Rush of Pleasure

by Rhyannon Byrd

  “We can talk about that later,” she murmured, more concerned at the moment with getting him out of his clothes.

  “We’ll talk about it now.”

  She could tell from his tone that he wasn’t going to let it go. With a sigh, she said, “The prophecy said that I would be killed by the man who took my virginity within four hours of the deed or deflowering or whatever you want to call it.”

  It was clear, from his expression, that she’d stunned him. “Jesus. Are you serious?”

  Willow shrugged. “I know it sounds crazy, but it’s true. Jessie told me after she found us together that night. She said that the prophecy had been told at my birth, but she’d just been waiting for the right time to tell me.”

  He made a rough sound in his throat. “And you slept with me, anyway?”

  He sounded so shocked she couldn’t help but smile. “Like I said at the time, I trust you.”

  Willow could see him thinking it through. “And that’s why Damon was coming to check on you, isn’t it?”

  “I think he wanted to be close by, in case I needed him.”

  He shook his head. “It was a helluva chance you took with me.”

  “Not really,” she told him, pushing his T-shirt up over his abdomen, wanting to get to his hot bare skin. He got the hint, pulling the shirt over his head for her. “I had faith in love over fate. And I felt like I was going to die, anyway, if I didn’t get you inside me.”

  “And now?” he asked.

  She smiled as she wrapped her arms around his neck. “I’m still feeling that way.”

  He took her face in his hands, and her emotions overflowed as he said, “I know you spent a long time having to be careful, Will.” He leaned forward and pressed his forehead to hers again, his voice breathless and low. “But you don’t have to be careful anymore. I love you, and I would never do anything to hurt you.”

  NOAH KISSED THE tears at the corners of her eyes, and his deep voice vibrated with the force of his feelings as he spoke. “I wish I were a Lycan or a vamp. Wish that I could put my claim on you. Mark you in some way, so that every other man in the world would know you belong to me. But I can bind us with something that’s just as real, Will. With something that will be as strong as any clan bond could ever be. With something that will last forever.”

  “God, I need you,” she groaned, the husky words shredding the last of his control.

  He swallowed as he tried to calm his heart and take it slow, but it was a wasted effort. He was too desperate to do anything but rip those sexy clothes off her even sexier little body and fall on her like a madman. They ended up sprawled across the bed, her soft laughter spilling through the sunlit room as he struggled to get his stubborn jeans off. When he was finally free of the boots and denim, Noah pinned her beneath him and lowered his head, eager to take her smiling mouth with a hungry kiss, when a burning pain filled his gums, and he knew his goddamn fangs had released.

  “Are you tempted, when they come out like that?” she murmured, twining her arms around his shoulders.

  Warily, he asked, “Tempted to what?”

  “To bite me?” she asked, her eyes clear and bright, without any trace of fear. “To have the taste of my blood in your mouth?”

  “I would never risk you like that,” he said, the gritty words edgy and raw. “So don’t even talk about it.”

  “If you want this to work,” she said in a soft voice, drifting her fingers through his hair, “then you have to be willing to trust yourself, Noah.”

  He forced his response from a tight throat. “It’s not that simple.”

  “I never said it would be. But whatever gave you the impression I wanted simple?”

  He could feel the heavy weight of temptation beating down on him, his pulse roaring in his ears. “Damn it, Will. I could hurt you.”

  “Noah, you might not trust yourself,” she whispered, “but for what it’s worth, I do. So why don’t we see where this goes? Who knows? You might not even like it.”

  His chest shook with a sharp, breathless laugh. “Not likely. Everything about you drives me wild. Your blood isn’t going to be any different.”

  “Then let’s give it a try.”

  He couldn’t believe this was happening. “You’re crazy, you know that?”

  She just smiled, her eyes shining with emotion. “Not crazy. Just in love.” She reached up, rubbing her fingertip between his brows. “I don’t want that look of worry in your eyes for the rest of our lives,” she told him. “I’d rather see satisfaction there. Need. For me.”

  “Where?”

  She blinked back at him. “Where, what?”

  He ran his tongue over one sharp tooth, knowing exactly what he wanted. “Where am I allowed to bite you?”

  She shivered, and he could tell from her scent and the provocative look in her eyes that it was from excitement, and not fear. “Wherever you want to, Noah.”

  He parted his lips, figuring he should tell her thank-you, or make more promises that he wouldn’t hurt her, but he couldn’t get a goddamn word out. All he could do was lower his mouth to her chest, nuzzling the soft weight of her breasts, so desperate to sink his fangs into her it was like a physical pain in his gut. He wanted her blood. Wanted the feel and the warmth of it sitting in his mouth. Against his tongue.

  “Spread your legs wider,” he told her, the words thick and graveled with need as he reached down and positioned his cock against her tender opening. She was already warm and wet, and with a feral growl rumbling on his lips, Noah drove himself into her, thrusting deep and hard…and bit into her breast. She gave a husky cry as her flesh closed in tight around his fangs, the rich taste of her blood spilling over his tongue, sizzling and sweet, and he jerked from the violent rush of pleasure, his eyes nearly rolling back in his head.

  Her back arched as he pounded into her, her arms clasped tight around his head, holding him to her. He was too far gone for anything but this rough, hammering rhythm, the bed banging against the wall as his powerful thrusts shoved her across the mattress. She came hard and fast, drenching him in scalding heat, and he took another long, greedy pull at her breast, before forcing himself to stop, worried he’d take too much.

  Noah stared at the small punctures in her pale flesh with hot, burning eyes, then lifted his gaze…and she said, “I love you.” And that was all it took, those three little words hurtling him into the most violent, explosive orgasm he’d ever known, the dark, crashing pleasure ripping through him with so much force he had to clench his teeth, his eyes going hot and damp as he poured himself into her.

  When it was finally over, Noah gave a low groan, collapsing beside her, and pulled her into his arms. She cuddled against his chest, pressing soft kisses to the hammering pulse at the base of his throat, and he told her, in a rough, pleasure-wrecked voice, just how madly in love with her he was. And he thanked her for coming back into his life. Then he thanked her for saving him.

  THEY SPENT THE day in bed, lounging together in a tangle of limbs, watching the sun work its way through the sky, making love and talking about the future. Wondering how he was going to take the news, Willow eventually said, “Just so you know, I’m probably going to make you marry me.”

  “Hold that thought,” he told her, reaching over the side of the bed for his jeans. When he turned back to her, he was holding a beautiful diamond wedding band, and he slipped it onto her finger.

  “There’s no probably about it,” he said with one of those warm, wicked smiles that never failed to curl her toes. “We are definitely getting married. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a wedding that’s going to be twelve years overdue.”

  “I want traditional vows,” she whispered, holding the sheet against her breasts as she sat up. She held out her hand to admire the ring, then looked at Noah, who was lying against her pillows, looking too sexy and gorgeous to be real. “Fidelity and eternal love, till death do us part.”

  He put his hand against the side of her face, rubbing his thu
mb across the corner of her mouth. “The two things you won’t ever have to worry about are my faithfulness and my love. My body and my heart belong to you, Will. There’s nothing that could ever change that.” And she could see the truth of those breathtaking words burning in his eyes.

  Flicking her tongue across her lower lip, she said the first thing that popped into her mind. “You are going to look so delicious in a tux.”

  He pulled her against his chest as it rumbled with laughter. “I’ll wear the monkey suit, if that’s what you want. But you’re just going to end up ripping it off me the first chance you get.”

  Willow shrugged. “We can sneak away at the reception for a quickie, then you can put it back on for me. Problem solved.”

  “Whatever makes you happy,” he drawled, rolling her under him and working his way back inside her, which seemed to be where he liked to spend most of his time. Not that she was complaining.

  “You know, this was always my idea of a perfect day,” she told him. “Sunshine and sex with the sexiest guy I’ve ever known.”

  He snorted. “Glad you think so.”

  “What’s yours?”

  “My idea of a perfect day?”

  “Yeah,” she whispered, stroking her fingertips down the masculine line of his spine, loving the way his muscles jumped at her touch.

  He cocked his head a little to the side as he stared down at her, a tender smile on his lips as he said, “It’s always been the same thing, ever since that first kiss.”

  “And?” she asked, her breath catching as he started to move in a slow, sensual rhythm. She was sore from the day’s excesses, but too hungry for him to care. “I want to know what it is.”

  “Okay.” His smile turned wicked. “My idea of a perfect day is fucking you until we’re both too sore to ever move again.”

  Her chest shook with breathless laughter and she swatted him on the shoulder. “You’re so romantic!”

  “Hey, I try.” He grabbed her wrists, stretching her arms over her head as he came down over her, putting his face close to hers. “But, honestly, my perfect day is just being close to you, Will. Holding you in my arms. Hearing you say ‘I love you’ when I’m buried deep inside you. It doesn’t get any more perfect than that.”

  “Then get ready for a perfect life,” she told him, hoping he could see the love shining in her eyes. “Because you can have that every day.”

  “I don’t need perfect,” he whispered against her mouth. “I just need you.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  FOR THE PAST WEEK, Willow and Noah had stayed holed up in her little house in Baton Rouge, and it’d been the best week of her life. But there was a wedding to organize, and they’d been asked to come down to Jessie’s so that they could start making plans for the big day. They’d parked Noah’s truck back at the bar, and as they made their way along the path where Willow had first pulled her knife on him, she couldn’t help but smile. It was a familiar expression, since she found herself smiling a lot these days.

  They’d both lost something important to them because of Anthony Calder, but they’d found something, too. Something they’d both been waiting for a long, long time, and they couldn’t help but cherish it.

  When they reached Jessie’s door, Willow started to lift her hand to knock, but the door was suddenly ripped open with an audible whoosh. “Well, get your ass in here,” Jessie snapped, shooing them in. “I can’t stand this anymore. It’s driving me batty.” Jessie’s dark gaze glittered with emotion. “And bad things happen when I go batty.”

  From the corner of her eye, Willow watched Noah give a hard swallow, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. He looked nervous, but she couldn’t tease him. She’d never seen Jessie this wound up and she was feeling pretty nervous herself.

  They followed Jessie into the cabin’s small dining room, and Willow was surprised to find Harris already seated at the table. Her brother looked even more dangerous than he had the last time she’d seen him, as if he could break a man apart with his bare hands. He rose from his chair to give her a hug and to shake hands with Noah, and Willow was relieved that they seemed genuinely happy to see each other. Maybe that was another old wound that could be healed, and she sent up a silent prayer that the two would become friends again.

  “Let’s get this over with,” Jessie said, taking a seat beside Harris, while Willow and Noah took seats on the other side of the table. Jessie folded her hands into a tight knot on the table-top, her white brows drawn into a deep crease beneath Rufus’s furry chin. “This isn’t easy for me to say. But I know it’s something I need to tell you.”

  Willow felt like her heart had just lodged itself in her throat. “Jessie, please. Just spit it out.”

  “You’re right. I’m sorry.” Jessie looked slowly from one to the other, then finally said, “I lied about the prophecy. I created it for the specific purpose of keeping the two of you separated.”

  Noah took a sharp breath, and Willow put her hand to her forehead, feeling like she’d just been smacked in the face. “What are you saying?” she whispered.

  Jessie’s gaze almost looked teary as she said, “I knew Noah was the one who would hold your heart, Willow, and that he would feel the same way. I knew it from the first moment the two of you ever set eyes on each other. But I also knew that you needed to stay a virgin.”

  “How did you know?” Noah asked, taking hold of Willow’s trembling hand.

  Jessie looked at Noah and explained. “The voices. They told me she would be needed for a purpose one day, and that it was necessary for her to remain untouched.” Returning her bright gaze to Willow, she said, “I’d been planning on telling you before you got much older, but it wasn’t…easy. And then you were found with Noah that night, and everything changed. I knew I had to do something to keep you from going after him.”

  “So you made up the prophecy to separate us,” she whispered, the soft words full of pain.

  Jessie frowned. “The voices have never lied to me before, so I did what had to be done. But only because it was necessary.”

  “Why?” she demanded. “I mean, why separate us? You could have just told us the truth. Warned me to stay celibate.”

  Jessie snorted. “That never would have worked. The way he looked at you—it was only a matter of time before he would have gotten in your pants.”

  Harris winced, looking as if he was in pain. “Jessie, seriously. Think about what you’re saying. I don’t want to hear crap like that about my baby sister.”

  “Anyway, I couldn’t take that risk.” Her aunt’s voice was firm with conviction. “Not when your virginity was going to be so important. The second I read that spell that Noah brought me, I suspected it would be you. And I was right.”

  “You should have told us,” Noah rasped. “You had no right to keep this a secret for so many years.”

  Jessie lifted her brows. “And would you have been able to keep your hands off her if I had?”

  He started to say something, then stopped, and Jessie laughed.

  “I didn’t think so.” She reached up and adjusted Rufus, then took a deep breath. “I know you’re both angry, but the lie served its purpose, keeping Willow’s virginity intact until she was needed for that spell.”

  Noah braced his hands on the table and leaned forward. “She’s always been needed,” he growled. “I needed her!”

  Completely unfazed by his anger, Jessie reached across the table and patted the top of his hand. “And now you have her, Noah. For the rest of your life. And you’re smart enough to appreciate what you’ve got.”

  He cursed something foul under his breath, but sat back down, and Willow took his hand again, giving it a little squeeze, since she doubted he was going to like her next question for Jessie. “You managed to keep me away from Noah, but didn’t you ever worry I might hook up with another man?”

  Shaking her head, Jessie said, “Once I told you about your death, I knew no other man would have the ability to tempt you. He
was the only one.”

  “Oh, God,” she groaned, sliding a wry look toward Noah, whose angry mouth was already curving with a gloating smile. “I think I can actually see your head getting bigger.”

  Noah and Harris laughed, and then Jessie said, “I know this has all come as quite a shock to you both, but I’d like to make it up to you, if you’ll let me.”

  “How?” Willow asked with a heavy dose of suspicion.

  Jessie gave her a hopeful smile. “How about a honeymoon on a private island in the Caribbean?”

  Willow arched one eyebrow. “You know the owner?”

  “You could say that.” Jessie’s smile grew wider. “I am the owner.”

  “An island?” Harris croaked, his dark eyes going wide with shock. “How the hell did you manage that?”

  Her aunt shrugged. “Let’s just say that a recent client wished to show me his gratitude with a profound gesture of generosity. I told him some flowers would be fine, but he insisted on giving me the island.”

  While Willow gaped at Jessie, Noah rubbed a hand over his eyes. “I don’t even want to know,” he muttered under his breath, and Willow stifled a laugh. He was no doubt thinking the same thing she was, wondering just what kind of spell her aunt had performed for this mystery client. God only knew what the woman had been up to this time.

  “It’s a beautiful place,” Jessie added, obviously intent on tempting them to accept her offer. “White sand beaches and crystal-blue waters. I think there’s even a waterfall. It would be incredibly romantic.”

  “We’ll think about it,” Willow murmured, unwilling to let Jessie off the hook that easily. Pushing her chair back from the table, she asked, “Any other bombshells you want to drop on us before we go?”

  Jessie settled her warm stare on Noah. “Only something that the voices have been telling me about this young man here.”

  “About me? Oh, God,” he muttered.

  “Don’t look so worried, Noah. This is a good thing. It’s about the changes you’ve been going through.”

  He tensed, looking a little green, and Willow gave his hand a comforting squeeze.