The Shifter's Kiss (3 page)

Chapter 5

Placing the basin with the water and washcloth within
easy reach, she whipped off her dress and slipped beneath the sheets. Cuddling
close to him, she offered up her body heat to quiet the tremors in his. His skin
was hot and dry beside hers, and she took hold of the damp cloth, passing it
along as much of his body as she could, trying to lower his body
temperature.

As she passed the cloth along his forehead and cheeks—as red as
if he’d run a race—a ghost of a smile passed across his hard, masculine lips
before they trembled with imagined cold once more.

“Thank you,” he said and placed his hand at her waist, urging
her close. They were almost the same height, so every part of their bodies
touched.

The tender act gripped her heart hard. It had been so long
since she’d been touched like that. So long, and never by a man as handsome as
this one. Not even the scars could diminish his beauty or the strength in the
lean body tucked beneath hers.

She once again dipped the cloth in the basin, the action
dragging the pebbled tips of her breasts along the wall of his chest. Against
her thigh came the jump of his erection, responding to her even with his
weakness.

Wetness erupted between her legs, but she fought the need.

“I’m sorry,” he said and tried to move away, but she pressed
him down to keep him still.

“You are a man. I’m a woman. It’s to be expected,” she said
because that was the natural order of things. The logic of nature had guided her
people. It was only with the advent of man into their area that things had
gotten out of whack and her people had been virtually exterminated.

“You’re a woman now, but you weren’t before,” he said, gently
rubbing his hand up and down her side as she did the same with the damp cloth,
cooling his heated flesh.

She could have denied it, passed it off to the effects of his
wound, but something about him made it impossible for her to deceive him.

“Not before,” she confessed but then urged him to rest.

With a nod, he closed his eyes while she continued caring for
him. As the hours passed, she was pleased as the tremors in his body gradually
abated and his skin cooled. Soon after, the slight sheen of sweat on his body
confirmed that the fever had broken.

Tired from all that had happened and loathe to leave him, she
tucked herself against his side to rest, but her inner spirit swam within her,
alert and restless as was the way of the shark.

It was that spirit that detected the change in his body—the
awareness of her and the arousal that rose up in him. The smell of it, so richly
masculine, awakened her desire.

As he stirred and went to move away, she rose and lay a hand on
his chest to keep him near.

“Why do you wish to go?”

She sat up slightly and her breasts brushed against him. The
action tightened them immediately and, for a moment, his gaze dipped down, his
look as powerful as a caress, before jerking back up to her face.

“I don’t want to take advantage of your kindness.” His voice
was stronger, all traces of weakness gone. The flush on his skin now was from
passion and not fever. Her one concern was that he might reopen the wound with
anything too strenuous, but she relished the idea of his touch against her.

“I think I’m the one who owes you thanks for saving me.”

With a shake of his head, he said, “Do you really want me to
believe—”

“My name is Nali. You know what that means in Kuna,” she said
and for a moment he furrowed his brow, searching for the word. Recognition
slammed into him.

“Shark. Nali means shark.”

“When you are better, I will show you. It’s the least I can do
as thanks.” After she finished, she trailed her hand up and across his shoulder
and smoothed her palm over the rough scars there.

“How did this happen?”

“A fire. I went in to rescue a child, but part of the building
collapsed on me.” He said it nonchalantly as if it had been just a routine
thing.

“You saved the child?” she asked, trailing her hand down his
arm to his uninjured forearm. The hair there was soft beneath her palm.

“My team got her out.”

“You like being a hero,” she said and shifted her hand down the
final few inches to cradle his hand in hers.

Victor didn’t know what to make of her. She seemed almost
innocent in some ways. Possibly crazy, he thought, although he couldn’t deny his
dreams and the vague recollections of what had happened in those moments after
he’d been speared.

But there was one thing of which he was certain.

“You can keep the whole hero gig. I prefer being alive.”

A knowing smile blossomed on her lips, and those almost-black
eyes gleamed with an intriguing mix of amusement and passion. Taking his hand in
hers, she guided it upward along her lean, curvy flank and to the swell of her
breast.

“Then why are you afraid to live right now? To share yourself
with me?” To prove her point, she pressed his hand to her breast and, beneath
his palm, her nipple puckered into an even tighter nub. She shifted her thigh
across his to cover the erection he had been fighting. The softness of her and
the damp heat at her core made him groan with need.

“Let me love you, Victor. I will be careful,” she said,
smoothing her thigh across his erection before dancing her hand down his
midsection to take his cock in her hand.

“Yes,” exploded from his lips as she encircled him with her
hand and stroked, her movements sure and determined.

She smiled then and bent her head to sample the shape of his
lips with her mouth. Her touch was questioning and uncertain, unlike the sure
caresses of her hand. Over and over again she drifted her mouth across his lips,
avoiding a true kiss.

When he dug his fingers into the short, dark strands of her
hair to urge her in for a deeper taste, she pulled away to instead drop a kiss
on the underside of his jaw. Then she worked her way downward to his nipple
where, with a little nibble, she flitted to her next stop: his navel.

He moaned and shifted his hips upward against her hand as he
realized her intent.

She slipped her long, powerful body between his legs and guided
his cock to her mouth. With a quick swipe of her tongue, she nearly had him
coming, but he held back, needing her. Wanting to be buried inside her as he
came. It had been so long since he’d allowed himself the pleasure of a woman’s
body.

But Nali had other plans for him.

She took him into her mouth, her tongue dancing all along his
head and length. Her smooth hands worked his cock and balls until he had to
close his eyes against the sight of her, the sensations were so intense.

“Nali, ride me,” he pleaded and bent to urge her upward but
groaned at the pain in his side from the movement.

“Soon, Victor. Soon,” she promised and sucked him deep into her
throat while caressing his balls. The pleasure of her mouth was so intense, he
had to dig his hands into the mattress to keep control. He wanted to haul her
down onto the bed and plow into her, bring her the kind of pleasure she was
offering him.

“Nali,” he said roughly, and against his cock came the coolness
of the night air as she finally relented and moved up his body. She straddled
his hips and held herself there, poised over his erection, the dark copper tips
of her breasts tight. An almost sad smile appeared on her face before she
reached down and guided him to her center.

The heat and wet of her bathed the sensitive head of his cock
for only a second before she plunged down and took him into her body.

Nali gasped at the fullness of him. She held herself still
against the sensation of being one with a man again. How long had it been, she
wondered? So long that she was tight and the feeling had been slightly painful
at first, but now pleasure slowly suffused her from the feel of him stretching
her, filling her with the heat of his body.

Yet she still felt empty in some ways. Alone. She had spent so
much of her life alone, she thought.

The gentle swipe of his thumb wiped away the tear as it ran
down her cheek.

“Have I hurt you, Nali?” he asked and raised his other hand to
rest along her shoulder, the touch filled with comfort.

She shook her head vehemently. “No, Victor.”

He dropped his thumb to brush it across her lips, the touch as
potent as any kiss. A kiss she had avoided before because it would be like
giving her heart to him, a heart that would break as soon as she had to leave
him to return to her true home.

“I will not hurt you. Ever,” he reassured.

“I know,” she said and meant it. He was a hero. His body and
actions in the ocean had provided proof of that.

“Tell me what you want. Anything.”

She met his gaze and his face shimmered in her sight from the
tears she battled. The one thing she wanted she could not have, but she would
settle for this—for his body and his passion—until it was time to return
home.

“Touch me, Victor. Love me.”

His full lips, those lips she wanted to taste so badly, thinned
into a tight slash of control. His eyes turned the color of the sea during a
storm and were as turbulent. He sensed her pain and her need.

But there was only one thing he could provide her.

He moved his hands down to her breasts and tenderly cupped her,
exploring the weight of them, strumming his thumbs across the taut tips and
dragging a pleased sigh from her.

“You are beautiful, Nali. So strong,” he said as he dipped his
hand down for only a moment to rub the back of it against her muscled midsection
and then back to her breasts.

He deepened his caress there, tweaking her nipples. Inside, her
muscles jerked and stroked him.

Sucking in a breath, he said, “That feels good. Does it feel
the same for you?”

“Yes-s-s,” she replied on a long sigh, before she added, “But I
want...I want your mouth on me.”

He smiled then, the first real one she’d seen from him. In the
ocean, only his eyes had smiled thanks to the mouthpiece, but now there was
nothing to hold it back. To hide it.

It transformed his face, filling it with joy. Bringing out the
deep dimples that made the years fall away from his features. She realized then
that he was younger than she’d first thought. The weight of his pain, both past
and present, had made him seem older.

“Lean forward so I can have my taste.”

She shuddered in anticipation and did as he asked, aware that
his mobility was limited. But as she neared, he propped one elbow on the bed and
rose up partway to drift a kiss against her nipple before licking and sucking
it.

Moaning, she threaded her fingers into the thick strands of his
dark hair and held him close, loving the feel of him against her breasts. Each
tug and pull of his mouth brought more heat and dampness to her core, made her
vagina jump and clench against him until just having him inside her wasn’t
enough.

She had to move, had to release the animal inside her
restlessly searching for satisfaction.

She shifted her hips, riding him as he continued pleasuring
her, as he offered words of encouragement, urging her to find her own. He
stroked his hand along her hip and buttock to guide her until passion stole
their breath and she had to see him. Had to watch his face as pleasure swamped
them and pulled them deep.

He met her gaze, his eyes serious now. All traces of the boy
gone as the man sought release, sought her pleasure with a forceful roll of his
hips that buried him so deep it broke free the passion within her.

She came hard and fast, her breath exploding from her body.
Trembling roughly above him, she jerked her hips along him one final time and he
followed her down, calling out her name.

“Nali.”

By small degrees she lowered her body until her breath fanned
his face. He shifted up again, intent on kissing her, but she turned her head at
the last minute and his mouth brushed her cheek.

With a wiggle, she made to move off him, but he eased his hand
to the small of her back to keep her near.

“Don’t leave me. Not yet.”

She braced one hand against the mattress and glanced down at
him, her eyes narrowed. Doubt was alive in the dark grey of her eyes.

“Why?” she asked with that trace of innocence—or maybe it was
better to call it awkwardness, as if she was unused to the ways of men and
women. Maybe she was. If he believed what she had told him, maybe she was not
used to human ways.

He cradled her face and smiled, swiping his thumb across the
stain of color on her cheek. “Has it been that long that you don’t
understand?”

A mischievous grin erupted on her full lips. “The wham bam
thank you, ma’am?”

He chuckled and ruffled the spiky strands of her hair. “I don’t
want to feel used. I don’t want you to feel used. So will you stay?”

Nali hesitated for a heartbeat, then nodded and rested her head
on his chest while her lean length nestled on his, their bodies still joined.
His arm wrapped around her loosely, as if he sensed that the wildness within her
could not rest if captive.

Even as her human body accepted the comfort of his arms and
allowed calm to wash over her, the shark spirit within her stayed alert,
remaining active long after she had closed her eyes and surrendered to the
fatigue brought on by assuming a mortal form and the events of the day and
night.

* * *

It was that spirit that experienced the stirring of dawn
as the first rays of the sun peeked above the horizon and pulled her from the
first real sleep she’d had in months.

With that awakening came hunger gnawing in her belly,
especially as the smell of food cooking from her father’s home wafted in through
the open windows of her shack.

She eased from Victor’s side but sat on the edge of the bed,
examining him. Skin tanned to a golden hue by the Caribbean sun showed no signs
of fever and his breathing was deep and regular. As a soft snore escaped him,
she smiled.