Any Price (12 page)

“Oh God,” Kenna gasped. “I can see your memory. Lore, this is getting stronger.”

He scooped her up and headed for the shower. “It seems the longer we spend wrapped up in each other, the more intense it gets.”

Carrying her from one room to the next was excessive. He knew that, but reasonable didn’t have anything to do with what they exchanged. He needed to do it. Her acceptance without comment indicated that need was shared.

“What of our disagreement?” Kenna questioned as Lore stripped off her sweatshirt and pants.

“Is that an issue anymore?” he murmured as he adjusted the water temperature and lifted her into it with him. “It’s clear we can’t be separated. Sex is an integrated part of how we respond to each other. I don’t mean to be rude, but you can’t return to your old life. It’s physically impossible.” Lore soaped up and washed briskly while she watched. “The argument seems pointless.”

Kenna crossed her arms and chewed her lip. Her eyes narrowed on the beautiful man who’d just told her the logic of her argument was garbage.

Lore rinsed and sighed as he looked at the fuming, intoxicating witch beside him. Her stubborn brain was not about to yield gracefully. He reached out and dragged her under the spray. Carefully he soaped a washcloth and started going over her inch by inch.

As he worked he continued. “Not garbage, just irrelevant in this circumstance.” It was time to work on a brilliant strategy to bring about the outcome they both wanted. All that was required was a simple battle plan that identified objectives and narrowed options to the most advantageous. Then she actually scoffed at him in his head.

His eyes shot to hers and he glowered. “What the hell does that mean?” he demanded.

“I’m a woman, not a freaking battle plan objective. Logic fled the area in that fairground crowd when we connected telepathically. Nothing that’s happened in the last twenty-four hours had a thing to do with logic. So good luck trying to wrap it around one little bit of this, Lore,” Kenna huffed as she raised her arms for his attention.

Lore hadn’t paused in his care of her body, and Kenna turned and moved for him naturally while they argued. It’d be amusing if he weren’t getting irritated.

“Look, let’s get to the bottom line,” he calmly tried again. “We need to accept what can’t be changed and get on with the process that will allow us to deal with it. Both of us are struggling with the things happening between us. I mean Keeper species issues. What it entails and how it works will continue to unfold. We can’t change that. Only deal with it as it occurs.

“The thing we can gain some measure of control over is our relationship.” Lore put the washcloth down, rinsed off his hands and used fingers to delve into feminine folds. He stood beside her and ran a hand down and under on both sides. Thick fingers gently glided over intimate flesh.

Kenna grabbed his upper arm with both hands. Wide eyes turned up to him. Lore smiled and swooped down to capture her lips in a thrusting kiss. Moving his hand to a perfect ass cheek, he patted it lightly as the other hand went from cleaning to stroking.

“Lore, what are you doing? This is not going to settle anything.”

“Relax,” he purred. “Let yourself enjoy it. We’re experimenting with taking control of our response to each other instead of letting it control us.”

“You expect me to relax?”

The fingers in front strummed over fevered folds. She wasn’t sure when she’d gotten so hot. The sensations licked fire up her nerve endings. Kenna moaned softly and turned her face up for another kiss. She sucked his tongue into her mouth as he sealed their lips together. A hard finger rimmed her opening before sliding into her body, pushing into soft tissue with insistent demand. Just like last night, the sensations were magnified. She could feel it open her, invading to the first knuckle. He paused then pushed in hard, stroking her with the firm thrust of that one finger.

Extreme pleasure shot through her. Trembling major muscle groups meant it was difficult to stand but nor would her body let her collapse. Hanging on to his arm, her hips tilted to take him, spread legs asked him to thrust deeper, harder. Her body clenched down in painful pleasure.

Pulling out slowly shot another array of sensation through her, making her break the kiss and gasp. A second finger nudged her entrance with the first, and Kenna pressed down on them, desperately seeking more. He gave it to her, thrusting in with a hard push that brought her to her toes.

Nothing had ever felt so good, so fierce. His fingers pumping into her was raw pleasure. His thumb grazed her clit each time hard fingers entered. He knew exactly the touch that would blaze through her with each stroke.

“Lore, I need to come,” she demanded, gulping air. His touch took her too fast. How could she be this ready?

“Not yet, baby,” he crooned softly. “Feel how good it is. How the fire becomes part of us when we do this.”

Lore pulled out of her channel to capture her clit between two fingers. He barely stroked it and Kenna exploded. Her body tightened up on tiptoe and her head tipped back. A guttural, grinding moan escaped her as the fireball flashed up her body. Immediately two fingers thrust into her and he felt her clamp down, hard. Lore groaned as he stroked her through the orgasm.

Kenna collapsed against him as her legs crumpled. Lore’s hands had to abandon their interesting spots and catch her. Picking her up, he stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel to dry the dazed woman.

Huge blue eyes blinked at him as he carried her to the bed. “Damn, Lore,” she breathed, but couldn’t string another thought after that. Her body was still shuddering with uncontrollable flashes of sensation.

Grinning like the proud beast he was, Lore stretched out beside her on the bed. “Yeah, it gets better,” he promised. His hands caressed her gently. “Want to see what we do next?”

Kenna closed her eyes and let his thoughts wash over her.

The pictures in his head were graphic. Her response was so intermixed with the vivid images that they were erotically irresistible. What he wanted right now captured her attention. Muscle control returned as she focused on that fantasy.

She sat up slowly and looked down at him. A smile crept across her face as his breathing picked up from reading her intentions.

“Ready?” Kenna murmured. She wasn’t nervous. In fact, she was damn eager. What a lovely way to turn this massive man into the shuddering bit of flesh he’d made of her. Her mouth descended to his neck and she licked down sensitive tendons. Her hands glided across tense shoulders and dragged, flat palmed, down over tight pectoral ridges. Inquisitive fingers found the stiff nubs of his nipples, and she toyed with them as her mouth moved over his collarbone. Large hands petted down her back in sweeping strokes that ended on the globes of her ass in gentle kneading as her mouth moved over him.

Kenna quickly worked down his chest to find the copper disk around his nipple. She nibbled before her curious tongue dragged across it. His entire torso clenched as Lore groaned. His hands convulsed on her ass, quickly releasing. Her body slithered down as her mouth explored the tight muscles his body presented. That brought her to that fascinating ladder of ridges the length of his abdomen. Then she discovered his bellybutton. Bronze flesh trembled under her mouth as she probed the sensitive nerve centers that surrounded it.

Large hands came to rest on her shoulders. He knew she meant to continue but had gotten completely distracted with his abdomen.

Even though her experiences had never included this, there was no hesitation as she shared his responses. The needs he felt drove her, filled her with aching desperation as he felt each new sensation.

The length of him strained just under her nose. Her eyes traveled down the pulsing ridges and veins. Below the thick root of him rested two heavy balls that fascinated her as much as everything else. Gentle hands cupped them as her tongue flashed out to lick her way down over him. The man below those butterfly flicks jerked and responded to her with liquid appreciation. Kenna dragged her tongue back up to sweep over the broad head and gather up every drop he offered.

Her eyes closed as she opened wide and sucked him into her mouth. Lore barked out in almost painful pleasure as her head sank over him. The rhythm, pressure, everything he needed was clear to her from his mind. She knew his overwhelming sense of fulfillment as he looked down at her. Kenna marveled and shared his unconditional surrender to the pleasure. She knew exactly when to increase the speed and strength of her sucking.

His thick length strained her mouth over him. She had to use both hands to stroke the majority of his cock. His taste in her mouth triggered a consuming response. Kenna was way beyond analyzing how unusual their reactions developed. All that mattered was getting more of him. Her body strained with it, pumping faster, sucking harder.

Using the information from his responses to gratify the ravenous hunger, Kenna became the wildest fantasy a male could have. She greedily worked his cock. Her eyes closed as she sucked in loud, wet concentration. Lore had thought he could handle it when he realized she was examining his casual fantasy.

He should have known. Kenna took him over the cliff of pleasure and now he was free-falling. Her sweet mouth stripped him of the man he’d thought he was. Licking around the head of him, probing the weeping slit to lap up every drop as her mouth pulled off him, only to plunge him back into the hot, sucking depths of her for hard, extended pulls as she literally milked him for his taste.

Nothing, nothing had ever dropped him off the edge of the world like the woman kneeling between his knees did. Her mouth, her pleasure as she took him into her, her mindless drive to have him this way, it all added an appallingly uncontrollable edge to the raw sensations of having his brain extracted through his cock.

There would be a time for him to lose control but unfortunately it wasn’t now. He couldn’t allow it. Kenna needed something much more than she thought she needed this. She had to trust him, and earning that trust was his responsibility.

Just when she thought they’d reached the peak of pleasure, everything changed. He reached for her responses and brought them to the surface. Exploring with her how her body burned, the damp heat firing up between her legs as her head bobbed over him. Almost delirious with sexual abandon, he demanded she know her own pleasure before he took his. The image he projected in her mind made her pause. With him buried in the back of her mouth, Kenna’s eyes shot up to his.

Lore reached down and grasped her hips. Without dislodging her from the length of him, he swung her around and spread her thighs over his face. Hard hands opened over her ass and pressed her center onto his mouth. He latched on to her fiercely. All the sexual energy of a fully aroused male on the brink of orgasm slammed into her engorged flesh with his tongue. He took her with ravenous appetite. Kenna thought her eyes might roll back in her head as liquid fire shot up her body.

Her only option was to continue slurping him up as he used his fingers to hold her open for his consumption. Her hands tightened around the stalk of him and she began pumping in concert with the swift up-and-down motion of her lips. Opening wider, she took him down her throat. The mechanics of how to do it flowed over her without conscious thought.

As he sank deeply into her honey-hot mouth, his body jerked and pressed up. It was impossible to remain still when she accepted him this way. Her sweet opening tightened around his thrusting tongue and he lost it. Pumping into her, he finally marked her with his seed. Primal instincts exploded and both of them convulsed through searing waves of pleasure. They seemed to combine at the very foundations of their souls and fly out into the universe as one being.

Her need of him in her body became clear to both of them as his seed invaded her. So did a shattering pleasure as she’d never known. She took him into her body and demanded more as their orgasm intensified with each jet of come.

Returning to Earth on a slow burn, Lore gently lifted her off him and let her slide to the bed beside him. His whole body felt weak as emotions splashed through them in mind-numbing purity.

Kenna rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling. Her hand reached out and rested on one of his legs as he lay there with his head at the other end of the bed.

“My God, Lore, is that normal for you? You know, before?” Kenna questioned in awe.

Lore groaned and swung an arm over his eyes. “Hell, whatever this is, it’s the best damn thing that ever happened to sex.”

Lore chuckled as another thought crossed his mind. “Do you suppose this light deal that went on in you did this for the other Keeper couples?”

Kenna’s head came up off the bed and she glared at him. “You think they know when we, ah, you know?”

“It’s called make love, and I’m guessing they might. Do you feel something different from them?” he asked.

“Well, if I felt it, you’d feel it.” Her head sank back to the bed. “I’m not going to try and look either.”

“Don’t get all defensive,” Lore teased. “If the price of being able to do that is a few folk being aware on some level, we’re damn lucky. You do realize how good it was compared to regular sex?”

“Perhaps I should find a current comparison, just to have something to judge it by,” Kenna stated in answer to his teasing.

His response was immediate and intimate. There were absolutely no barriers between them and she felt his instantaneous instinct to kill. It wasn’t a petulant, civilized “I could just kill you” sort of thing. This was a male animal response that allowed no retreat or negotiation. The only acceptable outcome for him if a man touched her would be the man’s death. It shocked them both.