Lion And The Falcon (Furry United Coalition) (21 page)

Finding his balcony proved easier than expected
, especially given Nolan napped on it wrapped in a sleeping bag.
Is he waiting for me?

Warmth spread through her.
She’d never come home to someone before. Never had anyone who cared enough to wait for her.

A
lighting on the concrete floor, she shifted before he deigned to open an eye. She waited for him to say something. Anything.

He didn’t say a word as he yawned and stretched.
For some reason, his actions annoyed her.

“What are you doing?” she snapped.

“Waiting for you.”

His answer mollified her a bit.
But he had yet to get up or hug her or…treat her like he cared. She struggled not to let her disappointment show. “I told you to go to your mother’s.”

He shrugged. “I guess we’re both not very good at following orders.” Taking a deep inhalation, he frowned at her. “You’re injured.”

“Just a few scratches.”

“A few?” He stood
, shrugged off the cocooning shell, and paced around her, his body bristling with tension. “What did you do? Wrestle with a cat?” He growled the last part.

“Actually
, it was a pair of squirrels.”

He stopped and stood behind her. “Dare I ask why you were playing with squirrels? You know we have some perfectly
good restaurants if you’re hungry. Or I could have ordered in.”

“Eew.
I didn’t go after them for eating. I caught up with our escaped mutant squirrels. Which reminds me, do you have a phone I can use? We need to call in a cleanup crew.”

“
Your cell is on the kitchen counter.”

Shivering from the evening air and lack of clothing, which he didn’t seem inclined to provide, she went through the sliding glass doors and only paused a second as she took in the empty room. “Where’s all your stuff?”

“Gone. I had a cleaning crew in while you were out hunting woodland creatures.”

“Great big mutant ones, thank you very much.”

A rumble at her back told her the distinction didn’t sit well. “They cleared everything out, and steam cleaned the carpets.”

That explained why her feet were getting wet. The fibe
rs weren’t completely dry.

“Quick work.”

“The pride might be catty, but they know how to pull together in a crisis.”

“What did mommy dearest say?”

“I wouldn’t know. I haven’t answered her calls.”

“And she didn’t show up?”

“Oh, she did. However, I was out.”

“Out? Out where, you idiot?”

“Looking for you.”

He was?
Don’t melt. Don’t melt. Don’t…
“Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?” she yelled. “What if you ran into Lester or another of the psychos?”

“You mean like you did
? Alone?” His quietly spoken words hammered at her harder than a shout would have.

“It wasn’t safe and you know it.”

“Then I guess you should have stayed to guard me.”

The pointed reminder made her wince
, and that quickly, her anger dissipated and she changed the subject. “I’m surprised your pride didn’t manage to have the place fully furnished too.”

“It will be by the end of the day. Furniture stores don’t like to deliver after
midnight.”

Entering the living room, she noted
that wasn’t entirely accurate as he already had a pair of leather club chairs and an air mattress. Spotting her cell phone on the counter along with a neatly folded pile of clothes, she dialed the FUC switchboard to report on her encounter with the squirrels and their location.

Nolan leaned against the granite top, arms folded over his chest, his expression unreadable. Although, if she were to guess, he simmered.
She just couldn’t be certain of why he was angry. Yes, she’d left him unguarded, but with a roomful of agents. Agents he’d left to go looking for her? If anyone had a right to anger, it was Clarice.

As soon as she hung up
, she made a grab for the clothes, but he caught her hand and shook his head. “Not yet you don’t.”

“In case you hadn’t noticed
, I’m naked, and while your condo is warm, I’d prefer to wear some clothes.”

“I ha
ve noticed. Trust me, I’m doing my best not to do something about it. But you need to shower and let me look at your injuries.”

“They’re surface wounds. I’ll be healed by morning.” Or afternoon. She’d lost track of time during her flight.

“Given they were inflicted by my infected patients, we shouldn’t assume anything. So hit the shower to clean off and then humor me while I give you a checkup.”

Nothing in his tone or expression said he planned anything more than a checkup, yet, a spurt of heat lit low in her belly.
She thought back on her conversation with herself and her decision to have fun with the lion. With his grim face and standoffish attitude, had she lost her window of opportunity?

Only one way to find out. With a swing of her hips, she sashayed away toward his bathroom. A barely audible rumble of sound followed.
Perhaps not so disinterested after all.

But first
, a shower, which after catching a whiff of herself, she couldn’t deny she needed.

As soon as she left the room, Nolan whirled around and punched a wall, hard enough to crack the plaster. The pain blossoming across his knuckles did nothing to ease the rage aching for release inside.

She’s injured.
That didn’t sit well with him. Sure, he understood on some visceral level that none of the wounds were grievous, and as she surmised, most would disappear in a few hours. Reasoning didn’t calm his agitated lion. An urge to hunt down the scent of the creatures coating her made him punch the wall again. Dead or not, he wanted to kill the squirrels again.

And then, he wanted to mount her.
Primitive, yes, but he couldn’t help how he felt.

Without the least attempt at modesty, she paraded her nude body before him. Did she not know the torture she inflicted? The
self-restraint he had to show not to push her up against a wall and just take her? Nudity might be a fact of life for shifters, and politeness decreed that those who shifted not get ogled. Still, though…a man could only take so much.
And this man can’t take anymore.

To distract himself from the thought of her in the shower, the hot water streaming down her slim,
athletic body, her small breasts topped with dark berries, wet and begging for a tongue, he busied himself laying out some basic medical supplies from his medical bag. He’d brought it up from his car when he returned from his futile search for Clarice. His falcon wasn’t the only one pissed at him for leaving the safety of his condo and the team in place. He’d returned to find his mother losing her mind. Actually, she probably still ranted, partially out of feat for his safety, but more he suspected because he wouldn’t bow to her wishes.

Despite the arguments by his mother, Nolan wouldn’t budge
from his condo. Clarice had left her stuff behind, which meant she intended to return at some point. If he left, how would she find him? What if she needed him?

Kloe unexpectedly backed him
, claiming it was unlikely Lester would return, but just in case, once they’d finished cleaning his place, agents were assigned to watch key entry points. Someone scrounged up an air mattress,along with some clean sheets and a sleeping bag. However, Nolan eschewed the warm comfort inside his home to stand vigil on the balcon
y—
ahem, catnap. He needed the rest, but at the same time as he dozed, his lion side watched, listened, and waited. The moment he heard the flutter of wings, he’d sprang to total awareness, but feigned sleep a moment longer in order to control himself when he caught the myriad scents coming off Clarice, primarily that of her blood.

How he wanted to shake her until he teeth rattled for taking on two of the mutated patients. Who cared if she saved a human? She could have lost her life acting the part of heroine. From the sounds of it, the battle was a close one.
I should have been there to help her.

And this was the biggest problem he had. Funny enough
, it was the same issue he had with his mother. Clarice wanted to do things herself, on her terms. She didn’t want anyone to molly coddle her.
Just like me.
For the first time in his life, Nolan understood how hard his mother must have found it to let Nolan forge his own way, face danger by himself, leaving her to worry, worry that maybe everything wouldn’t turn out all right.

However
, just like he kept forcing his mother to realize he could stand on his own two feet, he also had to realize Clarice was an independent woman. Not just a woman, but an agent, one trained to do a job that would put her in danger on a regular basis. He couldn’t set restrictions on her actions. It wasn’t up to him to decide what she could or could not do. Whether he liked it or not, he needed to let her make her own choices. Trying to forbid or cage her would cause her to fly. The scary reality was the woman he’d fallen for would never be content to just sit back and let others take the risk.
I guess I’ll have to accept this is who she is and make sure I have plenty of antiseptic and bandages on hand for when she comes home.

Of course, this was all supposing he could convince her to give him a shot and that they could have a future together.

Still unsure of how he would accomplish that, his time for thought ran out as she emerged from the bathroom in a billow of steam, her bare shoulders glistening above the towel she’d wrapped securely around her torso. She arched a brow at his medical array.

“Good grief, Sylvester.
I got a few bruises and scratches. I didn’t lose a limb.”

“
Don’t be such a noisy chickadee. Zip your protesting beak and get over here.” He tempered his taunt with a grin. “Unless the big, bad falcon is scared of a tetanus shot?”

“You just want an excuse to poke me in the butt.”

Damn straight he did. “Drop the towel too, would you? I don’t want the fibers sticking to any open cuts.”

He expected more of an argument.
To his shock, the wet terrycloth hit the floor and she undulated her hips as she approached him, the bareness of her mound teasing him, the tautness of her nipples tempting, the half-smile on her lips… Was that an invitation he saw in her eyes?

Mouth suddenly dry, his mind
went blank as all the blood in his brain rushed to a certain body part. He stood frozen.

“What are you waiting for?” she asked huskily. “I thought you were going to check me out.”

Couldn’t she tell he was? And from what he could see, she was perfect. He shook his head and tried to regain some semblance of control before he threw himself on her like a ravening beast. Time to act like a professional. He took note of the bruises on her ribs. The one on her cheekbone. He palpated the skin around them, making sure the bones weren’t broken and that she didn’t have any internal bleeding. Her sudden indrawn breath made him pause.

“Am I hurting you?”

“Not exactly.”

A perfume rose in a seductive cloud to surround him, her desire making itself known.
Not pain then. He needed to finish his checkup quickly, make sure she truly was only injured in the most superficial manner. He wouldn’t be able to leash himself for long. He placed his hands on her and motioned for her to spin. She presented her back where he found more mottled bruises and minor scratches. He again pressed on the blemished areas, her gasps and hitches of breath coinciding each time with an increase in the heady musk coming from between her thighs.

As she’d said, her wounds were on the surface and would heal in a few hours.
The last test he did for pure pleasure.

“Touch your toes.”

Over she bent, again without argument, her buttocks pointing, the moist lips of her sex exposed. He ran a finger down her spine from her neck down to the crevice of her cheeks, then between them. A mewl left her as a shudder swept her body.

“
Does that hurt?” he whispered.

“Yes.”

“Do you want me to fix it?”

“Oh
God, yes please.”

That was all he needed to hear. Dropping to his knees, he pressed his mouth against her core, his tongue emerging to swipe at her cream.
She cried out and shivered. He grasped her cheeks and held her steady as he tongued her, spreading her labia to penetrate her channel and expose her clit. How she responded to his touch. As before, she shook, quivered, and gave in to the passion flaming between them. The more she urged him on, the more frantic his own need became.

Need to have her. Need to claim her. Need to mark her. Need to make her mine.

As she trembled on the brink of orgasm, he couldn’t wait any longer. He stood, ripping at his pants when they wouldn’t cooperate and slide over his engorged cock, the fabric snagging. Freed, he took himself in hand and rubbed the swollen tip against her moist lips.