Savage Hunger (26 page)

Her stomach rumbled.

She didn’t say anything about the sleepwalking, but she knew Maya would mention it before long. The issue was too important not to discuss.

Connor cooked the meal as Maya and Kat packed up their belongings.

After eating, they hiked along a dirt road headed toward civilization.

From what Connor had said before they had stopped for the night, the trek to the city would take hours still, but she couldn’t wait to get a room. She wanted to clean up and sleep in a bed, make love to Connor, and never get up.

Maya interrupted Kat’s thoughts of a soft bed and a hard-bodied Connor as she said, “Kat was sleepwalking.” She spoke matter-of-factly, not spitefully, nor did she sound worried.

Kat closed her eyes briefly and waited for Connor to say something as he trudged down the road behind her. She took a deep breath of the humid air. At least at this time of morning, it was still cooler and the air was easier to breathe.

“Sleepwalking as a jaguar,” Connor finally said.

From the neutral tone of his voice, Kat couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Although she thought a smidgen of dark humor accompanied his words. She was certain he’d never thought a jaguar could sleepwalk. They probably didn’t. But a jaguar-shifter?

Maya finally answered in the affirmative.

Kat thought she heard Connor swear softly under his breath. Yep, if they hadn’t thought she was trouble before, they’d know she really was now. But he didn’t say anything further, and they kept hiking at a steady pace through the outlying area approaching the city. Houses sprung up here and there. A few people sitting on porches stopped their conversations to observe the three Americans trudging along the road.

They must have made a bedraggled, unusual sight.

In the distance, Kat could see the picturesque, snow-capped Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta peaks. They discovered a quaint bed-and-breakfast near Tayrona National Park, which featured jungle and white sand beaches and blue waters on the Caribbean coast of Colombia. Cabanas with thatched roofs were built up a slope around huge boulders and surrounded by tropical plants that made Kat feel as though she was still in the jungle. She loved it.

They walked into the lobby where the owner greeted them with a wide smile and dark brown eyes that studied them, but if he was judging them by their appearance, he didn’t let on. “Everyone calls me Garcia. Welcome, welcome! Americans?” he said in a thick Spanish accent.

“Yes,” Connor said. “We’d like two cabanas near each other if you have any available.”

Kat knew from past experience that if you were a tourist, you paid more. But they couldn’t mask what they were so they were prepared. Having a bed to sleep in was worth just about any price for now.

Garcia must have wondered about them arriving on foot, carrying backpacks with all their belongings and no suitcases. And grungy like they had made a thousand-mile hike through the Amazon rain forest, through mud, rain, wind, and sun.

“I built the whole place by hand myself,” he said, looking proud. “We have excursions to a nearby waterfall.” He raised his brows in question as he took Connor’s money to pay for the room.

Kat didn’t attempt to hide a smile at Connor as she caught his gaze. After he’d washed her in the waterfall, she would never see another in the same way again.

“I can drive you to the park tomorrow so we can hike through the nature reserve and see all the wildlife.”

“Uh, no, thank you,” Kat said. They had seen all the wildlife she needed for the time being, and as for hiking any further? She was ready to be transported somewhere closer to home without having to slog one booted foot in front of another on any more long hikes.

Garcia watched their expressions as if he was trying to determine just where they had come from and why they were here. Finally, he mentioned the beaches and at that Maya nodded. “Yes, we must take in the beach.”

Garcia seemed to sigh with a bit of relief, maybe worried they were trouble.

“We’re biologists,” Connor offered. “We spent some time in the Amazon to do research.”

“Ah.” Garcia looked as though he could believe that.

When Kat offered to help pay for the accommodations, Connor gave her a macho look and shook his head. The intimation was that he paid, she enjoyed. She raised a brow at him. He looked smug.

“You’ll have cabanas close to each other. But privacy also.” Garcia handed them their keys and gave them directions.

They hiked up the path to Maya’s cabana, which was surrounded by dense foliage, trees, flowers, and colorful parrots, and even a monkey clambered up a tree high above. Now this was more like it: jungle fauna and flora, but also air-conditioned accommodations.

“Come see us in an hour after you’ve cleaned up and changed,” Connor said to Maya. “We’ll have breakfast, and then you can return here and we’ll all get some much-needed sleep.”

She heartily agreed, gave them both a hug, then closed her door and locked it.

After leaving Maya at her place, Connor and Kat continued up to the cabana at the top of the path. Maya’s was near enough that if they encountered any trouble, they could easily get together in a few seconds via the stone path that wound its way down to the main house and restaurant.

Inside the cabana, exposed stone walls and polished bamboo floors and a real bed covered in a hibiscus floral spread made Kat feel like she was in a swanky resort. A private balcony that overlooked the jungle had an adobe tile floor for the patio and a hammock strung across it. Floor-to-ceiling windows covered with white lacy curtains let in filtered light. And air-conditioning blasted them with cool, dry air!

A shower in the bathroom was even open to the sun, which was why Connor had picked the one at the top of the group of cabanas for Kat and himself.

A small restaurant was situated next to the main lobby, and nearby was a freshwater swimming pool, which Kat was hoping they could avail themselves of later that night.

Dirty and sweaty, Connor pulled Kat in for a hard embrace, kissing her lips with a searing kiss. “Let’s get cleaned up and then we can share breakfast on the patio with Maya.”

Kat loved how he didn’t want to leave his sister out, even though Kat was fairly sure he would have loved spending the rest of the day and night alone with her. He dumped the contents of his bag on the table and pulled out the shampoo and body wash.

“Come on, Kat. Let’s take a shower.”

“Don’t tell me… together, so we can share the hot water.” She ran her hands underneath his shirt, her fingers tracing his muscles.

“Nope.” He started unbuttoning her blouse with a glint in his eye and a curve to his lips.

She cast him a mock frown and then began to peel away his trousers. “No?”

“The water’s cold. We’ll have to share it to keep warm.”

She chuckled. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you planned it.”

He laughed and quickly began dispensing with her clothes, as if he wouldn’t last or was afraid they wouldn’t have enough time before Maya joined them.

He scooped her up. “Grab the soaps, will you, Kat?”

“Eagerly.”

And then he carried her into the bathroom and leaned down so she could turn on the water. It splashed her arm and she squealed, not intending to, but he was right. The water was cold!

The sun streamed into the shower, making it seem like a cleaner version of the waterfall. And she was excited about getting clean and whatever else they could come up with.

The scene was reminiscent of when Connor had washed Kat under the waterfall, except this time, he would be naked, too. That was much, much better because he could finish what they had started the last time. He lathered up his hands with the silky body wash and began to soap her up.

She smiled up at him, her hands already covered in soap as she smeared it all over his chest. She looked like a feral cat who loved the water as much as he did, who relished it and was emboldened by it.

The water
was
cold, but the sun and friction between them warmed them as he slid his hands all over her satiny skin, enjoying her soft curves and the way she smiled up at him as she began to soap all his body parts, making him hard as steel. He should have skipped the soap and just gotten down to business.

But spreading the silky soap over her skin turned him on just as much as it aroused her. He loved seeing her arousal, her sage eyes darkening to jungle green, the way her nipples tightened and her breasts swelled, the way her clit grew with his strokes, and the way she purred like a cat. He loved the way she barely breathed as he continued to stroke her sensitive G-spot, loved how she arched against his fingers, wanting him to touch her harder and faster and more.

She was like malleable heated clay in his hands as she melted under his ministrations, barely able to stand while he supported her with one hand around her back. He kissed her mouth as the water sluiced down their heated bodies, washing the soap off them and leaving them clean and smelling of tangerines and oranges, and musky female and male cat sex.

He might feel he had conquered the she-cat, but she had him panting, craving and savoring the feel of her, the smell of her, the sweet sexy sounds she made. As he bent to kiss her lips, her mouth parted to let him in, and he plunged his tongue inside the way he wanted to sheathe his cock between her legs. They slid their bodies against each other, bare skin to bare skin, her softness feeling so right against his hardness. Her belly pressed against his thick erection, and he cursed his need to fill her now as he tried to take it slower. But he was already ablaze, his loins on fire.

Every move she made against him turned the furnace higher.

Her hands were drifting lower, her nails lightly scratching his back and down and down. His cock moved against her soft stomach as if it had a mind of its own, soliciting a smile from her lips. Yeah, he had no control over it. Every tantalizing touch—the way her tongue probed his mouth, the way she rubbed affectionately against his body, like a cat would, only with a mission in mind—forced his body to respond with eagerness.

“You… are… mine,”
he groaned against her lips, desperate to hear her say she loved him, too, that she would stay with him forever, that she felt the same rampant need to be with him exclusively.

But she seemed so lost in his touch as he renewed stroking her sweet spot that she didn’t say anything. Her eyes were closed, her fingers grasping his hips as if she was about to come unglued if she didn’t have something to cling to, her breathing shallow and labored.

He loved her, loved the way she responded so eagerly, became so wrapped up in the act that nothing would deter her. “You… are… beautiful,” he whispered, licking a trail down the water droplets spilling over her skin until he latched on to a nipple and sucked, his finger still stroking her into ecstasy.

She cried out before he’d expected it and he smiled against one nipple, then suckled the other before he lifted her, angling her so he could enter her easily. Her legs wrapped around his waist, her heels pressing provocatively against him. He slowly penetrated her sheath with his cock until she could accept his size, then thrust deep inside her, wanting her, needing her, feeling the climax she had just experienced gripping his cock tightly.

Harder, faster, deeper he pushed into her narrow passage, claiming her, his shifter mate, different from him and yet the same. She licked the water off his chin and his cheek, seeking his mouth, and tangled her tongue with his in another mating dance.

He was reminded of the waterfall where he had kissed her, feeling her heavenly body rubbing against him, the torture of her naked skin pressing his erection when he was still wearing clothes and trying to keep some distance. He could hear the same jungle sounds, only this time from the national park next door. The monkeys and birds and bugs communicating in their way, the smell of the rain forest, sweet and decadent, and the taste of citrus fruits on Kat’s lips and tongue all reminded him of being back at the falls. Only this time, God, she felt so incredibly tight and feral, but most of all his.

He felt the end coming but knew that with her, it would never be the end. That she would always be at the edge of his awareness, whether he was sleeping or awake, and he would want her like this, close by, within easy reach.

He thrust hard and furious, and finally let loose his seed and groaned with spent pleasure. He leaned her against the bathroom wall, feeling satiated and more at ease than he had in years. All because he had found Kat.

And yet, it wasn’t over. He wanted her, wanted to keep her, to have shifter babies if they could. But she still hadn’t said the words that meant she was willing to stay with him forever.

Chapter 21

Kat knew what Connor wanted, but she couldn’t give it to him. Not yet. What if she said “I love you” and “I want to be with you forever”—like she’d done with Roger—and that was the turnoff in their relationship?

Maybe just being there for one another, loving and caring, but not making the “I do” commitment was better. Maybe their relationship would last longer.

For now, while she was still testing the waters with her new abilities and still unsure what her future might hold, she didn’t want Connor to believe that he had to be tied down to her if he found someone else who had been born a shifter.