Crave the Night: A Midnight Breed Novel (19 page)

With his free hand, Nathan palmed her breast, then splayed his fingers
up toward the base of her throat and coaxed her head back onto her shoulders so he could place a hot, deliriously erotic kiss to the pulse point that kicked into a frantic rhythm under his warm, wet tongue.

He growled against her skin, and for the briefest instant, Jordana felt the sharp tips of his fangs dragging over her vein. “Christ,” he hissed. “Even if the son of a bitch walked in the door right now, I wouldn’t take my hands off you, Jordana. I want him to know he’ll never have you.”

“No, he won’t,” she panted. “And he won’t be coming here anytime soon because I ended things with him.”

Nathan stilled. Then his head lifted, his stormy eyes ablaze with crackling heat. “You ended it.”

She gave him a small nod. “Last night. Just before I went after you and found you at La Notte.”

For a long moment, he didn’t move. Didn’t speak a single word.

When his lips parted, his fangs gleamed, the tips as sharp as daggers.

He muttered something dark and hungered.

Then, without warning or excuse, he scooped her up into his arms and headed toward the bedroom.

JORDANA WAS LIGHT IN HIS ARMS AS NATHAN BROUGHT HER TO the bedroom at the end of the hallway.

A delicate crystal chandelier hung from the center of the vaulted ceiling, casting soft light in the room. Beneath the elegant fixture sat Jordana’s sumptuous king-size bed, which was heaped with fluffy pillows, frothy white coverlets, and fine, crisp sheets. The walls were painted in an equally snowy hue, the plush area rug just inside the door crushing easily under his black combat boot as he entered the room.

Everything about Jordana’s private sanctuary was soft like her, pure like her.

And he, the invading darkness soon to defile both.

Crossing the threshold into her bedroom, Nathan recognized the moment now was do or die. Jordana could leap out of his arms and barricade herself inside. Or he could set her down on her feet and make his escape.

Run? Hell, yes
. That was exactly what he was contemplating—admittedly, not for the first time where this woman was concerned.

The thought perished swiftly, scorched into oblivion, when instead of fighting to get loose from his arms, Jordana turned her head and buried her face into the crook of his neck and shoulder.

Christ, the feel of her so close to him was arresting. It shot through him like a jagged flash of lightning, impossible to ignore.

And bewildering too. He didn’t know what to do with the humid rush of her breath against his throat. The touch was too intimate. Too tender.

Too honest and trusting.

It wasn’t too late to stop this. His intellect was quick to warn him of that, but his body had other ideas. With blood pounding furiously through his veins and to points lower, his cock grew even more demanding behind the confines of his patrol fatigues. His lust was vying for control of the situation now, and it had no intention of backing down.

Jordana nuzzled closer, innocently unaware of the depth of her impact on him. The scent of her swamped his nose, drugging him with the combined fragrance of the vanilla soap that she must have used in her bath and the more intoxicating perfume that was simply Jordana. She smelled warm and soft and innocent, yet heady with the scent of arousal.

How would her body taste against his tongue? And if he pierced the tender vein that fluttered so temptingly in the side of her neck, would her Breedmate’s blood flow down his throat like sweet nectar or boldly exotic spice?

Saliva surged at the mere idea. His fangs were already filling his mouth, but now they ripped farther out of his gums, the long canines pulsing with an even darker need than the one that practically owned him tonight.

Nathan set Jordana down on her feet beside the bed, his entire being vibrating with a barely restrained hunger.

If she were any other woman, he’d already have her naked and spread open wide to receive him—facedown or tied down, his long-standing requirement of anyone he fucked.

No kissing him.

No touching him.

No watching him as he exorcised the weakness of his flesh-and-bone body.

He fed and fucked because he had to, but he did it on his terms. Always under his strict control, in order to retain the edge of the honed, unfeeling weapon he’d been born and raised, mercilessly trained to be.

Jordana Gates had broken all of his rules.

If she were anyone else, he wouldn’t be standing there with a raging hard-on, a need that bordered on savage, and no damned clue how to begin what he’d started here tonight, let alone how to finish it.

She must have finally sensed the threat in him as he stood before her near the bed. She retreated a couple of steps, only until the backs of her thighs hit the mattress and she dropped down onto its edge. She swallowed
hard as she looked up at him, her alabaster face and wide blue eyes gilded in the amber glow of his transformed irises.

“You’re afraid,” Nathan said, the statement rolling out of him like a growl.

She gave a small shake of her head, her long, loose platinum hair tumbling around her like a bridal veil. “Not afraid,” she murmured, her voice somehow more steady than his. “You don’t frighten me, Nathan.”

He grunted, incapable of speech as heat spiked into his bloodstream. Jordana’s lavender robe had fallen open, revealing the flimsy excuse for clothing underneath. Her spaghetti-strap tank did nothing to conceal the buoyant shape of her breasts, nor could it hide her nipples, which stood erect and far too tempting under the pale silk. Her loose-fitting shorts were nothing but a whisper of fabric that covered her hips and the tops of her thighs.

Jordana’s legs were naked and seemed to go on forever. Nathan followed the line of them with his gaze, drinking in every flawless inch.

He could hear her breath racing now. He watched the rapid rise and fall of her chest and the frantic ticking of her heartbeat at the pulse point in the hollow above her sternum.

His own lungs were soughing hard, air rasping past his teeth and elongated fangs. “I only know one way to do this, and that’s me in control,” he said, feeble apology or warning, he wasn’t sure. “Do you trust me, Jordana?”

“Yes.” No hesitation. No waver in her voice or her beautiful, brave eyes.

Nathan swore, low under his breath. He moved closer to the bed, trying to resist the urge to pounce on her. He took off his weapons belt and let the blades and other lethal tools of his profession fall to the floor beside him.

It was all he dared remove for now.

Jordana might truly trust him, but that was more than he was willing to say for himself. He needed to keep a steady hand on the reins; he owed that to her for her trust in him. His focus would be entirely on her.

Nathan moved between her legs, urging them to part wider, and wider still. He drew forward, until the heavy bulge of his erection was brushing against the damp center of her sex.

She gazed up at him, as fearless as a goddess, as pure as an angel. By contrast, standing in front of her now, he felt dirty and unfit. As profane as a demon come to pray in the center of a cathedral.

For the first time in his life, Nathan realized he felt afraid—afraid that he would hurt her, disappoint her. That she would suddenly realize how unsuited he was for the gift of her body, of her passion.

Most especially, for the gift of her trust.

He reached out to move a thick wave of blond hair from where it had fallen into her face. It sifted through his fingers, sleek and shiny as pale, liquid gold.

“Everything about you is so soft,” he murmured, winding the thick, gleaming lock around his hand. “Soft but strong.”

He released the errant tendril and hooked it behind her ear, exercising a care he never imagined he possessed. “Tonight, I need to see that you’re okay at all times. I don’t want you to hide your reactions from me, no matter how small. I need to know if I’m pushing you too far. Do you understand?”

She nodded.

“No,” Nathan said. “I need you to say it out loud. I need you to be clear, Jordana. I don’t want to guess at anything. Not this time.”

She nodded again, then surprised him with a smile. “I understand, Nathan.”

“Good,” he murmured, then he reached down to touch her breasts, rubbing his thumb over one lovely nipple, then the other. “I shouldn’t be your first. Then again, I don’t think I’ve got honor enough to stand aside and let you give yourself to anyone else. Not now.”

“I want this,” she whispered resolutely. “I want you.”

She reached for him as she said it, her hands nearly taking hold of his face before he had the chance to elude them.

A cold panic seized him and he reared back, catching her in a firm grasp.

Her wrist tendons tightened. She gave a small flex of her hands, testing his hold.

He didn’t relent, not so much as a fraction. Uncertainty flashed in her eyes.

“Last night, in the elevator,” he said, trying to keep the hard edge from his voice. “I told you that when we did this, it would be on my terms.”

He could see the question in her eyes now. Apprehension washed over her face, flattening her lips and making her already racing heartbeat drum even harder as he held her, unyielding.

“My terms, Jordana.”

“Yes.”

She relaxed at once. Her hands lay in his grasp easily, her fine muscles loosening, surrendering to him.

He sucked in air, let it out on an approving growl.

Guiding her down onto the bed on her back, he pushed her arms up alongside her head. “Don’t move. I want to look at you.”

He drew back slowly, and simply gazed upon her.

And Jordana didn’t move. She lay there, spread out before him like an offering. Her bare inner thighs were open, warm against the outsides of his legs. Her heat was intense, permeating his combat fatigues and scorching the taut muscles of his thighs.

Need coiled even hotter in him, dangerously close to breaking.

God help him, he wasn’t used to taking things slowly. He wasn’t sure he could now either. She was so beautiful, so arousing.

Everything male in him was hammering hard with the need to take.

To possess.

To vanquish.

He bent over her and drew her robe off her shoulders, letting his palm rasp over the top of her little silk tank. The pebbled points of her nipples teased the underside of his hand as he caressed her breasts. He almost hated to leave them as he skated his touch lower, over the flat plane of her abdomen.

He could feel her strength in every flex and contraction of her stomach as she breathed, sighed, gasped under his fingers. He lifted the hem of her pajama top so he could touch her without the barrier of clothing and feed his craving for her nakedness.

He knew her skin would be as flawless as the rest of her, and it was—as fair and smooth as cream. Her breasts, which felt so incredible under the silk, were perfection unclothed. Round and firm, tipped with rosy little areolas the same shade as her kiss-bruised lips.

Nathan’s gums throbbed in time with his cock, all of his senses fevered with the need to feast on her. He lowered his face to her belly and licked a slow trail along her skin, up the center of her rib cage, before venturing off to the side to capture one of her nipples in his mouth.

He suckled, groaning with the sweetness of her, the purity of her—something he’d never known.

Greedily, he moved on to her other breast, his hand following the path his lips had just blazed. Jordana trembled under his touch, against
his tongue. Her fluttering pulse rang in his ears and sent hot need surging into his already granite-hard cock.

As he played the tight bud of her nipple between his teeth, her breath caught. Her hips lifted off the mattress in wordless plea for contact.

Nathan let his hand drift down her body then and beneath the loose waistband of her silk shorts. She moaned as he cupped her sex. She was wet and scorching against his fingers, her juices like liquid velvet. Her petals bloomed even more as he stroked her. Her folds swelled, slickened with each stroke of his fingertips.

The feel of her softness was driving him quickly to the brink. His skin felt tight and overheated, his erection straining so heavy and hard within his clothing, he could barely think straight.

But as demanding as his desire for her was, some distant shred of sanity punched at him with the reminder that she was untried.

As tempting as he found her, she was not at all prepared for the depth of his hungers.

She writhed and moaned with need, but she wouldn’t be truly ready to receive him until she was on the other side of that raw ache.

With a restraint nothing short of Herculean, Nathan drew back from her luscious body, slowly peeling off her pajama shorts as he went. Next, he removed her robe and tank, baring her completely for his fevered gaze.

A curse leaked out of him, as coarse and dry as gravel. “Ah, Christ … you’re so lovely, Jordana.”

Lame praise, hardly worthy of her. But it was sincere. One look at him—at his blazing irises, sharp fangs, and very obvious approval of his cock—would be enough to tell her how the sight of her affected him.