Impulse (3 page)
“This whole night is magnificent, Logan. Better than rollerblades.” I laughed.
Lying on my back, I thought about my place in the universe as tiny specks of dust infiltrated the atmosphere in a glorious flash of light. It used to make me feel small and insignificant knowing that I would burn out like one of those stars one day. Becoming an immortal changed the way I saw the world… and myself. There was time. Time to change, time to grow—time to make a difference.
We talked for hours, drinking in the wine and each other.
“Finn will be moving soon,” he said.
“Moving?”
“We’re a tight family and Little Wolf needs to bond with each of us. We agreed to rotate him.”
My brows arched. “Rotate him? He’s not a tire.”
“No, he’s a young Shifter who hasn’t been socialized, and nobody will hire him if they run a background check. He’s not ready to go out into the world on his own.”
I agreed. If something happened to Finn because we pushed him out too fast, I’d never be able to live with myself.
“His wolf may never trust us—that’s a given—but Finn must learn to. I’ve taken an oath to look out for him, and I keep good on my word. He’ll take something from each of us and become a better man,” Logan said, taking a sip of wine.
I smiled and brushed a strand of hair from my face that the wind kept playing with. “What’s he taking from you?”
“My furniture.” He chuckled, shaking his head. “Tooth by tooth. I’m just glad that I never bought drapes.”
A few more flashes of light silently skated across the inky sky above.
Logan turned over and propped his head in his hand. “Does it matter to you that we’re different?”
“I guess I’m just—”
“Looking for reasons out.”
“That’s not fair. Don’t finish my sentences for me.”
“I apologize. The way men have treated you makes my fangs ache. I’m smitten with you, Silver. Indulge me in my pursuit.”
I fell into his rapturous gaze, wondering where this would lead. Too much wine provoked too many questions.
My teeth chattered.
“Let me warm you,” he murmured.
Logan crawled over me, propped up on his elbows. He rested his head on my stomach and the weight of his body warmed my legs instantly. I was dizzy from the intimacy.
When a sharp sting pierced my thigh, I shouted and sat halfway up.
“I think something bit me,” I complained, rubbing my leg.
“Let me take a look.” Logan slid my dress up on the left side and traced his hand up my long legs. He pinched two fingers together and held them up, examining closely. “It’s just an ant.”
I glared at the large insect resembling a fire ant that he held between his fingers, but it was hard to tell in the dim light. “Well, tell him that I don’t like being nibbled on.”
He quirked a brow and flicked his fingers. “Is that so?” Logan purred.
The intensity of his stare and the proximity of his body to mine sent butterflies swarming through my stomach. Logan’s energy was strong for a Chitah when his emotions ran high. Justus said I was becoming more in tune with Breed energy and it was part of my development as a Mage. Logan never had to tell me how he felt; I could feel it in his touch, taste it in his kiss, and smell it on his skin.
He leaned down and I tensed when his tongue—rough and smooth all at once—ran over the insect bite. The itching immediately numbed and I shuddered. Logan Cross may have considered his healing ability to be no big deal, but I didn’t think I’d
ever
get used to that man’s tongue being on me.
With a lift of his head, he drew in a deep breath and sensed my altered mood. He crawled up the length of my body and lowered himself on top of me.
“Tell me where else you’ve been bitten,” he said playfully.
The heat of his kiss against my cold lips roared a fire to life. I circled my fingers around a soft patch of skin behind his neck, clawing lightly. The heavy taste of wine lingered on his tongue—stroking against mine—and he groaned. I felt nothing except Logan and the earth.
He broke the kiss and turned his head to the side, every breath a testament to his control.
“Logan?”
A veil of loose hair obscured his face. I cupped his chin with my hand and lifted his gaze to my attention. That’s the moment I felt his heart galloping against my chest.
“Don’t start something you can’t finish.”
I let go of his hair and rubbed my eyes. Logan had customs that were supposed to make him feel like more of a man, but it made me feel undesirable. When he spoke that way, I melted completely, so it was confusing when he resisted too much physical contact beyond a kiss.
“I need another glass of—”
Logan suddenly unleashed his desire like an avalanche. I was buried in it. Consumed by it as he kissed my neck.
I wiggled beneath him, trying to push him away, but all it did was create friction between our bodies.
“Keep doing that,” he whispered hoarsely, settling his weight on me.
His lips grazed my neck and when his tongue flicked against my earlobe, Logan found the match that set my furnace on fire. I began to unfasten the buttons on his shirt. He stared at me with vehement desire as shifting patterns of color moved across his chest beneath my fingertips.
Logan wouldn’t touch me. His mouth sucked hungrily on my neck and the blanket twisted within his clenched fists.
“Touch me, Logan. I want your hands on my body.” My fingers slid inside of his shirt, craving the feel of his skin.
His hand caressed my arm and that one simple gesture was so electric that I could have set the grass on fire. There’s something so wonderful about the casual movement of a man’s hand across your body, moving his way down to your leg in search of bare skin.
Logan watched me intensely with magnetic eyes, observing my reaction to his touch. He tugged the dress higher until his fingers splayed across my hip, looking for the edge of my panties.
Except that I wasn’t wearing any.
Stark confusion crossed his face and his fingers bit into my skin. Because the dress showed panty lines, I had gone without. Why not let him think that I did it just for him? Something about that made it sexy.
He licked his lips.
“Why, Mr. Cross… you’re
blushing
.”
A soft breeze chilled my skin, an owl hooted, a flash of light dashed across the sky, and Logan penetrated my soul with a kiss so deep and reverent that the light within me surged. He shifted his hips and I moaned. He knew exactly how to use his tongue and each time it stroked against mine, I gripped the blanket to resist the urge to join hands with him. It was a Mage thing, and while I’d only experienced a little of the act of binding, my body knew exactly what it wanted to do. In that single kiss, I discovered exactly what kind of lover Logan was.
Insatiable.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Your scent changed.”
“I can’t touch you. That’s what’s wrong. I’m starting to feel like a live wire.”
“Show me.”
“No!” I protested, struggling to sit up.
“Then how do you know for sure what will happen?”
“I’m not hurting you to prove a—”
Logan pried open my fingers and placed his palm over mine. The second he did, a surge of energy knocked him on his back, several feet away in the tall grass.
“Logan!” I flipped onto my knees and crawled, wide-eyed, knocking over a glass of wine. He rolled onto his side, looking like a truck had hit him.
Or a burst of sex lightning.
“Why did you do that? Are you okay?” I brushed the hair that pulled free from his band away from his face. “Didn’t your mother teach you not to stick your finger in a light socket?” I laughed, relieved to see that he was conscious.
He sighed and rubbed his face. “That’s going to be a problem.”
“Well, look on the bright side,” I said, falling beside him in the grass. “You won’t ever have to worry about buying jumper cables.”
Chapter 3
“I don’t understand why you insisted on coming, love,” Simon grumbled as he skipped up the steps to Samil’s enormous house
.
I held my arms as we passed the two fierce statues of lions before the front door. “I may not hold a position within the Mageri, but as long as Nero’s case remains open, then I’m going to be a part of it.”
The truth was, even if they closed the case, I would still be involved.
My Creator had legal rights to me before he died, but that didn’t justify the Mageri’s decision to hand me over to him like property. That’s why I related to Finn. Breed laws weren’t established to protect the people, only to uphold outdated customs. Seven days in that basement beaten, by a man who should have mentored me, had damaged my trust in the law. I never had nightmares about Samil because he was dead and gone. It was Nero that crept into my mind in the middle of the night. He was alive and doing God knows what with innocent lives.
Simon’s shoes tapped with contempt against the polished floor and he wiped the mud from his heel, leaving a brown streak on the marble.
“I don’t suspect we’ll find anything new,” he said. “I just like to be thorough.”
“If Samil had knowledge of anything that allowed him to create a stronger progeny, then maybe there’s something here,” I said. “A name, a diary, an instruction manual—hell, I don’t know. If there is, I don’t want Nero to find it.”
“The Council put this house on watch from day one; ask me what I had to do in order to get us permission to enter.”
“Don’t be dramatic, Simon.”
He spun on his right heel and lifted a brow.
“So how was Hannah in bed?” I snorted. Hannah was one of the Council members with the sharpest tongue and hairpins to match—
so
not Simon’s type.
He narrowed his eyes. “You think I would bed that strumpet? For your information, I posed nude.”
“For which magazine?” I bent over, unable to contain my laughter.
“Laugh it up, missy. There’s a high-ranking official of the Mageri who apparently has a passion for sculpture and nude men.”
“Can I see it?”
Simon smirked and reached for his zipper.
“Never mind,” I muttered.
“Thanks to the guards, Nero can’t touch this place with his pinky toe.” Simon sniffed and crossed the room, staring at a pretentious painting encased in a gold frame. “I would have liked to kill the sod myself. You do know that?”
“Putting Adam in the challenge may have been the only legal way to kill Samil, but I don’t know if I’ll ever be right with it, even if Adam is. Let’s not dig up bones in this cemetery.”
Simon whirled around. “I do love a good bone.” I glared at his T-shirt that said:
Chess players do it all Knight
.
“You are the most inappropriate man I know.”
“
Moi
?” he asked, folding his arms and glaring judgmentally at me, foot tapping on the floor.
“What’s that look for?”
His eyebrow rose. “You are the biggest troublemaker I know.”
“So I flirt with disaster once or twice. Who doesn’t?”
He snorted. “You don’t just flirt with disaster, you have intercourse with it.”
I was three seconds away from having a verbal confrontation when a wicked smile slanted his dimple and he sauntered across the room.
Simon pulled at the banister and headed upstairs. “There are two lessons I’ve learned in life: never play chess against a Sensor, and never lose your sense of humor.”
Halfway up he stopped and leaned over the railing. “Oh, and never shag a woman with a tattoo.”
Now that surprised me. “Why?”
“They’re freaks. The lot of them.”
“I thought you liked getting your freak on,” I said with a laugh.
He rolled his eyes and jogged upstairs, voice trailing off. “Remind me to tell you about the time I was tied and taped to a washing machine by a woman who had the grim reaper on her back.”