Leopard's Rage

by Christine Feehan

  “It is more difficult with a mature tree,” Flambé conceded, “but we’ve got many already planted on our property that my father began years ago with the idea in mind that we might need to use them for special clients. There weren’t that many shifters in this area, but he planned ahead. I’m doing the same thing. When I take an older tree, I plant several more and work on them in order to shape them accordingly. Still . . .” She broke off, looking up at the loft, shaking her head with a small smile. “I don’t think we have anything close to the size we’d need. I’ll have to find one of our fastest-growing, tallest trees and try to accelerate it a bit.”

  “It would be great if the branches could extend out in both directions, encompassing both garages fairly equally to bring the two buildings together so they look as if they were always supposed to be one building.” He flashed a small smile. “Not to mention, a strong tree branch would be an anchor for good suspension.”

  She laughed. “Naturally you’d think like that.”

  “And you weren’t?” he challenged.

  She blushed. “I suppose I was.” Flambé rubbed her arm and then rolled the water bottle over her skin.

  Sevastyan dropped his gaze to her arm. Her skin had turned a rosy strawberry and something seemed to run under it for just a moment. Shturm roared. The wave receded.

  She frowned and indicated they start back to the house, turning away from him, quickening her steps in an effort to put distance between them. His longer strides made that impossible.

  “What’s wrong, Flambé?” He poured concern into his voice. “Did you hurt yourself?”

  She shook her head. “It’s nothing. I should have put on more sunscreen. I’m so fair I burn easily.”

  She stepped back when he reached around her to open the door, avoiding his body brushing hers. He didn’t let that happen, crowding her just a little. A little shiver went through her. Definitely sensitive. He followed her up the stairs, watching the sway of her ass. She had a way of moving that could make any man notice.

  Sevastyan waited until they were in the bedroom and he’d closed the door and leaned against it. “Go in and shower. When you come out, I’ll put lotion on you.”

  Her tongue touched her lips and her eyes went green and gold, flicking to his face, barely meeting his gaze then shying away. Already, the haze was starting. She was equating their bedroom with his place of domination. He also wanted it be her safe place. Her haven. She was still very torn. In the ropes she felt safe. But outside of them, she was emotionally terrified. That dichotomy just didn’t make sense.

  He stepped close to her and cupped her chin, sliding his thumb over her lower lip. “Baby, take your shower.”

  “You rubbing lotion on my skin will make me burn so hot I’ll go insane, Sevastyan,” she confessed in a low voice, as if she felt guilty.

  His thumb strummed her lower lip like an instrument, knowing her sex was keeping that same pulse. “That’s not a bad thing, Flambé. We’re in our room. Even if we were downstairs and you were burning hot, I’d take care of you. This is our home. If we were having a dinner party and you needed me, you just crook your little finger and I’ll figure it out. It’s my job to put the fire out.” He bent his head and brushed a kiss across her eyes. “I like my job.”

  “Why did your cat bite me again? This morning, when you were holding me, he bit me. I was so far gone, I barely knew it, but he did. Flamme rose again. I felt her for a moment. She went wild. Why did he do that?”

  He slid his hands down her body to find the hem of her tank. “Shturm has been worried about your little female.” He pulled the shirt over her head and removed her sports bra, spilling her breasts into the cooler air. Gently he cupped the full mounds, thumbs sliding over her nipples. “I love how responsive you are. One small touch and you’re ready for anything.” He tugged and rolled with equal gentleness. When she shivered, he pinched with much more firmness.

  “Why has he been worried?”

  “She should have been making more appearances, even if they were brief. He wanted to ensure she knew he would take care of her and you. That he’d protect both of you.”

  “But he didn’t have to claim her again, did he?” she protested.

  He clamped down on her nipples, pinching between his thumb and finger, leaning forward to kiss her neck. “Take off your shorts, Flambé. When you move your hips like that, is the material rubbing? When you rub does it burn?” He increased the pressure on her nipples, distracting her. “I thought about that when you were running ahead of me, the friction between your legs. What kind of panties I wanted to buy for you so you could run and I could torment you and know you were thinking about me while you ran. Were you, baby? Were you thinking about my cock and what it could do to you? How it can make you scream?”

  She gasped and came up on her toes. “Yes.” The confession came out in a rush. “You’re all I thought about. You’re mostly what I think about when I’m not working.”

  He bent his head to her left breast and sucked, pressing her nipple to the roof of his mouth and then teasing it with a lash of his tongue. She had rope marks around both breasts. Those marks were the deepest. He traced the circles while he gave her right breast equal attention. When he lifted his head, he spun her around abruptly and gave her a little push toward the bathroom, swatting her ass. “Shower.”

  By the time Flambé returned, he had everything he wanted set out beside his favorite chair. He showered, taking his time, knowing she was waiting for him naked, walking around the room because he hadn’t told her to stand, hadn’t indicated that he was going to tie her. The anticipation was building in her.

  In spite of her desire to deny that her hormones were getting out of control, her female leopard rising to add to the fire already continually spreading through her nerve endings, Flambé couldn’t stay still. Restless, she rubbed her thighs together and paced the floor, casting glances toward the glass door and then toward his chair and the things he had set out.

  Sevastyan came into the bedroom completely naked. He knew he looked intimidating. He was big, a brutal-looking man with a thick, wide chest covered in defined muscles and various scars. His cock could be intimidating as well, but Flambé never found it that way. She always seemed fascinated, always prepared to be adoring. What man didn’t want his woman to have adoration for his cock?

  He sank into his chair and beckoned her to stand in front of him, facing him. Immediately he pushed her thighs apart. “Are you burning up now?” He kept his voice soft. That same tone that told her he was in charge and expected answers. His fingers moved up her inner thigh slowly, brushing flames deliberately.

  “Yes.”

  “Here?” He flicked her already exposed clit and she moaned. She was totally inflamed. He flicked a second time a little harder and she had to steady herself, a cry breaking free. “Yes, right there. Everywhere.”

  “I can see that. Kneel down, legs apart, and let me get this lotion on your arms and shoulders and then I’ll see what I can do to help. Keep your knees wide, and face me so I can rub this on your breasts as well.”

  Obediently, Flambé sank down, not paying much attention until her sex hit the knots in the rough rug made of sisal rope. He had painstakingly made the rug himself, tying the knots and then weaving the rounds until he had a good-sized piece he could use. He’d stashed it just in case it could be useful someday. He was very glad he’d done so when she gave another little cry and rocked her hips.

  “Baby, you need to try to stay still for me.” The rough rope would play over her burning sex and the knots would slide on her tender inflamed parts, adding to the coiling tension so that she would strain for release.

  He took the lotion and began a slow massage into her neck and shoulders. At first, the lotion had a soothing effect on her skin. He knew it would. It had natural aloe vera in it, but his touch on her body was sensual, whispering over her pr
essure points, the ones that triggered her needs, that ones that heightened her awareness of him. His hands slid from her arms to her breasts, massaging the lotion into the full mounds, cupping the soft weight and massaging lotion into the undersides, not wanting to be neglectful.

  “Turn around for me. No, don’t get up, just spin around, keep your knees wide.”

  She closed her eyes and obeyed him, grinding down on the knots as she did, rocking her hips forward, a kind of long groaning sound of need escaping. He simply continued with the slow massage, starting with her neck, digging his fingers deep into her tense muscles, finding every trigger point. Occasionally, he bent forward and nipped at her earlobe or whispered a kiss along her ear, watching the goose bumps rise on her skin.

  When her skin was glowing and she felt hot, when she couldn’t stop moving, he put the lotion down and reached around to her front, very gently covering her breasts with his palms. “Baby, if you prefer, you can go lie on the bed and I’ll make love to you slow and easy and take away that burn right now. I’ve never tied you twice in one day and you’re already climbing out of your skull. That can either be a good thing or a bad thing. I don’t want you burning to the point of hurting. I want you burning to the point of anticipating. If you want to stop, we’ll stop, and I’ll give you my cock, let you sleep while I make us dinner and then you can rest again.”

  He fell silent and waited. Flambé didn’t disappoint him. She tilted her back until it was nearly in his lap, her nipples hard little points of flame in his palms.

  “Or what?”

  “I’ve wanted to build a pattern called the necklace on you. I think it will look beautiful. It really depends on how tired you are.” One finger slid back and forth along the side of her breast, adding to the flickering flames of electricity snapping over her skin.

  Her hips rocked. She kept her head in his lap, her back stretched, her breasts thrust into his palms. “I’m never too tired for you to tie me, Sevastyan.”

  His heart stuttered. He heard the note of truth leopards couldn’t hide from one another. She had seen the bundle of green rope, silk, a stark contrast to the sisal rope rubbing on her bare pussy. He reached one hand for it, keeping the other on her, rubbing gently, reassuringly, soothing her.

  The necklace was a beautiful pattern. He wanted to add a couple of variations to it, but essentially, he would tie it the way it had been done for many years. There was no screwing with perfection. He pulled her hands behind her back and looped her wrists and then wove a quick cuff and open lace glove over them. Pulling her head back farther and down toward her hands, and hands up toward her head, he quickly braided her hair into the rope and the rope and hair into the line with her cuffed hands. Now her head was anchored and she was unable to move it.

  He checked her pulse, whispered encouragement and kissed her as he looked down at her body. The light had changed in the room. Evening had shifted the sun so that the ball had dropped from the sky, creating orange-red streaks that were already fading to bluish grays.

  Shadows fell across Flambé’s face. Already she looked as if she was slipping into subspace, and he wanted her focused completely on him. He caught the rope and tugged hard, snapping it against her scalp, causing it to sting, bringing her eyes flying open. He waited until she was looking at him and nowhere else. He snaked the green rope around her neck and began to weave it in the intricate pattern that was high up on her neck and made its way down to her breasts until the ropes were draped and pulled over them in loops, covering the mounds and nipples at an angle, two strands at a time. Each weave ran around to the back and was threaded into the bindings of her hands and back up to the necklace ties at her neck.

  When Sevastyan was finished, Flambé was kneeling on his rug made of sisal rope, her naked inflamed thighs and clit pressed tight into the knots there. Her hips bucked continually, riding the knots, her body bent almost backwards. At the same time, the necklace around her throat and breasts seemed almost demure in contrast to the sordid display of her open legs.

  He moved out from behind her, camera in hand, and took several shots of his work, then several shots of her face before seating himself once again. He tugged on her braided hair, letting the knots unravel, watching them slide away quickly. He’d deliberately used ones that could easily be removed fast. His woman was just about done.

  When he had the ropes off of her, he lifted her, carried her to the bed and took her down to the mattress, his body blanketing hers. Murmuring soothingly to her, he kissed her over and over, stealing her breath, wanting to steal her heart. Her soul. God, she was the most amazing woman he’d ever found.

  He had no idea he could be tender. He was a rough man, especially when it came to sex, but for her, there was tenderness. She was slick and hot, and so tight that when he pushed into her folds slowly, filling her, he didn’t think he could make his way into that snug tunnel. She gasped, her lashes suddenly lifting in alarm, eyes staring straight into his, her fingernails biting deep into his shoulders. She shook her head at him, fear creeping into the gold of her gaze.

  “What is it, baby?” he murmured, one hand stroking her mound, her inner thighs, circling her clit, feeling her body shudder as her pussy swallowed another inch of him. “Look at you taking me.” It was an erotic sight, seeing himself disappear into her body. “Look at us, Flambé.”

  Her gaze slid from his face to their joined bodies. Her feminine form was flushed, covered in his rope marks, in strawberries where he’d left his personal marks behind, on her breasts, her thighs, one on her neck, but low so it wouldn’t show when she wore a shirt. She had a business and she was the boss.

  He dipped his head and kissed her throat. The action sent his cock sliding another inch into her. She shuddered. Her sheath, scorching hot, tightened like a vise around him. His breath hissed out. He stopped moving and watched her face. That beautiful face while she squirmed and did her best to try to impale herself on him.

  “We’re doing slow and easy, Flambé.”

  She shook her head, looking as if she might fling herself off the bed and run.

  He began to move again, because it was impossible not to. He needed to bury himself all the way, to feel her body surrounding his. It was easy to drown in her eyes. She didn’t want to look at him like this; he could see her trying to escape their connection. It was too deep. Too visceral. She shook her head again. “Faster. Harder. Not like this.”

  “Just like this, Flambé. It’s good, baby. You know it is.” He whispered the truth to her, and it came out like a sin between them instead of the growing love he was trying to convey.

  He detested that he wasn’t good at romance, at telling his woman what he wanted her to know. He could do it with his ropes, but she didn’t hear him. He was trying with his body, but she didn’t want it. Verbally, he couldn’t get the words out that would reassure her, because in the world he grew up in, those words were a death sentence. He had to try to reach her someway and she only let him close through sex or ropes.

  He did a slow surge forward with his hips, forcing her tight petals to give way and open for him. This time he didn’t stop but, all while holding her gaze to his, buried his cock deep in her. The burn turned to flames licking hot and wild over and around him, feeling as if the fire was consuming him in a new and different way. That shocked him. Judging by her expression, the feeling shocked her as well.

  They were both used to hot and wild. Fast and furious. Slow and easy was so different, but equally as good, very moving. So much so that terror had crept into her eyes. He tried to reassure her, but a part of him was feeling that same fear. She had taken him over when he wasn’t looking. When he’d been so busy binding her to him. Wanting his own woman for all the wrong reasons and realizing, when he had her, what the right reasons were.

  He moved in her, sharing her body, her haven, in intimacy unlike he’d ever experienced in his life with another being. The fire bui
lt and built like a slow-moving storm, flames licking all over his skin, all over hers, touching and receding and then coming back again, leaving them both breathless.

  “Sevastyan.” She whispered his name.

  He heard a note in her voice that had never been there before. She didn’t want to admit true feelings to him. To herself. But they were there.

  He kept moving, building the heat between them, that slow, easy build that was anything but easy. The fire began to roar. Became a storm of emotion. Her body clamped down on his without warning, a scorching-hot grip, a blaze of fire so hot his cock jerked and pulsed, erupting in a wild storm of white-hot ropes of semen, a volcano there was no stopping.

  Flambé’s body seemed to have one continuous orgasm in response, so that even when he collapsed over the top of her, careful to keep his weight to one side to keep from crushing her, every movement sent powerful ripples through her. Her arms crept around his neck and she buried her face against his chest, hiding her expression.

  “I want us to try together, Flambé,” he whispered in her ear. “I know it’s scary to you. Neither of us has ever done this, but let’s try.” He waited, closing his eyes. Hoping. Hearing his own heartbeat. Feeling her body rippling with such magic around his. “We’re good together. I know we are. Let’s try, baby.”

  She was very quiet for a long time. Her head nod was barely there. He felt it and his heart turned inside out. It wasn’t much, but he’d take it. She always felt so elusive to him, like she had one foot out the door. At least it was somewhere to start.

  13

  SEVASTYAN didn’t think his mood could get much fouler. If Mitya didn’t fucking start cooperating with him, he was going to take out a gun and shoot him himself. How could the entire world spin out of control overnight? He’d been gone one damn day. You’d think he’d taken a month off, not one single day, but Mitya was acting as if he’d deserted him.