A Seacat's Love (Oceanan Trilogy Book 1) (21 page)

His knees grew weak. Rick knelt behind Leonora, startling her. Grabbing her above her elbows, he brought her tight against his chest. He whispered her name as he buried his face in her hair and inhaled her scent.

Rick sounded like a starving man, inhaling the aroma of life. He nuzzled Leonora’s hair, making her tremble with fear and anticipation. His breath on her skin zapped her strength. Closing her eyes heightened her senses. She smelled the salty clean air, felt the cool breeze on her skin, heard the angry waves bang against the nearby rocks.

Leonora envisioned herself upon a high cliff with the raging blue sea below her, beckoning her, calling her by name to become one with its tempestuous infinity. The water’s lure grew more powerful as it hit against the rocks. Her will grew weaker. Unable to resist, she flung herself into its embrace.

Falling against Rick’s rock-hard body, Leonora was aware of only one thing: Rick. The whispery touch of his lips against her cheek made her struggle for air. Her head moved toward his gentle kisses. Rick awarded her with a soul-wrenching groan and a firmer position between his powerful thighs.

His arm was like a band of steel around her waist. His moist tongue flickered in her ear and around her earlobe. Her body became sensitive and responsive to his every movement.

Rick made his choice. There was no way of knowing how long they had left together. He had no intentions of allowing any of it to pass without being a part of her. No woman had enchanted him so. He had never wanted anything in his life—whether it be big or small—with the ferociousness of an untamed, half-crazed lion. But in him Leonora caused this uncontrollable passion, this insatiable hunger, this insanity and obsession of possessing one woman—the woman with the pale blue eyes.

He wanted to absorb his obsession through all his senses. Sitting back on his heels, Rick buried his face into her hair. He inhaled deeply. Leonora’s scent was unmatched. His entire being focused on her fragrance. It transported him into another world—a world where the only known scent was that of Leonora’s.

Rick rubbed his clean-shaven face into the thick strands of her hair. He lifted his left arm from around her waist and lightly passed it over the curls. He took a lock from her slim shoulders and felt its richness between his fingers. He rubbed it against his mouth. It stimulated his lips.

Not caring or thinking, only feeling, Rick parted his lips and hooked the lock of hair with the tip of his tongue, which made him hurt more. The blue fire in his eyes seared the back of her head.

His tongue traveled over the strands in a horizontal fashion. It felt smooth and sleek. His tongue changed directions, moving vertically. He felt a soft-layered roughness. He sucked on the lock and tasted a combination of cleanliness and perfumed chemicals. It was strange. It was intoxicating.

Rick moved Leonora’s hair aside and nuzzled her cheek with his. Her skin was satiny soft. He inhaled the unique scent that emanated from her. His head began to reel. Rick rose onto his knees and planted feather light kisses on her face and neck. He felt, rather than heard, Leonora’s struggle for breath. Her lips reached for his, and his soul soared to the heavens.

Clasping her shoulders, Rick held Leonora in place, while he sensually rubbed his heated form along her spine. He made certain she felt every inch of his throbbing need. Leonora pressed her backside into his loins. She had sealed her fate. Gripping her face in his left hand, Rick roughly brought her mouth to his pulsating lips. So excited was he that he could feel his ecstatic heartbeat on his own lips.

Rick’s kiss was soul shattering. Leonora gripped his thighs and mindlessly rubbed her derriere against his arousal. She tried to give herself fully to his onslaught. Rick broke the kiss and quickly spun her in his embrace. Pulling her close, he deepened his kiss.

Through the eyes of an onlooker, Rick looked like he was trying to devour her—which he was. He had been with many women of different skill levels. He had been happily married for several years. But not once had he tasted anyone as heavenly or as carnal as Leonora. She was experienced yet inexperienced, scared yet bold, shy yet daring—combinations that drove him mad.

On their knees, they strained to get closer to one another. Rick took a deep breath of the ocean breeze, mingled with Leonora’s scent. Belatedly, he realized it was a huge mistake to do so, for it sent him over the edge. With his tongue imbedded in her mouth, Rick gently lowered her onto the incoming waves. He nudged her
legs apart with his knees. Grabbing her around her hips, he urgently pulled her upward into him.

Leonora wrapped her legs around his rotating hips. She met him thrust for thrust, desperate to fill that all-consuming ache she felt within her soul. She heard him groan. His grip on her hips became painful. It mattered not. All that did matter was that Rick wanted her. She growled as her need for him intensified.

Rick released her hips and ripped her blouse open. She gasped at the forceful way his mouth seized her. Her fingers pushed roughly into his golden tresses to secure him in place. Rick fed on her breasts with a savagery beyond her wildest dreams. Combined with feeling the pressure of his erection at her junction, Leonora’s yearnings exploded. Her true sentiments revealed themselves in her eyes.

Rick ravished each mound in turn. He never stopped to check if anyone was nearby. He disregarded all caution and captured Leonora’s lips. Everything about Leonora called out to him, and he needed to—
had
to——answer..

He spoke against her lips, “To hell with time and promises. I need you, Nora.” He went for the buttons on her pants. “I need you!” He kissed her hard before he got up and slid off her pants, made easier by her lack of shoes.

Rick scanned Leonora’s naked form, covered only by her bikini. His passions soared higher. He gave her his full weight and gloried in the way her curves fit perfectly beneath his solidness.

“God, I want you so much,” he admitted, gazing into her eyes. He froze. All thoughts vanished. “My God. Your eyes are glowing.”

{Yes, they are.} She telepathically spoke to him. Leonora took Rick’s buttocks in her hands and pressed him downward, tilting her hips to greet him. {You are making them glow.}

“How?”

She clasped the back of his head and brought his lips to hers. Her tongue plunged into his mouth and demanded his response. {By making me want you with a hunger not of this world.}

Rick’s head dipped forward; his body bore down on hers as he struggled to keep up. Leonora’s body heat radiate through his
clothes. She zapped him of energy, strength, and oxygen. He tore his mouth from hers and gasped.

He closed his eyes and tilted his face to the sun. A vision began to take form behind his closed lids. “I’ve wanted you for so long. Nora, I…” He stopped. The vision was of a beautiful, elegant, paleeyed…
cat
. He frowned. He felt the fire in him lessen.

Rick suddenly realized that the woman he desired was not the woman underneath him but the woman in his vision. He remembered each time he had pictured himself with Leonora, she was in her natural state, not like she was now. And if he could not have her looking as she normally did, then he did not want her at all. His dying manhood confirmed his decision.

“No!” Leonora cried. She brought Rick’s attention back to her by placing her palms on his cheeks. “No. Do not think about anyone. Please, Rick, think only of me. No one but me.”

Rick studied her features. Leonora was exceptionally beautiful with her deceptor device activated. However, his heart, his body, and his soul ached to possess the feline in her. It was her catlike features that enthralled him. It was Leonora the feline he was dying to make love to—the real Leonora he longed to claim as his own, not Leonora the human, the imposter.

Rick smoothed Leonora’s hair away from her face and read extreme pain and fear on her angelic features. Her eyes dimmed, and she desperately clung to his shoulders. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him.

Rick tore his mouth free. “Nora, stop.”

“No,” she cried and snatched his mouth.

“I said stop it, damn it! Wait!” His eyes flashed with anger at her. “Don’t destroy it, Nora, please don’t. I need to catch my breath. Besides, there’s something on my mind. Something I need to ask you.”

“Ask me later.” Leonora grabbed the center of his shirt and ripped it open. “I have wanted you so much…too much!” She rubbed her breasts against his smooth chiseled chest. {Make me yours.} She kissed him.

Rick did not respond. His fingers curled around her head as he firmly held her head to the wet sand. “No,” he said in a firm voice. “You’re not the one I want.”

Only the waves that splashed around them made a sound.

“What?” Leonora’s eyes filled with instant tears.

Her horrified expression made Rick hurry forth with his next words. “I have wanted you from the start, Nora.
You
. Not this woman who’s naked beneath me, but the gorgeous feline with the in-human eyes. She’s the one I want to make love to. She’s the one who has driven me crazy day in and day out. The one who enters my dreams at night. The one who has me so hard all the time I feel like I’m about to burst in my pants without her even touching me.” As if on cue, his manhood rose to prove he was being truthful.

Leonora shook her head. “I do not understand. I am still her.”

“No, you’re not. You’re some attractive woman with similar traits. But, Nora, let me make something perfectly clear to you. I never settle for second best.”

The tears slipped from her eyes. With a heavenly smile, Leonora pressed a button on her wristguards. Rick did not blink. He did not want to miss her transformation. He watched on as if she were a miracle taking place before his eyes.

“I have never wanted anyone as much as I want you. Never has anyone bewitched me like you have.” Rick remembered when he
had found Leonora on the lab table, the pain he had felt when he thought she was dead. His fingers roved over her face like they had done that day. “Let me make love to you.”

Leonora weaved her fingers in his hair. “I would do anything for you, Rick.” She brought his head to hers. “Anything, for as long as you are true to me.” She blessed him with a kiss full of her unconditional love for him.

With a loud groan, Rick surrendered himself to the feline’s passion. He reached for his pants. Without breaking their mind-boggling duel, he removed them and settled between her golden thighs. Leonora’s eyes ignited into a white glow, and her hips bucked upward. A rush of heat soared through Rick’s body, and he groaned louder.

Rick grabbed a hold of Leonora’s bottom with his bandaged hand and nudged forward. He cried out in frustration. Her underwear kept him from claiming her. He snatched the thin material with both hands and ripped it apart. He immediately grabbed Leonora by her waist to keep her from impaling herself as he held himself back, refusing to enter. Leonora soon covered him with her liquid need for him.

“Dear God, Nora, I can slip right into you.” The tip of his erection did just that. She was small and tight. A blazing, primal craving took hold of him.

Leonora squeezed her eyes shut and clung to his shoulders. Arching her back, she begged, {Take me!}

Rick grabbed her bottom and thrust forward with a loud, frustrated moan. He almost missed the tearing of her maidenhead. Her cry made him stop. “You’re a virgin!” He was stunned. “My God, Nora, are you all right?” He laid soft kisses over pain stricken features. “I’m so sorry. Had I known you were a virgin, I would’ve prepared you better. It wouldn’t have been so painful.”

Leonora kept her eyes closed. {What…what do you mean? You could never have prepared me enough for your size.}

“I can’t believe you’re a virgin.”

{Was a virgin.} She peeked up at him from beneath her lashes. {What else did you think I was?}

His gaze grew deadly. “Tigif’s lover.” The cat had lied.

Leonora’s eyes opened wide. “His what! How could you? I told you he was engaged to marry my sister!”

“I know. But that son of a bitch was so convincing.”
I’m going to kill him
. “Plus, I was afraid of what I was feeling for you,” he stated. “It was an easy escape route for me.”

“How do you feel for me?”

Rick’s heart jumped in his chest. How did he let that slip? He was not ready to touch that topic yet. “We’ll talk about that later, okay?” He gazed into her soul.

“Yes.” She placed her arms around his neck. “Make love to me, Rick. Make love to me like no male has done before.” She seductively purred. Her right foot rubbed along the back of his left leg.

“Like no man has done before. Like no man ever will.” Rick sealed his promise with a soul-capturing kiss, moving his member inside her tight, sleek shaft.

Making love to Leonora was earth shattering. Mary had never responded with such high-pitch fervor. No woman in his past had. Rick thought of Leonora having an orgasm. He yearned to feel her muscles tense, convulse, then relax. He longed to feel her river of heat pour over his arousal. Rick trembled with the anticipation and feverishly sought after it. His hips increased their speed. Above everything else, Rick desired to be the only man to take her there.