Stealing Kathryn (30 page)

“No locks?” she asked.

“No need. Crime is severely punished in this world. With an overpopulation of men, it has to be. The men who dare are swiftly executed.” He didn’t look at her as he said it, perhaps showing that he was ashamed of his society’s extreme tactics.

“And women?” she asked.

He looked up quickly. “You really don’t want to know this,” he said firmly. “Can we discuss something else?”

“Such as?”

“Such as, why were you flirting with my friends all night?” She could see he was very tense as he asked the question. Had he been so rigidly on edge all night? Was that why he was so quiet?

“I wasn’t flirting,” she said, her tone aghast at the accusation. “I don’t even know how to flirt!”

“Maybe,” he said flatly. “Maybe not.”

She laughed, a short burst of shock. “Are you…Are you jealous?” she demanded.

“Not jealous,” he said shortly, “just trying to protect what’s—”

He broke off before he said it, but he might as well not have.

“Go on, say it. Mine. After all of this I’m still just your pretty little treasure you want to lock in a room where no one else can see!”

“No. Not like that,” he said sharply. “Not anymore. In fact, quite the opposite. I want to show you off. And not as a treasure, but as my mate. I am proud to have such an exquisite kindra, Kathryn. And yes, at times I do want to keep you to myself. That makes me possessive, I know, but I cannot help what nature forces me to feel for you. You are the one special thing in my life, Kat. I won’t lose you to another and I won’t let harm come to you.”

“Lose me to—are you kidding? Do you really think I would do that to you? After all the craziness we’ve been through, you think I’m going to suddenly hop off with someone else?”

“I don’t think it, I fear it. Irrational or not, it is what I feel.” He looked down at the floor, not meeting her eyes as he spoke. That was when she realized just how afraid he was. She had never meant so much to anyone before. Oh, her family had needed her terribly, but more as a warm body than who that body was. Adrian had gotten to know her pretty damn well over the months he’d been tracking her in her dreams. She wondered exactly how long that had been. She imagined him being obsessive about her in his former state. It was going to be hard for him to let go of that obsession now, despite his changes.

But in a way that was okay with her. She kind of liked that she was so important to him. The thing she was insecure about was the sex thing.

“Is this just a sex thing? This thing between you and me.”

That got his attention fast. He raised his eyes to hers, and the ferocity she saw told her the answer before he even spoke.

“This is not just about sex. I cannot give you a definition to satisfy me, but it is much more than sex to me. Sex I could find anywhere, Kathryn. You…you are one of a kind. And I will always treat you that way.”

She swallowed as a warm melty feeling spread all throughout her midsection. She smiled at him, cocking her hip and swinging it just a little as her body went into full flirt. Yep. She had definitely figured out how to flirt. And what was more, it was working. All she had to do was watch his eyes. They swam over her fast and hot, the air between them heating up rapidly.

“I think I like the way you treat me,” she said as she tugged down one of the black dress’s straps and exposed her shoulder a little bit more to him. She moved her hand to her waist, tugging on the ties that cinched the waist of the dress. “I think you’ve treated me very well since you’ve become more…yourself.”

“Have I?” He sounded thirsty. He looked it too.

“You don’t think so?” She unraveled the bodice laces until the dress hung loose on her body. Then she went to tug on the remaining straps holding the dress on her body.

“I’ve tried,” he said passionately. “I know I’ve failed on many occasions, but know that I’ve tried my best to please you.”

“I think you’re doing fine,” she said as she dropped her arms, did a little shimmy, and let the dress fall on the floor around her ankles.

“Suddenly I want a lock on the damn door,” he growled as he closed the distance between them in a single hard step. He grabbed her by her bare waist, jerking her up against his body. “Do you feel? Do you feel how hard you make me just by undressing for me?”

She did, and it was amazing. She reached down between their bodies and stroked his length right through the firm denim he wore. Or maybe it just seemed firm because he was so very, very hard. Now that he had fully reverted to his normal self, she knew that this huge and beautiful cock was going to remain this size forever. She wasn’t complaining one bit. She loved the way he felt under her hand. She loved even more the intense sounds he made as she slowly stroked over him. She realized there would always be a little monster in him, but she would always be able to tame him with her touch just as she had from the first time they had met.

She worked open his fly quickly and carefully, then sank her hand in to grab hold of him. She smiled up at him as he filled her hand and burned her palm with his incredible heat.

“What you do to me,” he murmured, pressing kisses along her hairline. “I’ve done things in dreams that I once thought were the best in sexual extremes, but I was wrong. Nothing compares to the reality of you. Nothing.” He cupped the back of her neck in his large hand, pulling her up on tiptoe so she could meet his kiss. She felt as though she was swallowing the most voracious of hungers, and then she was meeting it with a hunger of her own. She thrust her tongue deep into his mouth, teasing him and tasting him again and again and feeling his hands grow tighter and tighter around her naked flesh.

Their kisses became long and drugging, making her body go limp against his, making her go soft and wet for him. She suddenly wanted him inside her. She didn’t care how, she just wanted it. She pulled from his mouth with gasping breaths, then reached for his pants and pushed them down off his hips. She dropped to her knees before he could even formulate an idea to stop her, and in the next instant he was past her teeth and against her tongue. Oh, she could so grow to love this, she thought. She licked him clean of the sweetly salty fluid that her touch on his cock had milked from him, moaning softly at the taste and at the understanding that it was because she excited him so much. She felt powerful as she swallowed it down, felt like she was taking in a magical elixir that strengthened her desire for him. Made her hotter. Made her better at pleasing him.

Adrian sucked in his breath through his teeth. He wanted nothing more in that moment than to sink his hands into her hair and hold her head to him, but he resisted mastering her like that, choosing instead to let her do whatever she wished to do.

“Ah, sweetheart, I can’t tell you how good that feels.” He closed his eyes briefly, tipping his head back with his pleasure, but he preferred to watch her work her magic. “I love your mouth,” he breathed.

She loved how frantic he sounded so quickly. She licked him all around the head of his cock, then sucked him in hard and deep. She repeated the steps over and over again until he couldn’t help himself and he put his shaking hands deep into her hair. He crushed the strands in his fists and between his fingers, but still made no physical move to guide her. She was doing just fine all on her own as far as he was concerned. But that didn’t preclude him from giving her verbal instructions.

“Touch my balls while you’re doing that,” he instructed. “Even if it’s just the lightest scrape of your nails…Oh God, yes!” he cried when she followed his instruction well. Too well. Now she was sucking and manipulating him with zeal, making it impossible to focus on anything but her and the buildup of sensation going on in his body.

Satisfied she was getting to him in all the best ways, she was relentless. She could tell by the sounds ejecting out of him that he was fast losing control, that he was swept up in what he was feeling to the point that he had very little to no power over what was happening to him. This was exactly what she had wanted. She reached out with both hands and crawled her fingers up his thighs, making sure to tickle through all the sensitive hairs she found there. He drew his fingers through her hair, clutching and reclutching it at different lengths and intervals. Then his hands moved to her face, his thumbs stroking over her concave cheeks as she drew on him again and again, sliding his length as far into her mouth as she could manage.

“Enough, Kat,” he rasped, holding her head still between his hands. “I won’t come until I’m inside you.”

But she could tell by his breathing and the shaking of his hands that he was very close. He was trying to exhibit control where there was none to be had. To prove the point, she tongued him within her mouth, making him suck in his breath in shock and sensitivity.

“God…I’m warning you, Kathryn, don’t.”

But his gruff warnings and behaviors didn’t frighten her any longer. He had lost that power over her long ago, perhaps even before his looks had fully reverted from those of his monstrous counterpart. Reaching up to take him hard in her hand, she slid her fist up his length until it kissed against her lips. She repeated the action until he moaned. She looked up and saw his head shaking, as if he could ward off what was coming with the power of his will alone.

When he realized how determined she was, that his warnings and wishes otherwise were being completely ignored, he gave himself over to the inevitable. Until now she had always been so caught up in her own pleasure at his hands that she hadn’t really gotten a chance to see what he looked like when he came. She saw it up close and personal now, the way it built in him, the way he couldn’t be still, had to thrust into what he was feeling. His teeth were clenched tight; she could tell because the sounds he released were shot out between them in harsh bursts. Every muscle in his body stood out in relief, the veins beneath his skin drawn clearly in contrast.

“Kathryn…Kathryn, you’d better be good and wet for me,” he ground out, “because right after this I’m going to fuck you within an inch of your life.”

She laughed, the vibration of it clearly passing along his cock because he cried out and abruptly became more frantic before her.

“Kat! My God!” He tried to pull free of her mouth, but she wasn’t having that. She’d always wanted to know. She wasn’t going to let him cheat her out of knowing.

His orgasm was ferocious, from the sounds he made to the burning heat shooting into her mouth. She was surprised by the salty, tart taste of him, swallowing him down before she could even register it fully. But there it was again, over and over in hard spurts against her tongue. And she watched him as he gripped her face fiercely between his palms, clearly forcing himself not to give in to the wild thrusts his body was demanding of him.

She finally allowed him the freedom to escape her mouth. He did so with haste, nearly falling flat on his back as his knees gave out. He sat down hard, gasping for breath and, by the look of him, trying to uncross his eyes. Kathryn giggled at the thought and was surprised to hear him laugh as well.

“No doubt, love. My eyes are well and truly crossed.”

“Hey!” she gasped. “How did you know I was thinking that?”

He gave her a look. “You mean you haven’t realized that we’re a pathic species?”

“Pathic? Like telepathic? Like you know everything I’m thinking?” Her voice grew higher pitched until she was squeaking by the end of the question.

“There isn’t an English term for what we do. It’s more like—the louder the thought and the feeling behind it, the more clearly the impression and words come through. It has to be projected to be received. And you have to be receptive to hear what’s being projected. You can do it too, you know.”

She snorted. “I can not!”

“You can and you will. It just takes practice. Other human women have come to this world and adjusted to the way we speak. So will you.”

“Hmm. Well, this explains how you always knew everything all the time. That’s poor sporting, not letting me know before now.”

“It simply didn’t occur to me until just recently. I was going to say something, but I think I got distracted.”

“Well, next time when it’s something that important, don’t get distracted,” she huffed.

“Not even if it’s by you and that fascinating mouth of yours?” he asked her.

“Not—fascinating?” she asked, hearing the compliment on a delay because she was still flustered to realize he could read her thoughts all this time.

“Beyond fascinating,” he said, moving forward on his hands and knees until he crowded her flat onto her back. “I would be remiss if I didn’t also add ‘extraordinary’ to the list.”

“I think you’re trying to charm me,” she accused him, “so I’ll forget about your little lapse.”

“And if I am?” he asked, running a finger up the center of her belly.

“Well, it might not work,” she warned him.

“Won’t it, though?” He grinned at her as his finger changed direction and headed directly south of her navel. He kept going until he was traveling deeply between her labia and probing teasingly at the portal to her body.

“You think you can use sex to get your way?” she breathed.

“I do. Mainly because from the very start you have struck me as a sexual creature, Kat. I know you don’t think of yourself that way, but I have never seen you as anything but. Your sensuality is stunning. From the scent you wear to the clothes you choose.” He dipped his head and tongued her belly button, making her giggle an instant before he thrust his finger inside her. “Mmm, it’s a wonder how you can still be so tight when you’ve had me inside you already today. It’s as if I was never here. I’m not sure whether to be fascinated or put out.”

“I’m sure it’s not a commentary on your performance,” she assured him with a smile.

“Let’s hope not. But just to be safe, I’m going to test the theory.”

“Already?” She laughed as he whipped his tongue around her navel once more, then drew a line straight down to her pubic curls. “I must say, that’s, like, porno impressive.”

“Have you seen many of those?” He glanced up in time to see her blush. He chuckled.