Lightning whipped through him, scorching him. He caught her hips in his hands, and brought her back to him as he surged forward, needing to plunge deeper into the dark recesses of her tight sheath. Lust and love whirled together until he couldn’t tell one from the other. Emotions surged through him, filling his mind and heart when he barely could sustain feeling any other time. Where he was cold and dark, she was as hot as the sun and bathed him in her light.
He slammed home again and stopped, feeling her tense, throb around him, tighten, and grasp with her silken muscles. Slowly he bent over her, even as he tugged on her hair, bringing her head up. His lips whispered over her ear. “You fucking save my soul, Tansy. Every time.” It was stupid of him to give up so much of himself to her, but he couldn’t stop himself. He needed her to know what she was to him—that he might demand her total surrender, but he was hers, all the way, and he surrendered himself completely to her.
He moved again. Long and slow, taking her to the edge, until he heard a sob escape. He wanted to do a little sobbing himself, his breath hitching, and love choking and clogging his throat. But he held on, pushing her past every limit, poising her on the edge of release, only to pull back, prolonging, building, seeing how high he could take them both.
Tansy heard the sob in her voice as she pleaded with him for release. He was relentless, burying himself deep and hard, and then just when she was certain she couldn’t take anymore and she’d find release, he’d pull back, slow down, change his pace, all the while putting pressure on her most sensitive spot. Her legs shook, and her body shuddered with urgent need, aware of every inch of his thick shaft buried deep inside her.
“Hold still.”
She couldn’t. He couldn’t possible think she could, when she was on the verge of mind-numbing pleasure. He held it just out of her reach, and she writhed and bucked in a desperate attempt to impale herself.
“Not yet. You’re going to take me with you and I don’t want to end this.” He pressed kisses down her spine, his hands caressing her breasts, her belly, flexing at her hips. “Not yet. I want to stay here awhile.”
“Please, Kadan, I can’t stand it.” She felt almost crazy with need, her body on fire, her insides swollen and aching and desperate for release. She couldn’t help herself, pushing back, twisting her hips, finding a frantic rhythm, grinding hard against him.
The breath slammed out of his lungs. Inside his throat—in his mind—he sounded wild, feral, a demon possessed. He buried his fingers deep in her hips, holding her still, his grip hard. He surged deep and she screamed. He pistoned forward, hard and deep, each thrust driving through the bundle of inflamed nerves so that she bucked and cried out, the sensations swamping him as her sheath tightened, strangling him, clamping down so hard he thought he’d go mad with pleasure. An explosive orgasm tore through her and took him with her, destroying all control so that he speared into her harder and faster in a frantic attempt to prolong the tidal wave that ripped up his thighs, down his belly, and centered in his shaft where her body continued to tighten around him, milking him dry. He jerked convulsively and then shuddered with pleasure as he filled her with hot semen.
He stood behind her, buried deep, his arms wrapped around her waist now while she hung exhausted over the couch. He didn’t even know how they’d gotten started in the first place, only that he would never be sated. He wanted to spend every waking minute just touching her, filling her.
Kadan rested his head on her back, drawing in great deep breaths. “You know, for me, you’re my woman. My wife. Whenever you’re ready, say the word and we’ll do it legal. There’s no way you weren’t meant for me.” Hell, he’d never believed in God; there were too many sick, perverted people in the world, too much crime, and too many natural disasters for him to believe anyone who cared was really out there in the cosmos watching. But Tansy was a miracle. For the first time in his life, it occurred to him that if there was really such a being, Kadan owed big-time—for Tansy, because he believed absolutely that she was created for him. And he knew he’d been created for her.
“Damn it, woman, you’ve even got me thinking spiritual crap.” How pathetic was that?
Her body shook. He straightened up, allowing his shaft to slip out of her, enjoying the ripple that ran through her belly, telling him she was having delicious little aftershocks.
“Are you laughing at me?”
She turned her head, looking over her shoulder at him, a small smile teasing her mouth. “A little, yes.”
“I have what could be a revelation and you’re laughing.” His hands were gentle as he helped her straighten up. He drew the edges of the shirt together and rebuttoned it.
“And your revelation is what?”
“You don’t deserve to know.” He leaned down to kiss her because he couldn’t resist her beautiful mouth. “We’ve got work to do. Stop distracting me.”
“You can set up the game pieces while I take a bath. If I don’t, I’m going to be too sore to walk.”
“I like that idea.”
“You’re so bad, Kadan.” She tossed another grin over her shoulder and left him.
Kadan listened to the bathwater running as he pulled on jeans and padded barefoot into the war room. He didn’t want her here, not where the photographs of the dead would surround them. He took the pieces out into the dining room and, wearing gloves, positioned them on the table in the order of the murders on the East Coast and then the West. He hated that she was going to do this, but he was going to make damned certain she didn’t have the same repercussions as she’d had the time before.
Tansy surveyed the ivory pieces Kadan set on the table. The game pieces were beautifully carved. Whoever had made them knew what he was doing. Each figurine was detailed meticulously. She held her palm over the pieces, an inch or so above the tallest, and passed her hand over them, feeling the waves of excitement and violence embedded in the ivory. Taking a breath, she dipped her hand lower.
Kadan’s hand slid beneath her wrist so fast it was a blur, his fingers circling hers and jerking her hand away before she could pick up one of the ivory carvings. Standing behind her, he held her wrist away from the game pieces. As he placed a proprietary hand on her shoulder, his body curved over hers so that his heat enveloped her.
“Wear gloves.”
“But . . .” She frowned at him over her shoulder. “I won’t pick up the details you need unless I touch the objects with my skin.”
His grip tightened, fingers digging through the thin material of the silk shirt, into her soft shoulder and into the sensitive skin of her wrist. “Gloves.” His voice brooked no argument. “See what impressions you get. We’ll start there. If we’re lucky, it will be enough.”
“You know better, Kadan.”
He pushed a pair of gloves into her hands.
“Do the men on your team ever tell you that you’re a tyrant?”
She pulled the material over her hands and felt some of the tension leave his body. He’d already grilled her for an hour on the layout and security of the house, going over every single detail a hundred times, until she considered hitting him over the head with something. He was very thorough when it came to questioning—no,
interrogating
—someone.
“You’re so dramatic.” He slid his hand down her arm, tugged on the glove, and then splayed his fingers across her belly.
Heat spread as if he’d branded her. She felt the familiar ache beginning. He pressed even tighter around her, so that she felt him breathing in the same rhythm.
“You’re distracting me.”
“That’s the point. Well . . .” There was grim amusement in his voice. “The point is, I want to touch you.”
She was very aware of his body pressed tightly against hers. His shaft was full and heavy, rubbing along her bottom with only the thin tail of the shirt separating them. How could he be so ready so fast? A part of her was ines-capably pleased. “I’m working here. Do you want to get this information or not? You’re already handicapping me by insisting on the gloves.”
“I’m protecting you. And I’m going to keep protecting you. I have the feeling that once you get started, you can’t stop yourself.”
She frowned and leaned forward to look over the game pieces. Kadan didn’t move, and the action only pressed him tighter against her.
“You’re going to have to go stand over there if you want this to work.”
“I’m staying. Just get on with it.”
Tansy sighed and forced herself to concentrate. Kadan had separated the game pieces into two groups. The first were the objects left behind at each crime scene on the East Coast. The stallion, frog, snake, and blade. There were two stallions.
“Was the stallion the first murder?”
He nodded his head.
“Then they have a sequence. Like cards or a board game, they have a certain order and each player takes his turn. If you lined them up in the order you found them, the frog would commit the next murder.”
“That’s right.” His breath fanned her cheek, moved the strands of hair falling around her face. His lips whispered over the nape of her neck.
“Kadan. Really. I can’t do this.”
“Yes, you can. But you’re going to know where you are, and who you’re with. You’re not going to be pulled down that long tunnel into a nightmare. I’ll be right here, real and solid, and nothing is going to take you from me.”
She shook her head. “You’re so crazy. Fine. I’ll try.”
She had to admit to herself she was a little afraid. There were so many of the game pieces, and the energy was strong, radiating out to her palm even through the material of the glove as she passed her hand over them. In a way, she was thankful for the distraction of Kadan’s hard body and gentle hands. She knew once she began picking up impressions, there would be no feelings like she had now, the arousal peaking her nipples and teasing her thighs, the feel of his hand slipping under the tail of the shirt and shaping her bottom, his fingers doing their silky slide as he stroked her skin possessively.
She wanted to stay like this forever, feeling a part of him. Sharing his mind and the pleasure he got in just touching her. He loved just being able to slide his fingers over her, slip a hand inside her shirt and cup the weight of her breast, thumb caressing her nipple. The intensity of his enjoyment at simply stroking her skin was amazing to her and she didn’t want to go back to the real world, where no one ever laid a hand on her and she never dared to have actual contact.
I’m not going anywhere.
He couldn’t promise that. She looked at the ivory figurines. If she touched them, and she couldn’t control what happened, if the voices sank into her head, were trapped in her mind, he would have no choice but to abandon her.
Kadan swore and wrapped his arms around her, burying his face in her shoulder. “You don’t have to do this.”
“Yes, I do. We can’t let them keep murdering people, Kadan. They have a taste for it and they won’t stop.” Tears burned behind her eyes. Usually there was one killer, one depraved mind she was forced to share. This time there were eight, and they were psychic, just as she was.
His lips slid over her ear. “My mind shares yours. If you’re determined to go through with this, then know wherever this takes you, you won’t be alone, Tansy. I’m strong. I’ll find your mind and I’ll bring you back.”
“Last time I broke into a million pieces.”
“I’ll find each one.”
It was the resolve, that absolute determination, that reassured her that he meant what he said. He wouldn’t abandon her no matter how bad it got. It was his nature to be completely focused and implacable. He wouldn’t turn back or turn away. His willpower gave her strength. Tansy settled her fingers around the frog, lifting it from the table.
The jolt was hard. The room shifted beneath her feet as the energy rushed at her with greedy claws. She hadn’t expected the frog to be so strong. She’d already formed an opinion that he was one of the lesser members of the team, but his psychic energy was intense. She felt the familiar slick oil pouring into her mind, a sludge that indicated perverse sickness. He sought power. Always power. He wanted attention. Wanted his strength known when no one saw him. He was always passed over by everyone. His commanding officers thought themselves superior, but they were nothing to him—
nothing.
Each week he took people down into his world. They had no idea he held their lives in the palm of his hand. He enjoyed that feeling, deciding—live or die by his hand. Who would he choose to let live? He wanted them to know, but only the ones who died knew, at last, looking into his eyes while he held them under.
See me.
Drowning, drowning.
See me.
Tansy!
Kadan’s voice was sharp, filled with menace, with command.
She dared not disobey him. His fingers forced her hand open. She hadn’t realized she was sobbing, or that the whispers had grown loud in her mind. Tears poured down her face. The screams were loud now, victims screaming as water poured into their lungs and he stood toe to toe, holding them down, forcing them to stare at his mocking, exultant face.
Revere me. I’m a god. I condemn you to death. See me. Damn you, look at me. You will stay with me and always see me.
Kadan shook her. “Look at me. Look at me now.”
Her dazed eyes, shimmering with opaque violet, jumped to his. Kadan dragged her away from the table to the center of the room. He could feel the thick oil clouding her mind, hear the screams and whispers threatening to take over. He refused to allow her to look away from him. Deliberately he filled her mind with emotion, with warmth and tenderness, his hands gentle.
“Are you with me, baby?”
She moistened her dry lips, blinking rapidly. He could feel her mind clinging to his. “I’m all right. He was stronger than I expected.” She shivered again, trying to drown out the sound of his voice. Thankfully, Kadan’s firm, velvet-soft voice, although low, pushed over the top of the other. Kadan had established his dominance, and his power and control over her was absolute. His voice took over in her mind.
We’re together, baby, one mind, one skin. They can’t touch you.