Born in Blood (The Sentinels #1)(37)

“You woke me,” she murmured, her voice husky.

“Did I?” His tongue traced up the back of her neck, pausing at the tiny dip just below her ear. “You smell like apples.”

She trembled at the rasp of his morning beard, instinctively pressing her head deeper into the pillow as she invited him to continue his sensual exploration.

“What time is it?”

“Early,” he breathed in her ear, giving her lobe a sharp nip.

She jerked in pleasure, her heart picking up speed. “Then why aren’t you sleeping?”

He trailed his lips along her jaw, his touch seeming to sear her skin.

“I’m a morning person.”

Of course he was. She wrinkled her nose.

“Ugh.”

“Hey.” His arms tightened around her, surrounding her in delicious heat. “‘Ugh’ isn’t a word a man likes to hear from the woman waking in his arms.”

Callie swallowed her moan as he pressed his cheek to hers, his breath brushing her lips with the promise of a kiss.

“Then you shouldn’t have woken me up in the middle of the night.”

He chuckled. “Haven’t you heard that the early bird gets the worm?”

“Fine, you go hunt your worms and I’ll ...” She forgot how to speak as his hand slid beneath her robe to cup one aching breast. “Duncan.”

With a skill that made her eyes slide shut in feminine bliss, he circled her nipple with the tip of his finger.

“You told me to go hunting,” he reminded her. “You’re the only prey I’m interested in.”

Her hand clutched his arm as he tormented the sensitive bud with light, teasing strokes.

“I don’t think I like being called prey.”

“Okay.” With a speed that caught her off guard, Duncan had her robe pulled open and was yanking it off her body. “You be the bird and I’ll be the worm.” He pressed his fully engorged c**k against the bare skin of her ass. “I have better equipment for the role.”

She gave a husky chuckle as he pressed a line of kisses down her shoulder.

“You’re such a man.”

“I try.” He growled low in his throat, one hand continuing to pleasure her breast while the other slid down the flat plane of her stomach. “My god, you feel so good in my arms.”

She arched her back, shocked by her sizzling reaction to his every touch. It was as if she were perfectly tuned to his seduction.

Or maybe he was so practiced in pleasing a female he knew just how to elicit the response he wanted.

The thought was oddly troublesome.

“Do you do this often?”

His lips explored down her shoulder blade, his hand skimming along her hip and over her thigh to slip between her legs.

“Hold you in my arms?” he teased. “Not nearly often enough.”

She pulled in a shaky breath, barely capable of thinking as he gently tugged her leg up and over his hip, leaving her exposed to the caress of his searching fingers.

“Wake up in strange beds,” she managed in a strangled voice.

“I haven’t been with a woman since my divorce,” he confessed, his lips settling at a tender point on her nape as his fingers drew absent patterns on her inner thigh.

She groaned, a damp heat forming between her legs as his fingers strayed ever higher.

Oh ... baby.

It was almost more than she could stand. The tingles of electric pleasure darted from the tips of his fingers straight to the aching void in the pit of her stomach. The gentle tug on her hardened nipple. And the brush of warm lips up and down her nape.

No man had taken such care to ensure she was so fully aroused.

“Why me?” she demanded.

His fingers traveled another inch higher. “There’s the obvious reason.”

She grasped his forearm. Not to stop him. Hell, she might strangle him if he tried to halt.

But it was becoming increasingly difficult to remain still beneath his bold caresses and she had to do something to keep from squirming right off the bed.

“And what’s that?”

“I can’t be in the same room with you without imagining you stripped naked and spread across the nearest bed.”

“That’s ...” She squeaked as his fingers at last found the tender cleft, his touch so feather-light it only added to her rising frustration.

“Dangerous,” he whispered in her ear. “But not as dangerous as the less obvious reasons.”

Oh lord, it was hard to follow his words.

Her nails dug into his arm, her hips angling forward in a silent plea for satisfaction.

“Should I ask?”

His fingers gave a tug on her nipple, sending a blast of heat through her taut body.

“You fascinate me.”

Trembling beneath the onslaught of sensations, Callie lightly raked her nails up his hair-roughened arm, ridiculously pleased when he gave a low hiss of pleasure.

Hey, what was good for the gander was good for the goose.

Or something like that.

“Because I’m a freak?” she asked, her heart missing a beat as one finger slid into the slick heat of her body.

“Because you’re clever.” He stroked deeper. “And strong.” Another mind-destroying stroke. “And aggravatingly elusive.” Stroke, stroke. She bit her bottom lip, straining to contain her building explosion. “Your talents are just the icing on the cake.”