Crave the Night: A Midnight Breed Novel (21 page)

She wanted Nathan to do whatever he pleased with her, a wish that should have terrified her but only made her need wrench tighter.

And that peculiar, unfurling coil of energy deep within her seemed to agree.

It rushed up from the center of her like a live current, jagged and white and consuming.

“Now,” she said, astonished to hear the growled command push past her lips. “Nathan … oh, God … I can’t bear this. Please, I beg you … do it
now
.”

His head came up sharply from her throat, his face hard and impassive. Maddeningly, unbreakably in control.

But his eyes … they gave him away.

She wasn’t alone in the violence of her desire, not even close.

Nathan snarled a curse, amber light flaring hotly in his transformed irises. He moved between her legs, his erection standing thick and upright, terrifyingly large.

Doubt flickered through her mind, a sudden fear making her brace for certain pain. Her breath stopped, heart rate speeding now, as he shifted his hips and the blunt head of his cock slid through her wet cleft, coming to rest at the virgin opening of her body.

Nathan stilled above her. “Open your eyes, Jordana. Let me see you.”

She obeyed at once, not even aware she had closed them. Nathan stared at her, eyes locked on hers as another subtle pivot of his hips seated him more fully at her entrance.

“You’re so slick and hot,” he murmured. He pushed slightly, testing her. Studying her. Patiently allowing her to prepare for his invasion. “Your body is ready for me. I need to know you are too.”

“Yes,” she replied, her stifled breath gusting out of her on a tremulous sigh as he moved against her, teasing her with the promise of what was still to come.

She bit her lip but kept her gaze trained on his as he’d demanded. Another nudge of his hips coaxed her untried channel to accept more of him. A flood of liquid heat pooled in her core, all her fears drowning quickly in that rising tide.

Nathan’s mouth curved in a knowing, wicked smile. His hips drew back slightly, then pushed forward in one sure thrust.

Jordana’s body bowed as he entered her, filled her. There was pain, but it was as fleeting as it was sharp. There and gone in a few instants, obliterated by the incredible feel of their bodies pressed tight together, naked and joined as one.

“Ah, fuck.” Nathan’s voice was rough, guttural. And the raw sound of it only made Jordana’s arousal spike higher. He moved inside her, his pelvis rocking smoothly, gently, even as his big body shook with hard tremors. He rasped a low curse beside her ear. “I didn’t want you to feel this good. Dammit, you shouldn’t feel so right.”

He thrust deeper as he said it, impaling her as if in punishment, yet Jordana could only revel in the fullness and the tempo that sent pleasure into all of her senses.

It felt more than good. It felt more than right, Nathan deep inside her, their bodies answering each other’s rhythms as if they were meant to be together.

As if they had always belonged like this.

Jordana spiraled toward orgasm, climbing higher and higher as Nathan drove into her welcoming sheath. She cried out as the first wave crashed over her. Gripped by the force of her oncoming release, she arced into each rock of his hips, tugging against the silken bonds that still held her hands above her head.

Nathan showed her no mercy, increasing his speed and depth until she was lost and adrift, every particle of her being turned electric with pure, powerful sensation. She screamed as an explosive climax overtook her, splintering her from the inside.

And then Nathan followed her, pushing deep, grinding his hips against hers at an urgent, violent pace. Lips peeled back off his enormous canines, he bucked into her, riding her hard.

Jordana loved the wildness of his passion. Nathan, the cold, cool warrior—the ruthlessly in-control Gen One male—scorching her with desire-drunk eyes and an expression caught somewhere between fury and rapture. That she had done this to him, turned him so savage with lust, was astonishing. Empowering.

The headiest aphrodisiac she could imagine.

She was already coming again when a fierce shudder gripped him. Nathan roared her name, his voice unearthly, untamed. One hand clamped on her hip, he buried himself to the hilt and yet another coarse shout ripped from between his teeth and fangs as a jet of fluid heat shot inside her.

Jordana lay there, floating on a strange new plane, her senses both satiated and hyperaware. She heard every breath, felt every heartbeat—her own and Nathan’s both.

Her body felt loose and relaxed, newborn in many ways, as it recovered from the dull pain of her lost virginity and the even greater pleasure of what she and Nathan had just shared.

He was still inside her, still firm, stretching the walls of her sheath as his erection pulsed with renewed life. The feel of him growing bigger, hard all over again, made her own body react like tinder near an open flame.

She exhaled a deep sigh, moving beneath him in effort to create more delicious friction.

Nathan’s muscles twitched, and inside her, he thickened in swift response. Eyes narrowed on her, he lifted his head and uttered a low groan.

“Too soon for you,” he cautioned. “Your body needs time to mend, Jordana.”

No, it didn’t. What it needed was more of him.

But Nathan withdrew and rolled off to the side of her. He reached up and freed her hands from the soft tether above her head. He paused for a moment, the length of silk crushed in his tightly clenched fist.

When his gaze met hers again, she saw regret there. An apology he didn’t speak but communicated with his light caress on the bare undersides of her arms, then in the tender stroke of his fingers along her flushed cheek and parted lips.

The torment in his expression pulled at her. He struggled with very private demons; she might have guessed that, in light of his background. Now she saw his internal struggle playing across his handsome, tortured face. A struggle he seemed accustomed to battling alone.

Her heart clenched at that thought. There was so much about this solitary, remote man that she didn’t know. Things she wanted to understand.

She didn’t know if he would share any more of himself than what he gave her tonight. And despite the real fear of his rejection, Jordana couldn’t let her questions go unasked.

“Nathan,” she said softly. “Will you tell me … why?”

Black brows furrowed—an instantaneous reaction, and one that he swiftly schooled into the cool aloofness she’d come to know and expect in him.

How adept he was at erasing all traces of emotion from his face, even from his eyes. What had he endured that he could mask his feelings with such little effort?

He held her inquisitive stare, almost as if he challenged her to see through him. “I told you what to expect before we began any of this.” Mouth flat, grim, he poured the crushed length of silk out of his fist and onto her nude torso. “This is the way it is with me. You can’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Cold words. No doubt meant to freeze her into silence as he pivoted away from her on the bed. His defensive walls had gone up, blocking her out. That is, if he’d ever been inclined to let her inside in the first place.

His bare feet hit the floor and when he went to stand up, Jordana tossed the sash aside and drew up onto her knees behind him. “That’s not what I meant. The bondage … it doesn’t matter to me. Your need to be the one in control doesn’t matter.”

She took a fortifying breath and crept closer to him, very much aware that of the two of them, only he seemed frozen and silent now. Jordana edged up behind his broad back, with its masterpiece of
dermaglyphs
adorning the flawless canvas of his skin.

She lifted her hand, but drew it back, unwilling to dare that much.

Not when she could feel the caged power radiating off him. A menace so dark it nearly stole her voice.

“Nathan,” she whispered carefully. “Why is it that you can’t bear to be touched?”

The answering silence seemed to stretch on forever. He sat on the edge of the bed, unmoving. Jordana wasn’t even sure he was breathing.

She’d overstepped. She realized that now. They had shared something incredible tonight—something intimate and real to her, at least—and now she’d ruined it by pushing him to open up a part of himself that wasn’t hers to examine.

“I’m sorry,” she blurted. “I shouldn’t pry—”

“Would you want to touch the bloodied edge of a blade?” He spoke without turning to face her, his deep voice even, utterly devoid of emotion. “Or willingly put your hand in the jaws of a fighting dog?”

He slowly pivoted then, his stormcloud gaze flat and unblinking. “I’m not the kind of man you should want to get close to. I don’t function the way you expect me to. A weapon doesn’t require touch or comfort. And if you reach out to a creature bred and trained to kill, it’s liable to be your last mistake.”

Jordana swallowed, a keen ache opening up in the center of her chest for what Nathan must have endured as a young man—as a mere child—while he was part of the Hunter program.

She’d heard little more than rumors about the secret breeding labs that had been disrupted by the Order some twenty years ago. There were whispers of neglect and brutality, of terrible abuses suffered on the Gen One boys who’d been created to serve as the private army of one diabolical Breed madman.

Boys like Nathan who, according to Carys, had been removed from his mother as an infant and spent the first thirteen years of his life under those unthinkable conditions.

Jordana’s heart broke for that infant, for that tragic little boy.

And for the detached, battle-hardened man who sat before her now. The beautiful, deadly Breed male who had shown her such unexpected
tenderness tonight and who had awakened her to a passion that still stirred, potent and alive, within her.

“You’re not a blade or an animal, Nathan. Whatever awful things you were forced to do in your past don’t define who you are today.” She inched closer, braved the smallest caress of his stern jaw. “Nathan, you are not what they tried to make you.”

This time, he didn’t remove her hand from where it rested lightly against him. But he stared at her with a calmness that chilled. “Yes, Jordana, I am. Don’t try to imagine I can ever be like the other men you know.”

“I don’t.” She gave a small shake of her head. “I wouldn’t want that.”

She’d proven that to herself in recent days, if not to Nathan. All her life, she’d known the warmth of a loving home and the safe embrace of family and friends. She’d had no shortage of admirers, no lack of even the smallest thing she’d ever wanted or required.

And yet she would give all of that up right now, trade her past with his, if it would remove the hauntedness from Nathan’s stormy eyes.

Oh, she was in trouble here
.

She was falling fast, one foot over the edge of that steep, storm-swept cliff she felt teetering beneath her whenever Nathan was near.

Tonight, she’d given him her virginity. If she wasn’t careful, he would own her heart as well.

Maybe he already did
.

The realization washed over her, left her speechless as she stared into his impenetrable gaze.

Nathan didn’t permit the silence to linger. Nor her touch either.

He pulled away. “It’s late. I should go.” He started to get up, then scowled and uttered a low curse. “Fuck … you’re bleeding.”

Jordana glanced down at the sheet beneath her. A faint pink stain wet the pristine white cotton where she’d lain with Nathan. Embarrassment flooded her face with heat. “Oh … no, it’s nothing.”

“Like hell it is.” He grunted, his brow furrowing deeper. “Dammit, I didn’t want to hurt you.”

Awkwardly, she shook her head. “You didn’t. It was just a little blood, and I’m not hurt. I’ve actually never felt better in my life.”

“Christ, Jordana.” He snarled under his breath. “You deserved someone who would’ve been more gentle with you. You still deserve that.” Another curse boiled out of him, but with less venom now. He held out his hand to her. “Come with me.”

Jordana slipped her fingers into his grasp, not that he had intended to wait for her agreement, of course. That dominating side of him was in full control of the situation—and her—before she could even utter a syllable.

He hauled her up from the bed. In the adjacent bathroom suite, the shower turned on with a sharp hiss, obeying his mental command.

Led by the hand, Jordana followed after him. As her bare feet padded softly on the hardwood a pace behind his long-legged strides, she tried not to gape at the lusciousness of his naked body. Six and a half feet of muscle and gorgeous,
glyph
-adorned skin, all of it moving in catlike fluidity as he prowled across the room with her in tow.

Her blood warmed in her veins, and that molten pool in the center of her began to simmer all over again.

God, she really had it bad for this man
.

Nathan brought her into the steam-filled bathroom, his fingers yet clamped around hers. When he opened the tall glass door of the shower, she half expected him to toss her inside and order her to attend herself.

Instead, he led her inside, bringing her under the hot spray with him.

He didn’t speak, didn’t explain. Nor did Jordana need his words. Not when his hands were tender as he began to wash her, handling her with utmost care and gentle attention.

She needed nothing more than this.

This moment.

This man.

Jordana closed her eyes as Nathan’s cleansing touch eventually turned sensual and his mouth found hers through the steam of their surroundings.

Heaven help her, she was on unsteady ground here.

She was stepping off that ledge tonight, falling too fast.

Falling too hard for a lethal, untouchable Breed male who’d promised her nothing.

She knew this, the same way she understood that if reality waited for her at the bottom of this mad leap, it was certain to break her.