Obsession (19 page)

But she could not fight it any more than he could.

When he pulled away, he stared down at her mouth and smoothed back her hair. “Tonight, Jessica. You’re coming back to my house. If anyone’s going to make love to you tonight, it’s going to be me. You have five seconds to back off. What do you say?”

Chapter 13

Jessica said yes.

She could no longer deny the sensual web ensnaring them both. Nor did she want to.

Raphael drove like a maniac back to his home. Once inside the house, he swung her into his arms and carried her into the bedroom. He gently set her on her feet and ran a finger between her shoulder blades. “Exquisite,” he murmured.

Between her legs, her panties felt damp with perspiration…and desire.

“Undress for me,” he ordered softly.

Raphael stepped back. Jessica removed her jeans, letting them land in a heap on the hardwood floor. She shrugged out of her sweater and tossed it aside.

“Turn around,” he commanded.

A sharp intake of breath followed as his hungry gaze devoured her body, now clad only in violet bra and panties. Jessica felt her nipples harden and her breasts grow heavy beneath the intensity of that look.

He circled her and stopped behind her. She arched beneath his touch as he traced a line along her panties.

“You wore Wednesday. On a Saturday.” Deep satisfaction tinged his voice. “Like our dream.”

Then he turned her around to face him. Jessica fumbled with her panties and tugged them down past her ankles and she stepped out of them.

Then she unsnapped her bra and stood before him naked. Stricken by uncertainty, she hugged herself.
Can I do this?

He arched a dark brow, but then reached out and selected a lock of hair, let it dangle between thumb and forefinger. Lifting the strand to his nose, he inhaled its scent. His breath released on a sigh.

“You smell of flowers and sex,” he murmured.

Jessica remained motionless, trying to hold her breath, barely containing herself as Raphael’s gaze found her breasts. Raphael looked at her expectantly. His expression was that of a victorious hunter.

Cool air brushed against her naked breasts and caused her stomach muscles to contract. Never had she felt more vulnerable to him, not even in the forest when he’d pleasured her with his mouth. That had been the wolf rising in her, wild and feral.

This was human, exposing everything she had.

With all her inner strength, she forced her hands down to her sides, hiding nothing. “This is me, Raphael. Everything you see.”

His expression shifted. For a moment the mask dropped and she saw inside the man, a raw-etched and haunted loneliness, something she’d glimpsed before. The man behind the mask of cool urbane sophistication. Jessica watched as he removed his clothing.

He turned around and her heart ached at the raw scars marring his muscled back.

“This is me, Jessica.”

Another link in the chain forging them together, even if they did not want this. She hid her scars of pain and abandonment on the inside.

He bore his on his back.

They were cruel and horrifying, an ugly thatching of silvery marks, made even more so because of his suffering. She flattened her palm upon his back and gently stroked, feeling him tense.

“So much pain,” she whispered. “How strong you must have been to withstand all this.”

Then he turned around and mingling in his eyes was something other men had denied her: tenderness.

Raphael slid a hand around her neck. His touch was both arousing and soothing. He kissed her. His tongue found her lips, demanded entrance.

Encouraged by his need, she allowed it. His tongue slid deftly inside, meeting her own with bold strokes. She felt his passion, his crude lust and it equaled her own.

Then he caught her lower lip between his teeth and gently clamped down. Raphael released it and swept his hot, caressing gaze over her from head to toe. A smile tugged at his mouth.

“You’re a real redhead.”

Blood rose from her throat to her flaming cheeks, and her nipples grew rosy and hard beneath Raphael’s intense stare. His hand drifted over her slender shoulder, caressing her skin, his fingers gentle.

He palmed her breasts, his gaze fierce. He flicked his thumbs over their hardening peaks in small, expert strokes. Jessica writhed, a hot throbbing between her legs that grew ever more concentrated.

“You’re Lupine as I am, Jessica.”

As she started to deny it, pointing out her weaker powers, Raphael shook his head. “Perhaps you cannot shapeshift as quickly into wolf as others. But the core of you is a Lupine’s sensuality, longing to be wild and free. You were born for this. I saw it in your eyes from the moment we first me.”

She could not deny it—especially not when he bent his head and fastened his mouth on a nipple. Jessica stiffened, half expecting pain. Instead, there came a gentle suckling, and his tongue flicked over the cresting hardness and swirled. The sharp ache between her legs increased.

The wolf stole all reason from her, his adroit skill stealing what little sense she still possessed. Jessica pressed against him, feeling the tensile muscles of his body.

Raphael released her nipple. He straightened, a haunted look in his eyes. “I have a confession to make, little Red. I have not been with a woman in seven years.”

Her heart turned over at the sadness in his eyes. “Then I’m glad I’m your first in a long while. Because you’re my first, too.”

“When I first saw you, I swore I was looking at a devil,” he murmured, and he rubbed his thumb over her jaw. “That hair of yours. Demon fire. Damn me for wanting you so badly.”

Raphael stepped back. Her fascinated gaze roved him, his taut, lean body boasting of honed strength, his broad chest, rippling muscles of a flat stomach, and legs dusted with dark hair. Her gaze dropped to the long, thick penis thrusting up from his groin. He was aroused, this male who had denied himself pleasure for seven years. Jessica felt a peculiar mix of pride and wonder.

Raphael gave her no time to think. He tumbled her backward onto his bed, kissing her, his hands fisting in her hair. A shiver born of sexual awareness arose as she tested the hard muscles of his shoulders with her fingers. The spark between them caught and flared. She turned her face to where his shoulder met neck, put her mouth on his flesh and lightly bit. Jessica tasted the tangy salt of his skin and smelled the citrus, musky spice of him.

Then Raphael kissed the tiny hollow of her throat, the movement of his mouth increasing the hot throbbing between her legs. She twisted beneath him as he slid a hand between her thighs.

She felt his finger slide between her soaked slit. Smooth as silk, he glided back and forth, creating tendrils of coiled tension. She became a coiled spring, ready to release with each caress, ready to feel the full burn of erotic pleasure.

A pleading whimper arose in her throat.

“Shhh,” he murmured. “Just let go.”

All tension within her exploded, and she cried out as it burst from her center. And when her eyes fluttered open, she saw Raphael looking down at her with deep satisfaction, and with a hint of male pride.

“It’s time to make you mine, Jessica,” he murmured.

She watched him reach into the nightstand, tear open a foil packet. Jessica closed her eyes as he pushed open her trembling thighs.

Jessica. She was a ripe peach, sweet as sin, slick beneath the surface, drenched and ready for him. Raphael released a low groan of satisfaction. Her own little whimpers of excitement tugged at his heart. This wasn’t merely sex to ease his lust; this was something more, and he knew it. Hated it but craved it. Needed it.

He caged her with his body and wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight as his mouth met hers. The kiss was punishing, a maelstrom of unleashed lust. He took her mouth with fury, his tongue plunging inside with masterful strokes. Tasting her, taking all and leaving nothing, building her fervent and growing ardor. He intended to strip away everything, grinding her down to her bones. He’d turn her into a wild wolf mindless with pleasure, reckless with need.

Make her as wicked as he was.

All that mattered was getting inside her, his thick cock invading her fully so that she’d sink into his soul and push back the memories haunting him for a little while. For just a little while, Raphael longed to forget and lose himself in the pleasure of another woman’s body.

Not just any woman. Jessica. The sheer longing he felt for this particular Lupine scared and enthralled him. After corralling all his male lust for so long, she had shattered his resolve with a single bite of a juicy peach. One look at her two months ago, and he’d melted into his own desires. She enthralled him, infuriated him, amused him.

And she understood him. Maybe even loved him, the alpha who’d let his pack down. Just a little.

He parted her shaking thighs and nudged his lean hips between. The breath caught in her throat. She arched upward, not knowing what she wanted but frustrated and needing something. He was in control here, stronger than she, dominating, but a promise lingered in her passion-darkened eyes, a promise that had grown ever since they’d first met.

Raphael lifted the long mass of her curls and kissed her neck. He ran his tongue over her skin, enjoying the little shivers of pleasure his touch evoked. “Don’t be afraid,” he murmured. “I promise, I’ll take good care of you.”

Jessica opened her legs wider, the ache between them exquisitely sharp, demanding to be filled. Wide-eyed, she watched Raphael settle closer. The silky hair on his muscled chest rubbed against the sensitive, hardened crests of her nipples. He rose above her, gaze fierce, his shoulders blocking out view of the ceiling. She felt the insistent demand of his penis pushing against the entrance to her body.

Raphael slipped forward, beginning to penetrate. Jessica’s virgin flesh quivered in both anticipation and apprehension. Her breath stalled. He eased in another inch. Then, with a soft murmur and a powerful twist of his hips, he surged forward, breaching and impaling her. Jessica bit back a sharp gasp at the sudden twist of pain. A small whimper fled her lips, and she was pinned beneath the muscled weight pressing her into the soft mattress.

“Shhh,” he crooned, kissing her, soothing her with gentle presses of his mouth against hers.

She felt oddly full with Raphael joined to her body, his penis buried deep inside her. After a moment he began to move, pulling slowly out, then slowly thrusting back into her. As he created a delicious friction between their bodies, he stared down at her, the smoky heat of his gaze burning into her. Jessica slid her hands around his neck, arching her hips upward. He obliged, offering more of the languid yet powerful strokes.

Jessica wriggled and arched impatiently, wanting all of him, wanting him gasping in need as much as she. He smiled, and began to piston his hips, his penis sliding in and out until his breath became rapid pants. Then he stiffened above her, and Raphael threw back his head and shouted her name, the cords in his neck strained. Ecstatic knowledge filled her, and a quiet sense of her own female satisfaction. She, the Lupine banned from sexual encounters with powerful alpha males, had coaxed this pleasure from him.

He’d wanted only her, the Lupine no one else wanted.

Raphael collapsed with a heavy sigh, burying his face in the pillow beside her. She stroked the sweating, scarred muscles of his back, and her legs cradled him tenderly. When he shifted his weight off of her, Jessica instinctively curled next to him, putting her head on his shoulder. Her eyes slowly closed, and her breathing deepened. She, too, felt sleepy and oddly comforted by Raphael’s arm about her waist anchoring her to him.

For a few moments, they lay together, Raphael staring at the ceiling as he held her tight. Languid with lovemaking, she dozed off.

She awoke to his lips nuzzling her neck. The sensation was erotic, and she shifted against him.

“Awaken, sleeping angel,” he whispered into her ear.

Jessica opened her eyes and saw him studying her. He lay close on the rumpled sheets and touched a finger to her cheek.

“You look like an angel when you sleep. Except for the fact that you growl.” His tone was teasing.

She narrowed her eyes. “I do not growl.”

He gave a deep chuckle. “You’re wolf. You growl quite nicely. And you make lovely noises when you are awake.”

Raphael gazed at her neck, making her feel oddly self-conscious. “So lovely. And this mark…” He traced the odd star shape on her neck. “It’s most unusual.”

Self-conscious, she slapped a hand over the marking. “It’s just a birthmark. Made me feel embarrassed to shift back to Skin when I was running as wolf. It looks like a damn target zone.”

Raphael gave a wicked grin. “Definitely a target zone.”

Bending his head, he traced the mark with his tongue, making her shiver. Then his tongue dipped lower, encircling her nipple. Ripples of pleasure coursed through her with every flick of his tongue across the hardening peak.

Jessica sighed as he released her nipple. Raphael studied her with a thoughtful look.