CHAPTER ELEVEN
Kate was dreaming once again of silky seas and tentacles. Many tentacles, large and muscular. They reminded her of cocks, but they were infinitely more flexible. The ways they could turn, twist, curl, even double up upon themselves were amazing. They could suck, too, with different pressures from gentle to brutally intense.
One wound itself around her chest, pinning her arms to her sides. Another lifted her off her feet while a third lashed her butt like a whip. A fourth stimulated her breasts, exciting her so much that she was pleading as yet another snaked up her bare thigh and fed itself into her dripping pussy. It was so damn hot. So damn thick. She moaned and rocked and bucked, but she couldn't seem to reach a climax. She needed something else, something more. Dear god, she was so damn hungry.
She woke up suddenly, aroused and unsatisfied, her skin damp and an ache in her core. No orgasm in the maze, she remembered...Ross had been eager to please her but he hadn't been able to stop that mystical glowing.
Tentacles again. This time she didn't even think they'd been attached to anything, but they sure were erotic. Was that what the Zrakon did to those girls on Midsummer's Eve? There was no way they could report it later as a pleasant experience if he had actually thrust into them with his monster penis. That would have killed the poor girls. No, he must be all about the tentacles. Maybe that's why the girls refused to talk about their experiences, other than to declare the Zrakon the superman of lovers? Admitting to the tentacle thing would be embarrassing.
Kate tried to bring her thoughts back to hard reality. In the maze with Ross, she had been making love to a man, not a mythical creature. Except....as she lay there in her lonely bed, she felt reality slipping away from her again. Never before had she met a human whose fingers emitted sparks when he was aroused. And despite her own yearning for sexual satisfaction, there had been something a little frightening about him towards the end of their encounter. It had felt as if he was treading right on the line that separated sex from violence. His burning touch had hurt her, but the pain had felt like good pain. Until it had suddenly grown too intense.
But she had nothing to blame him for or accuse him of. She had been willing to take things even further. She'd wanted the torment he had begun to inflict.
Maybe I just like living on the edge, she thought, laughing at herself.
Ross was an enigma. As laird and as the local vet, he was kind, genial, friendly. Yes, he made it clear that he was in charge around here, but the hand that held the reins was not a harsh one. Mrs. Dumfries, Hamish, and Jamie, who all worked for him, adored him. The people who brought their pets to him for care liked and respected him. And except for her initial meeting with him, when he had scolded her for trespassing and ordered her off his land, Ross had been unstintingly courteous and friendly.
She liked him. She found him attractive. Fascinating. Searingly hot.
Damn. Now she was restless. That lustful ache in her core wasn't going away any time soon.
She closed her eyes and tried to sleep again. Run that dream by me again, she thought, smiling as she settled more comfortably into the downy mattress.
* * *
In his own bedchamber, Ross was awake and sweating, too, but from a far more ominous cause. He had been jolted out of sleep, overcome with the type of fiery lust that always consumed him at this time of year. In other years, though, he had satisfied it with the ritual and the monster had gone back to sleep for another twelve months. This year the Zrakon was roaring because he hadn't been permitted his annual grope fest with whichever one of the village girls had won the lottery.
The sea dragon was pissed. He was not going to go quietly back down to the depths of Ross's consciousness, or wherever the hell he dwelt for the other months of the year. Especially now, with Kate so near. Kate, whom the Zrakon had marked as his lover and his plaything. She was his destined partner, and he needed to mate with her. Really mate. As in stick that gigantic cock between her thighs and fuck her brutally.
Christ. Ross's own cock turned steel hard at the thought. He could easily find his way to Kate's bedroom in the dark. It would take but a minute or two to reach her. Even if she had locked her bedchamber door, he had all the keys.
He saw it in his mind, the whole thing. He saw it in his mind: Kate's soft, silken skin. Her dark hair, rich and warm and curtaining her body in luxuriant waves. Her mouth, tasty as a mango, juicy as a peach. Her cunt, juicier still, and hot and tight. Her smile, both merry and mischievous. Her spirit of adventure, her obvious love of everything life had to offer.
Even if what life offered her was a monster.
She was special. He'd never met a woman like her. No wonder the Zrakon had claimed her for his own.
Dammit. His fucking balls were aching and his dick so hard that even the brush of his t-shirt against the head of his cock felt like fire. He needed to cool himself, thrust himself into moistness, feel the smooth walls of her pussy gripping him tightly as he ripped into her with tentacles and his gnarled and thorny cock.
He felt something crack and split apart and terror swept over him for a moment before it was banished by something even stronger. The Hunger. Fuck. Once again he was changing, shifting. Head growing monstrous. Skin rippling over with scales. A huge muscular tail sprouting and beating with rage.
It happened swiftly this time. The Zrakon was not about to be lulled into quiescence again with a lecture on molecular biology.
He was going to go to her. Here, in the keep. But if he did so...if he went to her in such a state...he would surely break her. And if he broke her, he would be alone forever.
The last rational thought he had was the memory of Cam's warning:
You'd better figure this out fast, bro, or both you and your honey might be screwed.