Lion's Heat

CHAPTER 7

Jonas scented Rachel's nervousness as she paused at the top of the stairs, staring down at where he waited below. Turning, he had to forcibly control the animal growl that rose in his throat and the need that had claws threatening to slide from the tips of his fingers.

Had he ever seen anything, or anyone, so damned beautiful? Jonas was certain he hadn't, just as he was damned certain there was no way he was going to make it through the night without taking her.

Hell, he wasn't going to make it from the house before he touched her. He could touch her in reasonable safety, he told himself. But that sounded rather lame even to him. There was no way to truly ensure that the mating hormone didn't affect even the fine hairs that covered his body.

It was damned certainly affecting his tongue. The glands were so swollen they were painful, the taste of cinnamon and cloves filling his senses and reminding him how easy it would be to infuse her with the same arousal tearing through him.

Not that she wasn't aroused. She was. Just not insanely aroused. She wasn't in mating heat, and that was where he wanted her. Now.

Before he realized what he was doing, his foot was on the top step, his intentions clear in his mind. To kiss her. To taste her. To fill her with the hormone tearing through him, demanding sex, touch, taste. Possession.

"Merinus outdid herself." She touched the skirt of the dress self-consciously as she watched him. "The dress is exquisite."

Merinus hadn't arranged for the dress; he had. Jonas kept that information to himself for the time being and watched, waited, as she made her way down the curving staircase.

The dress cupped and hugged her upper body like a possessive lover. The skirt flowed over her legs, lace spilling down the side, the glittering blue threads sparkling through the material.

He wondered if the stockings looked as pretty on her as they had on the mannequin the dressmaker had kept in her shop.

"Are we ready to go?" she asked as she secured the fur-lined silk wrap that went with the dress.

"Not yet." If he didn't touch her, he was going to die. He was going to do something he knew they didn't want to face when the cold light of morning revealed itself.

But did he have the strength to pull back from just a touch.

"Come with me." He didn't touch her, not yet. Turning on his heel, he strode along the short foyer to the receiving room, waited until she entered, then closed the doors securely and locked them.

"Jonas?" The concern in her tone sliced through him as he turned back to her.

Before he could stop himself, and God knew he wished he could have stopped himself, he gripped her shoulders, spun her around and pressed her against the door.

Her soft cry was lost as his lips parted and his teeth gripped the side of her neck in sensual warning. The animal knew what was going on with the man. It knew he was fighting a battle he was going to lose, and he couldn't stop himself.

"Jonas!" Shock and arousal fueled the needy, breathless sound of her voice.

Gripping her hips, Jonas held her still as his knees dipped, his hips pressing against her rear as a harsh growl tore from his throat.

When she didn't fight, when he smelled the soft flavor of feminine juices spilling from the luscious heat of her pussy, his teeth slowly released her.

His fingers flexed on her hips as he rubbed his cock against the cleft of her rear, rotated his hips and imagined the pure ecstasy of sinking inside her.

"Why are you doing this?" she whispered.

"You're my mate." His voice didn't sound like his own. It was rougher, harder, more primal. "Do you know how hard it is not to take you?"

Pressing his lips against the vulnerable crook of her neck, Jonas inhaled the scent of her, tasted her with his tongue, and swore it would go no further.

"I want to taste you," he groaned. "Just one kiss, but I know what just one kiss will do. It will destroy both of us."

Her fingers were flexing against the door, her nails scraping the wood as his hands slid lower, bunched the fabric of her gown and began drawing it upward.

His control was splintering. He could feel it. Every shred of strength he possessed was centered on holding her to him, keeping her locked in place while he touched.

His cock was throbbing as he rolled his hips against the firm muscles of her ass. He imagined pushing her dress higher, tearing her panties from her, spreading the smooth globes and watching as he pressed his cock inside the heated depths of her pussy from behind.

She would be tight.

His fingers met the smooth flesh of her thigh, the material of her skirt and lacy underskirt flowing over his arm as he let them stroke the silken flesh until he worked his way to the tender skin at the crease of her thigh.

"Jonas, if you don't stop now, you won't--" Her soft protest ended with a gasp as the pads of his fingers raked over the silk covering the humid heat of her pussy.

"I'll stop." But he wasn't so certain.

Jonas could feel the hunger rising now, the hormone spilling harder from the glands beneath his tongue and heating his senses with the need to share it.

"Tonight, I have to walk into another of those parties, and I have to see other men watching you, smell their lust and their intent, and know you aren't yet my mate."

"I'm not your mate, period," she argued breathlessly.

His lips peeled back in a furious snarl.

She was denying him, again.

His fingers slipped beneath the elastic leg of her panties and before she could protest, two slid through the slick, hot juices hidden between the soft folds of flesh there.

She was wet. Hot. She was his mate, whether she wanted to admit it or not. His mate. God help him, but he didn't know if he could let her go.

Pleasure. She had never known so much pleasure in a man's arms in her life.

Rachel fought not to arch against the touch of Jonas's fingers between her thighs, the callused pads rubbing, stroking.

"Oh, God." The words slipped from her lips as heat swirled through her body, built and wrapped around her senses. "Jonas, we have to stop."

He had to stop. She couldn't break away from him, even if he allowed it. All she could do was stand there, her nails raking against the wood of the door as her legs parted further for his touch.

"I want inside you." His voice was so deep, so rough now. "You're so sweet, Rachel, so hot. The thought of how tight and slick you'll fit around my cock steals my breath."

Hearing it stole her breath.

Rachel's head fell back against his shoulder as sensual weakness assailed her. The dangerous, overwhelming sensation of vulnerability washed through her, making her feel feminine, more sexy than she had ever felt in her life.

Jonas did that to her. Whether he was touching her or not, he had the ability to make her feel too soft, too female.

"There, my Rachel," he crooned, a rough, rasping sound that sent shivers of arousal racing over her as his fingers circled her clit. "Just rest against me, baby. I'll take care of everything."

Everything was sliding his fingers lower, pressing two together, and with blunted force thrusting into the narrow, tight confines of her vagina.

"Oh God, Jonas." The words tore from her throat. "It's too good. It's too good."

She was so close. She could feel her orgasm raking at her womb, pounding at her clit. Flames were licking across her flesh, centering between her thighs and causing her abdomen to clench with violent pleasure.

"Think how much better it could be." His fingers bent just enough to caress, to stroke previously hidden nerve endings and tender tissue. "Think, Rachel. I could be fucking you, filling you with every inch of my hard cock instead of my fingers."

She should have been insulted. She had never allowed Amber's father, Devon, to talk so explicitly to her. She had never enjoyed it--until she heard Jonas do it.

Fighting to breathe, she turned her head, her lips glancing the hard line of his jaw as he continued to thrust slow and easy inside her. His fingers caressed with knowing strokes, rubbing, easing through the clenched muscles of her pussy as his other arm wrapped beneath her breasts to keep her on her feet.

Her lips parted, pressing to his jaw, her tongue stroking over his sweat-dampened flesh to taste a hint of cinnamon and cloves. Her hands held on to his wrist, her fingertips rubbing against his flesh in concert with the strokes of his fingers inside her pussy.

"You make me regret," he groaned as he lowered his head, allowing her lips to move as close as the corner of his lips.

"Don't regret, Jonas." Her voice was broken, breathless from pleasure. "You have nothing to regret."

He was a man. A man who had broken rules, one who had done things that perhaps were not even legal. But he had done what he had thought had to be done to save himself as well as his species.

He was a man whose touch was pure pleasure, pure heat. A man who held her with strength and yet a gentleness in the face of overwhelming, animalistic pleasure. And still, he was in control. She could feel him fighting for it. Feel the struggle for it. The intent.

Her body tensed, drawn tight as the pleasure built inside her. His fingers thrust deeper, stroked, firmed, fucked her with increasing speed until she began to pant for air, for mercy.

Her nails bit into his arm, her lips parted against his cheek as a wail began to tear from her.

Rapture exploded inside her. Blood pounded, boiled, erupted. Sensation raged, flaming through nerve endings, racing across her flesh, striking her clit, then deep inside her pussy at the same time, and throwing her into a cataclysm of such astounding pleasure that she completely lost her breath.

Flaming fingers raced up her spine and back again. Her muscles trembled as sensation tore across it and her entire body became a writhing mass of complete ecstasy.

"You're mine, Rachel." The growl at her ear was a snarl, a hard, primal vibration of sound that in no way resembled Jonas's voice. "Remember that when their eyes flame with lust, when the scent of their hunger is like a disease filling the fucking room. Damn you, remember you're mine."

She shook her head desperately and could have sworn she heard him say with utmost softness, "I belong to you."