Scent of Darkness (33 page)

"We'll learn to get along." He looked her straight in the eyes. "And he'll be happier at my house than in your empty condo."

"Empty? Condo?" She took a step closer to him. "You're kidding, right?"

"I told you we'd talk about this morning's phone call."

"With Boris." She stood tense and still.

"Yes. With Boris." Jasha stood as if standing would calm his restlessness. "I woke him out of dead sleep, but he's like any animal. He revived at once. He asked what had happened to his son. I told him I killed him and ate his heart. He shrugged it off, said the boy was the least of his sons, and told me how much he admired my ruthless brutality. He suggested a truce."

She'd done the research. "Varinskis don't make truces."

"I know. I know so much better than you. My father taught me what the Varinskis say and what they really mean, and what tactics they use and when and why." Jasha rounded the desk, striding rapidly toward her. "I won't have you stay alone again."

"So you had my furniture moved to your house?

Today?"
Her outrage grew until she felt as if
her
eyes glowed red. "Why didn't you ask me?"

"Don't give me trouble about this." He caught her arms in his hands.

"Give you trouble about this? This? You didn't ask me, you didn't tell me, you just had my furniture moved, and you're acting as if
I'm
unreasonable?" She'd always known he was high-handed, but this!

"You spend every night at my house anyway. What difference does it make if you keep your furniture there?" He wasn't ridiculing her. He was serious.

She could feel the furious rush of blood staining her cheeks. She clenched her fists, and she struggled to lift her arms so she could box his ears. "What difference does it make if I have my own home, the first home I've ever had, with my own furniture where my own cat can be comfortable? I don't know—why don't you move in with me and see whether you feel displaced?"

"I'm sorry. I didn't think about your condo being your first home."

He did look sorry, and that really fried her. How dare he feel sorry for her?

"I would stay with you if it was possible," he said, "but there's no way to be secure in your home."

"What do you care? The icon is in your safe." And that pissed her off, too. Maybe it wasn't strictly her icon, but everyone agreed—at least, she and Zorana agreed—that it was her responsibility.

"It's not the icon I'm worried about. It's you."

"Let's talk about what's really important—your place is nicer," she mocked him.

"Not nicer. Larger and easier to guard."

Now, in addition to feeling sorry for her, he was being patient. "Oh, please. As if the great Jasha Wilder would stay in my little condo with—"

He kissed her.

He hadn't kissed her since the day he'd proposed, and this stealth attack caught her off guard. All the days of being with him, yet being alone, caught up with her, and she kissed him back. Kissed him with her heart and soul open and vulnerable. Kissed him passionately and lovingly.

.When'he drew back, he made the mistake of smiling with the smile she'd seen him practice on so many women. "Believe me. I love you, and I want you to marry me. Please."

A month ago, she would have killed to hear those words and have him smile like that at her.

Now she just wanted to kill. "You think you treat me like you treat every other woman in the world, and that'll be enough? I don't think so, buster."

"I do not treat you like I treat other women." He slid his hands over her rear and lifted her into him, letting her feel his erection. "Other women don't keep me hard twenty-four hours a day."

"Am I supposed to be flattered?" She injected disdain into her voice, but the sensation of him against her made her nipples ache and her body reach for him.

She was so easy. And he knew it, because he was a wolf.

Great. Just great.

"No, you're not supposed to be flattered. But you should be flattered that I still say I love you. I may have proposed to another woman, but I never told another woman
that."
In direct contrast with his irritated tone, his hand moved with slow sensuality up her spine, and his fingers whispered lovingly to the soft hair at the base of her skull.

"I wouldn't be flattered even if you meant it."

She saw the rush of blood to his cheeks, the narrowing of his eyes. She'd finally made him lose his temper.

"What about me? All you want from me is safety."

"What?" Why did he think that? "That's not true!"

"First you thought you wanted some dream man, some noble cavalier to rescue you from your loneliness. Then when I turned into a wolf, when you found the icon, when you realized we were fighting for lives and our souls, you wanted to run away— until I proved I could protect you. Then you were willing enough to be at my side."

"How can you say that?" She tried to elbow her way free.

He kept her close. "Finally, when I told you I loved you, you were afraid to believe me. Fine. Don't believe me. Tell yourself my kind of love isn't the kind you want. Just let me do what I do so well, and protect you from harm."

He was bitter, he was annoyed, and worse—parts of what he said were true.

It was the true parts that made her angrier than ever. "All right. Ill move in with you—until the danger's passed, however long that takes. But I won't marry a man like you."

"What do you mean, a man like me?" Jasha's face grew cool.

"A man who arranges things as
he
likes. A man who doesn't trust me enough to tell me his secrets."

"Am I the only one with secrets?"

She stiffened under his direct stare.

"That's what I thought." His hand still caressed the nape of her neck, but her impression had changed. Somehow, the gesture was less tender and more blatantly sexual. "And you do know my secrets."

"If I knew your secrets, maybe this move wouldn't have taken me by surprise. Maybe I would have—"

"Volunteered to move in with me?" He found nerve endings that sent sensation to the hollows of her elbows and knees, to the sensitive places at the tops of her thighs. "If I thought there was a chance you would display that kind of sense, I certainly would have had you arrange the move. After all, that's the kind of work a secretary is supposed to do."

His calm insult caught her by surprise, and cut her to the quick. He never called her a secretary, he always thought well of her, and he always insisted that she turn the rote phone calls over to the receptionist.

Her upsurge of loathing surprised her more. "I have never hated anyone like I hate you." Right now she meant it—but perhaps she really hated only herself.

Jasha walked to his office door. He shut it. Locked it. And when he turned around, the blaze in his eyes made her take a step back. "Since you hate me forever anyway, I might as well prove how very much you also love me."

He paced toward her, and just the way he walked, with the slow, long stride of a predator, made her realize his intentions, and her heartbeat accelerate. "Jasha, no."

"Why not? What are you going to do?" As he circled her, he stripped off his tie. "Despise me? Hate me? Refuse to marry me? You already do all those things. So what have I got to lose?"

She thought she felt him brush her earlobe, but when she swung around, he stood off to the side, taking his belt out of the belt loops. "Don't take off your clothes," she said. "Nothing's going to happen."

She might as well have saved her breath, for he asked, "Do you know how very much I love to watch you walk in this skirt? But of course you do. You wore it to tease me."

She caught his scent on her left side, felt a wisp of his breath on her ear, but when she turned, he paced behind her. "No, I didn't."

He laughed in disbelief. "You've worn skirts every day this week, just to get even with me for keeping you at my house. Don't you think I recognize a good strategy when I see one? And it worked, too. You've got such a long stride, and the slit on this skirt—"

She jumped as he ran his hand up her thigh.

"The slit on this skirt shows such a beautiful expanse of pale creamy leg. But I have to wonder— what kind of panties are you wearing?" His voice dropped to a husky whisper. "Bikini? Thong? A sensible cotton number, perhaps?"

Her mouth grew dry, and she shifted her legs, suddenly uncomfortable, needy, and far, far too bare in her thong.

"Do you know what has been my fantasy this week?"

"I don't care." She so cared.

"The weight bench. I could see you straddling it, bent over, and facing away from me, while I—" He caught her around the waist, moving so quickly she didn't have time to scream. He propelled her backward—the movement was almost like dancing—

until the bench struck the backs of her knees and she overbalanced.

He caught her on the way down, spun her away from him, and lifted her skirt at the same time.

She found herself standing at the end of the bench, bent from the waist, her hands gripping the sides.

His fantasy was almost reality.

He groaned with delight, and stroked the bare globes of her rear. "Ann. My God. You're going to kill me."

"Only if I can get my hands on you." But her eyes closed as he moved the thin string of her thong aside and caressed her, his fingers exploring her clit, then slipping inside her, exploring her depths, then sliding slowly up her crack.

Her hands gripped the bench so hard her fingers turned white.

My God. It was broad daylight; her legs were spread; he could see colors and textures, all the contrasts that made her a woman. Worse, he didn't wait for permission to do whatever he liked. He truly was the autocrat she called him—and all she wanted to do was tell him to hurry up.

He pulled the thong down, off, and that was a step in the right direction. He urged her forward, making her spread her legs to straddle the weight bench.

She heard his pants drop. Then he stepped up behind her, as close as he could get. He pressed himself against her, and used his dick to stroke her.

The skin was silky hot, the size large and rigid, and she wanted him to stop messing around and . . . "I hate you.” she whispered again.

"And?"

She rubbed herself against him like a wolf in heat. "And . . . Jasha, I need you now."

"That's it. That's exactly what I wanted."

His quiet exultation made her want to turn on him, shriek at him.

But she couldn't, for he thrust himself inside her.

The head, the ridges of his cock rubbed her inside and out. The sudden intrusion made her tighten almost to orgasm. As he pulled back, her body released him only reluctantly, and he groaned.

Then he thrust again, and thrust again, and she met each lunge with an eagerness that demanded its due.

She wanted to come. She needed to come. She craved that sweet release, those moments when nothing but pure pleasure filled her mind, and she and Jasha were one.

Yet climax remained tantalizingly out of reach. No matter how hard she tried . . . she bent down farther, put her cheek to the weight bench, and gave herself up to the motions, the sounds, the scents.

"Please," she heard someone say. "Please." She recognized her own voice, chanting its plea.

But before she could reclaim her dignity, his hand slid between them. His fingers softly bit at her clitoris, and climax jolted through her, bringing her alive and wild with the glory. She shuddered and spasmed, and when she could contain it no more, she screamed with a pleasure that couldn't be contained.

And he was there with her. He moved her hips back and forth as he pounded into her. Waves of scent rolled off him: pleasure, release, satisfaction, and yet more pleasure.

She truly did hate him, but he was right—she loved him, too, and if she wasn't careful, he would absorb her. For as she came to rest, she realized—she could identify his moods by the shifts in his scents.

When had that happened? When had he marked her so completely?

He slid out of her, and she crumpled onto the bench, gathering all her strength, and all her courage.

"Ann." He grasped her waist and helped her sit up, helped her tuck her skirt under her. Sitting beside her, he took her hand. "We can't go on like this. We've got to talk. We need honesty between us."

"I was thinking exactly the same thing." She risked a glance at him.

He looked tired, worried, and satisfied, all at once.

She thought perhaps she looked the same.

He didn't understand why she held him away, and everything between them had become twisted, complicated, confused. She had to tell him the truth.

For the first time ever, she would tell someone— no, show someone-—her secret.

"I didn't refuse to marry you just because your mother said we ought to,” she said. "I had reasons of my own."

"I would never marry to fulfill my family's expectations. If I was willing to do that, I would have been married at twenty. But please—I'm fascinated to hear the reasons of your own."