Shifters, Beasts, and Monsters

by Aya Fukunishi, Linda Barlow, Elixa Everett, Virginia Wade, Savannah Reardon, Skye Eagleday, Giselle Renarde, Jessi Bond, Natalie Deschain, Audrey Grace, Francis Ashe, J. E.

  He closed a mental bond with the mouse—a trivial feat, really, and lured it into the open. It scampered obediently toward his boot. He stooped, cupped his hand in the grass, and the mouse crawled into his palm.

  Kate, who had been watching him with an arch smile, gasped. She slipped to her knees beside the bench, squinting down at the tiny field mouse that he held out to her. “How did you do that?” There was no skepticism in her voice now. “The poor thing—it’s trembling.”

  “It’s frightened.” He released the creature, which scurried away, diving into the hedgerow.

  “I’ve never seen anyone do that before. I can communicate with cats and dogs and such. But they don’t obey my will.”

  “I’m not that good with cats. I get along well with most other animals, but cats remain elusive.” He grinned. “Rather like human females.”

  Kate rose to her feet, but her knees were weak. Who was this man? He had just moved them both into a different territory. Ross Malloch had casually done something she would have thought impossible. “How did you do that?”

  “I’ve startled you. Forgive me. I am a vet, as you know. I have an affinity for animals.”

  “Will you teach me?”

  His smile flashed, crinkling his eyes and softening his cheekbones. He moved closer and his voice lowered, spinning a sensual web around her. “Teach you what?”

  She felt giddy. She was alone in the heart of a maze with a sorcerer. And unless she was mistaken, he was going to kiss her.

  He moved the two paces that brought him close to her. The atmosphere around them thickened. It was as if he walked around with his own cloud of sensuality surrounding him. All he had to do was get near her and she was engulfed, too.

  He drew her close. There was heat where his body touched hers. It made her breasts heavy and caused a warm, fluttery feeling in her belly. Desire. She wanted him so much.

  She felt his fingers brush her scalp, and then graze the side of her throat. He cupped her chin. His blue eyes, intense now, gazed down into hers, then blurred as he lowered his face to hers.

  He took his time. His mouth stayed poised above hers while the small space between them pulsed and throbbed with expectation. He brought her closer still, tightening the arm around her waist. His other hand slid into her hair. The air sizzled as his lips touched hers.

  The mouth that could look so hard and stern at times could kiss like velvet. He tangled his tongue with hers. The skill of that tongue sent bolts of arousal into her breasts and belly. Her arms slid around him and clung. She went up on her tiptoes and rubbed herself against him. She could feel him along the entire length of her, hard bone and firm sinew pressing aggressively into her softer flesh.

  He sighed with pleasure. She could feel his heart thundering against her breasts, and between her legs she was slick and hungry.

  The hand that had been in her hair moved. His fingers descended along her back to her hip, then cupped her butt and squeezed hard before sliding up the groove of her spine, one vertebra at a time.

  Kate was damp with need, intoxicated by him. Fiercely, she caressed the smooth, firm muscles of his back. He made a low growling sound of encouragement. “Kate,” he murmured. His breathing changed and she felt him tremble. His hands roughened, and his touch felt like fire.

  He explored her breasts, pushing fabric aside. Her eyes widened, for, as his fingers drifted over her, they gave off tiny sparkles of light, like phosphorescence on the surface of the sea at night.

  He seemed to notice it at the same time she did. His hand stopped moving. “Don’t be afraid,” he said raggedly. “It’s nothing.” He drew a deep breath and the sparkles coming from his fingers winked out. Kate blinked at the air where they had been, wondering if intense desire could make people see stars.

  Ross seemed to realize how tightly he was holding her. He released her. A look of unease crossed his features. “Am I hurting you?”

  Kate shook her head. She wanted to laugh out loud. Who was this man, this mysterious Ross Malloch? She had never met anyone remotely like him. He was special. He gave off sparks.

  How would it feel to strip off his clothes, and trace her fingers over his glowing skin? Her body yearned to join with his, giving and receiving all varieties of pleasure.

  Ross cleared his throat and passed the back of his hand over his damp forehead. “That settles it.”

  “What was that?”

  “There is a bond between us. You felt it, too.”

  “Well, I certainly felt something.”

  “There’s a strange old legend about the Zrakon’s Bond—I thought it was a fable, but maybe it’s not. You are meant to be with me. To be my mate.”

  Kate backed up a step. “Your—wait, what do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  She didn’t know what he meant, but what the hell, who cared? The energy emitted by his hands had looked like sparkler fireworks from Fourth of July celebrations. How would they feel against her skin? Taking his hand, she brought it back to her breast.

  She felt him tense. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  Her curiosity was stronger than her fear. She had to know how it felt. “It doesn’t hurt.”

  That wasn’t entirely true. As soon as his skin touched her, the sparkles started up again. As she drew his hand inside the neckline of her top, she felt both heat and static. The sensation was odd. It didn’t exactly burn, didn’t exactly shock, but was something in between—a strong tingling, vibrating feeling. “What does it feel like to you?”

  “It feels good,” he admitted. “Intense.” His eyes looked dreamy. “It’s warm and it tingles. It makes your skin feel extra soft and silky. It’s as if all the nerves in my fingers have been zapped up to a higher degree of sensitivity.”

  “That’s how it feels to me, too. It’s as if your fingers have turned into a human vibrator.”

  He laughed low in his throat. “Really? Well, in that case...” He slid his glowing hands lower on her breasts, letting the sparkles flicker over her nipples. She groaned and arched her spine, bringing her breasts more fully into contact with his magic. The sensation from sparkles radiated from her nipple down in a line to her clit, which pulsed strongly. Her breath came out in a sigh. “Ross,” she said his name like a plea. “It doesn’t matter who won the race. If you want to get naked right here in the maze, I won’t say no.”

  Ross felt his pulse go into overdrive. Had she just said yes to him? Sure sounded like it.

  He knew now the true tenor of their bond. No sooner had she surrendered to his first kiss than the erotic magic of the Zrakon swept through him. She had been seared upon him, body and soul. It was more than just a sexual attraction, far more. She had imprinted on him. She was his mate.

  The Zrakon wanted her, he knew that, but he wasn’t the Zrakon—at least, the Zrakon wasn’t all that he was. The Zrakon’s midsummer lust every year was an inconvenience, but he had tolerated it since the first time, when he’d been nineteen. Usually the damn creature left him alone. They didn’t even have the same taste in women. The Zrakon liked lassies like, well, like Effie.

  But one of the most enduring legends of the isle was that he, the human part of him, would one day feel a mystical bond with a human female and fall in love with her. And now his body was clamoring to seize Kate, march her up to his bedroom, tear off her clothing, and fuck her until they both screamed aloud, sealing the bond between them.

  The Zrakon always knows his mate.

  Control, damnation, get some control. He forced himself to breathe slowly and evenly.

  She was his. He let the images of what he intended flow toward her, envelope her. She felt them; he could tell by the way her lips parted and her breathing grew shallow and fast. He could arouse her without even touching her. They shared a telepathic link. That was exactly the way it should be between them now.

  He wasn’t going to waste this chance, burning hands or no burning hands. As gently as possible, he slipped her top ove
r her head. It got tangled in her long hair, but she laughed and helped him pull it free. He loved her laugh—so deep and throaty. Kate was a woman who really enjoyed life. It was one of the things that drew him to her.

  It might be his hands that were glowing with mystical fire, but she was the one whose warmth radiated into all the gloomy corners of Mallochbirn. He was certain that the riot of colorful flowers blooming in the garden today was due to her presence. The entire place was greener and more fertile since the Zrakon had cradled her against his breast and brought her to the keep.

  Don’t think about that, he warned himself. The Zrakon was growing more and more difficult to suppress. Touching her in his human form, especially when his dick was so hard and heavy with desire, was a dangerous thing to do. The more aroused he got, the closer to the surface the beast rose. Usually the only time of year when it was difficult to keep him buried was on Midsummer’s Eve, when he came out and had his fun. But this year his fun had been denied.

  Kate had already unsnapped and slipped out of her bra. Christ, her breasts were beautiful. Pert and plump, they were larger than he had imagined. He wondered if, like many women, she worried about them being too large. Why did so many women choose to be so skinny these days? Some of them barely had breasts at all. Kate’s were just the right size, though. Lovely breasts, her dark nipples hard with arousal.

  He put both his hands on her breasts and let the sparkles stimulate the nipples. At first she flinched slightly, and he knew what she was feeling could not be quite as harmless as she had claimed. But a moment later, she relaxed and even arched into his hands. Her lovely eyes closed and the expression on her face spoke volumes—she was into it. Her head fell back and she writhed like an erotic dancer as the sparkles danced over her flesh.

  “It’s so amazing,” she murmured. “I’ve never felt anything like it. You’re some kind of sorcerer, aren’t you? The Sorcerer of Sex.”

  He laughed, not feeling much like a sorcerer, but wishing he knew more magic, if magic would please her. Keeping one hand at her breast, he slowly moved the other down over her belly. Her skin felt so smooth. Every touch of it reverberated in his cock, which was just about splitting his trousers. He traced his hand in a circle across her abs, which were well-defined. She was really fit.

  She was wearing one of those skirts that clung to the hips rather than the waist, but it was getting in the way. He searched for its fastenings, and she obliged by unbuttoning something in the back and pushing it down over her hips. Then she kicked out of it and slid her bikini panties down her long, lovely legs. She didn’t seem at all shy to be naked, which didn’t surprise him. He reminded himself that he had already seen her bare body thru his Zrakon eyes. And then again as a human when he carried her from the cavern to her bedroom in the Tower. But even so, her body was a revelation to him.

  She was perfect. Her hips were lush and her ass was delightfully rounded. Between her thighs, her dark thatch of hair was full and a delicious contrast to her rose-ivory skin. “You’re a goddess.”

  She laughed lustily. “You’re the mystical being here, not me. And you’re wearing too many clothes.”

  He hurried to repair that oversight. Oddly, the glowing of his hands died out when he touched his own body, so he couldn’t tell what it felt like to press the sparkles to his own skin. Probably just as well—he wasn’t much for pain, even during sex, although he couldn’t deny that he enjoyed dealing it out if such was a woman’s desire. He would happily spank a juicy bottom or pinch an erect nipple just to feel his partner react to the intense stimulus. If the sparkles excited Kate, even if they hurt her a little bit, his cock—and the fierce Zrakon inside him—would be all the more aroused and pleased.

  There was a cruel side to the Zrakon, he knew. If the beast was out of control, he could be sadistic. Perhaps it was just his nature, or perhaps the violence of his pleasures wouldn’t seem so dramatic if his partner was a female sea dragon, with a tough hide. What the Zrakon wanted was not so different from what Ross, the man wanted—to thrust his aching cock inside his female partner. Too bad there were no female sea dragons in the waters around this island—life would be much simpler for everybody if the poor dragon had not been placed under a curse.

  “You’re too slow,” she laughed, and helped him with his trousers. Her hand found him quickly as he slid pants and underwear down. “You’re not glowing here,” she noted. She stroked him up and down his erect cock, and then she dropped to her knees. The realization that she was going to take him in her mouth nearly made him come on the spot. A moment later her tongue flicked around the rim before sucking him into her hot, silky mouth. God!

  She pulled back, taking him in one hand. She pumped her fist up and down his shaft, and then held him still while she explored the head with her tongue. While teasing the slit with the extreme tip of her tongue, she caressed his balls with her clever fingers. Then she drew him part way into her mouth again and sucked hard.

  He nearly exploded. He held back because it felt so damn good. He didn’t want it to end. There were too many things he wanted to do to her, this bare beautiful goddess who was kneeling, naked, at his feet. His hands dove into her thick hair and pulled her to him as he thrust deeper. He was so hot for her that he knew he was right on the verge of getting rough. He was afraid he would choke her with his thick cock, but she managed to take him without faltering, her mouth a deep well for a thirsty man.

  He’d been dreaming about this. Imagining how it would be. But it was so much sweeter.

  Her tongue kept working him while one of her hands massaged his balls. The other went around to grab his ass and urge him to take her harder, faster. She sucked him deeper, taking all of him, bobbing her lovely head up and down. One of her fingers found the spot between his ball sack and his arsehole and pressed. Ah, the bliss of it. He was sure he must be hurting her as he pumped his hips into her face, fast, fiercely, driving just as deep as it was possible to go, and groaning as she sucked him into mindlessness.

  He was going to come in her mouth. He couldn’t stop it. He hoped to hell she wouldn’t mind because he was beyond control, beyond thought, burning up with passion. “Catriona,” he moaned, reveling in her mouth, her breasts, her beautiful hair. She must have pressed that tender spot again behind his balls because pleasure and muscle tension both erupted together, sending waves of ecstatic release crashing through him. He shot into her mouth, and she swallowed him down, continuing the gentle licking and sucking afterwards, soothing him as he gradually descended.

  When she backed off and looked up at him, her green eyes were smiling. “I think we put out your fires, at least for a little while.”

  Laughing, he sank down in the grass beside her. “That was amazing. Sorry to lose myself so completely, but you sent me right over the edge. You’re so fucking sexy.” He ran his hands, which, indeed, had stopped glowing, over her breasts. Her nipples were rosy beads, erect and sensitive in the moonlight. “I’ll make it up to you, though.”

  “You’d better,” she teased him.

  He could still feel the pleasure coursing through him, but curiously, his desire had not died away. As he touched her, stroked her, it surged again. His genitals began to fill and ache as if unsatisfied. It was the Zrakon who was unsatisfied. The beast inside him wanted more than human-to-human congress; it wanted Kate spread out beneath his dragon body, writhing in pain as he speared into her with his monstrous spiked cock. He wasn’t sure why his beast wanted that so much, but he felt the rise of timeless ancient lust, and he was afraid for her.

  She didn’t remember her experience with the Zrakon. Maybe that had been a bad idea—making her forget. She was curious about his sea dragon without realizing that he was the monster.

  She leaned up to kiss his mouth. He pulled her to him, wrapping her tight in his arms and sealing his lips to hers. It must be the kiss that did it—because his fingers began once again to glow and spark. She shivered as he ran his hands under her hair and down her back.
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br />   “The tingling,” she whispered.

  “Aye. It’s coming back. Is it hurting?”

  “No. Not exactly. It’s strange. Magical, I think. It burns a little, yes, but it’s good pain, if that makes any sense.”

  This time, though, he felt as if he was burning inside. Desire was again overwhelming him, and not just physical desire. His brain felt strange. He couldn’t think clearly. He lifted Kate as if she weighed nothing and laid her over the low stone bench, her belly on the bench and her ass in the air. “So sexy,” he said, as he spread her thighs and bent to bathe her pussy with his tongue.

  She arched and cried out. She was wet and tangy, all woman, delicious and wild. He loved the way she squirmed. He held her down firmly with one sparkling hand on her ass as he licked and sucked her pussy, stabbing his tongue into her.

  “Oh, Ross, that’s so good,” she moaned, twisting beneath his touch.

  He inched toward her clit, teasing and circling before sliding his tongue across the firm little bud. She gasped, and he slapped her bottom with his glowing hand, feeling increasingly eager to feel her twitch, hear her cry. She was his now and he could do anything. She was his to play with, his to enjoy, his to torment if such was his need and his desire.

  “Is my hand burning you?” he whispered. He sucked hard on her clit. She moaned and ground herself against him. He did it again. “Answer me.”

  “Um...yes, a little, but it’s okay.”

  He ran his glowing fingers up her spine and felt her jerk and shiver. Over her shoulders and down her sides to her buttocks again. He spanked her lightly. She cried out in what he thought was pleasure, but might have been pain. “Do you like that?”

  “Oh god, yes!”

  He rubbed more vigorously, fascinated by the way the sparkles danced over the soft curves of her ass. He spanked her harder, and her cries grew louder, more intense. “I’m going to use my fiery hand on your clit,” he threatened.