Play of Passion

by Nalini Singh

Page 19

 

  It had taken everything he had not to stroke his fingers up to cup her breast last night after she kissed him, to nuzzle his way down and lap up the warm, erotic scent at the juncture of her thighs, to pleasure her with his mouth and his hands, to adore her in the most rawly sexual of ways.

  He’d almost snapped when he’d realized she was fighting against her own body’s needs once again. Sometimes he wanted to shake Indigo, make her see sense. After the arousal he’d scented, he now knew he could seduce her by stoking up the embers of her passion until her wolf—sensual, tactile, with far fewer concerns than the human—pushed her into his arms.

  But of course, it wasn’t that simple.

  Feeling Maria rub her damp cheek against his chest, he pulled his attention back to the present, running his hand over and along her back until she quieted down. “Kieran’s an idiot,” he murmured, continuing to pet her with the undemanding caresses of a packmate. “When you grow up a little more and become the woman you’re going to be, he’s going to kick himself. And you can rub his face in it. ”

  Maria gave him a shaky smile, dark eyes near black even to his night vision. “You know how to stroke a woman’s ego. ”

  Using his thumbs, he wiped away the remnants of her tears. “It’s easy with someone like you. ” Too bad he was stuck on a woman who might just drive them both to insanity with her refusal to even admit the possibility that there might be something between them.

  Indigo found herself alone half an hour after Drew left with Maria clinging to him like kudzu. No guesses as to what the two of them were doing, though thankfully, they’d gone far enough out of range that she couldn’t hear or scent their bodies. As for Hawke, he’d noticed that four of the juveniles weren’t as exhausted as their peers and had rounded them up for an exploration of the night-swathed forest.

  The eight Hawke had left behind were all lost in deep sleep, their faces—no matter the form they’d chosen—content. Only Indigo remained awake by the fire, her spine stiff, her wolf snarling inside her mind as she stared at the spot where Drew had disappeared into the dark, his arm curled around Maria’s shapely form.

  Her eyes shifted without conscious control, until she saw everything with the wolf’s piercing night vision. Furious with her lack of control, she went to the tent—to be confronted by Drew’s sleeping bag. He wasn’t likely to come back here, and even if he did, she sure as hell did not intend to sleep next to a male who stank of another woman. Decision made, she rolled up his bag and put both it and his pack in a neat pile against a tree a small distance away, where he couldn’t miss it.

  Just being a good packmate, she told herself. It had nothing to do with the fact that an odd kind of anger was boiling through her system. She didn’t want to sleep with Drew. Okay, yes, she did, but she wasn’t going to do it, so she had no reason to be so savagely angry that he’d gone off with another female. There was nothing worse than a woman who played dog in the manger—it would be the worst kind of hypocrisy on her part.

  Her mind snapshotted to an image of Drew’s naked body as he dropped the towel the night of the storm, his muscled flesh inviting touch. Maria was probably in raptures—Enough.

  Stripping off her clothes, she pulled on a large tee over her panties and slipped in between the unzipped halves of her sleeping bag. She’d ended up kicking off the top half last night, not needing it given the blazing heat of Drew’s body. His heartbeat had been a slow, steady rhythm behind her, his breath warm against her temple. Sometime in the night, he’d spread his hand out over her abdomen and intertwined his legs with her own, the hairs on his thighs rubbing rough and sensuous against her skin. It hadn’t only been comforting to sleep like two tangled pups, it had been . . . more.

  Gritting her teeth against the heavy impression of memory, she closed her eyes. Sleep continued to evade her like the most frustrating prey . . . and she was wide awake when she scented two familiar forms coming back to camp. Her hand fisted and she set her jaw, determined not to take a deeper breath, to peel apart the scents in a search for the musky taste of sex.

  “Looks like everyone’s asleep. ” A feminine whisper.

  A pause and though Indigo knew it was impossible, she could’ve sworn Drew’s eyes were drilling into her skull. “You better get some rest, too. ”

  Sounds, skin meeting. A kiss? “Good night, Drew. That was really nice . . . thank you. ”

  Nice? Not exactly a ringing endorsement. She hoped that burned Drew’s ego.

  The next sounds were of Maria moving about, heading to her tent. Drew’s heavier tread didn’t follow. Instead, Indigo felt him go to his pack . . . and then more quiet, determined sounds—fabric being unrolled, boots being unlaced and dropped to the ground.

  Unable to resist, she opened her eyes and twisted toward where she’d left his gear—to find him stripping off his T-shirt and throwing it on his pack in a way that shouted temper. His sleeping bag lay open beside him. She should’ve closed her eyes and gone back to sleep, but her wolf’s edgy temper prodded her to get up and confront him. “What are you doing?” she asked in an almost subvocal tone, not wanting Maria to hear. The kids were too tired to wake.

  Cool blue eyes met hers. “Going to sleep. ”

  The cutting bite of his response took her aback for a second—she’d never really seen Drew angry before. “I thought you’d be sharing with Maria. ”

  “Is that what you think of me?” he asked with a frost in his tone that made her want to wrap her arms around herself. “That I’d take advantage of a girl who’s just had her heart broken?”

  “I—what?” She was a good lieutenant, but she hadn’t seen anything in Maria’s behavior to betray that kind of hurt. “Who?”

  “Doesn’t matter. She’ll be fine. ” His hands went to the top button of his jeans and he flicked it open. “Might as well shift,” he muttered, not undoing the zipper. “Since it smells like rain, I don’t think I’ll be getting much sleep tonight if I stay in human form. ”

  The way he said that, the way he looked at her, rubbed her temper raw. “Fine, I misread the situation. ” She folded her arms, curving her hands into fists. “You’re welcome to—”

  “No, thanks. ” He put his own hands on his hips, his chest a muscled plane only inches from her. “I think I prefer a little rain to being frozen out by Lieutenant Indigo Riviere for daring to ask her to step outside of her safe little worldview. ”

  She saw red. “What’s that supposed to mean?” It was sheer breath-stealing fury that kept her tone low.

  “How about I ask a question instead?” Closing the distance between them until they stood toe to toe, the heat of his body a silent challenge, he said, “Why are you out here, sniping at me?”

  “I do not ‘snipe. ’” Her wolf growled.

  “Yeah, sure sounds like you’re being snippy to me. ” And then the damn male did that thing he did—he kissed her. As if he had every right to just take her mouth with the wild heat of his, to cup the back of her head, to bite down on her lower lip and suck her upper one into his mouth.

  Her toes curled, the rage in her bloodstream translating into pure wild heat as the touch-hungry wolf took control. She hadn’t even realized she’d unfolded her arms until her palms met the hard wall of his chest. Hot. Strong. Beautiful. Overwhelmed by the sudden blaze of the sexual inferno, Indigo wanted to push him to the ground, claim every solid male inch with her mouth, her hands, and finally, her sex. The hunger was a fever inside, a spiking, thudding pulse.

  “Damn. ” Drew lifted his head, his chest heaving. “I can scent Hawke and the others. ”

  The words poured cold water on the flames of passion. She realized she still had her hands on his body, the fingers of one curved slightly into his flesh, as if she wanted to prick at him with her claws—as if she was in heat. Shoving away, she stumbled a little. “You lied,” she said, taking out her own stunned confusion on him. “All that bullshit a
bout everything being back to normal. ”

  “So did you. ” His eyes gleamed, hard and bright. “You want me, and if you’d stop fucking lying to yourself for one second, you’d realize we could have something good. ”

  Her wolf, no longer caught in the sexual inferno, snarled at the challenge, at the arrogance of this male who thought he could bring her to heel. “Don’t kid yourself. Yeah, you can kiss—but I need a little more in my man. ” Harsh, angry words, torn from the part of her that hated how he’d made her feel earlier when he’d gone off with Maria—so vulnerable, so weak. She was never weak. She refused to allow it. “I might play with boys, but I don’t keep them. ”

  Drew flinched, and she knew she’d drawn blood. Somehow, it didn’t feel as good as it should have. But she couldn’t bring herself to take it back, too proud, too confused, too fucking scared of what Drew was asking from her. She knew how it would end. She’d seen how it would end. The hurt, the pain, the constant effort to make herself less so that he would feel better as a man.

  It wasn’t worth it. Not even if it hurt like a bitch to walk away.

  CHAPTER 17

  Henry looked at his man. “It can be done?”

  “Yes. ” An unequivocal answer. “However, we’ll have to be quick to get the rest of the operation in place now that they’ve detected us. ”

  “I assume you have that under way. ” Henry had chosen this man because of his intelligence and dedication to Silence—and, unlike Shoshanna, he wasn’t about to squander that resource by killing him simply because he happened to be strong enough to be a threat.

  A nod. “Even if they somehow discover the first element, the second should give us what we need. ”

  And the war to uphold Silence, Henry thought, would claim another victim.

  CHAPTER 18

  Andrew dumped his pack in his room and began to tug off his clothes for the shower. The hike down from the campsite had been undemanding in spite of the rain that had fallen overnight, and, for the juveniles, fun. Most had abandoned their packs for later retrieval halfway down and shifted, gamboling in the pools of water like four-year-olds, their howls of pleasure singing to his soul.