Shadow's Awakening: The Shadow Warder Series, Book One (An Urban Fantasy Romance Series) (23 page)

Helpless to resist her any longer, Conner lowered her onto his cock. Her face suffused with bliss, eyes still locked to his, hands still holding his face. He was so much a part of her, Conner imagined he felt the almost uncomfortable stretch as he filled her just to the edge of what she could take. When she had all of him, Conner slid his hands up her back, curving them around to slide up the sides of her neck. He took her face in his long fingers, mirroring her hold on him. Drawing her forward, he kissed her.

At the touch of his lips, Hannah detonated. Mouth opening beneath his, she returned his kiss with hunger, grinding down on his cock as if she could draw even more of him inside her. Her breasts pressed against his chest, tongue tangled with his, Conner gave up any pretense of taking his time. Why bother? His cock gave no sign that it wouldn’t be up to go again as soon as they’d caught their breath.

Releasing her face, Conner dropped his hands to her ass again and took over. He tilted her hips, dragging her up and down his cock, pounding hard, angling her so that each pass scraped her swollen clit against his hard abs. Hannah gripped his shoulders, nails biting into his skin as release barreled through her, the tight clenching of her body begging Conner to come with her. It was beyond his power to resist. Again he filled her with himself, arms binding her to his body as he did.

It seemed to take more than a few minutes to catch his breath. Conner resisted the urge to fall back on the bed with Hannah on top of him. If he did, they might never get up. And now they really did need a shower. Gaining his feet through force of will, Conner rose with Hannah still wrapped in his arms, still filled with his cock. He strode across the room to the bathroom. The fixtures in the cabin weren’t top of the line, but the shower was oversized and there was always plenty of hot water.

Lowering her to stand on her own, Conner turned on the shower with a quick twist of his wrist, dragging them both beneath the spray. Hannah squealed at the shock of cold, gasping for air until warmer water chased out the chill left in the pipes. She squirmed against him, twisting her upper body to press her breasts into his chest as her mouth reached for his. Squirting soap into his hands, Conner cleaned her, relishing her slick curves, lost in anticipation of sinking again into her tight pussy, drowning in the pleasure they brought each other. Conner forgot all about the past, his duty, the consequences to come. His universe narrowed down to Hannah in his arms and the rising heat that flowed from the depths of her soul into his, drawing with it an edge of pleasure so sharp it was almost painful.

Much later, Hannah stood in front of the stove, waiting for the slowly dripping coffee to fill the pot enough to pour two mugs. Her hip pressing into the counter, she leaned her head against one of the upper cabinets, every muscle suffused with a languid exhaustion that was the most delicious feeling she could remember. Well, outside of the way she felt when Conner was touching her.

The pipes hummed as the shower cut on. Demonstrating good sense, Conner had suggested she shower before him and start breakfast. They both knew if they got under the hot water together, they’d just end up back in bed. And if she was starving, Conner must be about to pass out. He had a lot more muscle to fuel and they hadn’t eaten more than scraps over the past day and a half.

If someone had told her it was physically possible to make love so often they didn’t surface for almost two days, Hannah would have laughed, then accused them of bragging. She’d started to wonder if they’d been possessed. Or drugged. Or something. Never had she even imagined the need she felt for Conner. It was bad enough when she thought of touching him, but when he actually laid his hands on her, desire blazed back to life, demanding release. They’d had each other five times before their lovemaking eased into something more than frenzied couplings.

The intensity hadn’t diminished, just drawn out into stroking, sliding hands and the long deep thrusts of his cock inside her still-needy body. Pleasure built, rose and shattered, only to begin again in a long hazy stretch of hands and mouths and that sense of soul-deep connection. She should have been sore. Given the pounding she’d taken, she shouldn’t have been able to walk. Somehow her body adjusted to their near constant lovemaking. She still felt a delicious stretching pain when Conner filled her, but it never chased away the pleasure. And it never left her hurting afterwards, no matter how hard or long he took her. Just thinking about it her nipples peaked and her core moistened. Hannah shook her head in disbelief.

Hannah had to force herself to remember that their time was almost up. Loath to break the dreamy peace of their cocoon in Conner’s bedroom, Hannah had thought only of the beauty and pleasure they’d found together. With Conner filling her senses, it had been easy to shut out the world. Now that she was standing in the kitchen, squeaky clean, wearing a dark green Yertle the Turtle nightshirt purchased by Conner’s friend, Hannah was unable to quiet her brain any longer. Her inner voice sounded a lot like one of her psychology professors.

You know this is just your mind’s response to the stress you’ve been under. There isn’t a special connection between you and Conner. He’s your white knight. He rescued you from a terrifying and painful situation. He’s hot. You’re grateful to be alive. It’s natural to choose to reaffirm life with sex. It’s normal to imagine an emotional connection to the first person to show you any kindness in months. That doesn’t make it real. Conner is going to deliver you to the Shadows any day now and you’ll never see him again.

There were times when Hannah hated her rational side. This was one of them. She wasn’t stupid. In college, before her Shadow side had asserted itself and screwed her brain, she’d had an excellent GPA. She understood how the mind worked under stress. She’d been on the debate team in high school. No one was better at putting together a reasoned argument or playing Devil’s advocate. There wasn’t room in her worldview for love at first sight or spending two days in a haze of sex with a man she barely knew. Now that her mind was temporarily unclouded by amazing orgasms, the unknown future loomed over her.

You’ve had your vacation from the real world. Now you have to make a plan and move forward. Without Conner. Even if seeing him wouldn’t cause him huge problems with the Warders, you still need to get some space and a clear head. Once you have a little distance, you’ll see that this was all a response to what you went through with Glenn and your relief at being safe and alive
.

It sounded reasonable. Certainly the marathon sex and the deep, emotional bond she felt with Conner weren’t even remotely sensible. Too bad for her that they felt so much more real than the world outside the door of the cabin. Hannah knew she should listen to the lecture. Her rational side rarely led her astray.

Except with Glenn. Her survival instinct had risen its head and prodded her to get away from him when he’d checked her out of the mental health facility, but Hannah had been battling the static and didn’t trust her instincts. She’d told herself not to be such a drama queen. Of course nothing was wrong with her stepfather. That had been the bad bet of the century. Sometimes the smart thing was to follow your gut. It was possible that everything she felt with Conner was real. With a sigh, Hannah pulled the full carafe from the coffee maker and set about getting eggs and sausage from the fridge for breakfast.

The problem was, it didn’t really matter if the feelings she thought she had for Conner were real or just her brain’s way of processing a stressful situation. Either way she would have to leave him behind, for his good and for her own.

The pipes squealed, signaling the end of Conner’s shower. Taking a long sip of coffee, Hannah forced herself to focus on food, not the future. Her stomach was grumbling with hunger. Turning on the heat for the sausage patties, Hannah dug deeper into the supplies in the fridge. Junie had included a tube of cinnamon biscuits. Shoving away her concerns, she allowed herself to wonder if Conner would mind if she saved half of the creamy frosting. She loved to lick it off cinnamon rolls, but she’d rather lick it off him instead.

Chapter Fourteen

Crouched over the sigil drawn in black sand, Kate hardly noticed the burn of strained muscles in her neck and shoulders. Shadows gathered in the corners of the white beadboard, chasing the late afternoon sun from the room. The day had passed unnoticed. Over the past twelve hours, the swirling lines of sand spread before her had slowly altered, changing position and effect, grain by grain, as Kate adjusted them to counteract the shifting energies seeking to bypass her spell craft. Resistance was gaining in strength while Kate’s power was waning. Even the great Shadow-Warder would eventually run out of gas with nothing to fuel her power.

Over the years Kate had debated adding a skylight to her bedroom. The sun was a Shadow’s most convenient power source. Surrounded by dormer windows, her room was flooded with light during the day. A skylight had always seemed unnecessary. Drained of energy, Kate would have given a lot for a few extra beams of light. Despite the warm, sunny day they’d had on the South Carolina coast, Kate’s house and the surrounding yard were freezing.

While it wasn’t the most efficient fuel, a Shadow could pull heat from his or her surroundings. If there had been a living creature within her reach, Kate might have used it as well. Zach had powered her spell craft more than once. Knowing what was coming, Kate had sent everyone and everything far away. Even the stray cat that haunted their back porch in search of shrimp heads was elsewhere, lured to a neighbor’s for its own protection. She sat alone, cold, and nearly out of juice, coaxing one more minute, then another, from her power. It wouldn’t be long before she collapsed and the sand scattered into a useless mess.

Outside the attic room, the cold, dense air thickened with power. Instinct drove Kate to reach for it before she understood exactly what she sought. The dank, fetid scent of the energy, its icy charge as it raced through her limbs, broke her concentration with a jolt that sent a concussion of pressure through the room.

Flinging her arms out as if shaking off a viscous liquid, Kate tried to dispel the power she’d drawn in error. Using the last of her reserves, she forced every spark of the dark, grating energy from her cells. The effort used her up.

Vision graying out, Kate fell forward, her body smearing the sigil she’d crafted with such precision. Just before she passed out, a familiar presence appeared at her side, his energy pattern as distinct as a fingerprint. No matter what body he chose, Kate always knew him by the aura of power surrounding the flesh he wore like a borrowed suit.

Low and smooth, Druj whispered in her ear. “Caught you.”

Kate swam back to consciousness, awareness seeping in with prickling pain, as if her mind had been numb with cold. She had no idea how long she’d been out. Instinct told her it hadn’t been more than a few minutes. Her limbs were immobile, spread wide and pinned to the floor with the malignant power she knew too well. Keeping her eyes closed, she forced an insouciant smile to her lips. The fucker might make her scream, but she’d never show fear.

“I’m weak as a kitten and you need to hold me down? Shame, shame,” she said, wishing her voice wasn’t thin with exhaustion.

“Ahh, little love. I don’t need to hold you down. I just like it,” was the answering voice. Amused, pleased, echoing from the southwest corner of the attic. Too far away for her to attack with the meager spark of power remaining. But then, this was the one Voratus she couldn’t fight. Not directly.

“It’s a little clichéd,” he went on, sauntering closer. Kate didn’t have to see him to know how he moved. There were few beings on this earth she knew better than this one. “The classics become cliché for a reason. Makes me want to find a railroad track just to see you squirm. Sadly, I don’t have time to get inventive.”

Kate felt his breath against her neck. She fought the urge to flinch from the press of his heavy energy. All the years she’d lived with his intrusion into her life, she’d never grown used to the weight of Druj’s power. So much stronger than his brethren, almost godlike, he repulsed everything in her that was Shadow and Warder.