Chapter 5
“You have nothing to worry about,” Analia said, her heart not quite believing it was true, but she refused, refused, to acknowledge the connection she’d imagined she’d felt at Stones.
He was not the mate the charms would lead her too. He was just the catalyst and the encounter with him was the first step on the promised journey.
“That’s good to hear,” he said.
She took a deep breath, ready to put the conversation and the events at the club behind them. It didn’t matter whether he was telling the truth about the black-haired woman, Deidra.
It. Did. Not. Matter.
“Where to?” Analia asked.
“Stones, so I can retrieve my Hummer.” He pulled out his cellphone and texted someone. A second later a ding announced a response. “Your friends are still at the club. We’ll go in when we get there. I need to take a look at the tarot cards.”
A chill slid down Analia’s spine. She stifled the urge to glance at the bracelet.
Ace had seen her talking to the old man, may have actually seen her pull out her wallet and pay for the charms though he hadn’t asked her about the purchase.
Another text came in. Kellen read it and muttered what sounded like a curse directed at Maksim, then slipped the phone into his pocket.
He said, “For now it would be safer for you if anyone seeing us together believes that we’ve hooked up, and not that we’re together because of an active investigation.”
She managed a nod, but failed to block the memories of their dancing, kissing, of the hard feel of his erection against her mound and the heat in his voice when he’d said he needed more. She shivered, not convinced she could keep heart and mind separate if she found herself in his arms again, especially now that she knew he wasn’t involved with the dark-haired woman who’d had just about every other man in the place panting.
I can pull this off. I can! But the death grip she had on the steering wheel said otherwise, and her fingers were completely ignoring her brain’s command to loosen their grip.
“I wasn’t lying,” Kellen said. “You outshone every woman in the club.”
He was just trying to help her get into the role, she knew that, but her heart still fluttered. “Not a chance,” she denied.
“I could make you believe.”
His voice was a rough growl that might as well have been a hand shoved beneath her panties to cup her mound. And the worst part of it was that she wanted him to do just that—make her believe.
Why couldn’t Maksim have assigned the dog to this case? She was a lot more comfortable around the hound, or maybe, if she was being honest with herself, a lot more confident that she could be and stay in control.
If he’d just assigned the wolfhound, she could easily have learned whatever commands were needed to manage the dog. And then she wouldn’t be trapped in a small space with Kellen and battling the resurgence of fantasies.
They reached the beach, and then Stones. She parked the car next to Ace’s Harley and couldn’t help but think that it felt like a lifetime had passed since she’d gotten home, taken the call from Sabra and agreed to come to the club.
It felt as though her entire reality had somehow shifted. And that chased away some of the trepidation at being with Kellen. The journey predicted by the old man had begun. She could do this!
At the club’s front door, Kellen’s hand settled on her back, sending melting heat straight to her breasts, and lower, to pool in her sex.
It’s part of the hook-up act, she told herself.
She tried to shake off how good it felt to have him touching her but her body didn’t care. It only wanted more, more, more.
They entered the club. Sabra was just coming off the dance floor with the Hollywood Honey.
According to Saffron, there were actually Supernatural Ops groupies. They appeared at crime scenes. They created Facebook fan pages and blogs dedicated to identifying the agents and speculating about their supernatural powers or supernatural specialties.
“Is he really a prince?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Kellen answered, a hardness in his voice that had her glancing at his face.
It was completely shut down. Like somehow asking the question had struck a nerve.
For reasons she had no intention of examining, she said, “So we could refer to him as either Prince Hollywood or the Hollywood Honey?”
Kellen’s lips kicked upward, his expression thawing. “Either name could be applied to Gaige.” Then as quickly as he’d smiled, that smile turned into a frown. “I hope Saffron’s sister knows the score; he’s not looking for permanent.”
Analia didn’t know whether to fume or laugh. Seriously, did these guys really believe that every woman they encountered wanted a wedding ring?
“It may surprise you,” she couldn’t resist saying. “But not everyone who dances with one of you wants more than hot, sweaty sex.”
That earned her an arrogant glance. “They may start out that way, but they soon want to stake a claim.”
“Right,” Analia muttered.
Sabra was heading toward the seat she’d claimed for the night. At seeing them heading toward Sabra, the Hollywood Honey altered course and joined them at the table.
Sabra’s gaze immediately zeroed in on the way Kellen’s hand was on Analia’s back. Her eyebrows lifted in a silent question.
Analia’s face warmed. “Kellen has an interest in tarot cards,” she said, hoping they could take care of this and get out of the club, though the damage was already done.
Sabra would soon be texting her, and if that didn’t yield a juicy play-by-play of the hook-up with Kellen, she’d start calling. And Sabra could be relentless when it came to satisfying her curiosity.
“I’ll let you see them on one condition,” Sabra told Kellen, her smile warning enough, even for someone who didn’t know her well.
“Name it.”
“You get a reading.”
“What if I don’t have a question that needs answering?”
“You’d be lying,” Gaige said, gaze flicking to Analia. “Though from where I stand, the answer is obvious.”
Analia’s traitorous heart fluttered. What was it about Kellen that drew her, even when she knew any involvement would only lead to heartbreak?
Sabra pulled the deck of tarot cards from her purse. “The question has to be asked out loud. Yes or no?”
Analia couldn’t suppress the small shake of her head. Sabra was fearless. If she’d been the one sitting in Maksim’s office, the outcome probably would have been totally different. Sabra wouldn’t have meekly agreed to anything the IRE boss wanted.
“I’ll do a reading,” Kellen said, sounding as if he were grinding his teeth between words.
Sabra gave him the deck of cards. He took his hand off Analia’s back and she immediately missed the feel of it there, and the heat it produced.
Pressing the deck between his palms, Kellen lifted it to within inches of his face, his fingers pointed upward, almost as if offering a prayer.
His eyelids swept downward, hiding his eyes. He might have been communing with the cards, or concentrating on the question he intended to ask, though Analia suspected he was using the talent Maksim had alluded to in order to determine the presence of magic.
Sabra stared at him speculatively and Analia wondered if she suspected Kellen was doing something more, something involving the supernatural.
He lowered his hands and began shuffling the deck. “You have to ask the question out loud,” Sabra reminded him, not mentioning that he only had to pull one card, the way the rest of them had done earlier in the evening.
“Where will my current investigation lead?” Kellen asked, the cards moving smoothly and easily through his hands.
Analia wondered if he often handled tarot decks, then remembered a comment Saffron had made, about Taine playing high stakes poker with fellow agents.
The cards went down on the table, one, two, three and her heart gave a little leap at seeing The Lovers, followed by the Six of Swords—the same card she’d gotten, symbolizing a journey—and then The Tower, depicted as a castle struck by lightning, its occupants, a man and a hound captured midway as they fell toward the ground.
Gaige laughed just as the dark-haired agent who’d been at the table with Kellen, and at the supernatural fair with Taine, joined them.
“Was I right, Crew? Or was I right?” Gaige asked the other agent.
One look at the cards and Crew slapped Gaige on the shoulder. “It might be time for us to run for the hills.”
“Agreed,” Gaige said, and with a final glance at Kellen, and a small shake of his head, he and Crew left.
The feel of finely honed hatred bore into Analia and she turned her head, spotting the woman she’d seen Kellen with earlier—Deidra. Sabra followed her gaze and said, “Looks like someone’s a sore loser.”
“It’s not a competition.”
“Right,” Sabra murmured in a disbelieving voice. “It’s not a competition.”
Analia rubbed her bracelet. Felt a spike of fear at realizing the action might draw attention to the charm. And then a second spike of fear at discovering the apple-shaped crystal was gone.
Her gaze snapped to her wrist. Her mouth went dry.
Both charms must remain in your possession, the old man had said.
She flashed back to Maksim’s office. She’d been careful not to look at her wrist when he’d asked about items she’d purchased at the supernatural fair. She’d been too paranoid to look when he’d left the room with the dog.
When had she last seen the charm?
She frantically searched her memory, and came up with an answer. She’d seen it when she was sitting on the bench, after the Irish Wolfhound had departed for parts unknown.
She glanced at Kellen, trying to suppress her panic. She needed to go back to the bench and then walk to the spot where she’d been attacked.
Her palms dampened. The longer she waited, the less chance there’d be of recovering the charm.
“I need to take care of something,” she said, easing away from the table.
Kellen’s hand locked around her arm. His narrowed gaze moved from Deidra, to her, sending mortification through Analia at the implication he thought the sight of the other woman was causing her to flee.
“You’re not going anywhere without me,” he said, putting heat in his voice and even though she knew it was for Sabra’s benefit, it had Analia’s heart tripping into a faster beat and wishing it weren’t an act.
She wasn’t going to shake him. That much was obvious.
I have to risk it. Despite the old man’s warning not to let the charms come to the attention of Supernatural Ops agents, she had to risk it. She had to hope that if Kellen hadn’t reacted to the charm when they were dancing, then maybe, just maybe this would turn out okay.
Rubbing a damp palm against her jeans she said, “Let’s take a walk on the beach.”
Sabra smirked, but Analia couldn’t care what her friend thought. And thankfully Kellen agreed, probably glad to leave the club and end the pretense.
Within seconds of getting outside, her cell chimed with a text. She checked it, not surprised to find it was from Sabra.
Not a competition? The text was punctuated with an eyebrow-raised emoji.
It was followed by a second text.
The cards have spoken. Go for it! This one was punctuated by a thumbs-up emoji.
Analia put the phone away without responding, finding it hard to ignore the way her heart grasped onto hope.
“Where are we going?” Kellen asked, curious, aroused—and then more aroused by the nervous swipe of her tongue over her bottom lip, followed by the grasp of that delectable lip between dainty white teeth.
“I lost something on the boardwalk, or maybe on the beach. One of my charms. I didn’t notice it was missing until just now.”
Remembering the mugger assaulting her, daring to touch her, brought a savage surge of anger. “When you were attacked?”
“It probably happened then.”
Another nervous swipe of her tongue across a lip he wanted to take between his own teeth had a hard throb of want going through his cock. The tarot deck didn’t have even the tiniest whiff of magic, but that didn’t mean his own desires and fears hadn’t been reflected by the cards.
He wanted her and that want was growing with each minute he spent in her company. With each moment in her company their becoming lovers grew inevitable—and Maksim was making sure they didn’t escape each other’s company—even to the extent of having the Hummer retrieved from Stones, then texting him the news after they’d left headquarters.
It wouldn’t change the outcome, not when it came to taking a mate. But he couldn’t fight her desire as well as his own—and her desire matched his. Her scent had grown lusher when he flipped over the tarot card to reveal The Lovers.
He’d given her fair warning when it came to involvement with him. He wasn’t offering more than sex and protection. The Tower signified nothing beyond his fear of taking a mate and being destroyed as a result.
“Does the hound sniff out magic?”
The hair on his body lifted, then settled a heartbeat later. If she’d guessed that hound and man were one and the same, she wouldn’t be walking next to him so calmly.
“He can sniff out spell boundaries and magical items.”
“Are there a lot of them? Magical items?”
He cocked his head, considered the question then shrugged away worry. It was inevitable that by the end of this investigation, she’d know far more than most humans did about the supernatural.
“Yes. But most of them are benign.”
Her lip was momentarily caught between her teeth again, and he had to fight the urge to grasp her arm and swing her around so she was in front of him, positioned so he could swoop and plunder her mouth.
“Even though most are benign, whatever item I’ve had contact with is probably dangerous,” she said, the barest hint of a question—or maybe it was hoped-for denial—in her comment.
“It depends on the intentions of the user. But, given they are willing to do violence, or have violence done, in order to gain possession of the item, it most likely means their intentions aren’t benign.”
She shivered, and seeing it, he surrendered to the need to touch her. He took her hand in his, only to fight the desire to carry it to his chest and then downward.
She glanced at their joined hands. “Can you tell anything from the charms?”
It took him a second to shift his focus from the feel and sight of her hand in his, to the bracelet on her wrist. “Marginal magic.”
He didn’t bother to bring her hand closer to his face. In hound form he would have noticed the presence of something magically powerful. He hadn’t.
“I think we should start at the last place I remember seeing the charm,” she said, and proceeded to lead him to the very bench where she’d stroked him in hound form and shared her hopes and hurt.
He made me feel beautiful and desirable. I should have known better.
Kellen suppressed a growl of frustration. He’d explained why he’d walked away from her on the dance floor!
But remembering what she’d said challenged him to convince her of just how desirable she was. And that would be far more dangerous than the as yet undetermined threat.
“What does the charm look like?”
“It’s a green, crystal apple.”
They scanned the pavement as they slowly headed toward the place where she’d been assaulted. Though he had a vague idea, because of her shared confidences, he asked, “What kind of work do you do?”
“I’m a rehabilitation counselor. I help people live independently, or as independently as possible. Some of my clients have sustained injuries and are having to adjust to altered limbs or limited movement. Others were born with physical, mental, emotional or developmental challenges. I work with them to accomplish their career and living goals.”
Her words brought scenes from his past, of himself, shunned because of his withered forearm then later desired after having gained enough magic to make himself whole.
She wouldn’t have turned away from him, been repulsed by his deformity, by the obvious physical weakness. She wouldn’t have been content to ignore him as he grew thin from not being able to bring down prey, as he slowly starved as a newly weaned pup, only surviving by eating vegetation and insects.
Her words brought memories of the overheard conversation between Cosette and Cason.
Admit you’d rather have me, Cason had said, jealous at now having to share their sire and dam’s attention, despite being the heir.
Of course I’d prefer you to Kellen. Don’t you think I worry that regardless of what he looks like now, at least some of the pups he’ll sire will be defective? Don’t you think I loathe the idea of being whispered about after a pregnancy? When those pups have to be hidden away until they either die or are restored by magic?
Kellen squelched the memories that followed those, when he’d confronted her about the things she’d said. He told himself to remember that this was the price he’d paid for the weakness of lowering his guard and falling in love.
Given who he was with, he’s probably some hotshot Supernatural Ops agent, and look at me, I’m a rehabilitation counselor. I can’t stack up against the women in his world.
The words Analia had spoken when he was a hound with his head resting on her thigh overrode caution and restraint. Kellen did what he’d wanted to do earlier. He stopped, used her hand in his to swing her around to face him.
He released her hand, but only to use both of his to grasp her hair and prevent her escape as his mouth took hers, his tongue rushing to rub and twine with her tongue.
Pleasure pulsed downward to his cock. Pleasure forced his eyes closed and his nostrils to flare and fill with her lush scent. Pleasure had him pulling her tightly against him, wallowing in the sensation of her body against his.
She met the thrust of his tongue with the thrust of hers. Placed her hands on his side and stroked, up and down, up and down.
The touch made his cock scream with the demand to have her do the same to it, stroke upward, then downward, upward, then downward.
He kissed his way to her ear, sucked the lobe, his pleasure heightened at feeling her shiver, at hearing her moan. He pressed his lips to her ear and words he’d never intended were wrenched from his soul.
“I was born an embarrassment and kept isolated. I wish I’d known you then. What you’ve chosen to dedicate your life to is far worthier than what I’ve dedicated my life to.”
He heard the catch of her breath and soaked in the pleasure of having her arms go around him, then tighten in a hug that squeezed his heart.
He returned to her mouth, the need to retreat from the confession driving him to replace vulnerability with passion. And she responded, hands gripping his shirt, scent deepening with arousal as he thrust into her mouth with his tongue and ground against her mound with his cock.
Desire shimmered between them and intensified. He wanted, needed, knew that when they returned to her apartment, he wouldn’t be able to withstand temptation.
It was that very compulsion to get to her place that gave him the strength to leave her lips, though not without capturing them again, and again, prolonging the kiss for a few minutes more before saying, “You wanted to search for your charm.”
“Yes, I need to find it.”
Her breathlessness made him smile and brought a surge of satisfaction. “Onward then.”
They followed the path she’d taken earlier. Her scent—and her assailant’s—still lingered.
The closer they got to where she’d been attacked, the greater the urge to sink his canines into the mugger’s throat at the next opportunity. The charm hadn’t been dislodged at first contact on the boardwalk so they went down onto the beach.
Analia knelt on the sand and he reluctantly freed her hand. She scooped up sand with both hands, then allowed it to sift through her fingers. Rather than scoop, he put his palm on the sand and ran it along the surface.
Like a human metal detector, Analia thought. “Too bad you can’t find gold coins and other buried treasure that way.”
“Who says I can’t?”
Her eyes widened. “Seriously?”
“No.”
“Tease.”
The smile he sent her way created a molten sensation in her chest. One that flowed unerringly into her breasts and sex.
Not his fault, she knew. He couldn’t help the fact that he was panty-drenching gorgeous and she was hopelessly attracted to him. Would it be so bad to just give in?
He’d been up front with her about what he had to offer. Nothing beyond a good time and protection.
But… In those precious moments when he’d shared some of his childhood with her, she’d felt and heard echoes of the pain he’d experienced.
She was curious about why he’d been an embarrassment, why he’d been kept isolated. And she didn’t doubt his truth, despite his good looks, his obvious success, his companions and his job.
She strongly suspected that he’d be mortified to know he’d revealed that old pain. He’d probably go so far as to deny it, or to at least blow it off as no longer relevant.
Was it such a stretch to believe his insistence that he didn’t do permanent was just a way to shield himself from hurt?
She lifted more sand and let it slowly sift through her fingers. Since her first crush, her heart had wanted a forever relationship.
When it came to men, she’d always gone with the motto: You’ve got to risk the lows if you want the highs, otherwise it’s all flat-lining.
The old man had given her the charms and said they’d lead her to the perfect match—and then she’d met Kellen. But, the old man had also made it sound like Supernatural Ops presented a huge threat.
She nibbled on her bottom lip. Maybe this was part of the reason he’d insisted she not wear the charms at the same time, because apart, they would be harder for IRE agents to notice. But she still thought it would be better if she found it, and not Kellen.
She continued scooping and sifting, trying to hurry as he moved further away. Five minutes passed. Then ten, and panic was beginning to settle in. What if she didn’t find the charm? What if she’d lost it days after being entrusted with its care?
Her heart pounded so hard in her ears that it took a second to process Kellen saying, “I’m guessing this is it.”
He stood and she lunged to her feet, hurrying to join him. Relief at seeing the small crystal apple on his palm made her feel momentarily weak.
Strangely, the link was unbroken. The old man must not have completely attached the charm to the bracelet.
“That’s it,” she said, going dry-mouthed, but unable to resist asking, “Did you sense magic? Or did you just find it on the sand?”
“There was enough magic for me to find it.” He grasped her wrist, sending a shiver of heat up her arm. “I’ll reattach it for you.”
He did just that, but didn’t release her wrist or move away. Their eyes met and held. There was nothing keeping them from going back to her apartment.
Was she ready for that? Ready to make the decision that would be waiting for her there? Give into the attraction? Open her heart at the same time she opened her legs?
Her sex heated and his lashes dropped, as if he were already imagining being on top of her, being inside her. A shiver of heated want sped up her spine and pooled in her breasts.
She licked her lips and his gaze dropped to them, sending another shiver of hot need along her spine, this time downward to wet her panties with want.
She wouldn’t be able to say no. Didn’t want to be able to say no. Not when everything inside her, except for a tiny sliver of self-preservation, shouted yes, yes, yes!
Still, the sliver of self-preservation had enough of a hold that she said, “Walk on the beach?”
“Sure.”
Kellen released her wrist and took her hand, unable to stop himself from the physical contact.
They moved down to the edge of the surf, careful to stay just out of the water’s surge.
“What will happen to the dog?” she asked, the honest worry in her voice wrapping his heart in warmth.
“He’ll be kept out of sight.”
“Not punished?”
“Does he deserve punishment?”
“No. I’d give him a hug and a kiss if he were here, though he’d probably prefer a rare steak.”
Kellen laughed. “You might be surprised.”
Walking the beach was a nightly ritual for him. Before Taine had claimed Saffron, he’d often taken his hound form and accompanied the dragon.
Now he walked alone. Usually.
He hadn’t thought there was an emptiness to it, hadn’t felt lonely, but with Analia at his side—
He blocked that line of thought. Nothing had changed.
He was right back to where he’d been upon first linking Analia to the scent he’d encountered at the supernatural fair. He’d fuck her until she no longer had the power to send blood rushing to his cock.
He jammed his hand into a front pocket, adjusting the jeans—or trying to, which wasn’t an easy task given the hard state of his dick.
His lips twitched. He’d give the humans credit where credit was due, they did come up with an assortment of interesting words and expressions.
“What exactly do you do at IRE?” Analia asked.
“Mostly chase around, cleaning up messes made by sorcerers.”
She swung in front of him and walked backward, to better see his face. “Seriously?”
Damn he found her adorable. Worse, he found her believably honest.
Would she remain that way if she knew he was his sire’s heir?
He could almost believe that she would. And that was dangerous thinking.
Already he’d proven himself vulnerable to her. Even his fellow agents knew nothing of his childhood. They knew nothing of his early shunning by his sire, dam and older brother.
What next? Would he share how he’d foolishly fallen for Cosette? That even when he’d confronted her with the overheard conversation, he’d desperately wanted her to somehow convince him she’d just been telling his brother Cason what he’d wanted to hear, that it had been a lie, and of course, she loved the spare heir and wanted to be his mate.
Kellen shuddered, resolved to keep silent about the life he’d lived before coming to this realm. He would continue living as he’d chosen to live. Free. Completely free of any dictates that weren’t related to Supernatural Ops.
His gaze swept downward, leaving Analia’s eyes to linger on her lips. He’d given her fair warning. Pleasure and protection were all he had to offer, and pleasure alone was all he wanted from her.
Heat surged into his cock at imagining the lips he studied trailing kisses downward as she went to her knees. She stumbled on a half-destroyed sandcastle and he grabbed her other hand, steadying and pulling her against him in one smooth, fatalistically natural move.
His mouth swooped down, covering lips he wanted exploring his body. And those sweet lips parted, her soft moan rushing into his mouth.
It was like on the dance floor, only worse, because knowing her better made him want her more. His tongue slid against hers, twining and stoking the flames of desire.
It was no longer her scent that intoxicated and compelled. It was her taste. It was the soft swell of her breasts pressed to his chest. It was the hungry rub of her pelvis against his. It was her.
His hands moved to her waist, tugged at her blouse then slid under to press against her bare back. Her skin was silky smooth and heated. It begged him to follow the contours of her body, and he surrendered to the need to explore.
He stroked upward, easily undid the clasp of her bra and then cupped the sides of her breasts. Her shiver of need was a streak of pleasure through his cock. Her moan of want fed a desire to pleasure her, to demonstrate the heights to which he could take her. It was madness, but he was caught in that madness.
For now. Only for now he promised himself.
He rubbed his thumbs over nipples plumped and tightened by desire. She shivered again, pressed her lower body against his, and it was easy to imagine stripping her naked, taking her beneath the moon and stars.
Breathing hard, he pulled his mouth from hers. “I’ve got to see you,” he said, watching her expression as he unbuttoned the front of her blouse.
The want on her face was mesmerizing, so powerful it blotted out the memory of any other woman’s face. His gaze moved to breasts framed by her bra and his hands.
He hooked his thumbs into lacy material, pulled downward so the bra no longer obstructed his view. “Beautiful, like the rest of you,” he murmured, his voice husky.
He reclaimed her lips, hands cupping, molding her breasts, his thumbs circling, rubbing as his tongue stroked and glided against hers, each of her moans a throb through his cock.
Take her, it screamed. But then it had been screaming that for hours.
His mouth left hers, trailing kisses downward along her arched neck, stopping to suck, to bite her lightly.
Dangerous images crowded in, of her on elbows and knees, thighs spread, her pussy glistening, its lips parted, inviting him to mount and mate.
I’ll be able to resist, he told himself, moving from her neck to her delicate collarbone. Then lower, finally reaching his destination.
He took a plump nipple between his lips and sucked, his hands molding her breasts, pushing them together so he could easily switch from nipple to nipple. She was delectable, a feast he wanted to savor.
Her hands gripped his hair, holding him tightly against her. And though he couldn’t read her mind, he felt her struggle not to tug him downward to her pussy.
“Let’s get off the beach,” she said in a voice filled with heated need.
The words had him kissing his way up to her mouth. He looked into her eyes and the dangerous want returned in a hot surge, the fantasy of her positioned for mounting, mating.
The end of his cock thickened, as it would thicken with a mate, tying him, locking him into her channel. The possibility of it happening should have iced his body and shriveled his dick.
It didn’t. And that sent his heartbeat into what felt like a pounding race toward, rather than away from, danger.
He kissed her, plunged his tongue into her mouth. With each rough thrust and retreat of his tongue, he attempted to drive away the image of her presenting her pussy.
It helped. But he didn’t dare test it by going directly to her apartment.
Coward! his cock silently screamed, trying to goad him into entering her—here and now, if not at her apartment. Uncaring if the end result of thrusting into her hot, slick channel was a permanent bond.
No, he told it. No. No. No. And yet he continued to thrust his tongue against hers.
Shudders of pleasure wracked his body with each imagined thrust of his cock. Fuck, he wanted her. Wanted her more than he’d ever wanted another female.
It was that thought that finally gave him the strength to lift his mouth off of hers and delay the moment when he’d join his body to hers.
His breathing harsh and ragged, he said, “We need to stop by the police station first. They’re holding your assailant there. The sooner he’s interviewed, the better.”
“If you say so,” she said through lips wettened and swollen and calling to his to return for more kisses.
He touched his mouth to hers. “We’ll have to take your car. Maksim had someone take my Hummer back to headquarters.”
“Okay,” she said, the movement of her mouth against his all it took for him to recapture her lips. He wasn’t ready to give up the pleasure of having her in his arms. Not yet. Maybe not for a little while.
* * *
On the boardwalk, Deidra seethed. The human was a nobody, a nothing.
She was beneath Kellen’s notice but there he was, unable to keep from touching her, kissing her, seducing her. It was obvious now that he didn’t intend to stop. That he’d soon be spewing his seed inside a human.
It didn’t belong there. It belonged inside of the fey hound meant to eventually rule others in their realm—inside of her.
Not that she longed for young, but they were a necessity. Not that she longed for Kellen, though she didn’t shudder at the thought of being covered by him. He wasn’t repulsive, but if he had been, it wouldn’t matter. It couldn’t matter where power and lineage were concerned.
He was a prince, his father’s heir. And time was running out to capitalize on that fact.
Uneasiness was rising throughout the realm as fewer and fewer pups were born. The lesser packs were forming new alliances, and soon they would become emboldened enough to try and take the kingdom.
Hot, angry bile rose in Deidra’s throat as she watched Kellen kissing the woman, caressing her breasts. It was the same human female he’d danced with earlier, and she wasn’t some casual conquest.
It was there in Kellen’s body language. He was deeply attracted, dangerously attracted, and that attraction threatened to derail everything if he decided the human female was his true mate.
The wind shifted, forcing Deidra to turn and walk away rather than risk having her scent carry to Kellen and warn him of her presence. The human had to be dealt with, that much was obvious.
Deidra crossed the street and kept walking. There was nothing she could do immediately, nothing she could do to prevent Kellen from having sex with his mortal tonight.
But the thought of him with her ate at Deidra. It consumed her so she wasn’t immediately aware of the otherworld creature until he was at her side, smelling of a cold-iron blade.
Fool! To let thoughts of Kellen and his human plaything leave her open to threat.
Deidra whirled and faced what looked like a man. Glamour or magic gave him the guise of a thin human with hollowed cheeks and a bulbous nose. But magic and glamour couldn’t hide his scent, not from her.
The air smelled of blood and charred flesh and apples, a disgusting combination even for someone who tore raw meat off carcasses and gorged on livers and hearts as a hound.
She bared her teeth and issued a low, rumbling growl.
The man held up his hands. “I’m called Tobik. I come with an offer from my mistress.”
“What mistress?”
“She is known by the name of Herrica. She lives in the grig realm.”
Weak fey magic brushed against Deidra’s senses, reducing the potential for threat and providing an opening for curiosity. “What offer?”
Tobik glanced over his shoulder, in the direction of Kellen and the human female. “My mistress can make you irresistible to him. With the power she can grant you, you can easily bring him to heel. You can not only have him as a mate, but have a mate who is totally ensnared.”
Offended and resentful that some lesser being had guessed at Kellen’s preference for a human instead of her, Deidra snarled, “I need no help.”
“Of course not. But a mutually beneficial alliance would mean faster results, something my mistress prizes.”
Deidra allowed her pride to be salved. But only because time was of the essence.
Kellen had long claimed he would never take a mate. He would fight the inevitable tonight. And perhaps tomorrow night. And the night after. But eventually instinct would prevail.
He would bind himself to the human he seemed compelled to touch, and she would lose the opportunity to one day rule a kingdom. “What would this alliance entail?”