Shadowed Lover

by Lauren Dawes

  He grazed her skin with his teeth as he made his way back to her mouth, nipping at her bottom lip. Neve shuddered, pressing his lower body closer to hers. His cock rubbed through her cleft, and his hips thrust forward. She made an impatient sound in the back of her throat, angling her hips so that the next pass he made, he was nudging her entrance.

  Liquid heat pooled between her legs, inviting him in. She was so ready for him, the thought going straight to his chest, cleaving him with equal parts of longing and need. She wanted him. Just as much as he wanted her. And it was the best fucking aphrodisiac in the world.

  Another plaintive moan escaped her throat, a noise that hit him on the most basic level. His mate was desperate, and he needed to ease her ache.

  “Please.” She drew out the last syllable, her body undulating beneath him. His willpower snapped, and he eased into her heat. Her slick channel squeezed around his cock, making his concentration slip. He wanted to take this slowly, but as soon as Neve clamped around him, his cat surged forward, demanding that he mark her. He barely resisted the urge to follow through, forcing his teeth together and clenching them tight until his jaw ached.

  He watched her through heavy-lidded eyes, loving the way a flush of color came to her cheeks. The noises she made would be his undoing, though. She mewled like a kitten, gripping his shoulders like she was afraid he would simply disappear if she wasn’t touching him.

  He squeezed his eyes shut, savoring the sensations, savoring everything that passed between them. This was the female his cat had claimed, the female he’d fallen in love with the moment he’d seen her. She was his strength, his weakness, his arnasa.

  Neve brushed her fingertips across his cheek, and he opened his eyes, seeing her own need reflected. Slowly flexing his hips, he drove his cock inside her, sealing his mouth on hers and swallowed her sweet cries of pleasure. Retreating, he slid back into her, deeper this time. A hiss rumbled through his chest and crawled up his throat.

  She arched her back, pressing her breasts against his chest. Breaking the kiss, he latched on to one of her breasts, teasing the nipple with lazy strokes. Neve thrashed her head back and forth, his name on her lips in a prayer. Again, he retreated, gritting his teeth when he returned deep into her heat. Her inner muscles gripped him tighter, tearing away the self-control he forced himself to have.

  On the next upstroke, Neve raised her hips, deepening the angle and making his brain fuzz out to white.

  “Drake,” she whimpered. “I’m going to come.”

  Yeah, well, he was right there with her. He kissed her again, slamming his lips to hers, his tongue invading the warm, wet recesses of her mouth. Neve’s inner muscles began to clench around him, and she moaned, the noise swallowed by their kiss. His thrusts became more hurried then, a spear of heat hitting him as she came apart beneath him. She threw her head back into the pillow, her moans of ecstasy fueling him. A few shallow thrusts later, and he was spilling inside her, marking her as his, even if she didn’t know it.

  His pistoning hips slowly eased until he was boneless. Rolling off her, he gave her the space to breathe as both of their racing hearts returned to normal. He tucked her against him, stroking her long dark hair back from her face. Her breathing eased into deep breaths that eventually turned into soft snores, and his cat was happy she was so relaxed with him. She trusted him, because Neve wasn’t the kind of female who let her guard down so easily.

  24

  Avah had woken up before her alarm went off. She was too wired to sleep—too wired, and too excited about what was happening that day.

  She threw the blankets from her body and slid from the hotel bed. As far as hotel beds went, it wasn’t bad. She’d had her fair share of lumpy pillows and bowing mattresses, but at least she’d had a decent night’s sleep here.

  Padding to the window, she opened up the heavy drapes and looked out at downtown Great Falls. Montana was a stunning state, its geography so picturesque, you couldn’t be blamed for mistaking it for a fictionalized, fantasized state. She sucked in a deep breath and let it out. Today was the day. She felt good about it.

  Her interview with the editor-in-chief at Great Falls Tribune was set for ten-thirty. That gave her plenty of time to get ready, have a good breakfast, and prepare to talk herself and her credentials up enough to secure the copyediting position her college friend had told her about. She knew it was way above her experience, but fortune favored the bold, and she was feeling particularly bold today.

  The thought of returning to Portland was already distasteful to her, and she decided that if she didn’t get this position, she would apply for any other job she could find. She didn’t want to return to that small house, to that shit job. Sure, she’d miss Phil, but he’d get over it. He’d move on and work Obits like he always did. He was a survivor, just like she was.

  Turning around, she went into the bathroom and got the shower going. Peeling off her pajamas, she got under the spray and wet her hair. She wasn’t used to having this much time in the mornings. Usually it was a mad dash to the office that resulted in breakfast on the run and the dark sludge that was passed off for coffee in the office.

  Rubbing shampoo through her hair, she took her time, massaging the stuff through before rinsing it out. She could get used to this. She really could. After the soap-rinse routine, she got out and dressed before drying her hair and applying some makeup. She’d decided to have breakfast out this morning and had Googled a café close to the paper where she could have a leisurely breakfast, then go and dazzle Erin Cottle, EIC of the Great Falls Tribune.

  She dressed in a navy business suit that she hardly wore because her job at the Portland Observer was relaxed to say the least. She’d bought it when she started at the Observer, but soon learned that jeans and a sweater or T-shirt was enough professionalism for that job.

  But she wanted to make a good impression.

  She wanted this.

  Slipping her pumps on, she grabbed her laptop and bag and locked up her room. The ride down to the lobby was a quiet one, the three-sided mirrored car reflecting herself back at her. She had to say she looked good. As the car slowed to a stop, she greeted the reception staff and gave them a wave on her way out the door.

  She walked to the café, which was only four short blocks away, and entered to a greeting from the girl behind the counter and the hipster behind the coffee machine.

  “Take a seat, and I’ll be right with you, hon,” the girl said, picking up a pad of paper and making her way over. She was fresh-faced, like she was ready to face the world and make it her bitch.

  “What can I get you, sweetheart?”

  Avah smiled. The girl seemed too young to be calling her sweetheart, but she rolled with it. Picking up a menu from the table, she gave it a cursory glance then put it back down.

  “What would you recommend?”

  The girl laid her pen flat on her little pad of paper and smiled. “The blueberry pancakes are to die for, and Sam here,” she gestured to the guy behind the stainless steel monster puffing out steam and grinding beans, “makes the best coffee in Great Falls.”

  “You had me at pancakes.” She smiled. “And I’ll take a hazelnut latte as well, please.”

  “You got it, sweetheart.”

  When the waitress left, Avah bent down and pulled out her laptop, firing the thing up.

  “Do you have a Wi-Fi password?’ she asked Sam as he frothed the milk for whatever order he was working on.

  He wiped the sweat from his brow with his bicep, the lean muscles contracting under the short sleeve of his shirt. “Yeah. It’s KoffeeBeen - capital K and B, ‘been’ like the past tense of ‘to be’ and all one word.”

  Avah typed the case-sensitive nightmare in and waited. Bingo! She was in.

  “Thanks,” she told him with a smile, opening up a browser that loaded the Observer as her homepage.

  He smiled back at her, his straight white teeth blinding her temporarily. “No problems. You’re not from around her
e, are you?”

  “No. Portland.”

  “Texas?” he asked.

  She laughed. “Oregon.”

  “Did you know there are nine Portlands in the US alone?” He pulled the stainless milk jug from the steam wand on his behemoth of an espresso machine and wiped it down. “And another three around the world? Two in Australia?”

  “I did not know that,” she replied. “I should start saying the state, too.”

  He grinned. “Not a bad idea, really.”

  Avah’s phone vibrated on the table. Glancing at it quickly to see who was calling her, she picked it up and said to Sam, “I’m sorry, but I have to get this.”

  He nodded and got back to his coffee while she answered the call.

  “Phil,” she said, bracing herself for the grilling.

  “Avah May,” he said. “Where are you?”

  She glanced out the large front window of the café. “Great Falls, Montana.”

  “Montana?” he replied, unable to hide his surprise. “What the hell are you doing over there?”

  Clearing her throat, she ran her index and middle fingers over the touchpad on her laptop, scrolling through the news articles.

  “Avah?” His voice deepened and got quieter simultaneously.

  She sucked in a breath. She was a big girl. She could entertain the idea of getting another job in a different state without having to ask permission.

  Really.

  So why did she feel like she was betraying Phil somehow?

  “I’m interviewing at another paper.”

  There was a hiss over the line. “Fuck.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” she blurted out, genuinely feeling remorseful. He was her only real friend in Portland, and he had taken her under his wing when she’d started at the paper fresh out of college.

  “What position are they offering?”

  Her coffee was placed in front of her, and she smiled at Sam in thanks. “Copyeditor,” she told Phil, slowly stirring the caramel-colored foam into the coffee. She dumped in a couple of sugars and stirred some more, watching the silver stripe of the spoon cutting through the frothy milk.

  He whistled. “Damn, girl. Heading up.”

  His levity gave her hope. “Please don’t hate me.”

  “Why would I hate you, Avah May? You’re just leaving me alone in this cesspool of human beings who are about as deep as a puddle.”

  She laughed. “I’m sure you’ll be just fine.”

  “A small selfish part of me wants you to crash and burn in that interview, but the other part of me hopes you knock it out of the fucking park. You’re a great reporter who’s languishing away here. I’ll miss you, but I know you’re destined for greater things.”

  Damn, did she have something in her eye? She wiped her fingers beneath them and said, “You’re a real saint, you know that, Phil? I don’t deserve to have a friend like you.”

  “How about a lover?” he asked in a soft growl, and she laughed just picturing how he’d be jogging his eyebrows at her.

  “I’ll call you later, okay? I don’t think I’ll find out for a while, so I’ll be back in the office the day after tomorrow.”

  “I'll hold you to that.”

  There was a long pause, like neither of them wanted to end the call first. “I’ll speak to you later,” she said, hanging up. Placing her phone back down, she stared at the screen until it winked back into darkness.

  “And here I have the blueberry pancakes for you, sweetheart,” the waitress announced. As she made a show of placing them on the table, Avah smiled. She liked this small-town style hospitality. It made a person want to stay a little longer.

  “Anything else I can get for you?”

  “No. Thank you. Everything looks great.”

  The woman smiled and walked away, greeting the new customer who’d just walked through the door with a jangle of bells as an announcement. Avah picked up her cutlery, cutting her pancakes into one-inch squares before drowning them in syrup.

  As she ate, she read through the newspaper’s online edition, taking note of yet another woman going missing in Portland. How many did that make now, and how had their bodies not been found? They’d have to be dead by now, the chances of surviving an abduction reduced exponentially with each passing twelve hours.

  When her phone rang again, she didn’t bother to check who it was this time.

  “Detective,” she said. “How are you?”

  “How did you know it was me?” Detective Smith asked her.

  “I’ve just finished reading about the latest victim of the mysterious missing girls phenomenon. Do the police have any leads?”

  “None, and we’re getting concerned. That last girl? She was the niece of one of the beat cops here at the station.”

  “Damn,” she muttered. “That’s tough. How’s the guy holding up?”

  “As well as can be expected, considering we’re gearing up to look for cadavers.”

  “When do you think it’s all going to stop?” She speared another bite of pancake onto her fork, but had second thoughts about putting it in her mouth. She’d suddenly lost her appetite. Pushing the plate away, she listened as the detective danced around the real question, never giving her a solid answer. He was wary, and she got it. Despite them having a good working relationship where she never used the information she learned in a way that was detrimental to the case, this was obviously getting out of hand.

  “Have there been any other reports of missing girls outside of Portland, or is it an isolated case?” she asked when he’d finished speaking.

  “Just here so far, but I’m waiting for new reports to start filtering through.” There was a heavy thump like his fist just got acquainted with his desk. “Dammit!”

  “Hey, you’ll find them, Detective.”

  A heavy sigh.

  An even heavier silence.

  “Yeah, but will they still be breathing?”

  They both knew the answer to that question, but they were both unwilling to accept it.

  “I’m sorry to bail on you, but I’m late for an interview.” As soon as the words came out of her mouth, she tried to backpedal. “I mean, meeting. Team meeting.”

  Dammit.

  “Are you leaving the Observer?”

  “Maybe,” she replied. “I’m interviewing today.”

  “Heading over to the Trib or something?”

  “No, actually. I’m in Montana.”

  “Well, I’ll miss you if you get it.”

  For the second time that morning, she felt a tear prick the corner of her eye. “I’ll miss you too, Detective.”

  “You can call me Chris. We’ve been working together for too long for the formality.”

  “All right. Speak to you later, Chris.”

  “Goodbye, Avah.”

  She hung up and took a sip from her coffee, her eyes darting down to the clock on the top right hand side of her screen. Shit. It was already nine-thirty. Shutting the lid, she packed away her computer and slid it back into her bag. After placing some money onto her table, she waved goodbye to Sam and the waitress she never got the name of, and left to the jingle of bells.

  As far as interviews went, Avah had only had two in her life. That was her second one, and she thought it went pretty well, considering she was fighting for the chance to prove herself.

  Erin Cottle had been a hard-nosed woman battling to stay standing in a traditionally male-dominated world, and she was doing a fantastic job. Avah liked her—a lot—and even though she fired some tough questions at her, Avah felt like she’d not only answered them competently, but she’d answered them well. Only time would tell whether she’d made a big enough impression on the woman.

  As she strode through the marble lobby, she tried not to get too distracted by how professional and well-appointed this building was. From the outside, it looked like a concrete box, so she was pleasantly surprised to see the interior was warmly decorated.

  “Avah!” someone cal
led behind her. She spun around to find Tilly walking quickly toward her. Her college friend’s lovely blonde hair was bound tightly to her head, a French knot securing it in place like it was a naughty puppy who kept getting out and making a mess. Her pixie-like face was unadorned by makeup, but then again, she didn’t need it. It was like she hadn’t aged at all.

  “How did it go?” she asked.

  Avah shrugged. “It’s hard to get a read on your boss.”

  “Oh, tell me about it,” Tilly replied with that same steady smile she remembered. “What are you doing now?”

  It was nearing midday, and after pushing away her breakfast that morning, she said, “I’m famished.”

  “Food. Good. Let’s go.”

  Tilly led the way through the revolving glass doors and out on the street. Pulling her jacket closer to her neck, Avah shivered at the bite in the air, despite the sun being at its peak.

  “Do you still eat Japanese?” Tilly asked, unbothered by the chill.

  “Yeah.”

  “Fantastic! There’s a new place here in town I’ve been wanting to try out. And you are my perfect excuse. Come on.”

  Avah and Tilly walked a few blocks away from the newspaper, arriving at a small hole-in-the-wall place that was nothing but a glass door. Tilly pushed inside, and Avah followed to get out of the wind. She looked up in awe of the cavernous space that seemed to have appeared out of nothing.

  “It’s built behind the other shop fronts, using the space that most of the time gets forgotten about. Come on.” She took her hand and walked her to a table. As they sat down, a lovely dark-haired woman dressed in a geisha-esque costume came over to them with two menus.

  “Something to drink, ladies?” she asked, her American accent a hard-edge to her lovely Asian features.

  “Sake, please.”

  She bowed and disappeared.

  “Isn’t it a little too early to be drinking?” she asked Tilly, who was already perusing the menu.

  “It’s five o’clock in the world somewhere, right?” she replied with a grin.