lips, licking tenderly at the sleek bit of flesh. She lifted her pelvis, pressed her sex tighter against his mouth and he licked deep inside, swirling his tongue over the slick, clenching tissues. His nose pressed close against her folds and he breathed deeply, inhaling her scent.
How he wished he could shift! If only he could use his Chanku tongue to taste her, his wolven body to love her. The more sensitive Chanku taste buds and ability to smell even the lightest scent would make an almost perfect experience even better.
Shit. Any better and it might be fatal.
He lifted his head for a moment, breathing deeply, fighting for control. Heart pounding in his chest, Jake was almost certain he heard the rush of his blood, the throbbing veins in his cock. Shannon’s scent drew him back. Once more he dipped his head to feed between her legs.
While his tongue learned the secrets of Shannon’s sweet sex, Jake’s fingers stroked her taut buttocks, found the cleft between her cheeks, pressed lightly at first, then with more force against her anus. He felt her push against his finger and knew she was no stranger to this kind of touch. Groaning against her pussy, his hips beginning to sway in longing, Jake dragged his fingers through her dripping fluids for more lubricating moisture, then slowly but surely gained entrance through her anus, pressing his finger deep into Shannon’s hot, tight passage.