Burning up the Rain (Hawaiian Heroes) (33 page)

“You just saying dat because I have to cook so much when you’re here,” Leilani said to Malu, but she was smiling. “Dis man eat for days.”

“Hmm,” Melia answered. Hard not to notice when he sat across from her eating two helpings to the others’ one—he obviously had to fuel that physique.

“Maybe Melia cook for us, yeah?” He was laughing at her again, darn him. Not out loud, but that sensual mouth was tilted up at the corners, and his dark eyes held a suspicious gleam. She’d like to cook for him all right—a nice serving of ipecac. “
Melia paha
.”

Leilani laughed easily, then looked quickly at Melia. “Sorry, not laughing at you.
Malia paha
mean ‘maybe’. Close to your name.”

“Meh-lee-ah,” Malu said, rolling her name on his tongue. “You have a Hawaiian name.”

“Yes. It means plumeria. My parents spent their honeymoon here,” she said. “They liked the name.”

“So, you cook Hawaiian?” he went on, still with that gleam in his eyes. “Know any good Spam recipes?”

Melia frowned, wary of a trap. She knew the canned ground ham product was an island favorite, but she’d never actually eaten it. Malu grinned, and she narrowed her eyes at him. “I’m sure I could come up with some recipes, just for you.”

Leilani shook her head at him. “She cook fresh, not canned. Anyway, dis girl here on vacation.”

“Yes, I am. Nice talking to you, Leilani.” Without looking at Malu, Melia turned and sauntered out the nearest door, which turned out to be the one to the rear lanai.

Behind her, she heard Malu say something to Leilani. Both of them laughed. She wondered if they were laughing at her, and then rolled her eyes at herself. That was so junior high. And Leilani was nice, even if Malu was a big recipe gone bad.

It was dark on the back lawn, just the light shining from the windows. The only sounds were the rustling of foliage and a few frogs piping in the forest.

Melia flipped her hair off her shoulders and blew out a long breath. Good grief, why did she let him fluster her this way? She wandered slowly along the lanai. The soft caress of the humid air and the sweet scents wafting on it soothed her. Walking on, she stopped to sniff a familiar acrid odor, then wrinkled her nose. Eww, some of the group were smoking pot, right up in the trees. She heard Clay or Jimmer laugh, and shook her head. What a useless waste of time, not to mention illegal.

She followed the faint sounds of island music around the corner. Frank was perched on the porch railing, playing a small ukulele. He smiled at her as she walked into the light of the tiki torches stuck in the garden. Curling up on one of the rattan loungers, she listened to the soft melody and let her mind drift.

She was bothered and bewildered by her attraction to Malu. She’d better handle it before she was bewitched. The Big Island was exerting its magic on her. That was it—he was part of the tropical ambience, like the lava flows, jet black against the green-and-gold mountainsides, like the turquoise water in the bay, the surf curling into frothy white on the golden, sandy beach.

Just another Hawaiian native, as beautiful as the fish eddying over the reef, the sea turtles paddling slowly along or the dolphins leaping joyously from the waves, as full of quiet power as the mountain that towered behind them. Hopefully without the menace.

Realizing the poetic nature of her thoughts, she blushed, glad no one else could see in the dim, flickering light of the torches. Good grief, next she’d be putting it to music and playing the ukulele in the moonlight.

She opened the nearest door into a quiet sitting room now in shadows. She bumped an end table, and something fell with a rustle to the woven floor mat. Melia fumbled for the nearest lamp and snapped it on. A sketchbook lay on the floor, a page poking out as if torn.

Bending, she picked it up and opened it, then blinked in surprise as she gazed at a pencil sketch of the bay, obviously done by someone on the front lanai. The sketch was rough, as if it had been done quickly, but even to her untutored eye, it was very good.

She sank onto the rattan settee next to the lamp and turned the page. Another sketch of the bay, like the first, only a little more refined, the black lava rocks shaded in, the palm trees textured. Were these by the same artist whose work hung on the walls?

She flipped to the next page and the next. To her disappointment, all were bare, except the loose one. As she pulled the page carefully from the sketchbook, she caught her breath. This sketch was of a woman. She was seated on a rock, foliage behind her, her head bent. She held a single flower in her hands, and she looked down at it with dreamy concentration. Her shoulders were bare, a few vague lines suggesting she was nude.

Melia narrowed her eyes. The woman’s hair was undefined, her features only a few tender lines. And yet she looked somehow familiar.

The edge of the paper was crumpled, as if the artist had begun to discard it and then changed his or her mind. A little guiltily, Melia set the sketchbook back on the end table, the sketch of the woman still in her hand.

The artist had nearly thrown it away. Surely he or she wouldn’t miss it if she just enjoyed it while she was here. She’d return it before she left.

She went to her room. After setting the sketch carefully on her bedside table, she readied herself for bed, her mind full of the activities and tensions of the day. When she closed her eyes, she felt as if she were still in the water, being rocked gently by the waves. She turned onto her side and hugged the extra pillow to her.

She dreamed of Malu.

He lounged in the shade of the beach palms, smiling lazily at her, even though Cherie and Jacquie snuggled close at his sides in their bikinis.

Melia walked toward him, drawn by a force beyond her control. His dark eyes slid down over her in a caress as strong as if he had stroked her with his hand. Heady triumph filled her—he wanted her, even with the other women available.

He beckoned her with one finger.

Her heart beat in slow, heavy strokes. She knew what he wanted. Slowly, she lifted her hands to the ties of her bikini top and unfastened them. The top dangled from her fingertips, then fell to the sand, leaving her breasts bare to his gaze. Her nipples hardened, thrusting toward him, feeling his gaze like a caress as soft as the fresh flower lei she wore.

He gestured again, and, naughty excitement flooding her, she hooked her fingers in her bikini bottoms and slowly pushed them down until they fell in a soft puddle around her bare feet. As his hot gaze fell to her mons, she caught her breath, trembling with the force of her excitement and arousal. She felt daring, free, and so turned on her legs were weak.

In the perverse way of dreams, she suddenly realized that Dane sat nearby, watching her with an enigmatic look on his tanned face.
Clay and Jimmer were there too, smiling avidly.

Uncertainty filled her. She looked back at Malu, and he smiled as Cherie and Jacquie pressed close to him, their hands all over him.

With a whimper of sheer humiliation, Melia turned to run.

His beast will have her beauty…but only on his terms.

Prince of Dragons

© 2010 Cathryn Cade

Orion, Book 3

Sirena Blaze has left a string of smiling males across the galaxy—but she’s not smiling now. After two attempts to sabotage her ship, it’s time to call for backup. Her warriors deserve the best, and that means recruiting a member of the elite Serpentian guard as co-commander.

One look at Slyde Stone, and Sirena’s smile returns. She sets out to indulge in the sensual delights for which his people are legendary.

Slyde would like nothing more than to bed the famous beauty, but a secret binds the hands that burn to take her. He is a half-dragon shifter, a race thought to be nothing more than a myth. He’s real, and so is the code he must live by—he can mate only once.

Sirena’s fury at Slyde’s refusal knows no bounds—until saboteurs loose a pair of deadly serpents on board the
Orion
. And the infuriating man has the gall to make a wager. If she finds them first, she can have him. But if he wins, she must agree to be his alone—for life.

Warning: Space cougar on the prowl, a handsome virgin in her sights. Hot love scenes, and even hotter dragon shape-shifting.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Prince of Dragons:

Sirena looked down at the naked male straining beneath her and smiled. She might be a siren, but she led males not to disaster, but to pleasure greater than many of them had ever known. And this one wouldn’t forget her any time soon.

“Ah, gods,” he groaned, his hands clamped on her hips as she rode him with sinuous abandon, letting his cock slide nearly out of her before enveloping it once again. His pleasure-glazed eyes were locked with hers. Sweat soaked his short dark hair and gleamed on his skin, enhancing the play of muscle beneath. “That’s so damn good! You are…unbelievable.”

Since he was approaching his third orgasm, she chose to believe him. She herself was far ahead of that number. She supposed this would be his last effort—human males were lucky to be able to achieve arousal more than twice in such a short time.

She rose and fell on him, closing her eyes to enjoy the sensation of the shaft working inside her, stroking her tight channel. Tipping back her head, she lifted her arms and twined them behind her head, knowing that the motion thrust her breasts out more prominently.

Her com-link beeped a tiny warning in her ear. She ignored it as the pilot surged upward, filling his hands with her breasts and suckling greedily on her nipples.

“Mmm, yes. Like that.” The pleasure began to tighten inside her, and she rode harder, feeling her orgasm begin.

Her com-link beeped again. Protocol demanded that whoever was paging her wait for an answer before opening a holo-vid link. She hoped for their sake they abided by the rules, because any commander who opened a link now was going to get an eyeful.

A hologram sprang up in sharp relief against the shadowed stateroom. It was Slyde Stone, watching her ride the other man. His stance was rigid, jaw clenched, his eyes flaming with such heat she was vaguely surprised her skin didn’t burn.

In the two lunar months they’d been working together, they’d been through a major crisis, trained new guards and improved the quality of security on the
Orion
. And through it all, the heat of desire hadn’t faded, and he still refused to act on it.

Her gasp of shock caught in her throat and, as their eyes held, it became a soft, escalating moan as she climaxed harder than she had all night, pleasure imploding deep within her pussy and then exploding outward through her body. Her co-commander’s voyeurism was as delicious as the cock inside her.

By the time she finally managed to open her pleasure-drugged eyes, he was gone.

A short time later Sirena stepped outside the pilot’s stateroom and stopped short, startled to see her co-commander of the Serpentian guard walking toward her. Walk—such a colorless word to describe the way he moved. He strode, he prowled like the magnificent male creature he was. His tall, heavily muscled body erect and graceful, his beautifully shaped head held high, he surveyed her with narrowed eyes.

His sculpted jaw was still clenched, his nostrils flared. Pushing back her hair, she eyed him cautiously. Great serpents, he wasn’t embarrassed. He was furious.

Perhaps it would teach him a lesson. He could have been the male groaning with pleasure beneath her.

Her own body hummed with satisfaction. She’d left her latest lover sprawled across the bed in the stateroom behind her. He wouldn’t wake for a long time, but when he did, it would be with a smile. As she recalled some of the things he’d done to her and with her, the corners of her mouth curled up with satisfaction.

If she’d sighed, feeling detached even as he groaned his eternal devotion, that was no one’s business but her own. As was the fact she’d come most deliciously of all with Slyde watching them.

“Commander Stone,” she said now, ignoring the way his narrow gaze made her want to touch her flight suit to see if it smoldered. Even after coming several times in the last hours, she still felt the usual low curl of desire at his nearness. But she’d resolved from the beginning that she wouldn’t hang on his sleeve. That was for dewy-eyed ingénues. Let the great beast tell her what was wrong, if he wished.

Otherwise, she was headed straight for a hot shower-dry.

Slyde berated himself in savage silence. What had he been thinking to confront Sirena here outside her lover’s door? Nothing coherent, that was certain. Since the instant he first saw her, he’d been thinking mostly with his cock.

After he’d refused her in the bar that first night, he’d seen the fighter pilot preen himself before her. Had known how it would end when the fellow swaggered out of the bar after her. And he’d watched the scene repeated several times in the last two months. The lovely, sensual Sirena was a typical Serpentian, sharing her body with any male she chose. And he was nearing the end of his patience. He’d done his best to show her how well they got along as they trained, planned and worked together, had even resorted to showing off in sparring. But still she turned to other men.