Nightshift Bundle with Wolf Tales & Embrace The Night

by Kate Douglas

  She shrugged as if he were a complete fool for asking, and for a minute he thought he must be, because there was no way in hell he’d ever forget bringing someone like Zianne home to his apartment. There wasn’t enough alcohol in the world to make him forget a woman like her.

  A memory flashed through his mind, of Zianne kneeling before him in the shower, her mouth ... Dear God. Her mouth!

  She smiled with those perfect, lush lips and stroked his cheek with her fingertips. Her touch was soft and warm. Perfect.

  “You brought me here.” Her scent enveloped him, stealing his thoughts from the question.

  Fresh-baked cookies. Vanilla and honey ... why does she smell so familiar? And then it came to him, the memory so subtle it held a dreamlike quality. Comforting smells from a childhood he’d long forgotten. A time when his parents still lived, when he’d had a real home, a real family.

  A time before he was four years old and the world as he knew it ended. No matter. He couldn’t go back, couldn’t change the car accident that took his mom and dad’s lives, the accident that left him unharmed and alone. Quickly Mac blocked the actual pain he experienced whenever that time intruded.

  He couldn’t change what was, though he could enjoy the spark of memory from before. Could enjoy the warm scent of Zianne in his arms. Mac took a deep breath and stared into those unbelievable violet eyes. Who in the hell was she?

  Zianne smiled, leaned close, and kissed him, enveloping Mac in more of that subtle, sweet perfume. Her lips moved slowly, warm and soft, over his mouth. Sex personified.

  Need blossomed. Need on so many levels, so many different wants and desires. Love. Sex. Companionship. Friendship. Other than Dink, he’d been alone for so long he’d forgotten what it felt like to have someone close, someone who mattered. Zianne’s kiss promised to fill needs Mac had forgotten he ever had.

  Her taste was even sweeter than her scent. Zianne’s mouth moved over his, tasting, nipping, licking. She slid closer until she lay atop him, until her lips covered his and her tongue probed the sensitive flesh above his teeth, inside his mouth. Her hands were in his hair, her fingers separating the strands and sending shivers of pure fire along his spine. She held him and kissed him deep; explored his mouth with her mobile tongue.

  He remembered the way her lips had felt around his cock. It had to have been her, but how? He couldn’t have imagined something as real as her mouth on him then. On him now. She’d sucked him deep, taken his seed and swallowed every drop. Now she made love to his mouth, the intensity of her kiss pulling all he was, all he had to give—just as she’d done before.

  Mac’s body grew hard beneath her long, supple length. His cock rose between her thighs, his muscles rippled beneath his skin. The weight of her breasts on his chest made him strangely angry. He wanted to see them. Wanted to nuzzle his lips and face against their softness, but she’d taken control and he didn’t fight her for dominance. He had no will of his own. None.

  He couldn’t fight her. Could only lie here beneath her perfect body as she made love to him. As she took him, raising up on her knees, grabbing his turgid length in her fist, placing the broad head between her thighs.

  There was the briefest awareness of soft, damp curls, of even softer, wetter lips. Then she arched her back and came down on him, all in one smooth, flowing motion that drove him deep inside. He felt heat and the ripple of flexing muscles, then a smooth, wet channel gripping him in an unforgivable vise, pure sensual pleasure personified in this perfect woman.

  He raised his hips and thrust hard against her, reaching now for those breasts she so proudly displayed. His palms cupped their weight, his fingers found the taut nipples and he pinched them. She moaned and he twisted the sensitive tips, waiting for Zianne to beg him to stop. Instead, she moaned her pleasure and her hips moved over him until he and she caught the same rhythm.

  He stopped pinching and lightly stroked and teased the rosy tips, then cupped her breasts fully in his hands as their bodies danced to an unseen orchestra, to the beat of the heavy drum of thundering hearts, to the song of blood rushing through veins and the discordant harmony of straining lungs.

  Caught in a maelstrom of unimaginable lust, he thrust into her, grabbing her by the waist, lifting her up, pulling her close. The slap of flesh against flesh echoed, of lungs gasping for air as they raced each other to the finish. Zianne’s body was hot and alive, quivering beneath his hands, her eyes hooded beneath their dark fringe of lashes, her full lips parted. She watched him. Watched him with an intensity that might have frightened him at another time.

  Not now.

  Now Mac was trapped in a delirium of need, his body connected at a visceral level he’d never experienced, his heart and soul held by too many emotions he couldn’t identify. Emotions he didn’t try to name, because they couldn’t be. They couldn’t exist in his world. Hadn’t existed in MacArthur Dugan’s life since that long-ago time before his parents died.

  He’d not known true happiness since then. Nor had he felt real love, and he couldn’t feel it now. This could not possibly be love, not this amazing sexual experience with a woman he didn’t know, a woman he might never see again.

  The thought left him bereft as it flitted through what little bit of his mind still functioned on a conscious level. Then everything fled, wiped out by the full-on experience of orgasm. By the overwhelming sensation of everything he was, everything he had to give—all of it flying out of him, leaving him entirely. Leaving Mac, and entering Zianne.

  She arched her back and pressed close. Took his heart, took his soul, took his seed. She cried out as her long nails dug into his ribs, leaving red furrows behind. He welcomed the pain. Added it to the sensations ripping him in two as he practically came apart, pumping his seed deep into her welcoming body.

  Mac’s heart thundered in his ears. He felt its counterpart in Zianne’s racing heart when she collapsed against him. Her tangled hair covered his mouth, her lips were pursed against his sweat-slick chest, blowing tiny puffs with each escaping breath.

  It took everything he had to raise his right hand and stroke her smooth shoulder. Enervated, he was weak as a kitten, yet his mind seemed unnaturally clear. Impossible, considering how much he’d had to drink tonight, but he was more aware of this woman, more aware of his body and the way it connected to hers, than he’d ever felt with anyone before.

  Her inner muscles still pulsed in a slow, rhythmic clench and release around him, and he wanted nothing more than to make love to her again. To repeat what had been a singular experience, something he’d never once felt in his twenty-six years. They’d shared more than mere sex. There’d been something else, a connection he couldn’t explain. A feeling of knowing, as if Zianne knew and understood him in ways no one else ever had.

  Or ever could. As if he knew Zianne the same way. Except Mac knew nothing at all. Who she was. Where she came from. How he’d met her. How she’d come to be in his apartment.

  In his shower?

  So many questions. So much he wanted to talk to her about, but his eyelids grew heavy and his heart rate slowed. His breath no longer huffed in and out of his lungs as if he’d run a mile.

  Zianne lay across him, apparently asleep with his softening penis still buried deep inside her. He knew there were things he should wonder, but her body was soft and warm over his and her perfume took him back to that childhood he barely recalled.

  With the scent of honey and vanilla, and Zianne’s thick, black hair tickling his nose, Mac tightened his arms around her waist and drifted closer to sleep. They’d talk in the morning. For now, though, his world felt right. As if the problems bedeviling him for so long weren’t problems at all. Not with Zianne in his arms. As long as he had her beside him, Mac imagined he could do anything. Anything at all.

  3

  Shaken, Zianne stood for a moment beside the bed. Her fingers drifted softly across his shoulder, over skin damp from their loving. Her body, this unfamiliar form, still trembled from the force of his p
assion, her passion. It had left her energized in ways she’d not expected.

  And confused in a manner she’d never experienced. She whispered his name. “Mac.” Rolling the sound on her tongue, she gazed at him with hope, and with more than a little guilt. She’d touched his mind tonight. Touched his memories, discovered his needs, and then she’d filled them. Such a simple thing, to return the fantasy after he’d shared so much delicious energy.

  There was untapped depth to this man. Reservoirs of strength she’d not expected, and he was not nearly as alien as his form suggested. He was more like her than she’d imagined. Not merely his intelligence—no, it was more than that. Emotions she’d thought only the Nyrians possessed, needs very similar to her own. A need for family, for connection. For love.

  She’d touched those needs on a level deeper than she’d expected. Had shared even more with MacArthur Dugan than she’d planned. Was that why she felt so unsettled and confused? So filled with emotions and, curiously, with regret?

  She didn’t understand why she regretted the simple manipulation of his thoughts—she’d merely given him the feelings he needed. Maybe the elders could explain. She hoped so. An entire race of sentient beings depended on her success.

  A shaft of morning sunlight cut across Mac’s closed eyelids. Blinking against the pain of daylight and too much alcohol, he slowly rolled to the edge of the bed and pushed himself upright. What a night. And what a weird bunch of dreams.

  He sat there a moment, cataloging all the things about him that hurt. The list was longer than usual.

  “Damn.” It hurt to blink. Hurt to move. Even hurt to breathe. He ran his fingers through his mussed hair and tried to think. That hurt, too.

  He scratched his chest and ran his fingers down the ribs on his left side. “Shit. What the hell ... ?”

  Blinking owlishly, Mac raised his left arm and stared with bleary eyes at the red lines running across his ribs. Frowning, he twisted slowly and painfully and focused on the matching scratches down his right side. Snapped his head around and stared over his shoulder at the rumpled sheets on the bed.

  He thought he’d dreamed her. Sex in the shower, in his bed. It had all been a dream. He was alone. He should be alone.

  Except he hadn’t been alone last night.

  Memories flashed, exploding so fast and furious they made his aching head spin. The woman. The sex. The thick, black curls tickling his nose. The sex. Her mouth around his dick. The flick of her tongue across his sensitive glans.

  Her fingers. He groaned. Those long, mobile fingers, stroking. Tugging. Twisting and squeezing. Pain and pleasure and more pleasure. Arousal so intense it almost fried his brain. A connection unlike anything he’d ever experienced with a woman so perfect she would be forever imprinted on his mind.

  Images raced through his head. His semi-aroused morning wood rose up into action mode. Mac groaned. He lay back down on the bed with his feet still planted on the floor. Zianne. She’d said her name was Zianne, but where the hell was she?

  He sniffed the air, and caught it—the faint scent of vanilla and honey almost lost in the pungent odor of sex and sweat. “Zianne? Hey, Zianne?” He listened to the familiar sounds of an empty apartment. Dripping faucet, neighbor’s shower, cars passing by four floors down. “Zianne? Are you here?” Nothing.

  Rubbing his fingers across his belly, Mac sighed. Where the hell’d she go? If not for the scent lingering in the air, the raw scratches across his ribs, he’d chalk her up to too much beer or an overblown wet dream. Or both. But she wasn’t a dream.

  Good God ... how many times had they screwed last night?

  Made love? No. MacArthur Dugan didn’t do love, but what they’d shared went so far beyond mere screwing he wasn’t sure what to call it. So unbelievable that if not for the scratches across his ribs, he’d think he’d imagined her. It. The sex.

  Damn. The sex. He absentmindedly stroked his erection, remembering the feel of her lips on him, the way her violet eyes had somehow looked right inside him. He and Zianne had hardly talked, but he’d felt a connection to her unlike anything he’d ever experienced.

  How the hell did you explain something like that?

  And where the hell was she this morning?

  Just thinking about her made him harder, so he kept stroking and squeezing his dick with his right hand, reached beneath to cup his balls with his left.

  She’d sucked on them last night. Sucked first one ball and then the other between those gorgeous lips. She’d used her tongue and the pressure of her cheeks to take him just to the point of pain, just to the place where he’d felt the first frisson of panic that she might actually hurt him.

  But she didn’t. No, she’d held him there, torturing him on the edge of pure bliss, sucking and stroking and somehow knowing exactly how much pressure it took, how hard to squeeze, how lightly she could lick and taste until he couldn’t take any more. Just thinking about her now had him on the edge. Had him gripping his balls tighter, stroking faster, breathing harder.

  She’d explored his slit with the tip of her tongue, stretched the tiny opening and lapped up every drop of pre-cum. She’d used her teeth, nipping at the edge of his glans and along the thick vein on the underside. Short, sharp little bites that, along with the sucking and squeezing and licking, made him nuts.

  He tried to remember exactly how it felt and what she’d done, and suddenly he was groaning, coming all over himself, shooting thick streams of ejaculate over his hand and wrist and making a mess.

  After so much sex the night before, he couldn’t believe there was anything left. His orgasm seemed to take forever, not that he wanted to rush it. His cock continued to pulse in time with his racing heartbeat long after the flow stopped.

  So now he was hungover and covered with spunk, without a clue who the hell Zianne was, where she’d come from, where she’d gone. Well, he was damned well going to find her.

  If only he knew where to start. Groaning, Mac rolled back to a sitting position and shoved himself off the bed. A shower first. And coffee. Lots of coffee. Then he’d search for Zianne.

  “Crap.” Mac slammed the cupboard door and rubbed his pounding head. No coffee. Grabbing his backpack, he headed for the coffee shop across the street. Dink was there, sitting alone in the back, leaning forward with his head in his hands.

  He looked as rough as Mac felt, which, for some reason, made Mac feel better. He dumped his pack on the chair across from Dink. The loud thunk when it landed earned him a curse and a bloodshot glare. Smiling innocently, Mac walked to the counter and bought a cup of French roast and a blueberry muffin.

  Still grinning, he carried his breakfast to the table. “Rough night?”

  Dink still glared at him.

  Feeling better by the minute, Mac sat. “You get that paper printed out? I left the file on a floppy on your desk.” He sipped the coffee, imagining little caffeine soldiers racing into his bloodstream, and wishing they would hurry.

  “Yeah. Thanks.” Dink stared at his coffee. “I turned it in first thing. Thank God I don’t have another class until after lunch.” He groaned. “Crap, man. Why do you let me do this to myself?”

  Mac took another swallow. “I’m not your mother.”

  Dink grinned at him. “Fuck. You’d make one ugly mother.”

  Mac popped him a middle-finger salute. It was the best he could come up with, at least until the caffeine did its job. He took another swallow. “Dink? You ever hear me mention a chick named Zianne? Dark hair, violet eyes?”

  “Not the name.” He shook his head. “That sounds like your fantasy woman, remember? We might have been almost sober when we were into that part of the conversation.”

  “‘Almost’ being the descriptive word here.” Mac sighed and took a bite of his muffin.

  Dink didn’t say anything. He just stared into his coffee cup. Finally he raised his head and narrowed his gaze. “You’ve got bigger worries than women. What’re you going to do about Bennett? I saw the bastard again
this morning.”

  “I have no idea. The project notes are gone. All of them.” He snorted his disgust. “No way I know of to prove I’m innocent if Dean Johnson won’t let me argue the project in front of the committee. That’s the only way I can possibly prove it’s mine.”

  “That sucks. You know it inside out. I doubt Phil Bennett knows his ass from a hole in the ground. Have you thought of going directly to the grant committee?”

  “It might work, if I could get to them.” Mac leaned back in his chair and stared at Dink. “Any grand ideas, smart guy?”

  “Can’t you just make an appointment?”

  Mac shook his head. “Won’t work. Dean Johnson’s not just on the committee. I could offer to meet with the chairman, but the dean’s got a lot of power in this—he administers the funds, and he’s convinced I’m guilty. I’m screwed.”

  Dink finished his coffee, stood, and tossed the cup in the trash. “It wouldn’t hurt to ask, Mac. Think about it.” He slapped Mac on the shoulder as he left. “This is your entire professional future we’re talking about.”

  Mac watched as Dink left the coffee shop. Times like this he almost wished he were wired like Dink. Wished he could go home with his best friend and fuck until he didn’t care anymore. Dink’s devotion was the one constant in Mac’s life, the one thing he knew he could always count on.

  But he couldn’t be what Dink needed. He could only be who he was, and that was one fucked-up bastard. Mac sat alone, sipping his cooling cup of coffee, thinking of Dink’s comment. “Entire professional future. Fuck.” He stared into his cup and sighed. “Like I have one?” After a moment, he tossed the cup in the trash and headed back to his apartment.

  No scent of vanilla and honey greeted him this time. If he didn’t know better, he’d wonder if he’d imagined the whole scene last night, but there were those long scratches on his ribs and the fact he knew his imagination wasn’t good enough to have conjured up someone like her. Hell, she even had a name. Zianne.