Serpent's Kiss (Elder Races #3)(90)

But she was also a predator. If he did not engage those instincts in her too, no matter how he tried to hold on, eventually he would lose her. And he could not let that happen. He would not.

He whispered back, “Always. But you have to want it too. You have to own up to it and admit you want me.”

Own up to it. Like she had taken ownership of her own life. Own it, take it, claim it.

He backed away from her until he reached the bed. His hands went to the buttons of his shirt as he toed off his shoes. His gaze held hers as he stripped off his shirt and tossed it into a corner, and that was when he began to lie. “You have to take me,” he said, “or I really will give up and go find someone else.”

“You wouldn’t,” she breathed. Her gaze was riveted to the bare expanse of his broad, tanned chest. The unsteadiness left her as her body went tense. Her beautiful lips parted. She did not look hungry. She looked starving.

It was the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen. He wanted to growl in triumph. It was his, that expression was for him. But it wasn’t enough. He hadn’t pushed her hard enough.

Come on, baby. Get cranky.

“I would,” the gryphon lied to his witch. His hands went to the fastening of his trousers. Then they came open. He wore nothing underneath. He pushed them down over his lean hips, the long heavy muscles of his thighs flexing as he kicked them off. “There would be nothing to stop me.” He cocked his head. “Maybe after all these years, I’ve discovered I have a type. Maybe I’ll find another dark-haired, beautiful woman. One who doesn’t argue about wearing pretty fashionable clothes or wearing makeup.”

Carling hissed, and her eyes flashed that pretty, scary red.

He put his hands on his hips and stood there nude, that insouciant alpha male, and he dared to taunt her while the sight of his body drove all the reason out of her head. Her hands fisted as she stared at him. He was built for both speed and power, wide in the shoulders and long, without an ounce of extra flesh anywhere. Washboard abs rippled down to his large erection. His large, tight testicles had drawn up underneath his penis. He was beautifully formed everywhere, with a hard warrior’s body that was poetry in motion.

Rune gave her his sleepiest, most disingenuous smile. “Maybe I’ll find someone who bites.”

A scorching image flashed in her mind, of him caressing an unknown woman who took his vein. She bared her teeth and launched at him.

He fell back on the bed as he caught her, and then she was on top of him, hands planted on the bed on either side of his head as she straddled him. His hard, wild face was flushed with arousal, and lit with a bladelike smile. Carling snarled, “Do you think I don’t know you’re playing me?”

“My give-a-shit button’s broken, baby,” Rune said. He cupped the back of her head and coaxed her down toward him. “Kiss me,” he whispered. “Take me. Don’t let me go—or I’ll go.” Then he said telepathically the same words he had said to her, so very long ago. But this man who is in front of you—I am waiting for you with everything I am.

She looked at him with such feral bewilderment he might have laughed if the stakes weren’t so high. “You have legions of women, and I don’t share.”

“There’ll be no one else, ever again. I’m all yours,” he murmured. “Body and soul.”

The Vampyre sorceress, who had been Queen, hissed in his face, “Swear it.”

“I swear it,” he whispered, stroking her hair. In this one thing they mirrored each other, for he needed her dominance and tenderness too. He opened his eyes wide again to take all of her in because he didn’t want to miss a single moment of this gorgeous, deadly woman.

“I tried to be good. I tried to set you free.” But she was a bad woman, of course. It was something she came to terms with centuries ago. His Power roared against her senses, even as he lay stretched out underneath her. She was so slick from wanting him, she felt drenched.

“Why would I want you to be good? I want you to be you.”

“If I take you, I will never let you go.” Her gaze grew heavy-lidded as she came down to his lips. “Never.”

“I will always hold on to you,” he said against her mouth. “Always.”

He slid his hands under her silken flowing T-shirt, and his clever fingers found their way under the camisole underneath. He eased the material up, and she held her arms up so he could pull it over her head. Then she was naked to the waist, and he almost groaned aloud as her gorgeous full br**sts swung free. He fingered the dusky aureoles, watching as the ni**les stiffened with pleasure. She caught her breath, and his c**k pulsed at the telltale, ragged sound.

Then she lifted off of him. The beast who had been lying in wait for her to take him lunged to the surface to snatch at her, but she was only shrugging out of her jeans. Her hands were shaking so that she could hardly manage it. He sat to help her yank her boots off, and then her jeans were gone as well. Her curved body was unbelievably gorgeous, bearing the twin scars of the whip and flowing with the sinuous grace of a cat, and it was Carling’s naked body, Carling’s most private places that were revealed, Carling who looked at him with the feral red gaze that was yet still delicate with need, and the luscious, plump, frilly flesh between her strong slender legs was so beautiful, it sent him into a meltdown.

He came down on top of her. She was already wrapping her legs and arms around him as his mouth drove onto hers. His hands were shaking, everything was shaking, and the sound that came out of him was harsh and guttural and completely inhuman. She felt between their bodies and grasped his cock, her palm massaging the broad thick head, and he felt huge and full and in so much goddamn pain, it was like he had never taken her. “Oh f**k, I wanted to take my time with you,” he gritted between clenched teeth.