by Vonna Harper
“What about Cougar?” he demanded. “And the fog.”
“I think you’d like to have me tell you the fog killed him, but I can’t. I want him to live. How does that make you feel?”
She was wrong, she had to be! All the times he’d battled Cougar for control, Hok’ee had never sensed anything except raw animal. And if—no! He wouldn’t entertain the possibility that Cougar had a soul, he wouldn’t!
Furious at this woman who’d tried to change him, he grabbed her shoulders and pushed her down onto the bed. She started to twist away, prompting him to clamp both hands around an ankle. Lifting her leg into the air, he anchored her in place. Her sex-scent drifted to him, and he rested her leg on his shoulder so he could slide closer. She scratched his chest. He growled.
“Who’s doing this?” she challenged. “You or Cougar?”
Growling again, he slapped the breast he’d been covering a short time ago. When her nails dug in and drew blood, he slapped her other breast. Far from looking frightened, she reared up and reached for his throat. He easily pushed her back down.
“It doesn’t matter,” he belatedly answered, “because either way I’ll win.”
“Win what?”
You. Determined not to answer, he used his knee to shove against the inside of her the leg. Instead of resisting, she let him spread her. Her wide eyes and the throbbing vein at the side of her neck said she was already turned on. Maybe she’d never climbed down from that state.
He was in control, his stronger body ruling her sweet and soft one. She was like water, like a breeze, formless.
Was he any different?
Cougar shifted inside him, not trying to break loose for once, but so he could share in what was going to happen. Instead of resenting the invasion, Hok’ee felt himself stepping aside to make room for the beast. Then, studying her with eyes belonging to man and predator, he dragged her hands off his chest.
“Your eyes,” she said. “He’s trying to come out again, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“If he succeeds—”
“I won’t let him.”
What if you can’t stop him? her eyes asked. He didn’t bother to tell her that he was determined to sense the shift in power in time to walk away from her. Cougar had no interest in fucking a human female. But if the beast wanted to shed blood—
Power. Fighting. Never giving up control.
Driven by the thought, he slid off the low bed, but remained on his knees. Then he dragged her to the edge and bent her knees, spreading her at the same time. It would take nothing to spear her, least of all her cooperation.
The thought of taking her against her will made Cougar’s muscles flex, but that wasn’t why Hok’ee thumbed her entrance. Fragments of memory hinted that he’d once been a gentleman, a civilized and politically correct male, but that creature had died along with the life he’d led before everything shattered. Only Hok’ee remained. And Hok’ee wanted sex.
Her eyes drifted close, and her head rocked from side to side. She didn’t try to draw her legs together. Leaning low over her, he took a breast into his mouth. The moment he did, she tried to pull her arms free. Pressing down, he kept them trapped between their bodies while he ran his tongue over full, heated flesh.
She kept tossing her head. Her mouth was open, as were her eyes. This close to her and intent on her captured breast, he couldn’t make out her expression. All he knew was that she’d stopped flexing her arms and had started pressing her legs against his flanks.
Her breast, his. If he wanted—if Cougar won this round—he’d bite and chew and there was nothing she could do about it.
Cougar shifted, muscles strengthening. Not fighting the other half of his being, Hok’ee pulled more of the soft, full mound into his mouth.
“Stop it.”
She spoke to the man, but Cougar heard. Energy ran through the predator. Gathering strength around him, Cougar took in the scent of woman. It curled through him to touch the man.
Shaking himself back to awareness, Hok’ee straightened so Kai no longer had to bear so much of his weight. But although he should release her breast, he couldn’t. She’d climaxed earlier, not him. She’d found release, not him.
The swollen flesh changed form inside his mouth as he sucked, adding to instinct and need. She was his, possession and property, raw sex. Surrounded by temptation, he relaxed until only her nipple remained in his damp cave. He ran his teeth over the hard nub, somehow keeping the touch light.
“Oh, God. God.”
She’d started to shake, nothing frenzied but neither, he sensed, was it anything she had control over. Cougar, conditioned by a lifetime of dominating prey, smiled. He’d run down some creature and had crippled it. Whatever it was lay under him, alive and yet standing on the path to death. Cougar had no conception of another animal’s pain, and didn’t care if it was terrified.
No! Don’t let it happen.
Trying not to snarl, Hok’ee pushed back and up, releasing her nipple at the same time. Even as he fought his own darkness, he realized Cougar was no longer trying to take over.
But soon…
13
Did he know how much he was revealing, Kai wondered, watching Hok’ee’s jaw clench. Studying him despite her loosening body, she wasn’t sure whether she was looking at the man or animal. Maybe both.
In some respects, it was like watching two movies at the same time, one superimposed above the other. Hok’ee might represent the dominant film, but the other was much more than a shadow. Cougar—she wondered if he had any other name—put her in mind of a creature trying to shake off hibernation.
Remembering her earlier thought about the possibility of the two working together to pull the Anasazi into the present distracted her from what she was experiencing. Then Hok’ee ran his hands over her thighs, and only his touch mattered.
“You’re all right?” she asked. “Cougar won’t—”
“I can handle him.”
“Stop saying that! All I have to do is look at you to know the truth.”
He started to shake his head, then stopped. “It’s never been like this. Always before, I know when Cougar needs to hunt. So we won’t fight, I step aside so he can do what he must. Right now there’s another kind of battle.”
“Am I responsible?”
Instead of answering, he stroked her thighs. She managed to remain still until his fingers reached the join between leg and torso. Gasping, she lifted her buttocks off the bed. She couldn’t think what to do with her hands.
“I didn’t know this was going to happen,” he said, his fingertips resting on flesh so sensitive she could hardly stand it. “If I had, maybe I would have left you alone.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Because?”
Instead of admitting to his loneliness, he pressed both thumbs against her labia. Shuddering, she tried to slap them away. Laughing at her feeble effort, he increased the pressure.
“Not fair. Not damn fair.”
“Tell me you don’t want this. Maybe I’ll stop.”
Silence, that’s what she’d give him. Otherwise she’d lie and he’d see through it. Giving up, she lifted her arms over her head. She shouldn’t trust him with her body, but whether she did or didn’t wouldn’t change the outcome, would it?
Besides, on some deep and inaccessible level, she did trust him.
“What does it feel like, coexisting with an animal?”
“It’s the only thing I remember; I have nothing to compare it with.”
The only thing I remember. But given enough time and Cougar’s essence beating inside Hok’ee, she might be able to reconstruct his past for him. Maybe she’d be able to do the same for Cougar.
“I asked a question,” he said, his body curling over hers, his cock stroking the inside of her left thigh. “Do you want me to go away?”
On the brink of saying no, she held back. Everything was so complicated, except for
her body’s responses. It wanted only one thing. Him. Now.
“What does my answer matter?” she came up with. “You’ve already changed everything.”
“Just as you’ve changed me.”
She needed to touch him, to embrace and curl around him as he’d done to her. At the same time, she loved being stretched out beneath him. He’d turned her into his possession and could do whatever he wanted to her. Of course he’d stop short of harming her, but maybe he’d slap her breasts again, and when they were red and aching, he’d run his teeth over her belly.
She’d moan and twist, prompting him to tie her hands to something to hold her down. Maybe he’d spread her legs and snake ropes around her ankles so she couldn’t move. Hissing, sometimes growling, even screaming, he’d slide a hand under her buttocks and lift her. Finding her core, he’d ram into her. Sweat would stream from his straining body as he humped his writhing captive.
Awash in fantasy, she stared at him. She couldn’t think how to move her arms, forgot she’d put them over her head. A vessel, that’s what she’d become, waiting to be filled.
“Do it! Damn it, do it!”
“Shut up!” Clamping a hand around her jaw, he forced her head down. “I’m in control, not you.”
“I know, I know.”
“Then be quiet.”
He punctuated his command by pulling on her legs so she was in danger of sliding off the bed. She’d started to dig her feet against the stone flooring when he arched her upward. About to beg him to fuck her, she remembered his command not to speak. Sweat pooled at the base of her spine, flames licked along her slit.
Power. His. The fingers on her hips holding her in place.
Halfway through a deep breath, she stopped. For an instant, she simply existed. Then understanding and acceptance ran through her. His cock head touched her entrance. She had no memory of her earlier climax, no awareness beyond his bold strength grazing her inner channel. He slipped in, easy and smooth, stretching her.
There was nothing civilized about him, only animal fucking animal.
Fear touched her, running along her sides and into her throat. He was so damn big, so strong. He might split her apart, the animal in him surging to the surface. No matter how fiercely Hok’ee fought Cougar, the beast would win. She’d be the ultimate victim.
Finishing her breath, she raked the back of his right hand. She tried to twist to the side, only to have him clamp down on her thighs.
“Not going anywhere.” He leaned back, then ran himself even farther into her. “You’re—not—going…”
Another change, fear fading beneath her sudden and raging hunger. He more than filled her—he consumed her, possessing every quarter-inch of her pussy.
Patting where she’d scratched, she lifted her ass as far off the bed as she could. His cock shifted inside her. Then it pulsed as if gathering energy from an inexhaustible source.
He was on the move again, sliding out a little before plowing and plundering. Quick, he was so damnably quick, she couldn’t possibly keep pace. Reaching deep inside herself, she found her own tempo. They worked as one, lost touch, ran off at their own pace, then came together again.
She’d found satisfaction earlier, she reminded herself. He hadn’t. His release came first, took precedent.
The hell it did! There was only her straining, screaming body and this terrible, wonderful burning. Let him grunt and groan. Let his muscles shatter and his cock catch fire; she didn’t care.
Then she did again.
“Now, now, now,” she chanted, trying to time the words to his full and fierce strokes. She couldn’t move and talk at the same time, couldn’t push her body to its limits while putting his needs first.
“Now, damn you, now.” That said, she ran out of breath.
He kept after her, punishing, hot, wet power searing her channel. Even as the hard explosion caught her, his cock’s contours changed, lengthened.
And his sounds, no longer the cries of a man in the midst of climax, but longer, coming from a deeper chest.
“Hok’ee! Hok’ee.”
Too late. Gone. She was gone, spinning and slipping, her body swirling.
The pieces of her started to come back together. Always before, she’d hold onto her climax and draw out the sweet, overwhelming sensation, but this time she gathered up the shards and slapped them together. Her eyes were open, and although she knew better, she tried to wrench her wrists apart. She wanted to touch Hok’ee’s hand, but was afraid. What if it had become a claw?
Calm down. Don’t lose it.
The cave roof was the same dark gray as the rest of the stone. Strangely, she wondered whether the original residents had wanted something different, livelier maybe, softer.
Shaking off the question took time and energy, but when she’d accomplished her task, she no longer stood on the edge of self-control. The man/animal who’d spilled himself in her still knelt between her gaping legs. His pelvis occasionally jerked, and his cock was shrinking slowly. With her cunt numb, she couldn’t tell whether his cock belonged to a human, or beast, or maybe a bit of both.
She wanted to say something that would prompt him to speak but couldn’t think what the words might be. Maybe she didn’t want to hear his voice after all.
No longer interested in the cave’s color, she closed her eyes. Male weight pressed on her thighs and male bulk kept her legs apart. Who or what had just fucked her was having trouble controlling his breathing.
Flashes. Impressions of something.
Thinking she might be returning to the scene with the motorcycle, she went deep inside herself. Instead, she found herself in an unlit living room. A woman was sitting on a pale couch, leaning forward with her hands clutched in her lap. She was looking up at something, prompting Kai to do the same.
A man, wearing black leather and holding a helmet.
“It was my decision,” the woman said. “I knew what you’d say. You’d try to change my mind. But my life—”
“Your life,” the man spat, and she knew it was Hok’ee, or rather whoever he’d once been. “What about the one you just ended?”
“Don’t put it like that. If you’d had any idea how hard—”
“No, I don’t have any concept what you went through making your damnable decision, because you didn’t allow me to be part of it. You shut me out, damn it!”
Hok’ee was angry, but another emotion lived beneath his outburst.
“We’re lovers, Ryan, that’s all,” the woman said. “Scratching each other’s itches. Nothing was ever said about spending the rest of our lives together.”
Hok’ee, or Ryan, let go of the helmet. It thudded to the carpet. “I wouldn’t have walked out on you. I’d be there for our—surely you know me well enough to—”
“I don’t know you at all, just as I’m a stranger to you.” The woman buried her face in her hands. “All that crap I fed you about being a modern broad in charge of her sexuality…Look, I don’t blame you for our accident. After all, I insisted on handling birth control. I thought I had, that this wouldn’t happen.”
“I wore a rubber, except that one time.”
“When we’d both had too much to drink.” She started rocking. “I was less than two months along. The abortion—I hardly felt anything.”
Hok’ee dropped to his knees and pulled the woman’s hands off her. Then he rested them against his chest. “You didn’t feel anything.”
“Don’t!” She tried to pull free. “Damn it, don’t! It’s been a nightmare. The last thing I need is to have you kick me while I’m down.”
“You just said you hardly felt anything.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about, and you know it. I want children, just not now.”
“Or with me.”
The woman said something, but Kai couldn’t hear. Although the couple’s body language left no doubt of what they were going through emotionally, Kai felt herself being drawn away from the scene. No matter how she fought, she co
uldn’t stay. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes. The dark gray ceiling waited for her.
“What is it?” Hok’ee asked. “You—what happened?”
They’d just had sex. What they’d both known would happen had. Contentment filled him, and she wanted to sleep next to him, nothing else.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t possible.
She had to sit up and tell him what she’d just learned, give him a fragment of his past. But because she didn’t know how he’d react, or how much of Cougar stirred inside him, she studied her surroundings instead.
Thousands of years ago a mysterious and mystical people had found shelter here. They might have lived a primitive existence by today’s standards, but surely their emotions had been no less complex than what modern people felt. They’d cried when their children died. Men had hunted with hammering hearts while women prayed those men would return alive. And when a husband or father died or was killed, their families faced an uncertain and sometimes frightening future.
That’s what she longed to pull out of the past, with Hok’ee’s help. And Cougar’s. Archeologists might be content with physical proof of the ancients’ existence, but she had an incredible opportunity to paint the ancients as human beings—with help.
From a man who’d been robbed of a child and had died shortly after?
“Kai? Are you all right?”
When she didn’t respond, he took hold of her hands and pulled her upright, compelling her to look at him. This close to him, she could see deep into his eyes. Yes, there was a faint yellow cast to them, proof of Cougar’s existence. “Does the name Ryan mean anything to you?”
The beginnings of a frown turned into puzzlement. Still looking confused, he drew his dying cock out of her and massaged it. “I’m not sure. Why?”
“I saw something, an image from your past. Maybe more of the last day of your life.”
“What happened?”
How could she answer right now? Not only did her body continue to hum with the aftermath of the sex they’d shared, she didn’t want to cause him pain while Cougar’s heart beat next to his. “I’m not sure this is the best time to—”