Claiming His Fire (22 page)

He chuckled and gave me one last bite before pulling back again, placing his forehead against mine, looking into my eyes as if he truly saw me. “I’ve been ready for anything you’d be willing to give me since the moment I saw you.”

My heart melted. “I’m sorry it took me so long.”

He shook his head, still smiling, still with me. “I would have waited forever.”

I closed my eyes, his words making me shiver. Making me tremble. “I’m glad I didn’t make you.”

“Hell, me too.” He chuckled, pulling me closer, hugging me with everything he had. I hugged him back, still wrapped around his body. His very hard, very strong body.

“Shadow?”

“Scarlett?”

“Can we go to bed now?”

He pulled back, his brow furrowed. “I…yeah. Of course.”

A knot of dread formed in my stomach as he placed my feet back on the ground. “What? What’s that look?”

“Hmmm.” He glanced at me, distracted. “Oh, I just realized I’ve never had sex in my bed.”

I stared, blinked, searched for words but found only one. “What?”

“It always seemed too intimate, I guess. I just…never brought a woman into my bedroom.”

“You’re joking.”

“No, not at all.” He shrugged and looked around his apartment. “I mean, it’s not like I needed to. I just used the walls, floors, tables, chairs, the couch—”

I held up a hand, stopping him. “We’re seriously going to have to get rid of every piece of furniture in this place.”

A sarcastic grin spread across his face. “Does that mean you want to stay here with me?”

“After we burn the couch, the tables, rip up the carpeting, and discuss any other items that may need to go up in flames” —I shrugged— “sure.”

He swept me into his arms, carrying me through the apartment and into the bedroom. “I think I know someone who can help set the stuff on fire.”

“They must be a cool as hell; flames are badass.” I giggled as he tossed me on the bed. Smiling, he pulled his shirt and pants off without waiting for me. I loved that about him, how confident he was in his skin, how sure. Of course, his body was toned and delicious, sexy beyond reason. There was nothing for him not to be confident about.

Lying back, watching him shed his clothing, something dark and vulnerable grew in my belly. Something much like fear. But instead of running away, I ran toward him. Sought him out.

“Shadow?”

“Scarlett?”

I fingered the edge of the pillow. “Was that true?”

He paused, staring. “Was what true?”

“What you said.” I huffed and looked up at him. Mentally running toward him faster and with gusto. “Have you never had sex in your bed?”

His smile was soft, his eyes bright as he crawled over me, pushing me back to lie on the mattress.

“You are the only woman I’ve ever had in my bed, the only one who’s ever been in this room. I told you, it seemed too intimate. Too…meaningful.”

“So we have meaning?” I reached up and wrapped my arms around his neck.

“We have so much meaning, Firecracker.” He let his weight come to rest on me, pressing me into the mattress. “You’re the first woman in my bed and in my heart. First and last.”

He kissed me slowly, deeply, as he worked on stripping me of my dress. Every move careful, every touch gentle. Intimate. Showing me where I stood, how much I meant to him. How much he cared.

When I lay naked underneath him, pinned by his weight and surrounded by his warmth, I clung to him, shaking.

“You okay?” he asked, stroking my hair.

“Yeah,” I whispered. “I’ve just never felt like this. I’ve never felt so much.”

He gripped me tighter, pulling me up and placing me on his lap, my legs on either side of his. “Isn’t it amazing?”

I nodded into his shoulder, thankful he felt the same. That he understood. “Yeah, it really is.”

Our foreplay started slowly, a simple shift of my hips, a run of his teeth along my shoulder. A building of heat within me and between us. But soon, we were pushing and pulling against one another, his erection trapped between us, my pussy sliding over it, making him wet with me, making him moan. We kissed and bit and teased our way through my first orgasm, Shadow holding me up as I groaned and shook from nothing more than rubbing against him. Keeping the pressure on my clit to make it last.

When I caught my breath, my forehead against his neck, I whispered, “Do you have a condom?”

He kissed my head and reached back, grabbing an unopened box from the nightstand. The fact that the box was still sealed shut meant something in my mind. He was starting fresh with me, as I was with him. First chances, first times, and if red threads and mates and fate had anything to say about it, this would be our last first. Together.

I took the foil package from his fingers and tore it open. Sliding back, gripping his erection in one hand, I rolled the latex down his shaft, loving the way even those simple touches made him moan and bite his lip. Wanting to make him feel as good as he made me. Once covered, I crawled back onto his lap, straddling him. Rubbing against him a little more. Still wanting to tease him even though we both knew exactly where this was going.

“Hey, Shadow?” I rotated my hips, pressing down, grinding on his cock. Sliding my hands to his shoulders, to the marks I’d left him, letting the heat within me rebrand those burns.

“Hey, Scarlett?” His voice came out harsh, his hands gripping my hips harder than before. I liked it. Liked that show of roughness.

I leaned in, put my lips right against the skin of his neck and whispered, “Make me yours.”

He snarled, tossing me back on the bed and sliding on top of me, inside of me. A single thrust was all it took, one shift of his hips, and it was on. No longer gentle, no longer soft or sweet, this wasn’t lovemaking or any other purple prose. This was sex. Fucking. Animalistic, harsh, and amazing. He growled and snarled his way through, biting my neck more than once as I did the same. Putting my teeth in his flesh was a need, a desire I couldn’t control to mark him. Own him. Claim him as mine.

Every thrust grew harder, every deep press of his hips into mine more desperate. I wrapped my legs around him, crossing my ankles against his ass, and held on tight. Grunting, sweating, sliding across the mattress as he took me higher. As he pushed me over the edge of desire. And damn was it perfect.

Until we fell off the bed.

Not that it mattered; Shadow picked me up and lifted me back onto the mattress, my ass right at the edge. He stood with a growl, pulling my legs up, straight up, then splaying them wide. Sliding back inside, going deeper than before. The angle, the depth, the blatant view he must have had as he watched himself fucking me was so filthy. Such a turn-on. I gasped and shook as he took me, one hand on my breast, the other edging down my stomach.

“Fuck, Scarlett,” he groaned as my fingers found my clit.

“Great idea.” I moaned and bit my lip as I teased my clit, forming a V around it with my fingers. “You should definitely fuck Scarlett.”

He huffed a laugh before increasing his pace. He spread my legs wider, forcing them down, making me groan at the change in depth and the stretch in my hips.

I kept my hands busy, pinching my nipples, spreading myself to give him an even better view, teasing his cock as it slid in and out of me. I clawed and mewled at him, but he didn’t stop. The bed creaked and hit the wall, but he didn’t stop. I came with a scream, trying to pull my legs together and failing, and he didn’t stop. He was a man on a mission, and that mission involved fucking me half to death. Thank the Goddess for his endurance and my yoga sessions.

Moving my ankles to his shoulders, he bent over me, still buried deep in my pussy. Folding me in half, finding a way to go deeper when I’d thought that impossible. To give me more when he was already giving me so much.

“Shadow,” I groaned, so tired and oversensitive but still wanting more, needing it. Needing something.

“Yeah, baby?”

“I need…I need.” I rocked my head back and forth, uncertain. Needing something new, something with meaning, something—

“Bite me,” I whispered, a surge of heat working up my spine at the idea of his teeth in my flesh.

He groaned at my demand, folding me farther, slowly moving his body over mine even as his hips kept up a punishing rhythm.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his voice breathy. “We can’t take this back. It’ll join us permanently.”

“I’m sure,” I said, looking into his eyes, being more truthful than ever. “I want you forever. Bite me. Make me yours.”

He nodded, pulling my legs off his shoulders and letting my knees hook over his bent elbows. The shallower depth of his thrusts didn’t change how good he felt inside me, how right I knew this was as he filled me again and again. He bent more, pushing me up the mattress, climbing on top of me. Thrusting hard. Keeping me on the edge of something.

He skimmed his nose along my neck. I shuddered.

He circled his tongue around a spot right where my neck met my shoulder. I groaned.

Finally, with whispered words of sweetness and devotion, he bit me. The orgasm that ripped through my body had my back arched, my toes curled, and the world turning red. Every inch of me burned, for him, for me. Didn’t matter. My world was on fire, and I loved it. Without thought, surrendering to the need I felt from him, I bit him back, sinking my teeth into the flesh of his shoulder. He bucked and groaned, stomach hard against mine, shaking as his own orgasm took over. Joined in more ways than one, coming together as we came apart.

“Fuck,” I whispered as my haze faded and reality came barging back in. “I can
feel
you.”

Shadow grunted, licking my neck as he teased me with long strokes of his hands. “I’m still inside you, so I sure as hell hope so.”

I rolled my eyes. “Not that.”

He hummed. “I know.” He pulled back, looking down at me, smiling. “I can feel you, too.”

“The thread’s wrapped around us tight,” I whispered, closing my eyes as my pull to him tugged, my heart skipping with the completion of it.

“I like tight.” He pushed his hips into mine, making me giggle. “Hold that thought, though. I need to take care of this.”

He slid out of me, holding the condom at the base of his still-hard cock as he hurried into the bathroom. How he could not be as deflated as a cheap tire on a glass-strewn highway, I had no idea. Maybe some kind of shifter magick. Something dirty and obscene…and perfect.

I stretched and grabbed the sheet, covering myself as I snuggled into Shadow’s pillows. He quickly rejoined me, waiting as I held up the covers for him to crawl under. To join me and snuggle together. Something I loved doing with him.

“What time do you leave in the morning?” he asked as he settled himself around me. I curled into his hold, sighing at how warm and comfortable it was to be caged by this man.

“Early. The girls want to be on the road at five so we can be at Merriweather by ten at the latest. The carnival is supposed to open at four, and we need to make sure everything is set.”

He kissed my temple, my cheek, nibbling my ear. “It’s going to be a long day for you.”

“And for you.” I tilted my head back, enticing him to my neck, knowing how much he loved nuzzling me there. “Doesn’t the ride start at like nine?”

“Yeah, we’re supposed to be in Kalamazoo for lunch, then we’ll ride the rest of the way to Chicago.”

“That’s a long ride,” I said, rubbing my fingers across his chest.

Shadow hummed. “It’s not like I haven’t done it before and won’t have to do it again.”

His words made me pause, my heart beating fast. My words soft. “Will you be coming back with the rest of the guys after the celebration?”

Shadow went quiet, his arms squeezing me tighter, holding me to him in a way that said more than his words could. “Probably not. There’s still some things to be done, and I need to help Jameson track down those loose threads we left dangling.”

“How long?” I asked, my heart aching at the thought of being away from him again.

“I don’t know.” He pulled back, meeting my gaze with warm eyes. “But this time, I’ll call every day. We’ll text all the time, too. And I promise to ride as hard and fast as I can to get back to you once I get a break.”

I sighed, knowing that was really the best I could ask for. He had a job built on secrets, ones he had to keep even from me. I could accept that as long as I knew he was safe. As long as I knew he’d come back to me. Though I had to admit, the idea of Shadow speeding through the night on his low-slung motorcycle to get to me was an exciting vision. One that made me wonder what it’d be like to ride on the back of his bike. Which made me think about...

“Does your ass get sore when you ride?”

Shadow paused, silent and still as if actually considering my question. “No, not really.”

“Huh.”

“Why, huh?”

I shrugged. “I just thought it might be a nice way to end the day.”

He pulled back, looking down at me. “What might?”

“Well, we won’t see each other during the day since I’m going with the girls to set up. And then I’m coming back first thing the next morning after the celebration carnival while you go off to do secret-agent-shifter stuff.” I smiled, pulling him closer, letting my hands warm as I stroked up and down his back. “I thought it might be fun to spend the evening taking advantage of the rides and games at the fair.”

“Well, yeah,” he said, obviously confused. “We’ll hang out at the fair with everyone else.”

“Right.” I pushed him to his back and sat up, straddling his hips, rubbing myself against where he was hard and thick still, secretly thanking my lucky stars for that ability. “And then, when the PG-rated fun is over, I was thinking I could spend some NC-17 time rubbing out the soreness from your ride.”

“Oh,” he whispered, staring up at me, biting his lip as I moved against him. “I’m down for that. I’ll definitely be sore enough for a rubdown.”

“Really?” I leaned down to capture his lips with mine as I reached for the open box of condoms. Ready for another round. Hell, ready for ten more rounds.

“Definitely.” He closed his eyes and tossed his head back as I sheathed him. Such a sexy vision, giving himself to me. Letting me take over. Letting me do what I wanted. And what I wanted was for him to be inside me.