Rhyannon Byrd - Primal Instinct 05 (28 page)

He made a raw sound, his claws digging deeper into the
bedding as he rammed into her harder…faster, his hips pistoning that hot,
massive shaft inside her. He slammed deep once, twice, shoving her body across
the quilted bed, a harsh, guttural shout tearing from him as he started to
come, his broad shaft jerking in thick, powerful bursts that filled her with
searing heat. The breathtaking power of his release forced Morgan into her own
shattering, screaming climax, the deep pulses of pleasure locking them
together, their bodies steaming, chests aching as they struggled to drag in
enough air. With a low groan, he retracted his claws and dragged her up onto
the bed, pulling her against his chest as they lay on their sides. In the
minutes that followed, Morgan realized that it was the quiet moments, the easy
ones, that were truly devastating. Lying there beside him, listening to the
heavy rhythm of his heartbeat, with his dark, delicious scent filling her head
and his hot seed filling her body, was the most poignant, meaningful moment of
her life.

Closing her eyes, she tried to soak up as much of the
blissful sensations as she could, and quietly asked, “How can you do it?”

“Do what?” he grunted, while his hand smoothed its way
down her spine, curving around her bottom.

A deep breath, and she carefully said, “How can you
touch me the way that you do when it’s only sex for you? Is it…are you like
this with every woman?”

His hand stilled, and he rolled onto his back, his
voice tight with strain as he shook his head and said, “No. Never. Not even
close.” Gruff, halting words that were scraped out of his throat. “It’s you.
You’re…different.”

Lifting up onto her elbow, she locked her gaze with
his, seeing the caution in the pale green, and knew he didn’t want to have this
conversation. But she couldn’t stop. She had to know. “Different how?” she
asked.

He swallowed, and his breath rattled between his
parted lips, his color high…his eyes shadowed with emotion. She didn’t think he
was going to answer, and then he slowly rasped, “Different in every way there
is, Morgan. In every goddamn way that matters.”

“I want to tell you something important, Kier.” Her
voice shook, and she could feel the uneasy tension quivering in his muscles.
“But first, I need to ask you a question.”

His auburn hair fell over his brow as he gave her a
wary nod, waiting to hear what she would say.

“What would you have done if Ian had said yes?”

His eyebrow twitched, and he tore his gaze from hers,
staring up at the dark beams of the ceiling. “Honestly?” he grunted, his jaw
hard.

“Please.”

He lifted his hand, scraping his palm against his
shadowed jaw, and muttered, “I’d have had to kill him. Even though I thought at
the time that you were his last chance to do what was right, there isn’t a
chance in hell I’d have let him touch you.”

A soft, shivery sigh of relief spilled from her lips,
and she snuggled against him, her cheek pressed to the muscled warmth of his
chest.

“I answered your question,” he rumbled a moment later,
the fingers of his left hand stroking the length of her spine. “So what did you
want to tell me?”

Morgan didn’t know if her confession would change
anything between them. And she would still have her secrets. Emotional armor
that would shield her heart. But she needed to tell him this one thing. Needed
for there to be at least one truth between them. “I didn’t…I didn’t sleep with
Ashe because I was ordered to.”

There was a perfect stillness within his body, and
then he shuddered, the tremor moving through his long frame like a rolling,
ground-shaking quake. His breath became rougher…deeper, his voice a raw, guttural
slash of sound. “What in the hell are you talking about?”

“The truth is that I’ve never taken an assignment from
the Consortium that required me to use my body, and if they’d ever tried to
force me, I would have quit in a heartbeat. And I certainly wouldn’t have
needed to do something like that with Ashe. He was more than willing to go
after those bastards who killed Nicole,” she offered in a quiet confession, her
mouth trembling with emotion and relief. “I didn’t need to sleep with him for
his help or to make him more cooperative.”

His reaction was instantaneous, his big hands gripping
her shoulders, pushing her to her back as he loomed over her. “Why did you do
it?” he growled, his dark expression revealing raw, visceral torment. “Jesus,
Morgan. All these years, why have you let me believe a lie? What the hell were
you thinking?”

“Once you made your assumption, I didn’t see any
reason to set you straight,” she explained, taking a deep breath for courage.
“And I think it was easier, somehow, letting you think the worst, Kier. Because
you were right about me wanting you. I did. And I guess I felt that if you
hated me, then it would make it easier to stay away from you. That I wouldn’t
ever be tempted to come begging for your attention and find myself humiliated
in the process.” A wry smile touched her mouth, and she added, “I just didn’t
realize that you would still be holding it over my head a decade later.”

He shook his head a little, his expression dazed. “And
now?” he asked, his voice thick. “Why tell me the truth now?”

“I’ve been pissed at you for a long time,” she said in
a soft voice, lifting her fingertips to the heated curve of his cheek, “but
I’m…well, I’m not so angry now. And it would be good if we could be friends,
when this is over. I’d like to leave the Watchmen knowing that I was on good
terms with you.”

KIERLAND SHOOK HIS HEAD, unable to believe the words
he was hearing. She wanted to be friends with him? As in freaking pals?

Christ.

“Would that be so hard?” she asked, her small smile
hitting the center of his chest like a physical blow.

“What’s hard is keeping my hands off you,” he
muttered, pulling her under him. He half expected her to tell him no, that
she’d had enough already—but she didn’t. Instead, she sank her fingers into his
hair and lifted up to him, licking into his mouth with a hunger that perfectly
matched his own. They were both starving, desperate, as if they could feel
their time together slipping away with each moment that passed by.

He kissed her harder, deeper, and began feeding his cock
back into that deliciously hot, tender sheath, his hands touching every part of
her that he could reach. He loved the lean play of muscle beneath his palms,
her skin a sensuous assault on his senses. Everywhere he touched her she was
smooth and soft and sleek, drugging him with pleasure, and he couldn’t resist
running his tongue over the damp patches of her skin. Beneath her ear. Across
her shoulder. The curve of her breast. The inside of her elbow. He could have
spent hours exploring her, making love to her. Days. Weeks. Years. It wouldn’t
matter how long he had; it would never be enough.

“You kill me,” he groaned, pushing the damp strands of
hair back from her face as he stared deep into her eyes. “So hot and wet and
tight. I could stay in you all night, Morgan, and never get enough.”

She gasped as he reached down and touched the swollen
knot of her clit, rubbing in slow circles until he could see the pleasure haze
in her eyes. He lifted his hand, wetting his thumb, then used it to rub that
taut bud in tight, slippery circles.

He pushed up on his free arm, watching the way his
cock stretched her, his ruddy skin slicked with her glistening juices, his
breath coming in rough, ragged gusts. “You’re so damn beautiful,” he growled.

“So are you,” she murmured, arching beneath him, and
he caught the way she flicked a quick, greedy look at the vein pumping at the
side of his throat. Pride roared through him, all but turning him inside out.

“Take it,” he told her, turning his head to the side
as he lowered himself over her. “Take as much as you need.”

She groaned, touching the tip of her tongue to his
skin, then sank her fangs deep, the hungry little pulls of her mouth shooting
through his core, reaching all the way down to the head of his cock. He gasped
for breath, grinding himself against her clit with each pumping thrust of his
body as he drove himself into her, needing to get closer…deeper, until he was
in every part of her. Even the ones where he didn’t belong. Where he couldn’t
stay.

They came together, on a long, cresting wave that
drained them both, his face buried in the curve of her shoulder, their bodies
left panting and twined together, slick with sweat despite the chill in the
air. Kierland knew he should pull away, but he couldn’t, needing to soak up
every moment of time with her that he could.

He hated that with each second he moved closer to
Kellan, he was also moving closer to the moment when he would have to tell
Morgan goodbye. Their time together was slipping away too fast. He wanted to
find Kellan, wanted to make sure his brother was safe….

But, damn it, there was a part of him that wanted just
a little more time with the woman in his arms.

A part that didn’t want to lose what he’d only just
found.

The Casus/Kraven Compound

Wednesday, 2:00 a.m.

“THE WOLF IS GETTING CLOSER.”

Westmore’s tone was conversational as he crossed his
arms over his chest in a casual stance, his shoulder propped against the iron
bars of the psychic’s cell. Most men would have found it difficult to sound so
at ease when conversing with a woman who was beaten and chained to the floor,
but the Kraven felt no pity for the frail creature. He’d ordered Raine’s
beating late the previous night, when his scouts had reported spotting Kellan
Scott traveling through the Wasteland in his wolf form, heading straight toward
the compound, no doubt acting on some half-baked plan to steal the Markers in
their possession. The instant Westmore had heard the report, he’d come to
Raine, knowing she would have seen the Lycan’s approach with her powers.

Seen it…and kept the information to herself, which had
earned her this latest little punishment.

“I’m going to add the Watchman to my collection,” he
murmured, wishing she would lift her face so that he could see her eyes. He was
beginning to have an unhealthy obsession with that brilliant, unusual gaze of
hers, and the knowledge made him frown.

“You no longer need him as a hostage now that I’m
helping you with the maps,” she whispered, her husky voice weak with hunger and
pain. “So why take him?”

“You know the Markers are only good to me if I have
them all,” he replied. “I need the five that the Watchmen have in their
possession.”

A soft, brittle burst of laughter, and she shook her
head, the metal cuffs circling her wrists scraping against the stone floor as
she pulled her arms beneath her. “It’s all just a waste of time,” she told him,
“because you’re not going to win.”

His eyes narrowed with outrage, and he silently
wondered just what it was going to take to break her spirit. “You can’t see the
future,” he seethed. “Only the past.”

A trembling groan as she pulled her legs to her side,
and then she said, “I don’t need to be a seer to know what will happen in your
war. Evil like you always makes a mistake sooner or later. Usually comes right
around the time that your ego gets too big to control. The more you think
you’re invincible, the harder the fall.”

“Bold words for a young woman whose baby brother is my
newest plaything.”

She stiffened in reaction to the soft words, trying to
raise her torso off the ground, but her bruised, bloodied arms were shaking too
badly, and he laughed quietly under his breath. “Let me tell you about this one
Casus who escaped from Meridian last year,” he murmured, enjoying her
struggles. “His name’s Gregory, and he has this thing for fingers. Crazy as a
loon, but the guy could give lessons on good, wholesome torture. You couldn’t
imagine the things he’s done. Things that I could so easily do to the rest of
your loved ones.”

“I’ve seen Gregory.”

The words were soft, barely a whisper, and he was
certain he must have heard her wrong. “What did you say?”

She took a deep, rattling breath, her voice a little
stronger as she gritted her teeth and finally managed to push her body into a
sitting position on the blood-covered floor. “I’ve seen Gregory. Seen you fail
to capture him…and fail to kill him, as well.”

A new edge of alertness sharpened Westmore’s gaze, his
fingers curling around the bars of her cell. “When? Where? Can you see where he
is now?”

She lifted her chin, pinning him with her hate-filled
glare. “Let my brother go,” she told him, “and I’ll tell you what I’ve seen.”

Rage flooded his system, making him shake. “You think
to negotiate with me, you little bitch?”

“I call it making a deal. And trust me when I say that
you don’t have any choice. Because I know what he has planned for you, and it
isn’t pretty,” she whispered, the corner of her busted mouth curving the barest
fraction as she gave him a cold, deadly smile. “If you don’t want to end up
just another one of his victims, Westmore, you’ll give me what I want.”

Wednesday evening