Casey's Warriors (Bondmates) (12 page)

“We are your new neighbors.”

“What?” Her jaw dropped, making him want to taste her again and slide his tongue against hers. “You’re the one who bought Johnson’s old farm?”

“Yes.”

She glanced between him and Cormac. “Why?”

Cormac laughed, smoothly turning her attention to him. His friend had always been quick on his feet and his brain wasn’t muddled by the huge surge of hormones filling Lorn’s body. “We are models from Europe who are running a boot camp for other models to improve their skills and exercise in fresh air.”

“You’re running a European male model boot camp here? Chelsea, Michigan? Why in God’s name would you do that?” She cleared her throat. “I mean, why not New York or something?”

Lorn answered her with the excuse Mary had given them to explain their presence. “We wanted to come to a place where we would not be hounded by fans and photographers. A place where we can exercise and improve our skills without constant public scrutiny. In a small town like this, we believe we will go unnoticed.”

Her hysterical giggle made him worry about her sanity. “You think you’re going to blend in here?”

When she began to laugh hard enough that she had to sit down on her worn green sofa he exchanged a confused look with Cormac. “Why do you find that humorous?”

“Oh God,” she wiped away a tear and started to giggle again. “Look at you! Two of the hottest guys I’ve ever seen, anywhere. You’re like sex on a stick.”

Cormac gave her an unsure smile. “Being sex on a stick is bad?”

Embarrassment heated her cheeks, but she still giggled. “No, no, it’s good. What I mean is you aren’t exactly going to blend here. And once the women of this town find out there is a houseful of male models I wouldn’t be surprised if you have to put up guards to keep them from sneaking onto your property to ogle you.”

Lorn frowned at her, not liking the thought of other women coveting him. “You are the only one who is allowed to ogle me.”

“What?”

Cormac cleared his throat. “It is getting late and we need to be up early. Say goodnight to your
alyah
and let us return to our home.”

Pulling Casey to her feet, Lorn picked her up and hugged her tight, smiling when she gave a surprised squeak then wrapped her legs around his waist. “Put me down, I must be breaking your back.”

He snorted while Cormac laughed. “You weigh far less than my pack and I had to run the circumference of your pl-I mean Earth with it on my back.”

“Model training,” Cormac interjected even though Casey was staring up at Lorn.

“Your eyes are a different color again,” she said in an absent voice as she examined his face.

“Time to go,” Cormac urged and laid a hand on Lorn’s arm.

Without thinking Lorn growled at the other man being so close to his bride and Casey gasped and pushed at his chest. He let her slide out of his arms as the need to keep her grew.

“What the hell was that?”

Giving a forced laugh, Cormac threw an arm around Lorn’s shoulder and practically dragged him out the door. “Oh, that is just something us models do.”

It was obvious Casey didn’t believe him, but she nodded. “I guess I’ll see you soon, neighbor.”

Lorn took one last look at his bride, looking so beautiful his heart ached. “Soon, Casey, I will see you soon.”

“Night,” Cormac shouted as he shoved Lorn out the door and slammed it behind him.

“Way to blend in with the humans,” he muttered in a voice too low for Casey to hear even if she was standing right next to them. “You need to watch more of those movies with me to learn how to act.”

Lorn snorted. “Those, what do you call them-romantic comedies? Thank you, but I have no urge to act like a bumbling idiot around Casey.”

“I’m telling you, Earth women must love those stories for some reason. I need to figure out why so I can use that knowledge to help seduce my bondmate.”

“Any luck finding her yet?”

“No. She was here, then gone, then back in the area again briefly.” Cormac snickered. “Your
alyah
is watching us from her window with a rather concerned look on her face. You sure you don’t want to watch ‘When Harry Met Sally’ with me tonight? It might help you blend in, act more normal.”

Opening the door of Cormac’s red Corvette ZR1 and sliding in, Lorn snorted. “Sure, this car blends with the other automobiles I have seen in town.”

Giving Lorn an unrepentant grin, Cormac drove out of Casey’s driveway and took a right to go the short distance back to their base. Looking through the tinted window he detected the shadow of her figure in the living room, watching them pull away. Did she feel the same desperate need to be together that he did? Was she feeling that connection between them that urged him to come to her?

Cormac glanced over at him. “Will you be able to stay away from her for the required time? If you have need we can restrain you or send you back to the ship.”

The thought of not being on the same planet as Casey was unacceptable. “No, I am strong enough. I will do nothing that could jeopardize my chances with her.”

Already the urge to return to Casey gnawed at him and he closed his hands into fists hard enough to almost break the tough skin with his nails. He’d suffered through some of the worst fighting conditions in the Bel’Tan galaxy, endured merciless training that broke the minds of more than one Warrior, and survived the Hive for nearly four hundred cycles, yet his formidable self-control was about to shatter because of one tiny, beautiful Earth female.

His female.

With a sigh Cormac glanced at him then back at the road. “I envy you.”

“How is your search going?”

“My
alyah
is here, somewhere, but she is hard to track down.” He frowned. “She moves around a great deal, though I know not why.”

“You will find her,” Lorn said, trying to comfort his friend even as his mind kept returning to Casey. Lord of Life, she was as hot and tempting as a woman could get. So passionate, yet shy, a combination sure to drive any male insane.

“I will,” Cormac said with determination filling his voice. “And when I do she will never disappear on me again.”

Chapter Seven

Casey curled into a ball on her bed and clutched at her stomach. “I’m going to fucking kill Jerry for making me clean out that cooler.”

Kimber made a noncommittal noise and Casey looked up, finding her friend staring out the window of her bedroom to the old Johnson farm. Dressed in a pair of jean shorts that showed off her long runner’s legs and a loose black t-shirt, Kimber had quickly abandoned Casey for the view her window provided.

“Hey, I’m dying over here. A little sympathy would be nice.”

Dragging her gaze to Casey, Kimber rolled her eyes. “For someone who’s dying you’re making an awful lot of noise. So you somehow got food poisoning; the doctor said you’ll be fine, to just drink plenty of fluids, blah, blah, blah.”

With that she turned back to the window.

Gritting her teeth as a cramp contracted through her lower abdomen, Casey glared at the back of Kimber’s curly black head. “I didn’t invite you here so you could drool over the neighbors.”

Kimber, that bitch, just laughed at her. “Yeah, right. You have a house full of hot-as-shit supermodels living next door to you, outside, working out without their shirts on and I’m supposed to not look? Have you lost your damn mind? You could charge admission for women to come use your windows and make a fortune. By the way, Dawn and Paige are on their way over.”

“I’m dying and you invited them over to stare at some guys?”

“Not just any guys, epically hot guys.”

A shudder ran through Casey’s muscles and she shut her eyes, wishing whatever the hell it was would work its way out of her system. She’d thrown up a couple times last night, but then the nausea had gone away leaving her with bone deep shivers. She didn’t have a fever or any signs of an infection, so despite her pain and nausea, her family doctor sent her home with her mom and told her to rest. Her mom went back to work and Kimber came over to keep her company. Casey snorted at the advice from her doctor, as if she could rest when it felt like she had period cramps all through her body. And to make matters worse, as those cramps eased they were replaced by the unmistakable burn of arousal.

Then again, her horniness might have more to do with her obsession with Lorn than whatever whacked-out illness she’d managed to contract. When she did sleep she dreamed of him, kissing him, touching him, licking him, and doing things with him that were probably illegal in some states. The more she thought about him the more turned on she got until she’d had to change her panties three times because she’d soaked them with her arousal. Thankfully, Kimber thought the barely stifled moans of need were moans of pain. What Casey needed was Lorn, right here, right now. She didn’t care if Kimber watched them and took pictures, she needed that man inside of her in the worst way.

The doorbell rang and Kimber sprinted from Casey’s room, returning seconds later with an excited Paige and Dawn in tow. Paige, a plump and pretty girl in a wholesome way with her long chestnut brown hair and light blue eyes, had the good manners to stop by Casey’s bed first with a sympathetic expression. Working as a nanny during the summer break, Paige had the mothering thing down pat even though she wasn’t married and didn’t have any kids of her own.

“How are you feeling, sweetie?”

Grateful someone gave a shit, she gave Paige a weak smile. “Not as bad as that night we stole a bottle of your dad’s moonshine, but pretty close.”

“Ugh, that’s awful.” Her gaze strayed to the window where Kimber and Dawn practically had their noses pressed to the glass. “Dawn, you could at least say hi to Casey.”

The sun shining through the window turned Dawn’s mass of red curls the burning orange of fall leaves, as her friend barely glanced over and grinned before returning her attention to the window. “Hi, Casey.”

“Oh. My. God,” Dawn whispered. “I have died and gone to washboard abs heaven.”

Kimber moaned in agreement. “Look at the shoulders on that guy with the long brown hair wearing the dark blue pants.”

“Niiiiice,” Dawn purred.

Paige, appearing increasingly distressed, quickly tucked the covers around Casey. “Can I get you anything?”

The only thing Casey wanted right now was a vibrator and a pack of batteries. “No, go ahead and join the peeping thomasinas.”

After Paige wiggled her way between Dawn and Kimber she made a little noise somewhere between a sigh and a whimper. “You weren’t exaggerating. It’s like a farm that only breeds incredibly sexy guys over there.”

The sun was setting and Casey was feeling increasingly better and increasingly aroused. She couldn’t seem to stay still, wanting to rub her body against the mattress, run her hands over her stiff nipples and change her wet panties…again. Having to listen to her friends talk about the hotties next door certainly wasn’t helping.

As they gossiped about the men’s bodies and good looks all she could imagine was Lorn over there, jumping, spinning, and turning so his hair flowed over his broad shoulders with every move. He had the most cut chest she’d ever seen and each solid square of his abdominals begged for her kiss. She savored the memory of his rough skin rubbing against her, the strength that flowed through him as he easily picked her up. And his eyes, goodness his eyes, she’d never seen anything as beautiful as those shifting blues. Her mind wandered to his lips and she touched her own, the skin tingling at the memory of his kiss. It had been, without a doubt, the best kiss of her life. He’d savored her instead of rushing, stroking her arousal high enough that she ended up nipping his lips, sucking on his tongue, and greedily devouring his mouth. While she enjoyed kissing, she’d never been so aggressive before, so confident that the man she kissed was enjoying it. He’d tasted so good, a flavor she couldn’t describe other than fresh and pure. Like taking a breath of cold country air after a big snowfall.

Except his touch didn’t make her cold; it made her almost unbearably hot.

Her pussy continued to throb with need and she wished her friends would get the hell out of here. It was hard enough to hold back her moans as it was and she distantly wondered what the heck was wrong with her. She’d never heard of food poisoning making someone desperate to be fucked. Craving the feeling of Lorn’s large erection being driven into her hard enough that she had to brace her hands on the headboard consumed her. He had nice, thick thighs, as muscled as the rest of him, and she could only imagine how good it would feel to wrap her legs around his trim waist and surrender to him.

“Are they fighting or dancing?” Paige whispered in an awed voice.

Kimber shook her head. “I don’t know.”

Dawn abruptly stepped back from the window, a dangerous gleam in her hazel eyes that meant nothing but trouble as she slipped the strap of her thank top that had fallen off one freckled shoulder back in place. “Casey, you haven’t met them yet, have you?”

Clearing her throat, she pulled her comforter up, trying to hide her obviously stiff nipples behind her t-shirt. Figures, she was actually feeling better but now the need for sex replaced the need to puke. “Just two of them. Lorn and Cormac.”

“God, even their names are sexy,” Kimber said with a pretend swoon.

Narrowing her eyes, she gave Dawn a look that let her know she wasn’t screwing around. Everything inside of her demanded she stake a claim on Lorn that would let her friends know she’d kick any woman’s ass that touched him. “Hands off the platinum blond hottie. His name is Lorn and he is mine.”

Kimber giggled. “They kissed last night.”

“What!” Dawn leapt on her bed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I was too busy thinking I was going to die.”

Paige tore herself from the window with obvious reluctance. “I don’t see him out there.”

Dawn looked up at Kimber and smiled. “You know, they must be worn out and hungry after all that exercising. It would be the neighborly thing to bring them over some cookies or something.”