by Mina Carter
He growled. Rat was as ruthless as his parents and twice as determined.
And he was set on one thing… Baby.
He would have her. No man had ever touched her. Their little incident with the unicorn had proved that. And if any man touched her, ever, it would be him.
The crowds parted ahead of him like theatre curtains, and there she was. In the middle of the dance floor, with her fiery hair and darkness a cape around her. The music hummed through his body, each beat echoed by his heart and the surge of blood through his cock. Sight and sound combined to send lust through his warrior’s body, freezing him in place. His heart stuttered, hands clenching at his side as he watched her.
She was perfect. From the top of her head, adorned with flame-like locks to the tips of her delicate toes. Acres of creamy, pale skin he ached to touch. To stroke and caress and make his own.
The crowd moved again and she was hidden from view. He started forward, cleaving through the crowd and scattering dancers to get to her. They moved like a sea and he spotted her again…
In the arms of another man.
Their body language reeked of lust. Fury burst through Rat, and scarlet obliterated his vision. Within a heartbeat he stood next to them, his gaze hard as he shoved his body between them.
“This is my dance.”
“What? Hey!” the displaced human exclaimed, trying to yank Rat away. “Get your own dance partner, asshole!”
“Fuck off if you know what’s good for you,” Rat snarled over his shoulder, fangs visible, “…human.”
The guy paled, backpedaling as all hints of lust disappeared from his scent to be replaced by fear. Rat lifted his lip higher in a sneer and released a little of his inner fire to flare in his eyes. The human stumbled back and knocked over a couple of female clubbers. They swore at him, a torrent of abuse as he made his escape. Rat’s lips quirked and he turned back around.
Baby was watching him.
“Pathetic human wouldn’t have made a good mate anyway.” He found himself growling in self-defense.
Her full lips pursed. “Who said anything about taking a mate. I just want to fu—”
He couldn’t hear those words on her lips, not if he wanted to keep his composure and avoid taking her here and now.
Yanking her closer, he crashed his lips over hers.
* * *
Whatever Baby had expected of the evening, it wasn’t for Rat to arrive and scare off her human admirer. It certainly wasn’t for him to cast off jealousy like a furnace gave off heat, or for him to kiss her…
His lips were so damn soft.
A whimper rose in her throat and she wriggled to get closer to him. His hard body was packed with muscles she’d admired from afar. Hot, dense, solid muscles…She flattened her palms over his chest, not sure if she had the courage to explore farther.
Sliding his hand into the nape of her neck, he tilted her head and seduced her with his lips. She’d heard demons were masters of the sensual arts, so skilled as lovers that their victims happily handed over their souls for just one more kiss, but she’d never believed it.
Not until him. Not until Raterrenh…
Right now Rat suited him better.
He was all hard edges and attitude, with the body of a dark angel and a face that would tempt many a woman into sin. Pale eyes, high cheekbones, and a noble nose were set above lips too sensual for any mortal man. Lips that whispered over hers, going from soft and gentle as he explored to hard and dominant.
His hands cupped her face, his tongue brushing the closed seam of her lips in a hot demand for access she gave in to instantly. She’d ignored the spark between them the moment they’d met. Dragon and demon. They would be like oil and water…they were too different to make this work. Surely?
Who cares if it doesn’t work…it only needs to be one night…
One night. It only had to be one night.
The scales fell from her eyes. She’d planned to experiment, use a human guy to find out if sex was as good in the flesh as it seemed when she’d been a passenger for all those years. But why a human guy? Why not Rat? Why go second rate when she could have the best…and she knew Rat would be good. He had that bad boy swagger and dangerous edge that screamed virility and experience.
Making her decision, she parted her lips to let him in.
He started but didn’t miss a beat. A second later he pushed his tongue into her mouth, thrusting in to find hers and slide against it. Brushing, stroking, teasing…claiming.
Her moan was unbidden, as was the heat that exploded in her veins to race through her body. Tingles began low in her stomach, reaching quivering tendrils outward. Downward. Her pussy clenched, aching for something she’d never experienced. For a feeling she knew, yet didn’t. For something she knew he could give her.
Kissing him back, she sucked on his tongue. He growled again and let go of her face to pull her hard against his body. She gasped as she collided with his solid frame. He was harder than the human she’d been dancing with. Even though he had been fit, his chiseled muscles and six-pack evident of time spent in the gym, Rat was harder. Like he wasn’t made of flesh and blood…
Demons are made of fire, sin…and sex.
The thought insinuated itself into her mind at the same moment his large hand spread over the back of her hips and pulled them flush against his. The thick, hard bar of his cock pressed into her softer belly, leaving her no doubt how much he wanted this. A low hum started in the center of her chest but she ignored it to focus on the here and now.
Her train of thought didn’t so much scatter as explode like a supernova going critical. She broke away, mouth open to say something, but words failed her.
He leaned down to whisper in her ear, his deep voice silken temptation. “You’re mine, Baby. I’m going to take you home and come morning, your entire block’ll know my name.”
She blinked, distracted by the whisper of his lips over the soft spot just below her ear. “You won’t have time to introduce yourself if we…you know.”
“Sweetheart, I won’t be introducing myself…” He chuckled, tilting her chin to kiss her throat under her chin.
“Then how will they know?”
He pulled back to look into her eyes, and heat blazed there. Not the heat of desire, although that was there in spades, but actual flames danced in the orbs for a moment before he blinked and reasserted his human eyes. Her dragon growled, wanting to curl around the heat.
“Because you’ll be screaming my name all night.”
* * *
Rat didn’t waste time, an arm around Baby’s waist as they left the club. All he could think about was getting her to himself, alone, somewhere with a solid surface. Horizontal or vertical, he didn’t care which. Hell, even the alley wall out back was looking like a good option.
He stopped in the middle of the sidewalk in front of the club doors and pulled her back up against him. His lips crashed down over hers, the deep growl in the back of his throat one of pure need. She felt so good he couldn’t help himself. A sweep of his tongue parted her lips and he drove inside to taste her again.
Her body against his, her lips parting beneath his… it was a glimpse of the heaven a creature of sin like him would never be allowed to touch otherwise.
He still couldn’t believe she’d agreed to this. Couldn’t believe she’d even let him kiss her… but he wasn’t complaining. Every cell in his body was attuned to her, to every movement and response she made. Hell, he was even trembling at the idea of touching her. Of stripping the sexy little outfit from her delicate, curvy body and making her his.
She was beautiful, delicate for all her draconic blood… and a virgin.
The thought sent a shudder through his larger frame. He would be the first man to touch her. The first man to know what she felt like wrapped tightly around his cock.
No, he growled in the center of his chest as he yanked her up higher against him, big hands on her ass until she was on her tiptoes. He would be
the only man to ever know her like that.
She was his. As crown prince, he needed a princess… or a queen.
He pulled back to look down at her. Her golden eyes were wide and dark with desire, her full lips swollen from his kisses. He groaned as a savage ache gripped his groin. His cock was harder than he could ever recall, about fit to burst from his jeans.
So wrapped up in her, he’d forgotten to pay attention to their surroundings. It should have been safe, what with this being one of the PPA’s local clubs. All the local paranormals knew to give the place a wide berth if they planned on causing trouble because it would be shut down quick smart.
But this wasn’t the club. This was the pavement outside. And even in the midst of the hottest kiss he’d ever known, Rat’s survival instincts were in fighting form. The scuff of a boot on the asphalt behind them brought him out of the sensual haze with a snarl.
All his non-mortal instincts rushed to the fore and he turned, arm already raised to block the blade of the demon behind him as it sliced through the air toward his back.
The demon—lower level from the red tinge to his skin, he was making no attempt to hide along with his horns and tail—growled and tried to yank his blade back. Rat wasn’t having any of that. With a dangerous growl he wrapped a big hand around the smaller demon’s wrist and yanked him forward.
The demon yelped, surprise on his face as Rat spun him around and twisted the limb to its extreme range of motion. He recognized him… not exactly by name, but what he was. Bounty hunter. He had to hand it to the guy. In hell he was the lower rung of the ladder, but up here? Even a smattering of demon blood would give him an edge against anything, even paranormals.
One problem. For him. That didn’t give him an edge against Rat.
“Bad decision,” he growled in his would-be assailant’s ear and tightened his grip. Bones ground together and the demon squealed. Not an awe-inspiring sound, it totally made a mockery of the horns and tail deal he had going on.
“You… what… who the fuck are you?” the demon screamed in pain as Rat’s punishing grip crushed the bones in his wrist. “You were supposed to be an easy mark… half-demons aren’t supposed to be able to beat a full-blood demon!”
“Oh yeah?” Rat growled, spinning the guy around. “And just who told you that?”
He almost pitied the guy. He’d been set loose on a mark he knew nothing about, and obviously he hadn’t been given all the information on Rat.
The demon set his jaw, stubbornness written all over his expression. Rat twisted his wrist again, and the demon’s screams echoed off the walls around them.
“Who sent you? And did they tell you who I am? Who I really am?”
“You’re just some half-demon Mr. Z… my boss wants out the way! That’s all I know. I swear!”
“Just a half-demon, yes,” Rat chuckled and let the darkness in his blood show in his eyes. Darkness and fire, the mark of a demon prince of the blood. “But did it ever occur to you to ask why your boss wants me out the way? Or to ask who I am?”
The demon went sheet-white, not even a tinge of red left in his skin at all as realization filled his eyes—both at who Rat had to be and that he’d well and truly fucked up.
Pop. Pop. Pop.
His horns disappeared one by one, followed by his tail. A survival instinct maybe, to make himself look less dangerous. It didn’t work.
“You’re…”
“Yeah…”
“Fuck!”
“Thanks for the offer. But you’re not my type.”
Rat yanked the guy nose to nose, lips curling back from his teeth.
“You interrupted my evening,” he snarled. “Now fuck off before I change my mind and rip your spine out and beat you with it.”
* * *
She’d seen Rat fight before, of course, but since at the time she’d been fighting a Dragos sorcerer intent on stealing her power to take over the world, she hadn’t had a chance to properly pay attention.
Now she could. And holy hell… like with kissing, it was obvious he knew what he was doing.
Shoved behind him, she backed up a few steps to give him room to move, a quick scan around assuring her that the attacker was working alone. Pity, she thought, her dragon grumbling deep within. They were both worked up after Rat’s kisses and needed an outlet. Sex or roasting someone... Either would work just as well.
Once she’d ascertained there were no other attackers, she turned her attention back to the fight in front of her. Despite his size, Rat moved like lightning, heavy muscles moving easily beneath the satin skin she wanted to kiss and lick.
It was easy to see the other demon was massively outmatched, the fight—such as it was—over in seconds. Rat held the other demon in an arm lock, his screams of pain echoing off the walls around them.
A couple of club-goers stumbled out of the door to the club, a brief blast of music and heat framing them. They took one look at the two demons and sidled away quickly, their running footsteps fading into the distance.
She breathed in, tasting the air as they went. Fae. She wasn’t sure what type. Certainly nothing that could stand up to either a minor demon or whatever Rat was. Because one thing was for sure. He wasn’t the minor half-demon loner he presented himself as. Not with the level of power throbbing in the air, or the way the bounty hunter had reacted.
“Now fuck off,” Rat growled, shoving the demon away. “Before I change my mind and rip your spine out and beat you with it.”
The demon didn’t need telling twice. Stumbling backward, he managed to get his feet under him and disappear without so much as a “poof” or any of the theatrics demons were normally given to.
Rat turned to her, his face hard. Fire still raged in his eyes, but that didn’t scare her off. Instead, it drew her toward him. His ruthlessness was like an aphrodisiac to her more brutal nature.
So she didn’t argue or fight when his hand snapped out to tangle in the hair at the nape of her neck, nor when he yanked her up hard against his solid body. She moaned into his mouth as his lips crashed down over hers, her body melting as he took what he wanted from her.
Her knees buckled, but he didn’t let her fall. A hard hand across the back of her hips held her to him. It slid down to cup her ass, lifting her as the hard bar of his cock ground into her softer stomach.
He broke the kiss to look down at her, his lips barely a whisper away from hers.
“I can’t wait to get inside you,” he growled, the low sound doing things to her body that should be illegal. Given the statutes on demons using their hell-born abilities on other races… they probably were… except she could tell he wasn’t using any of his demonic abilities.
This heat was all them. Just between them.
“Gods, yes,” she moaned, pressing her lips to his again.
Her entire body was on fire, but in a good way. She wanted him, wanted this… the sooner the better. Pulling away a little, she looked around.
“Cab…” she said quickly, not wanting to shift to her dragon form with the heat throbbing between them. Tonight was all about her as a woman, not as a dragon. “My place isn’t far.”
He dropped another hard kiss on her lips and pulled away, taking her hand as he strode to the corner. There was a cab rank around the corner from the club and within a minute, they were tucked into the back of one and on the way to her place.
Chapter 6
The cab ride was mercifully swift.
Half in Rat’s lap for the duration, she kept her attention on him rather than their journey. Whatever else she could say about him, he sure as hell could kiss. Teasing and tempting her with his lips and tongue, he kept her riding the edge of need and unfulfilled desire until she wasn’t sure which way was up.
Through it all, he hadn’t touched her breasts or below the waist. The most he’d done was brushed the back of his thumb against the underside of her breast. The soft touch had been enough to steal her breath and any thought other than to press closer to
him.
“Not here, sweetheart,” he whispered against her lips.
As he pulled away, she realized the cab had pulled up outside her apartment block. He urged her out of the back of the vehicle, paid the fare, and within a minute they stood alone on the sidewalk.
His face in shadow, he studied her, his big body tight with control. She felt the need and lust rolling off him in waves. Her inner dragon wanted to pull him closer and revel in it. Kiss him until neither of them could think, until he was buried deeply inside her, moving within her in that age old danc—
“Keep looking at me like that and we won’t make it up to your place,” he growled in warning, setting her away from him when she moved in for a kiss. Hands firm on her upper arms, he looked at her directly.
“Do you want this? Fuck, listen to me…” He broke away with a laugh, shoving a hand through his hair as he turned, obviously trying to regain his composure. Finally he looked back at her, his eyes burning with twin flames of desire. “I’m so fucking hard…I want you so much it hurts, Baby, but if you’re not sure, say so now. If we get up there, I’m not sure I’ll be able to stop.”
The big bad demon was giving her an out.
Stunned for a moment, Baby just stood there. That he wanted her had never been a secret. He’d been making offers since he and a group of PPA operatives had rescued her from the Dragos magician who’d drained her blood to fuel his power. But she thought that was it, that all he wanted was to slake his lust on her human body. This…made her think it went deeper than that. What the hell did she say to that?
Her inner dragon prompted her into movement and she sauntered forward. Rat watched her, his expression unreadable and hard, as she reached him. Thrilled with a sense of her own power, her own feminine power, not the magic in her dragon blood, she reached up to brush gentle fingertips over his masculine jaw. The skin was raspy with stubble. She’d never seen him completely clean-shaven and now she realized why. He’d have a five o’clock shadow at six in the morning.