Temptation Rising (33 page)

“This is what I am,” he whispered, staring down at her as the words tumbled from his lips.

He was the handsome attorney with the sharp suits and keen wit. He was the dominant yet considerate lover who had made her come with just the touch of his hand. He was the beast who’d haunted her dreams. And he was exactly who she wanted.

Shifting to bring a hand up, she touched her fingers over his jaw, let them trail until they feathered over his lips. “This is who I want,” she replied.

His head lowered and their lips collided in a hungry kiss. She gripped the back of his head, pulling him closer, trying to get deeper. She craved his taste, wanted every bit of his tongue in an attempt to quench this persistent thirst.

He gave her everything: lips, tongue, moans, nipping teeth that had her hissing at their contact. Her body trembled, aching to be touched, taken. As if he’d read her mind his hands began to move frantically over her body, severing their kiss while he worked. Her pants and panties were stripped quickly from her bottom; she toed off her shoes during the process. He grabbed the hem of her shirt, pulling it roughly over her head. His teeth found the sensitive skin of her neck and traced a stinging path of heat down to the crevice between her breasts. With her chest heaving, her back arching to meet his assault, she heard a snap and felt her bra slip from her body.

Rome took a bare breast into his mouth, suckling so deeply the turgid nipple burned. Simultaneously he cupped the other breast, squeezing just as tightly. Kalina’s thighs shook, her pussy creaming with expectancy. She gasped and clamped her hands onto his shoulders as he continued his assault.

“Mine,” she thought she heard him mumble as his lips moved from her breast down her torso to where his tongue stroked longingly over her navel.

His palms still held her breasts, and she lifted her hands to his wrists to keep them there. With each stroke of his tongue over her skin, she felt a new layer of herself being peeled away. Nothing was the same, not the sound of his voice, the feel of his kisses, the sensations rippling through her body. It was all different, new, vibrant in a way she’d never imagined.

When he nipped along the line of her juncture she cried out his name and realized her throat felt hoarse, like she’d been yelling and yelling for hours. She moved her head from side to side, seeming to go in slow motion as flashes of scenes filtered through her mind.

A picturesque jungle. Majestic cats standing together in unity. A colony. A whole new world.

His hands left her breasts to spread the plump folds of her pussy until cool air whispered over the tightened bud at her center. When the flat of his tongue covered that nub everything inside Kalina rushed forward, raging as the sound of a vicious waterfall rumbled in her ears. He licked again and again, using the full length of his tongue. She arched from the floor panting and screaming as each stroke pushed her closer and closer, until she was finally freefalling over the edge. Falling and falling only to land with swift efficiency on her feet.

The landing was like an awakening and Kalina’s body fully responded.

Grasping his head she worked her hips over his mouth, directing his strokes and begging for more.

Chapter 23

Rome felt the shift, felt the exact moment Kalina’s cat had taken charge inside her. It was a silent challenge, a hello-baby-I’m-home. And he was there, completely game for their meeting.

Thrusting two fingers inside her, he continued to work the nub at the hood of her center. She was pumping against him, giving him every angle, taking the pleasure she’d so longed for. With his other hand he found her rear, touching the tight entrance timidly at first, waiting to hear her response, then pressing farther when her breathing hitched.

He slid one finger inside her rear while the other hand worked her core until her essence was dripping. He wanted to lap at the thick honey flowing from her, but wanted to prepare her for his taking even more. So instead he pressed another finger into her rear, scissoring them to stretch her farther.

“I need you now,” a voice deeper than hers whispered. She moaned and it was a guttural sound, a rasping sound that rubbed over his body like a silken cloth.

“Not yet, baby. I’m hungry for you, too, but dammit, not yet,” he said through clenched teeth, wanting to sink his dick deep inside her warmth with an urgency that threatened his sanity.

But there was something else, some part of him that knew this was a defining moment, that what he did to her, what she did to him at this time would take them both to a place foreign to them. He couldn’t stop it but that didn’t mean he knew how to handle it, how Kalina would handle it. They’d known each other officially for about a week now, but unofficially it seemed like forever.

Unknowingly his cat had been in search of hers—the man in search of the perfect female. He’d never had admitted it, not to anyone. Except at this very moment there was no room for denial. He couldn’t—not that he’d ever considered this an option in any facet of his life—run from the inevitable.

She bucked beneath him and his body tensed, his balls drawing so tight he could barely swallow. The tip of his dick dripped with pleasure as his fingers moved through her silken heat. Her scent permeated the air, mixing with his, combining to form the
calor
. Together it was intoxicating, this scent that sealed their mating.

From this moment on Rome would not be able to keep his hands off her. She was in his blood now, her cat mingling with his, the female joining with the male. No other males could touch her now even though they’d pick up her scent and translate it as her being in heat. They’d want her, crave her, but die a quick death if they dared touch her.

For her, she would ache for him, her body would forever be ready for his touch, his taking, almost to the point of pain whenever they were near. And when they were apart her scent would thicken, sending out a message for him to come to her. Another male venturing near her would get an extreme reaction—either her intense arousal or rabid anger. Both would be dangerous to anyone other than her mate.

That was the way of their mating. Shadow Shifters mated for life.

And as Kalina arched up off the floor, her hazel eyes turning golden, touching their heat to him wherever their gaze landed, he knew he’d have it no other way. This was his
companheiro
and nobody was going to take her away from him. He’d protect her with everything he was, that was a promise.

“Rome, please,” she panted, his name a sweet whisper to Rome’s ears.

“Yes, baby,” he crooned, slipping his fingers from her then lifting her to carry her to his bed.

With the utmost care Rome lay her on the bed, but the she-cat would not have it easy. She rolled over, coming up on her knees, offering her luscious bottom to him. Then looking over her shoulder with eyes glossed with lust and hunger, she said, “Take me, now!”

He wouldn’t deny her, couldn’t even if he wanted to and he definitely did not want to. There was nothing in all this world—Rome was absolutely positive—more beautiful than the sight of his woman’s ass poised and waiting for him.

Inside his beast thrashed, slashing him with stinging lashes of hunger, need. He almost roared but bared his teeth instead, feeling the prick of their sharpness against his bottom lip. Stepping closer to the bed, he grabbed the soft cheeks of her behind, pulling them apart so he could see the slightly stretched rear entrance. His mouth watered with anticipation, his dick straining for admittance.

Rome wanted to go slow, to be easy with her, gentle even, but wasn’t sure he could. Need tore through him, and the second his tip touched the tight entrance his entire body heated. He pushed slowly, holding her hips still while he made the first attempts at entry. Her tightness gripped him, sucking him in the moment she had a small taste.

Kalina pushed back and he slipped deeper inside.

“Damn, so tight, so deliciously tight,” he whispered.

“More,” she demanded.

Rome thrust his hips a little, still holding back, not wanting to rush her acceptance of him. Spreading her wider, he glanced down and almost lost the last remnants of his control at the sight of his thickness stretching her, filling her. Her body welcomed him, like a hungry mouth, opening wider to take him completely.

His legs trembled, his mouth watering as he leaned forward and licked a heated line up her spine. She arched and moaned. He continued licking over her, loving the musky-and-sweet blended taste of her skin. She was smooth and hot and eager for him to take her completely as she rotated her ass over his dick. He pushed farther, planting his length deeper into her rear. His teeth nipped her shoulder blade and she screamed his name.

“Please, if you don’t take me now, I’m going to die.” She was panting, her body bucking back against him. “Now, dammit!”

“Gato inferno,”
he mumbled against her skin, bracing his feet, planting his stance, preparing to thrust deep one final time. “My little hellcat,” he repeated in English, the Portuguese rolling from his tongue as if he spoke the traditional shifter language every day of his life.

“Yes!” she murmured, her fingers clenching in the sheets, her back arching upward.

Rome licked her again and again, absorbing her taste and scent at the same time. He thrust deep inside her and was rewarded when her head snapped back and a long slow moan escaped her lips. He couldn’t hold back another second, pumping fast and deep inside her; every muscle in his body bunched and contracted with the motion.

Kalina moved with him, hungrily matching his thrusts with her own. She was wild and hot and everything he’d seen in her eyes. He’d known this passion was in her, waiting to be unleashed. And now he’d unleashed it, he’d captured the hellcat and was marking her, making her his.

Reaching an arm around her waist, he slipped downward, finding her moistened center, brushing past plump lips to find her drenched with arousal. Pushing two fingers inside her pussy, Rome grit his teeth as her rear gripped him tighter. He pumped her fiercely now from both directions, loving the feel of power, of dominance pouring through him.

But Kalina would not be taken, she was determined to give back all that she received. With Rome filling her both ways she wanted to scream with pleasure as spiky tendrils of desire ripped through her. She pumped his fingers and his dick, loving the fullness and completeness he brought her. Her head thrashed and she was making sounds that didn’t sound entirely human to her ears but she didn’t care.

Nothing mattered, nothing but this man, at this time. She was completely open to him, taking all that he gave. At the same time she was giving him something, a part of her she hadn’t even known existed. Sure there was a sexual craving, but Kalina sensed this was so much more. Her body responded to his every touch, her nostrils flaring at his scent, longing for him even more. It was a sweet salty aroma that permeated the room now and it fed her, pushing her to go farther, to break past barriers she’d erected in her mind.

He wasn’t what he seemed—not from the first time she’d met him. And yet she felt instinctively that neither was she. At least not this way. Kalina had never imagined herself loving like this, needing like this. She’d never imagined Roman Reynolds.

Now, with him planted so firmly inside her, steadily stroking the heat in her until she threatened to implode, she could not imagine being without him.

His fingers ministered to her, thrusting deep inside her pussy until her thighs shook with longing. In her rear he stroked her long and deep, with measured thrusts that swept her up into mindless pleasure.

Her release came quickly, ripping through her body like an unexpected storm. She screamed with its intensity, letting every nuance of pleasure rack through her entirely. Rome leaned over her, thrusting even faster.

“That’s right, my little hellcat. Feel that. Feel us.”

Oh she did, she felt it everywhere, from the spikes of her hair to the tips of her toes. Her body trembled in response as he continued to work her.

“Feel me and no other,” he murmured, his lips close to her ear. “No other. Ever!”

His words were dominant and insistent. She heard them with different ears, not of the woman, but of something else, and she roared, turning her head slightly to nip at his lips.

He took her mouth, thrusting his tongue as deep as his dick and fingers still were in her. She returned his fervor, their tongues dueling even as he worked her sex until she threatened to come again.

When he tore his lips from hers she made a sound of protest and thought she saw him bare his teeth—sharp teeth that then sank into her shoulder. The contact was instantly painful, mixing beautifully with the pleasure soaring through her from her sexual release.

He pumped harder, faster, then roared himself, his tongue licking over the spot where he’d bit her.

“My
companheiro,
” she thought she heard him whisper before pulling them both down onto the bed.

Kalina didn’t know what that meant but it couldn’t be bad because Rome wrapped her in his arms, holding her tightly against him. And she lay there, not wanting to move or question or even think about what sleeping with a half man, half cat would do to her.