Lover Unleashed (Black Dagger Brotherhood #9)(98)

As she threw her hand out to catch her balance, he was on it, guiding her down so that she was safely sitting on the bench. Arching up, he palmed her nape and kissed her deep as he went for the soap and got ready to make sure she was very, very clean. As her tongue met his own, he was so into the feel of her nipples brushing against his chest and her lips against his own that he didn’t notice or care that his hair was plastering onto his skull or that the scrubs had Saran Wrapped on him, clinging to his body.

“Healer . . .” she gasped as he started soaping her skin.

Her upper body grew slick and hot as his palms went all over her, from her neck to the tops of her hip bones. And then he started in on her legs, working her delicate feet and ankles and moving ever upward, over her calves and the backs of her knees.

Water was all around them, falling between them, washing her off as soon as he sudsed her up, and the sound of it falling on the tile was drowned out only by her moans.

Shit was only going to get louder, too.

Sucking on her neck, he spread her knees wider and wider, pushing himself between them. “I told you”—he bit her a little—“you would like bathtime.”

In response, her hands speared into his shoulders, her nails digging in and making him wonder if it wasn’t time to start thinking about baseball stats, zip codes . . . car prices.

Eleanor Roosevelt.

“You were correct, healer,” she said, panting. “I love it—but you are too well clothed.”

Manny closed his eyes as he shuddered. And then he got enough control over himself so he could speak. “Nah . . . I’m good the way I am. You just lean back and let me take care of this.”

Before she could respond, he sealed his mouth on hers and pushed her against the wall with his chest. To get her to stay away from the subject of his getting naked, he slid both hands up the insides of her thighs and ran his fingertips across her sex.

As he felt how wet she was—and it was the kind of wet that had nothing to do with water and everything to do with what he wanted all over his tongue—he pulled back a little and looked down.

Fucking . . . hell . . . she was so ready for him. And, man, what she looked like, all bent back, the water making her breasts glisten, her lips parted and a little bruised from him kissing her, her legs spread apart.

“Will you take me now?” she moaned, her eyes flashing, her fangs elongating.

“Yes . . .”

He gripped her knees and went down, putting his mouth where his eyes had locked. As she cried out, he went for it hard and fast, engulfing her sex, driving her hard, making no excuses for how much he wanted her. When she blew apart, his tongue went into her and he felt it all, the pulses, the way she jerked against his chin and nose, the hard grip of her hands on his head.

No reason to stop there.

With her, he had endless stamina, and he knew, as long as his scrubs stayed on him, he could keep going like this with her . . . forever.




Vishous woke up in a bed that was not his own, but it didn’t take him more than a nanosecond to know where he was: the clinic. In one of the recovery rooms.

After giving his eyes a good rub, he glanced around. The light was on in the bathroom and its door was cracked, so there was plenty to see by . . . and the first thing that stood out was the duffel bag across the way on the floor.

It was one of his. Specifically, the one he’d given Jane.

She wasn’t here, however. Not in this room, at least.

As he sat up, he felt as if he’d been in a car accident, aches and pains blooming all over his body like he was an antenna and every single radio signal in the world was channeling into his nervous system. With a groan, he shifted around so that his legs dangled off the bed—and then he had to take a little breather.

Couple of minutes later, it was a case of push and pray: He shoved his weight off the mattress and hoped—

Bingo. Legs held.

The side that had been worked on by Manello was not exactly ready to run a marathon, but as V ripped off the bandages and did some flexing, he had to be impressed. The scars from the knee surgery were almost completely healed already, nothing except a pale pink line left behind. But more importantly, what was underneath was straight-up magic: The joint felt fantastic. Even with the stiffness that remained, he could tell it was functioning perfectly.

Hip felt good as new, too.

Goddamn human surgeon was a miracle worker.

On his way to the loo, his eyes passed over that duffel bag. Memories from his morphine trip filtered back and were far clearer than the actual experience had been. God, Jane was a spectacular doctor. In the night-to-night running of life, he hadn’t so much forgotten that as not experienced it in a while. She always went the extra mile with her patients. Always. And she didn’t treat his brothers so well because they were tied to him. It had nothing to do with his ass—those people were hers in those moments. She would have treated civilians, members of the glymera . . . even humans in exactly the same way.

Inside the bathroom, he got into the shower, and man, it was crowded in the stall. As he thought about Jane and his sister, he had a terrible feeling he’d oversimplified what he’d walked in on the night before yesterday. He hadn’t stopped to consider that there was some other relationship at work between the two females. It had been all about him and his sister . . . nothing about the doctor/patient bond.

Scratch that. It had been all about him; nothing about Payne and what she wanted out of her life. Or what Jane had done or not done for her patient.