Feversong (Fever #9)(125)

Not even the great Ryodan.



As the door slides closed, I rest my forehead against the cool glass.

My office feels empty without her in it. The sun vanished behind clouds.

She stood there looking at me with fire in her eyes, comparing herself to Jo, unable to see they weren’t remotely the same. Yes, I’d casually fucked Jo. One doesn’t casually fuck Danielle O’Malley.

Her energy is nuclear, white-hot and pure as the new-driven snow. Passion is where she’s united, suffering no conflicts. I might be forged of hellfire but the woman-child is forged of pure energy and emotion, fierce and Valkyrie-strong.

Another man will experience her raw self-discovery, the volatile nuances of her first time.

I could have watched her talk for days. Eyes shining, face luminous, heart blazing in her face so brilliantly it had illuminated my entire office, warmed my cooling skin.

I still feel the burn of her hands on my face, in my hair, sliding down my body as our kiss took a much deeper, more savage turn.

But a storm like me isn’t what should come crashing down on the last vestige of her innocence.

She needs a slow immersion with a gentle hand that gives far more than it takes, a man who will dance her slowly, tenderly, into love. She needs something the fierce-hearted warrior never had: a normal, good experience with a normal, good man.

I’m not that man.

Fucking me would make her more like me.

Fucking him will make her more like him.

I knew the child. I know the woman. She’ll never be satisfied with a single lover. Dani craves experience, challenge, change, tempering, growth. She needs to taste it all. I understand that.

One day she’ll choose a mate. She’ll hunger to be a wolf running with a wolf of her own at her side, equals in everything, and when that time comes, she’ll need to know she’s chosen the absolute best.

I am that man.

But she has no basis for comparison.

She’ll give her virginity to Dancer. Soon. She’s on fire.

She wears my brand.

I’ll feel far too much of it. This time and every time.

Immortal though I am—if I survive the next week—the coming years might seem my most eternal yet.

I will never be her first.

But one day I’ll be her last.





DANI


I stepped out of the shower and toweled myself dry, smiling, listening to the sounds of Dancer banging around in the kitchen getting dinner ready.

There was only this moment, this night. The warmth of home, the delight of my best friend making a homemade pizza, the promise of a movie we’d pause more often than we played so we could talk about everything under the sun.

I’d made a deal with myself—no thinking tonight. No thoughts of tomorrow or Shazam or Dancer’s heart or the fate of the world. I know a truth: worrying doesn’t make tomorrow better; it only makes today worse. I wanted a single golden night before I made the hard decisions I had to confront.

Mind neatly compartmentalized with my Jada parts put away and my Dani parts free, I dried my hair, ran my fingers through the tangles, then stepped back and looked at myself. Naked. Clear-eyed. No makeup. No perfume or lotion. Just me.

I’d realized something on the way back to the penthouse. Sex with Ryodan would have been just that, sex. It would have been intense, wild, mind-blowing. Sex with Dancer was much more complicated. It would be making love. It would be sweet, tender, and heart-blowing. But hopefully not literally.

I’d figured out a way to trick myself. Since Dancer taking off my jeans was the moment I kept freezing up, I just wouldn’t put any on. Problem solved.

When I walked naked out of the bathroom, Dancer’s back was to me, but he must have heard me because he turned around, holding the pie and teased, “Mega, I know you definitely want mushrooms on your p-p—PUH.”

The pizza hit the floor and exploded when he dropped it. Crust went flying and sauce splattered across the floorboards and up the cabinets. Not that he noticed.

“Holy fucking fuck!” he said fiercely, then stood with his mouth ajar, saying nothing. After a moment he snapped it shut so hard his teeth clacked together.

He stood there, trying to keep his gaze on my face, like maybe it wouldn’t be polite to stare at my body, and I teased, “Dancer, you big gorgeous geek, I took all my clothes off so you would look at me.”

Permission granted, his gaze dropped like a stone. He looked down, up, down, and up again. I shivered as his gaze moved over me, making me feel hot and cold at the same time.

He stared and stared, and just when I was wondering what I might have to do to move things along, he reached behind his head, yanked off his shirt, unbuckled his belt, dropped his jeans, kicked them away into the pizza sauce, and he was naked, too.

“Couldn’t let you be naked alone,” he murmured.

“No,” I agreed, “that wouldn’t be right.”

“And I want everything to be right. I want it to be perfect for us. For you. You deserve that.” He moved toward me—finally!—still looking me up and down, slow and intense and astonished and gratifyingly awed.

For all my bluster about being epic when I finally had sex, I felt shaky and nervous and not at all composed. Butterflies fluttered from my stomach all the way up my throat. I tested my ability to access the slipstream. It was gone and I was relieved. I didn’t want to hurt him. “I’m pretty sure, since neither of us have done this before, it won’t be perfect.” But he was perfect. I’d seen my share of naked men, and although Dancer got shorted in the heart department, he hadn’t been shorted anywhere else. He was young and hot and sexy and his eyes were brilliant and shining and round with wonder.