by Kate Douglas
Ophelia gave her a slitted-eyed stare, an offended sniff, and turned with her tail waving in the air. She circled the carrier before she stepped in with the kind of queenly air reserved for Marie Antoinette going to the guillotine. Chloe rolled her eyes, snapped the door shut, and engaged the latch. She had no idea how long the cat would deign to remain in there, but she was there for the moment, and that was all Chloe was going to worry about.
Merek walked out of her bedroom and set her suitcases beside Ophelia’s carrier. A thought occurred to Chloe, and she turned toward the kitchen. “Alex, you might want to pause on the coffee making. We can pick some up at the airport. They have Starbucks there.”
“I broke out the travel mugs.” He poked his head out of the kitchen. “This French press you have makes better stuff than Starbucks. Since we’re flying in Aunt Millie’s private plane, she said we could take it with us. It’ll be done before you load Ophelia and your suitcases in the car.”
“I’ll take care of that.” Philip reached for the familiar’s carrier while Merek retained possession of Chloe’s bags. The two men sized each other up for a moment before Philip grunted. “You take good care of Millie’s girl, you hear? I’m not just talking about her safety.”
“Philip!” Chloe and Millie echoed, shock in their tone.
Of all the people Chloe would ever have imagined worrying about a man hurting her feelings, Millie’s brick house of a boy toy hadn’t come anywhere near the top of the list. He hadn’t even been on the list.
Millie recovered first. “Yes, well. Philip has the right of it, but I think Detective Kingston is smart enough to understand that or I wouldn’t be sending Chloe and Alex with him.”
“Yes, ma’am. Sir.” Merek dipped a nod in Philip’s direction, and both of the men headed for the door.
Chloe shook her head, but had no idea what to say at that point. She just sighed, walked over to Millie, and let herself be pulled into a warm hug. The older witch kissed her forehead. “Your detective will check in with me once a week on a secure line, so I’ll know you’re safe, even if I don’t know where you are. Philip arranged everything, including some discreet channels to keep us apprised of Agent Cavalli’s investigation.” Millie’s arms tightened painfully. “If you don’t check in, I’ll know you’re . . .” She let go, brushed her hands off. “You’ll be fine. Merek is the best. I checked into him. Of course.”
“Of course.” Her aunt wouldn’t send her with anyone who wasn’t the best. Gods, Chloe was going to miss her. Even more than her work, which fed a craving few could understand, she was going to miss the people in her life. Millie. Tess. Even the normally taciturn Philip.
But people were the most important thing. Millie had taught that lesson well. The science Chloe developed was always geared toward helping people, improving their lives. Millie’s work in the political arena achieved the same ends, just with a different means.
It was ironic that she and Alex had to give up their entire lives, all their people except each other, in order to stay alive, but that was the way the cookie crumbled. It sucked; it wasn’t fair, but life wasn’t. It was just life, and she wanted to live a lot longer before she saw the end of it. She’d fight to her last breath to make sure Alex got the chance to do the same.
“All right, kiddo. Let’s get this show on the road.”
6
Four days later they were on the craggy coast of northern California. Chloe flicked her fingers and turned on a lamp before she even entered the living room. Wandering across the room, she lifted the edge of the curtains to peek out the window of their oceanfront condo. She’d have liked to go out onto the balcony and let the sea breeze ruffle her hair, but if Merek found out, he’d freak over the exposed position. He didn’t mess around about security, so she propped her shoulder against the wall and contented herself with staring out the closed, locked, and spell-warded window. The moon hovered in the sky, heavy, bright, and almost full.
She wanted to tell herself that this was just a vacation she was on, an extended road trip, but worry gnawed at her. It wasn’t just the extra security measures. Alex had become more and more distant as the full moon approached, the silent intensity that burned in his eyes growing more feral with each day that passed. He’d have to Change soon, compelled by the lunar cycles. Worse, she saw a creeping fear haunt his pale gaze, echoes of horror from watching his mother die of Change. It was always like this before full moon, but she’d never spent so much time in close proximity with the boy. They’d never lived together as they were now.
It was awful.
Her determination to find a potion to control the lycanthropic disease redoubled. If Alex was this terrified every month, then she didn’t want to know what others went through. She just knew she needed to stop it.
Frustration heaped on top of her worry. If she were home, if none of this had happened, then she might have already finished her experiments. They might already have a prototype for the potion to inhibit full moon Change.
“Damn it.” She rubbed a tired hand over her eyes.
Big hands closed over her shoulders, rubbing the tension from her muscles. She sighed as her body went limp. Merek’s voice was a low rumble in her ear. “You should have been in bed hours ago.”
“I did go to bed hours ago,” she groused. She’d gone to bed exactly when Merek and Alex had. And then stared at the ceiling with gritty eyes. “I couldn’t sleep.”
“Clearly.” He pulled her back against his warm chest, wrapping his arms around her waist. “Keeping yourself up at night isn’t going to help anyone, sweetheart. You need to rest.”
“I know.” She sighed, quenched the desire to tell him she hated nights too much to sleep sometimes, and rolled her head on his shoulder to look up at him. He bent forward to brush a light kiss across her temple.
A shiver went through her, the lust that was never far from the surface bubbling up. They’d done their best to be discreet for Alex’s sake, but the calm, worldly eyes of her godson missed very little. She didn’t try to lie to herself—Alex was no innocent child, whether he was of legal age or not. Outside of that, she wanted no details, and thankfully he’d never felt the need to share. She’d caught the looks he gave her and Merek, but he hadn’t felt the need to broach that topic with her either, for which she was even more grateful.
The bottom line was, if she might die, she was going to squeeze every last ounce of living out of the time she had left. That meant she’d turn herself over to the passion that erupted between Merek and her. It was madness, it was stupid, and she didn’t care. She didn’t want to deny herself or him. She wasn’t even sure she could. Something about this man had reached down deep inside her from the very first, and pretending she didn’t want him was even more stupid than indulging herself.
Though they went to bed separately every night, not one had passed that they hadn’t ended up together. Irresistible temptation. “Kiss me.”
“I’ll do a hell of a lot more than kiss you, sweetheart.” Merek stroked his fingers down her torso until he could dip below the edge of her T-shirt.
He let his lips play over hers, a sweet savoring. Fire licked at her belly, spreading liquid heat throughout her body. Her concerns from just moments before drifted away as the endless desire she had for this man enveloped her in a slow fever. His tongue slipped between her lips, deepening the kiss. The taste of honey filled her mouth. She now knew it was because he used it instead of sugar in his coffee. The daily habits, the little details of him, were becoming familiar. All the things he liked best. She bit his lip, sucking it into her mouth, just the way she knew would make him groan. She grinned when the sound vibrated up from his chest.
The hard ridge of his cock burned through the thin material of her pajama pants. Excitement spiraled deep inside her, and her sex slickened. The feel of him, the delightful flavor, the musky masculine scent of him, made her want anything and everything he had to offer. One of his hands slid up her midriff to cup her breast. She bro
ke her mouth away from his and arched herself into his touch.
“Please,” she breathed.
“Shh.” His talented fingers caressed her nipples, drawing them into tight peaks. He plucked at them, twisting them just enough to make her squirm. Her pussy pulsed in scorching waves, the lips wet with juices. Just that quickly she was ready to beg for him. Gods, the man did it for her.
Her breath sped to shallow panting, a whimper breaking from her throat as the lightest sizzle of magic met her nipple. Now. Gods, now. She wriggled against him, but he tightened his arms around her to hold her in place. He skimmed one hand down her stomach until he dipped beneath the waistband of her pajama bottoms. She wore no underwear, so there was nothing between his fingers and her needy sex.
“Spread for me.” His words rumbled like thunder in her ear, and she was more than ready for him.
Easing her legs apart, she tilted her pelvis up in offering. “Touch me.”
He did.
First, a light brush over her soaking pussy, a barely there stroke that made her anticipation spike and her breath strangle in her throat. She closed her eyes and swallowed hard. “Please, Merek.”
“Soon, sweetheart. I promise. Soon.” His mouth opened against her throat, and he bit down. At the same time, his fingers opened the lips of her pussy, dipping into her thick cream. His other hand still fondled her breasts, kept her nipples in beaded crests. She could feel how wet she was, and every movement of his hands only made it worse. Goose bumps rippled down her skin as his thumb grazed her throbbing clit.
Every muscle in her body locked at that single touch. A deep shudder passed through her, and she twisted in his embrace. She felt him smile against her neck, then he licked a hot path up to her ear and sucked her lobe between his teeth. A delicate sizzle from the tip of his tongue hummed along her overstimulated nerves. Tipping her head to the side to give him greater access, she moaned.
His finger stroked her again, drawing circles from her soaking channel to the hard nub of her clit. Her hips undulated with his movements, trying to deepen the contact. He chuckled, and the sound vibrated against her back. Frustration ate at her. She wanted, she needed. “Now, now, now.”
Digging her nails into his forearm, she tried to force his fingers into her sex. Shock ripped through her when he didn’t resist. Two big fingers plunged deep into her pussy, scissoring to stretch her sensitized flesh.
It was more than she could bear.
Her mouth opened in a silent scream, and she came apart. Her sex fisted around his fingers, milking them in endless waves. Lava-like heat spread through every inch of her body, and she threw her head back against his shoulder. The heel of his hand ground against her clit, and his fingers thrust inside her pussy until she crashed headlong into another orgasm. Stars exploded behind her eyes when he sent a spell sparking and dancing from her clit to her channel. Her knees buckled, and he caught her close, still stroking into her sex.
A door down the hall opened, and then the bathroom light flipped on before that door closed. Alex.
She jolted, but it only drove Merek’s fingers deeper between her slick folds. She had to bite her lip hard enough to draw blood, to keep from crying out at the delicious sensation. He slipped his hand out of her pants, but not without a final flick of his fingers and sizzle of magic that left her arching and gasping.
“Oh, gods.” Her fingers dug into his forearm. “We need a bedroom with a locking door now.”
“Yes.” He stepped away, reaching to flip off the lamp on their way out.
Her heart thumped hard just thinking about how dark the room would be. “No, leave it on.”
“Why? We’re going to a bedroom with a locking door now,” he drawled, and turned out the light.
The terror was all-consuming, locking her muscles into unresponsive tightness. She couldn’t move, couldn’t make her body react at all. Cold sweat slicked her skin as the blackness seemed to press down on her, smothering her like a wet blanket. Panic shrieked through her until she began to shiver. The contrast with the fiery lust punched shock through her.
“Chloe?” Merek’s hand groped for her in the darkness, and she clung to the contact like a lifeline. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t . . . I don’t like the dark.” The words jerked out past stiff lips.
“Let me get the light, then.” His voice had gentled to quiet soothing.
“No, don’t leave me!” She hated the shrillness of her tone, but she couldn’t let go, couldn’t be alone in the blackness. Not again. Not like—
She shuddered away from the thought and threw herself into his arms, needing to recapture the passion of moments before. Her mouth was hungry, consuming, when it met his. He hesitated for a brief moment before he gave her what she wanted. His tongue plunged between her lips as he scooped her up in his arms.
What was going on?
The fear in her voice had made Merek’s heart trip, but he ignored that and met her kisses with equal ferocity as he swiftly carried her into the closest bedroom—his. He kicked the door shut just as Alex emerged from the bathroom. The werewolf could make of that whatever he wanted—he knew what they did at night.
Merek strode across the room and sat Chloe on the side of the bed. He flicked on the bedside lamp, which captured her in a circle of warm light.
Now he could see her expression, the wariness in her eyes that contrasted with the flush of desire in her cheeks. “All right, you want to tell me—”
“Don’t just stand there. Come here and finish what you started.” She slipped out of her clothes and arched on the mattress, going on the sexual offensive to cover whatever she didn’t want to discuss. She stroked her clit for him, teasing more cream from her body. He forced himself to ignore the way his dick throbbed at the erotic sight.
Cajoling entered his tone. “There’s nothing you can’t tell me, sweetheart. I can help you. You can trust me.”
“I’m already trusting you with my life. More important, I’m trusting you with my godson’s life.” She sat up on the bed. “There’s nothing I can do to make being afraid of the dark go away, and talking about it won’t help. Therapists with way more training than you have taken a crack at it and failed.” She looked away, dropping her sexy pose. “I realize I should have told you about my fear from the beginning, because it makes me more difficult to protect and makes your job harder. I apologize for keeping that from you. It’s just not something I even consider discussing with people, so I didn’t think about saying anything to you.”
“But you won’t tell me where the fear came from?”
“No.” Her eyes closed tight, her arms crossing defensively over her breasts. “That part isn’t relevant to anyone but me.”
He sighed at how stiff her words were. More secrets she was keeping from him, but he couldn’t force her to tell him everything, and somehow he knew pushing would make her less likely to talk in the future. “Someday you’ll trust me with it, Chloe.”
Her laugh was a painful thing to hear. “It wouldn’t solve anything.”
“Maybe not, but I’d still like to know.” Gods, but didn’t he know how that could be? A wound so deep nothing would ever fix it. A problem so huge nothing could overcome it. He understood that kind of pain, and what it took to live with it.
He settled himself on the bed beside her, stroking his fingertips over her jaw until she looked at him again. “What do you need, sweetheart?”
“You.” A little smile tilted up one side of her mouth. “I don’t want to think about this at all. It’s bad enough without dwelling on it, you know? I just want to pretend the last ten minutes didn’t happen, and to get back to where we were before.”
“The last ten minutes did happen, and I’m glad they did. This was something I needed to know.” He leaned forward and brushed a kiss over her mouth.
“I wish it wasn’t.” Her hands pressed to his chest, stroking over his T-shirt. She lifted her lips to his, tentative, as if she feared he’d push her away.
The thought made him ache inside.
“Come here.” His voice was gruffer than he intended, but he pulled her into his arms, and she came willingly. Her arms wrapped around his neck, her mouth slanting under his as she kissed him harder, her tongue probing for entrance. His cock surged with need as her taste exploded over his taste buds.
Her hands tugged at the bottom of his shirt, and he yanked it over his head. Then her bare breasts rubbed against his flesh, and he groaned. She explored him with her fingers, teased his nipples, stroked his stomach. When she reached for his dick, he broke, shuddered, jerked to his feet to shove his sweats down his legs.
The heat in her eyes as she took in his body made him burn.
Gods, it had never been so hot for him. Her touch, her scent, the eagerness with which she responded to him. His hunger for her went far beyond the physical, but the physical was so fucking good. His cock was so hard, it ached, and he needed inside her so badly he was shaking. He couldn’t wait another minute.
Crawling onto the bed beside her, he pressed her thighs flat to the mattress and mounted her. “Chloe, I need you.”
“Have me.” She held her arms out to him. Her hands slid up his biceps to his shoulders, her legs wrapping around his waist. She chuckled low in her belly, and it rubbed her against his dick. He gritted his teeth to keep from coming then and there.
“Now,” he groaned. And then he was inside her, no gentleness, just lust and sharp craving driving him to orgasm. His self-discipline went up in smoke as it usually did with her.
His hips bucked, and he slammed his cock into her hot, sleek sheath. She was tight, wet, and the feel of her inner muscles gripping his cock each time he thrust inside her made him lose what was left of his sanity.
“Kiss me.” She licked her lips, and her face was rosy with passion. Passion that was just for him. He liked that. He liked that far more than he should. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, a tiny, knowing smile kicking up the corner of her mouth as she deliberately fisted her pussy around his cock.