Unleashed by Shadows (By Moonlight Book 10) (3 page)

“To my place,” Silas told him quietly. “I’m going to pick Nica up from work. She gets out in about an hour. Be gone when we get there.”

By the time Cale glanced up to thank him, MacCreedy was already striding away.

He gave the keys a toss in the air and grabbed them tight in his fist. Well, all right then.

“Hey, mama. That’s a pretty mean machine you got there.”

She gave him a flirty smile. “That’s the way I like them. Remember?”

Oh, yeah. He did.

She patted the seat behind her, making him blink and straighten in objection. “You expect me to ride bitch?”

“If you want to ride this one, you will.” Her tinted face plate came down to mask a sassy grin.

Well . . . hell.

He did. So he would.

Glancing around to make sure no one observed his humbling situation, Cale climbed on the back and scooched up to fit tightly against the driver. The bike’s engine revved to life. So did his as she took his hands, placing one flat against her belly and tucking the other between her thighs. Then they roared out onto the street.

*

The instant the door opened into darkness, they fell inside, attached at the hungry lips.

Pushed up against the hallway wall by the urgent press of her mate’s hard frame, Kendra Terriot let desire overwhelm thought and breath as the ash of missing him ignited in desperate flame. Desperate for the heat of him, for the exciting feel of his tough contours bumping impatiently into hers, for the prowling eagerness of hands moving over what soon became way too many clothes. He must have felt the same because even as she toed out of her boots, he was skinning off her motorcycle pants.

“The door,” she whispered.

He twisted to secure the lock then his tongue was down her throat and his hands tearing open his over-crowded jeans. In a hurry to get to what was foremost on his mind.

His single-minded urgency reminded Kendra of other things.

She turned her head to the side, tilting it back so wet kisses poured hotly down her neck. “Are you angry at me for coming without telling you?” she asked.

It took him a moment to realize she was speaking, another beat to respond. “I’ll be angry if you don’t. Soon. If I’m doing it right, you won’t have to tell me about it.”

She smiled at his bold arrogance. “Did you miss me?”

“Until I thought I’d explode. Like now.” Tugging one hand to the evidence of that claim, he captured her mouth once more, greedy, plundering, devouring, unable to taste her deep enough, hard enough. Her fingers slid up into his hair, clenching, pulling back to lever a slight separation. His eyes gleamed, cool silver fire in the dark.

“And I missed you every minute, my prince. Those minutes that became hours, then days, then weeks . . . without explanation.”

The hint of her displeasure slipped through the roar of lust, making Cale hesitate and cautiously offer, “Aren’t we making up for that now?”

Kendra leaned toward him until his strong body trembled with razor-edged restraint. Her lips grazed softly over his, stirring a sound more growl than groan.

“No quickie slam bam is going to make up for my loneliness, my worry, or for our empty bed.”

Now he groaned. “Dammit, Katy, I’m at critical mass here and you want to talk?” He arched against her, tunneling the achy throb of him along the grove between her thighs. “How ‘bout we take the top off things first. Then we can talk all night if you like.” His palms cupped her bare bottom to squeeze tight, coaxing her hips to match the sensuous sway of his own. “I’m dying here, baby. What do you want from me?”

“I want slow hands, my king.” Hers captured his face as if holding something more precious than life itself between them. “I want you to make it worth my wait. I want all of you for as long as you can make it last.”

The stretch of his smile pushed into her palms. His teeth flashed bright. “It’s not like I won’t be ready to go again in the time it takes us to get horizontal. Then I can give you all the time in the world.” He waited expectantly. Silence. His heavy sigh. “You don’t ask for much, my queen.”

“Would you ask me to settle for less?”

“Never.”

He lifted her easily, letting her legs belt his waist and her arms circle his head and shoulders. “Where to?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been here. I thought you had.”

“No. Not on the preferred guest list.” He glanced in either direction, opting to go toward the light at the end of the hall where it opened into a shadowed living/dining area. He looked up toward the source of illumination and muttered an impressed, “Quite the nightlight.”

Following his gaze upward, Kendra had to agree. A huge skylight in the high, slanted ceiling looked out onto a towering hotel, the glow from its many rooms providing a soft gold reprieve from the blackness of the condo without intruding on its intimacy. Cale took advantage of her distraction to draw a damp path up her throat and lick around the delicate curve of her ear. She shuddered in response, her heart fluttering when he lifted away to murmur, “I’ve been starving for the sight and taste of you.”

“Take your fill of anything you like. And then take me.”

“I’m a glutinous bastard. I like it all. Every bite.” He caught her lower lip between his teeth for a nip and tug. “Every sip.” His tongue teased hers out to play over and about his. “Every swallow.” He sucked hers inside, drawing fiercely, smashing his mouth over hers until they both were bruised and close to out of control.

Kendra gripped his shirt collar and yanked it open, popping buttons until she could peel it off his glorious shoulders to adore muscle and heated skin. He just as roughly stripped off her moto jacket and whisked her sweater over her head, making her moan in complaint when their lip lock was interrupted. He returned for more with an insatiable demand.

“I need to sit down, lie down, or fall down,” she breathed into his heady kisses, feeling as though the earth had shifted as he lowered her to perch on the edge of the couch. Instead of joining her, he kicked the coffee table aside and went to his knees between hers. Showing her how much he revered, admired, and desired her with the leisurely sweep of his mouth across smooth flesh. Tracing her collarbone, the tendons of her throat, the faint scarring on one shoulder where they’d become one in the wild manner of their kind. His alone, forever.

For as long as he could make that forever last.

Her torso bowed as he concentrated on one sweet bud, buffeting, licking, sucking until her ribcage jerked, until her breathing labored. Her knees rubbed up and down his arms, her heels riding the ridge of his spine, her hips rocking closer and closer in invitation.

His palms grazed sleek inner thighs inciting a craving that shivered down her legs. She said his name, part prayer, part petition. Then breath and movement stopped as he slowly explored her like some new discovery he’d spent years searching for instead of just three lonely weeks. Rubbing, circling, plunging.

Mouth slanting over hers, he savored her fragile sighs, her hurrying gasps, drinking up the intoxicating taste of her pleasure until his mate cried out, shuddered helplessly, then finally went limp beneath him.

“Worth the wait, my queen?”

Her eyes opened, filled with dark, dreamy satisfaction. Providing a momentarily sated smile, she whispered, “Most definitely.”

“Then you’ll love what comes next.”

A wicked gleam flashed through her gaze. “You?”

“Most definitely.” Cale grinned wolfishly. “But not yet.”

CHAPTER TWO

Silas stepped across his threshold and frowned when the light behind him hit upon the scattering of clothes in his hall.  He bent and cautiously lifted a wispy pair of pink panties from a pool of boots and leather. Growling his displeasure, he first checked the bedrooms, finding them both empty, before stalking like an irate chaperone into the condo’s living spaces. There, he found his worse-case scenario tangled in uncaring slumber on his floor.

“Hey.” He gave Cale a nudge in the ribs with his toe. Bleary eyes blinked up at him.

“Oh, hey,” his unwelcomed guest muttered, instinctively cuddling the sleeping female sprawled across him closer, eyes sinking shut again.

“Hey!” There was nothing gentle about his kick. “Get your bare ass off my living room rug before Nica sees you.”

Appreciation of that threat woke Cale completely. Brows lowering and eyes squinting into an irritable glare, he asked, “You want me to jump out the window?”

“Only if I was sure the fall would kill you before my wife does.”  Fists knuckling his hips, Silas considered the options and found them all wanting. “Oh, hell. Up the hall, door right after the bathroom.”

Cale grinned. “Thanks for the hospitality.”

Silas grumbled a fitting obscenity and started collecting the rest of their discarded clothing, brows rising over a scattering of ten dollar bills that fell out of Cale’s jeans, while his distant relation, flashing way too much anatomy, carried an oblivious Kendra to the appointed room. Silas followed, tossing their garments in behind them with a glum, “No good deed goes unpunished.”

*

Waking up wrapped in warmth and contentment, Kendra sighed and slowly opened her eyes to the most glorious sight imaginable. Nose to nose with her mate, she took a leisurely moment to simply adore him, from rumpled artificially blackened hair that stuck out in all directions from the tugging of her hands, to the sweep of thick lashes across strong cheekbones, to the slight part of lips she could still taste when wetting her own in remembrance of the night they’d shared.

A warm glow kindled in her belly.

What a night.

For as long as he could make it last. He’d risen to her challenge enthusiastically. Again and again.

Before desire began to pool and demand attention, Kendra distracted herself by glancing about the windowless room housing the big bed they’d slept in. No memory surfaced of how they’d gotten there, but she could see their clothes on the floor by the closed door. Apparently, they were still at Silas and Nica’s. She blushed, wondering over the state of the living room. The evidence that they’d had sex—wild, noisy, furniture breaking, earth shattering sex—shouldn’t shock their hosts. Still the thought of having it, vigorously, under Silas’s roof made her uncomfortable. But without regrets.

She looked back at her prince, her king, her love, eyes welling with emotion. And her mind with questions.

In the dim light, she could read the exhaustion hidden earlier by darkness and urgency. Fatigue from something far beyond the athletics in the living room left smudges beneath his eyes. Bruises discolored the smoothness of a momentarily carefree brow and marked his stubbled jaw. He’d been fighting.

Her own brow furrowed as she puzzled over his empty earlobe. Where was his diamond, the mate to her own? Why had he removed the symbol of his commitment to her?

As if feeling her scrutiny, Cale raised heavy eyelids, his gaze the soft gray of a predawn sky. He regarded her in drowsy surprise. A smile spread slow and sultry.

“Hey, baby,” he whispered, voice rough with sleep and pleasure. “Was afraid I was dreaming. But you’re here.”

Her hand slid along his rough cheek in a gentle caress. “Where I belong.” Something he seemed to have forgotten.

“Mmmm. Yes.” He kissed her fingertips, eyes slipping closed once more. “Don’t go. Can’t sleep when you’re not beside me. You calm my soul.”

She smiled. “Are you sure that’s not from the great sex?”

A husky chuckle. “I’m sure.”

Her heart took a tender twist, but before she could respond, he drifted back into that much needed slumber, still holding her palm against his face.

He’d tossed off most of the covers, as he usually did toward morning, baring him down to the curve of his hip. He made a low, contented sound as her hand moved from beneath his to stroke along his strong, hard outline, but he didn’t stir. More ugly bruising dappled his ribs. What exactly had he been doing for Silas here in New Orleans to incur such damage to body and peace of mind?

She could only imagine, because all her long distance questions had been met by vague non-answers.

Though they’d known each other all their lives, intimacy was an exciting new development. They’d just begun their journey together as bonded mates and leaders of their clan, spending daylight hours meeting with the remaining eight princes of the House of Terriot, with their families and their people, reviewing policies, hearing grievances, making plans to improve and protect their situation. And spent their nights enthusiastically working toward the creation of an heir. The first showed promise. The second bore no fruit. As yet.

At Silas’s call, Cale had surprised them all by going to New Orleans, something a Terriot king would never think to do alone. Just some quick business, he’d said, stuffing a few things into his bike’s saddlebag. He’d be back before she had a chance to miss him. Business that kept him away and mostly incommunicado for almost three weeks.

He’d called every day, as promised. At first, their conversations oozed with restless longing and chafing innuendo. Gradually, those talks grew brief and edged with evasion. He vowed he was okay, that everything was fine. And he was lying. She knew it. She knew him. She heard it in his voice, sensed it in what he wasn’t saying. And she’d gotten increasingly worried. Was he in trouble? Was he hurt, afraid, in danger? He’d never admit to those things, not with so many states and secrets between them.

What was keeping him in New Orleans?

Perhaps it was time to go to the source.

*

After pulling her travel-worn clothing back on, Kendra took that quick, stealthy walk of shame to the bathroom next to their borrowed room and did her best to wash off the scent of their reunion. With hair finger combed, she stepped into the hall and started toward the scent of coffee. No Silas. Just his disapproving mate standing on the other side of the breakfast bar. Kendra offered a faint testing-the-waters smile.

“Good morning.”

Nica had no comment on whether it was or wasn’t. “Coffee?”

“Yes, please. Cream and sugar.” She glanced about uneasily. “Is Silas still sleeping?”