CONCEPTION (The Others) (28 page)

She looked up. “What?”

He looked down. “You should not push me this time.”

His expression alone should have scared her witless, but it
didn’t. Knowing she aroused him to the same level that he did her was heady and
restored her sense of balance. “If you don’t hurry, I’m going to finish this
without you.”

His head jerked back and he looked down the length of his
nose at her, every century of living packed into the arrogance of that look.
“You will not come until I give you permission.”

“Then you’d better hurry.”

He took a breath. She lapped delicately at his nipple,
nudging it with her tongue. She could feel him reaching for control, and knew
he found it as the heavy lust that swirled about her abated to a dull roar.

“Be easy. I’ll give you what you want.”

But not fast enough. She could tell he had no intention of
giving her what she needed as fast as she needed it. She’d spent years being
good, years being what her grandfather wanted in gratitude for him raising her,
tamping down her natural impulses so he would be proud of her. She wasn’t going
to start that again with Deuce. She wasn’t going to be a good little girl who
buried her desires behind a façade. She was his mate. If Deuce wanted her for
his mate, he was going to take her as she was, whether that fit his plan or
not.

“I don’t want easy. I want you.”

He took the last four steps to the bed and held her above
it, his black eyes deeper than midnight, swirls of red glinting through the
opaque surface. “You will have me.”

“Now.”

“You are not ready now.”

If she didn’t think he’d enjoy it so much, she’d bite him
for that display of arrogance. “I’ve waited forever for you.”

“And I have waited even longer for you, so we will do this
my way, and I will determine when you are ready.”

The slide down his body was pure torture. Every hard ridge
of muscle teased her sensitive thighs and stomach, tugging at her new ring, the
proud thrust of his cock settling to the outside if her thigh. As soon as her
butt hit the mattress, she reached for it, levering it up and in until it was
level with her mouth. Just a dip of her head away from pleasure. Fat, thick and
hungry, it throbbed. For her. She pushed her hair back off her face and licked
her lips. “Maybe I can hurry you along.”

Deuce caught her head in his big hands. “It is not about
hurrying.”

“But I ache!” From her knees to her breasts, she pulsed with
a relentless need.

“This is our joining night, mate. It needs to be done right.”

She kissed his cock, sucking the tip into her mouth, sucking
harder when his salty taste greeted her efforts. Her clitoris swelled in
delight. She squeezed her thighs together, twisting the ring between them,
trying to appease her clit’s relentless howl for attention. Her effort to take
more was thwarted by his hands on her head, pulling her away.

His cock popped free of her mouth. The broad head glistened
in the lamplight, harder than before. Redder. She looked up at him to find him
staring down at her with an intensity that would have terrified her if she
hadn’t been feeling the same way.

“At least part of you has the right idea,” she grumbled.

“You act like I will leave you wanting.”

“You already have.”

Deuce stroked his thumb over her lips, a slight smile on his
own. “You have not yet begun to want.”

Chapter Fifteen

“Lie back on the bed.”

Eden propped herself up on her elbows, eyeing Deuce
cautiously. He looked a little too comfortable standing over her, handing out
orders.

“Spread your legs.”

Way too comfortable. “Why?”

He arched that eyebrow at her in that way that set her heart
to pounding at the same time it encouraged her to smile. “I want to see you.”

There was no doubt what part of her he was referring to. Her
breath caught in her throat and swallowing became impossible. From where she
sat, she could appreciate the way all that muscle flowed from narrow to wide,
cut to bulge from his waist to his shoulders. It was both arousing and
intimidating. He was the one man her body wanted above all others, but he’d
never looked less human than he did in that moment, his eyes flaring black with
intermittent swirls of red, the emotion coming off him too powerful, too
intense to be human. Too intriguing to be ignored.

“Now, Edie.”

Blinking slowly, she took a deep breath, and parted her
ankles. His nostrils flared and his gaze left hers to linger on her legs.
Feeling incredibly daring, and a little like she was baiting a bear, Eden
separated her knees. Deuce’s breath hissed in. She didn’t hear it leave. She
got as far as her upper thighs before her courage ran out. She glanced at his
face. Every angle was drawn tightly into sharp planes with the force of his
desire. Pure, unadulterated male desire. For her. It still wasn’t enough to get
her past that last barrier of modesty.

His gaze flicked hers. “You are disobedient.”

He didn’t sound upset by the knowledge. The thick muscles in
his upper arms flexed. His touch on her ankles had her jumping. She wanted
this, wanted him, but she had a horrible feeling she was out of her league. She
snapped her legs closed. “Deuce?”

His fingers encircled her ankles, pulling her feet apart.
“Yes?”

She let her knees fall together, foiling his attempt. “It’s
not that I’m being difficult.”

His “You are not?” was skeptical.

Okay. So maybe it did look like she was being a little
difficult. “Not deliberately.”

The chain of his fingers slid up her calves, opening and
gliding around until he cupped the curve of her calf muscles in his palms.
“Then why do you hide yourself from me?”

Good question. “It’s just not that easy.”

He paused. “You fear me?”

“More like your reaction.”

That stopped him cold. “Why?”

“I have all sorts of weird thoughts running through my
head.”

“Show them to me.” A jerk of his chin punctuated the order.
His hair fell forward over his shoulder with the force.

“No. Absolutely not.” Some things were meant to be private.

A sound distinctly like teeth snapping together had her
setting her own chin.

Deuce shook his head, sending strands of his thick hair
brushing across her knees and thighs. “You will get over this resistance to
sharing with your mate.”

“I am entitled to some privacy.”

“This privacy is a human concept.”

She shrugged. “Go figure. It must matter to me because I’m
human.”

He shook his head at her. Pressure from his fingertips had
her knees parting a hairsbreadth, whether she wanted them to or not.

“Wait.”

“I have waited long enough.”

She squeezed with everything she had. “Promise me one thing
first!”

Again he paused, but his impatience was palpable. “What?”

“Don’t be shocked.”

His fingers twisted on her calves, sending tingles of desire
up the inside of her thighs. “You think seeing your pleasure could shock me?”

She shifted her hips to alleviate the pressure, but it
didn’t help. Her body clamored for his attention. “You just make me so crazy.”

“That is as it should be.”

“Please?”

Deuce paused. A quick glance at her face proved the truth of
his senses. She was truly worried that she felt too much, whereas he thought
she could not feel enough. Her scent was so strong, so pleasing he felt almost
humanly drunk. He stared up her thighs to the patch of pale yellow curls
protecting her mound. The glimmer of gold drew his eyes, not only because of
what it symbolized, but because of the fully engorged nub it framed. The
previous taste he’d had had been too short and tainted, but this time when he
loved her she’d be as she should be. His completely. His hands shook with the
anticipation. Her muscles—those dainty little muscles she thought prevented him
from anything—flexed in his palms, reminding him that she was awaiting his
promise.

“This promise is given.” She didn’t seem any more relaxed
for receiving it. Her breathing was becoming erratic and along with desire,
fear was pumping adrenaline into her system again. “Take a breath, Edie.”

She did, sucking it in deep, but forgetting to let it go as
he pulled her thighs apart. He backed off her adrenaline and the stress that
had her breath lodged in her throat. “What do you fear, Edie mine? Do you think
you are ugly to my eyes?”

Her groan confirmed his suspicions. He parted her thighs
farther. Her head dropped back and her eyes closed. “You are beautiful, my
heart. Delicately made, lushly inviting, and perfectly wet.”

The last drew a strange squeaking sound from her throat. He
glanced up to catch the blush racing over her torso.

“I like you like this. Wet and eager and hungry for the
touch of my fingers…” He parted her labia with his fingers. “My breath…” He
leaned in until his mouth was a scant inch from her clit. “My tongue.”

He touched her shy, sensitive little clit with the tip of
his tongue. Her scream echoed in his ears as he nuzzled his way under the heavy
ring. The carvings of the joining words lay against his tongue as he pressed
the sensitive nubbin, imprinting the rightness of the moment into his mind.

“Oh God!” Her sob of “Too much” reached out to him.

It was not enough. Her hands fisted in his hair, tugging at
him. She didn’t have a prayer of getting him to move. Not when he finally had
her under him, her scent in his nostrils and her juices on his tongue, and all
the time in the world to enjoy all three. He circled her clit lightly, feeling
the spark of delight shoot through her. Followed quickly by a shot of fear.

He kissed the straining little bud gently. Glancing up her
body, over the fluttering muscles of her abdomen and between her heaving
breasts, he studied her expression. Beyond fear and desire, he saw confusion.

“Edie?”

Her grip tightened in his hair. Her “What” was cautious.

“I am trying to make you lose control.”

“I figured that.”

He dipped his finger into the copious cream coating her
pussy and thighs and brought it up to her clit, sliding his finger all over the
little bud, coating it thoroughly. “Then why do you hold back?”

“Because I’ll do something incredibly stupid and ruin
everything.”

He rubbed his lips over the freshly slicked area. She
shuddered and strained toward him, her body understanding what her mind could
not accept. “There is nothing to ruin, Edie mine. Just relax and trust that I
know where I am taking you.”

“That’s what my grandfather told me when he took me on my
first roller coaster ride.”

“And?” There was always an “and” with Edie.

“I threw up all over him.”

He squashed the snort of laughter that threatened his
control. “You will not throw up tonight.”

“But if I do?”

“Then the fault will be mine.”

“How so?”

“With six-hundred-fifty years of experience, I should have
this down pat.”

She stared at him, her breath lodged in her lungs, her mind straining
to reach for him but smothered by her will, and finally nodded. “Okay.”

“You will relax?”

“Yes.”

He kissed her little clitoris again, smiling when she
jumped. “Because you know you can trust me?”

He felt her weigh the lie and then sigh with the truth.
“Because I don’t seem to have any choice.”

“No. You do not.” And neither did he. He had to have her.
Her scent, her taste, her passion. Her joy. “Come to me, mate.”

He cupped her buttocks in his palms, frowning at how little
of them there was left. He would need to remember to make her eat. Her gasp as
he squeezed the soft mounds jostled another smile from his desire. His mate had
a sensitive ass. That was good. Very good.

He lifted her pussy up into his mouth. Keeping her suspended
on the platform of his hands as he traced the swollen outer lips of her pussy,
licking at the cream there, rolling her unique flavor through his mouth,
catching the ring between his teeth and tugging gently, as he pulled her
buttocks apart, stretching her anus ever so slightly, savoring the reality.

This was his mate who tossed beneath the lash of his tongue.
His mate, who panted with anticipation as he rimmed the opening of her vagina.
His mate who screamed and pulled at his hair when he plunged his tongue inside.
His mate. Forever and in all ways, for all that she still did not accept it.
But she would. Before the night was over she would accept all of him. And not
just his body. He lapped at her clitoris, teasing her with the stiff strokes.
Her muscles tightened. Her body stiffened. Her head thrashed from side to side.
Her scent changed subtly. He sucked her clitoris into his mouth. Edie screamed
and thrashed on the bed, denying herself and him her orgasm. He growled deep in
his throat, deep in her mind.

You will not deny me this.

“I can’t bear it.”

His fangs exploded into his mouth. She would do more than
bear it. She would come for him. On his command. He increased the pressure of
his tongue, adding little nips between the strokes, gradually increasing the
force until she stopped pulling away and began thrusting up into his mouth.

He took his hands away from her buttocks. She fell to the
bed. She stared at him uncomprehendingly, her blue eyes dark with her passion,
her lips swollen and red from her biting, almost as swollen and red as her
other lips.

“Present yourself to me.”

The flush on her chest intensified, and then with a little
whimper that went straight to his cock, she arched her back, thrusting her
breasts out and her hips up. Her body swayed slightly as she offered herself to
him.

“Higher.”

Another whimper and her hips lifted that fraction more that
had her legs quivering and her sex parting, exposing the tender flesh between
and the gold hoop resting above.