Emergence

Chapter Three

My thighs hit the edge of the bed, and I broke away from him with a sudden, indrawn breath. My heart pounded and liquid fire seared under my skin. His mouth-what he could do with it was incredible. I stared at his kiss-swollen lips, and the need to find them again, to lose myself in him, had my hand stroking over his hard pectoral and the sharp strength of his collarbone until my fingers traced his jaw. My fingernail teased along the edge of his lip, and his mouth parted in a soft breath.

A smile twitched across his perfect lips and his hands eased over my waist to the curve of my hips. “We’re wasting the bed.”

“Not anymore.” I took his mouth and tumbled back onto the soft, deep mattress.

Kaden grabbed at me as he lost his footing, a look of disbelief cutting across his features. We bounced onto the bed, and I couldn’t help the laugh that escaped me. For a long second, I couldn’t gauge Kaden’s reaction. Dark emotion flickered through his eyes, and I had the oddest feeling that he never laughed…but then humour lightened his gaze.

He grabbed my wrists, lifting my arms and pinning me to the sheets. He stretched his lean, naked body against mine, straddling my hips. His heat, the brush of hair against my sensitised breasts, his cock pressing into my belly was almost too much. I arched into him involuntarily. Kaden’s eyes darkened and wicked humour twisted his mouth. “I think that needs a punishment in kind, don’t you?”

Before I could react, one strong hand caught both my wrists. His other hand worked teasing fingers down the underside of my arm. I gasped, wriggling against the intense sensations searing through my flesh, and still his fingers moved, played, finding too-sensitive reactions in my armpit, the curve of my breast.

A yelp ripped from me when his evil, evil fingertips found my waist. My body bucked, but his weight, his strength, held me to the bed. “Kaden!” His name was little more than a gasp. “Stop, please.”

His mouth was just above mine and it gave a wicked twist that forced my heart to beat harder. He drew insane circles against my skin, unrelenting, as my hips turned, twisted against his. The torment of his fingers fired wild heat through my flesh, coalescing with the hard push of him against my pubic bone. The tension tightened low in my pelvis, building, and I found an increasing rhythm, wanting to satisfy the thickening heat pounding, surging-

“Come for me.” Kaden’s raw words arched my body into his, his mouth teasing, hot over mine. He gripped my hip, urging me harder against him. “Come…and then I can really start to play with you.”

I couldn’t stop the overwhelming, shuddering rush that swept over my body, the power of it that robbed me of thought and breath. My mythoi roused with the strength of my release, wrapped a steadying warmth around me, easing the riot into a smooth, delicious wave. I let out a deep sigh and my body lay boneless, satisfied beneath him.

Kaden smiled and released my wrists, stroking his fingers down my arm. The little aftershocks melted into the hum of my flesh, and a smile curved my mouth. “You want to play?”

Light gilded the lithe perfection of his body, and I lifted a lax hand to trace over the rippled muscles of his abdomen. He twitched under my light touch, and I grinned as I teased my fingertips along his cock. Kaden sucked in a quick breath, his thighs straining, but he didn’t protest as I circled the sensitive head.

“Jaime.” The almost-growl of my name cast a fresh ripple through my sated body. His hand covered mine, easing my fingers free. “I plan to play with you.” He leaned forward, his hands planted on either side of my head. I couldn’t resist finding his mouth, letting his tongue flicker against mine…but he didn’t deepen the brief kiss. I groaned as he instead chased close kisses over my jaw. Hot breath burned against my ear. “You want my mouth? All right, I’ll kiss, suck, lick every inch of you.”

I swallowed, pushing against him, feeling heat and tension coil again in my belly. “How are you doing this to me?” The words escaped on a gasp of air. I winced…but it was true. Kaden Rhodes seared fire under my skin with his slightest touch.

His soft laughter rippled goose bumps. “I assure you, whatever this is, it’s mutual.”

An undercurrent of meaning lurked in his words, but I couldn’t examine it because his teeth nipped at my ear. I groaned, tilting my neck, wanting him everywhere he promised and vowing I would return the favour just as soon as I recovered.

Kaden nipped at my neck, and all other thought faded. His warm lips glided over my throat, pressing insane little butterfly kisses that shortened my breath and made my heart pound. I ran my hands over his chest, his ribs, stealing my fingers around to the smooth, taut muscles in his back. I needed to ground myself, find some way to deny the building tension that even his simple little kisses created…but touching didn’t help. Not one bit.

“What are you, Kaden?”

His tongue teased over my shoulder, his soft hum making more questions impossible. “I thought-” His lips teased the underside of my breast and I released a sharp, involuntary gasp, “-that we were keeping our secrets until the morning.”

“But that’s-” His tongue curled around my tightened nipple and broke my claim to his unfairness. He sucked and teased, the hot flow of need forcing my hands to clutch at him.

“Unfair?” His molten gold gaze held me, the lure of wickedness pulsing desire through my flesh. “I promised to play, not to be fair.”

“Don’t you wonder about who I am?”

A line of close kisses burned over my skin to my other breast. “I know who you are.”

I froze, staring at him, and found a dark humour lifting his mouth. “You know…”

“Your name is Jaime and you taste…” His tongue tip traced a wet line under my breast, and I groaned against the sudden, intense rush. “Incredible. Anything else? Not important.”

I wanted to believe that. I did. But even as his clever mouth trailed kisses over my ribs, thoughts of who my stranger was wouldn’t leave me. How had I found a man who could satisfy me and my mythoi so easily? It had to be more than a convenient coincidence. “Tell me one thing about yourself.” I ran my fingers through his thick, dark hair, fisting the cool silkiness as he circled my navel. “One thing.”

“I’ve never tasted anyone like you.”

“Kaden…”

Kisses eased over the soft curve of my belly. “You have your secrets. I have mine.” Warm air brushed over my mons, and I sucked in a quick breath. “And if you can talk so much, I’m really not doing this right.” He pressed kisses into the crease of my thigh, his tongue hot, ruthless, the anticipation of where I wanted him forcing out rough gasps. I clutched at his hair, his little nips and bites on the sensitive flesh of my inner thigh sparking pure heat and tightening desire.

He’d made it impossible for me to speak. My only thoughts centred on his mouth, on the rough stroke of his hands over my hips and thighs. Already the first flickers of another orgasm curled up from my belly, and I grabbed at the sheets, twisting their softness in tight fists. “You have to…”

“What?” He licked across to my other thigh, his scalding tongue arching my spine off the bed. Strong hands gripped me, held me to the soft mattress. “Here?” He kissed my thigh, his mouth so close to where I ached for him that I could easily smack him. Hard. I felt his smug smile just before his tongue swept all too briefly back over my labia. He nibbled my thigh. “Or here again.”

“Kaden…” I growled, and my growing frustration almost pulled my mythoi from her sated state. Everything in me screamed for release, my flesh tight and too, too ready. “You’re evil.”

“And now you know one thing about me.”

His tongue curled against my clitoris and cut off any coherent reply I could make. I think I moaned, maybe his name, maybe I cursed him, but it all became lost in the sudden and unexpected swell of molten heat rising up, up from my belly. I tried to breathe, to flow with it, yet Kaden’s unrelenting tongue thickened the wild riot, made my heart race, my breath short. And then it hit me.

I screamed, pushing hard against Kaden’s talented mouth as white heat smashed over my thoughts, my flesh. My mythoi wrapped around me, luxuriating in my ecstasy, and she eased me down, let my body sink, deep, deep into the mattress. “Your mouth should be made illegal.”

Kaden smirked against my thigh. “It already is.”

A soft snort escaped me. “Now that’s two things I know about you.”

He laughed and crawled over my body, sprinkling hot kisses on my damp skin. Pulling my limp body into his arms, he held me tight, his face buried in my hair. A long sigh brushed against my ear. “And that’s more than enough to know.”

I ran my fingertips down his back in a thorough examination of his smooth skin. His arms tightened briefly as I teased the hollow base of his spine, his hips pushing against mine. I kissed his collarbone. The hint of soap and cologne burned against my tongue, and underlying it was the elusive taste of him, spiced, sharp, and the undeniable hint of power that broke a soft moan from me. What was he? “Now it’s my turn.”

He pulled back, lamplight drops of heated gold in his amber eyes. “Your turn?”

“How can I resist this?” My teeth grazed over his flat nipple, making him draw in a quick, sharp breath. His skin burned under my tongue, and my fingers tightened against his ribs at the heat rising under my own skin. He was addictive. Completely addictive. “Or this?” I kissed and licked my way down over his taut abdomen, pushing him onto his back to let the light spill over his perfection. His quickened breaths pulled a smile from me, and his fingers tangled in my hair. I felt their trembling. “Sensitive?”

“No one has…” He groaned as I tormented his navel, deliberating pressing myself against his straining cock. “No one-”

Licking over the head of his cock broke him. He strained off the bed, and I pushed hard at his thighs to keep him still. I sucked him into my mouth, flicking my tongue tip fast and sure against the sensitive skin. Kaden growled, and his shadow thickened the air, falling in a cool, delicious slide of smooth wings against my spine.

I closed my eyes, the incredible touch of his mythoi dropping liquid heat low into my pelvis. No one had taken him? It was insane. Kaden was a wild mix of power and beauty. The thought that I was the first to have my lips on him made me grip his cock and urge him to thrust into my mouth. This was our single night together, but I wanted him to remember me.

Incoherent words rushed from his lips, and his hips bucked. The heavy weight of his shadow pressed into my spine, coarse, claw-tipped fingers gripping my backside. The rough tongue of his mythoi laved my skin, sparking fire along my spine, and my gasp drew Kaden deeper.

How was he doing this? I groaned at the slide of its tongue between my buttocks, long, lazy, deep licks that mirrored how I took Kaden. My fingers dug into his thighs hard enough to bruise, but I didn’t care. I wanted him, wanted the man practically panting my name to come in my mouth and quick, because his mythoi was just as relentless as Kaden had been. Already, the fierce heat of my approaching orgasm burned hard in my belly and I fought it, but-

Kaden stiffened under me, and a wild cry broke from him. I swallowed him, even as my release shattered my thoughts. My body shuddering, Kaden pulled me into his arms in a tight, crushing hold. For long seconds, we simply breathed, and my thoughts span with the impossibility of the man. A shadow couldn’t do that. It just couldn’t…

“Thank you.”

The two words forced me to close my eyes. Too much emotion lurked in his voice, and I wanted to hold him, promise that… My throat ached. I couldn’t stay with him. This was my fling before the First Dragon bound me into service. Nothing more. “Your shadow.” I pressed my lips to his throat and hoped he wouldn’t feel my tremor as I tried to think about something, anything else. “How did you…?”

“He’s a law unto himself.” Kaden low chuckle ran a shiver over my skin, and his arms tightened. His lean strength, the heat of his body, almost brought out a sigh. I could get very used to him…and the thought hurt. “And he likes your taste almost as much as I do.”

“Flatterer.”

He lifted my chin. The hunger and need in his eyes tightened my chest. Was he struggling with our…connection…as much as I was? “This night…” His lips covered mine, tasting cool and holding the lingering scent of my body. He deepened the kiss, a brief, tantalising hint of his passion before he pulled back. His fingers pushed through the tangled mass of my hair, his thumb caressing my cheek. “We make tonight our own?”

He sounded nervous, unsure, and it twisted my insides. Someone had hurt Kaden, and I wanted to hold him, offer comfort, my head screaming that was so, so wrong…even as my heart demanded it. My insane heart won. “Completely our own.”

Kaden closed his eyes and let out a controlled breath. Then his molten gold gaze found mine and the desire there had my heart beating hard…just before he rolled me. I yelped, and it mixed with my laughter.

Kaden bit at my lip, his grin feral. “Then tonight you’re ours.”