“Spread your legs for me, Red.”
Heat rushed through her, a furious mix of desire and anger. Within the space of one heartbeat and the next, he caged her, his palms pressing against the doorframe on either side of her head.
Asshole.
She pulled one of her knives, moving with a speed few could match, sliding it against his inner thigh.
“Spread yours,” she countered.
His grin only broadened. “You want me as badly as I want you. I can feel your desire rising from your hot little body like steam. I can smell your heat and see it in your eyes.”
“The only heat you see in my eyes is anger.”
He dipped his head, his warm tongue darting out to place a quick lick at her temple. “I can taste the desire on your skin. Sooner or later, you’re going to spread your legs for me, and I’m going to push deep inside you, over and over, until we’re both screaming for release.”
As hard as she tried to steel herself against the erotic power of his words, she felt her body melting,
wanting.
She pressed the knife tighter against his leg. “How about I cut off that cock of yours and see if it improves your manners any.”
He lowered his hands, freeing her from the cage of his arms. At least that was what she thought he was doing until his hands clamped onto her waist, his palms pressing against the undersides of her rib cage. The sudden burst of unnatural warmth startled her, rushing into her like a flow of pure, sexual heat. The lava ran down, flowing into her inner reaches, heating her, setting flame to the sparks he’d ignited with his presence and words.
Moisture gathered between her thighs as her deep inner walls began to pulse and swell. Heat filled her, opening her wide as her body begged for penetration. Deep inside her, a pressure began to build, a roaring, volcanic orgasm.
No, dammit.
She sliced through Jag’s pants, sinking her knife deep into his inner thigh.
As warm blood rushed over her hand, he jerked away from her.
“Bitch.”
The word growled from his throat.
With his hands no longer pressing unnatural heat into her, the building orgasm slowed and stilled, whirling close,
so close,
before dying a throbbing, aching death.
Olivia gave him her frostiest look. “You’ll keep your paws to yourself, Feral.”
Even as anger flared in the brown depths of Jag’s eyes, his mouth kicked up in a dangerous smile. “This isn’t over, Red. Not by a long shot. Before we’re done, you’ll be begging me to fuck you.”
“Only in your dreams, Cat. Only in your dreams.”
To her surprise, he gripped her jaw, something raw and wild in his eyes. “You don’t know anything about my dreams.”
She stared at him, glimpsing again the torment she’d recognized in the war room earlier. “You might be surprised, Jag.” Jerking her chin out of his grasp, she wiped her knife on her pants but kept it at the ready as she turned and left him there. His gaze bored holes into her back until she rounded the corner.
Damn him. Her body ached, so close to release that all she’d have to do was reach into the front of her pants and brush her finger over herself a couple of times to bring on a screaming orgasm. She was sorely tempted to duck into one of the empty rooms and do just that, except she feared Jag would follow and find her like that, in the throes of the passion he’d driven her to. She didn’t even want to think about what would happen next. His prediction could all too well come true. She would spread her legs and absolutely beg him to fill her.
Goddess, but she had to get away from that man.
With a growl of deep sexual frustration, Jag strode through the foyer and out the front door. Lavender and
pink streaked the eastern sky, just visible through the branches of the thick trees that surrounded Feral House. The morning air smelled of dew and damp earth, of trees and grass and the small creatures that shared the land with the humans and Ferals.
But it was the sweet scent of Olivia’s hair, the heady musk of her arousal, and the metallic smell of his own blood that lingered in his nose.
Damn, but he throbbed. His leg had already healed, thanks to his immortal Therian nature, but his body ached for release. He strode across the wide, circular drive lined with cars—everything from his own yellow Hummer to Kougar’s silver Lamborghini and the three nondescript sedans Lyon had purchased during Tighe’s recent run-in with the law.
Reaching the woods on the other side, he stripped off his pants, tossing them onto the ground as he pulled on the power inside him, the power of the jaguar that had marked him and claimed him over two and a half centuries ago.
In a rush of raw power, pure pleasure, and a flash of sparkling light, he shifted into his animal. A jaguar.
His line of sight shifted, his senses exploding with his cat’s. Without a moment’s hesitation, he took off through the woods at a full-out run, desperate to douse the fire that burned inside him. Though the shift into his animal form cooled the raging passion that had claimed his man’s body, the fire continued to burn inside, deep
in the recesses of his mind. Desire for something he couldn’t even name. Obsession with a woman he didn’t even want, except in the most carnal sense. A fire that licked at his innermost self with a pain he’d long ago learned to live with, though he found it impossible to ignore.
He ran, uncertain of his destination and not caring, as the damp morning breeze blew through his whiskers. But when he found himself high above the rocky cliffs overlooking the Potomac River, he climbed onto the rocks and stood, his cat’s body breathing quickly from the run, his jaguar’s face lifted to the wind.
What if he kept running? What if he never looked back? Never
came
back? The thought had entered his mind too many times to count. And he might have done it. A thousand times, he might have run, never to return. Except for two things—being a Feral Warrior was the one thing that made his life worthwhile, and the certainty that running would accomplish nothing. Because the thing he most wanted to be free of, he couldn’t outrun.
Himself.
Finally, he turned back for Feral House, his thoughts on the woman who wouldn’t leave his mind. Olivia. Dammit, but she intrigued him. He’d never seen her out of her pantsuits until tonight. He’d thought her hot in her trim business persona, but dressed for action, she’d set his blood on fire. He could still see her as
she’d stood in the media-room doorway, her thick red hair deliciously sleep-tousled, her feet bare, the pants clinging to her narrow hips, the tank top molding every sweet dip and swell of her breasts.
She put on that ice-princess act, but she was as hot for him as he was for her. And when he’d touched her with his palms, pressing the pleasure into her, he’d nearly melted from the heat that had roared off her.
The odd ability to heat or cool with his hands had seemed useless until he’d long ago learned to use it to excite and pleasure his lovers; but never had a woman risen so fast, so violently, when all he’d done was touch her waist. What would happen if he slid his hand between her legs and palmed her?
The thought of it, of the scream of release that would almost certainly follow, excited the hell out of him.
This thing wasn’t over between them, not by a long shot. Somehow he had to make certain she decided to partner him herself. And he knew just how to do it. He had her number. He knew pride when he saw it, and Olivia was made of the stuff.
Yeah, she was going to be his partner. And before this mission ended, that neat little package of a female body would be his.
Olivia sat alone at the huge table in the Feral’s dining room, devouring the piles of food on her plate. It was nearly noon, the time they’d agreed to meet to grab lunch and leave for their respective Daemon-tracking assignments. With no true understanding of the wraith Daemons, they weren’t certain if they were nocturnal like their draden hosts, or could move freely during the day. Nor had they any idea where they’d hole up during daylight if they
were
nocturnal.
So the teams would head out in broad daylight to begin a hunt that could take days.
She cut another thick bite of ham and shoved it into her mouth, amazed her stomach could hold so much. After her frustrating encounter with Jag just before
dawn, she’d devoured a plateful of food out of a refrigerator mostly stocked with meat, then returned to her room, where she’d given in to the need to relieve the awful sexual tension Jag had left her with. As she’d guessed, only a few quick strokes of her finger had brought on a cataclysmic release.
She’d fallen asleep almost immediately after, sleeping a solid six hours. And woken starved again. Her body was burning through the food at an alarming rate.
Pink set a platter of thick-sliced toast on the table, preparing for the rest of the household, who should be arriving any minute. With a smile at the pink-feathered bird-woman, Olivia grabbed a couple slices, eating them quickly. The others better get down soon, or there wasn’t going to be anything left.
What she craved and needed was life energy. She couldn’t get away from Jag soon enough.
She’d decided Niall would be the one to partner him. Niall was by far the more even-tempered of her two men and far less likely to let Jag’s antagonistic remarks draw him into a fight. And while her instincts told her Jag would never intentionally kill one of their own, a Feral with his claws and fangs drawn could be deadly to mortals and immortals alike. No Therian would ever win against a Feral. Not unless the Feral let him.
Or, in her case, unless she had an unfair advantage.
She had confidence that Niall would be able to handle
Jag for a few days, and that should be all they needed to find and kill the Daemons.
The sound of male footsteps and the low sound of voices beyond the dining-room door warned her she was about to get company. A moment later, Ewan and Niall walked into the room in uniform, dressed in black pants and boots much like hers, and dark red T-shirts.
A bear of a man, Ewan possessed fair coloring and a neck as thick as her upper thigh. Niall, on the other hand, stood lean and wiry, as dark as Ewan was fair. Of the two, Niall’s eyes were by far the softer. At least when they looked at her.
Both men followed her without question, or they wouldn’t be under her command. But she and Niall had known one another for more than three hundred years and had been intimate on and off during most of that time. And while that wasn’t unusual, she knew Niall wanted more from her. A relationship. Commitment. Neither of which she would ever give him.
To his credit, he didn’t push. She’d have him reassigned if he did, and he knew it.
She didn’t hear Jag enter, but knew the instant he did. The Feral, even in his human form, walked as silently as his animal counterpart. Jag wore a black T-shirt over a different pair of army green cargo pants. As Niall and Ewan took the seats on either side of her, Jag claimed the chair directly across from her. Naturally.
She braced for more carnal remarks, longing to ignore
him, but if she’d learned anything by now, it was that he’d only take her feigned indifference as more of a challenge. As if she hadn’t presented him with enough of one already.
She met his gaze with a simple nod, but the flash of devilish fire that lit his eyes had her groaning silently.
Here we go again.
Jag served himself from the platter piled high with thick slices of rare roast beef, a smile playing at his mouth as he considered the best way to force Olivia’s hand, to make her partner with him instead of tossing him one of her men, as she wanted to. And he had no doubt she wanted to.
His sex talk in the war room yesterday had clearly riled her pair of bodyguards, though they’d been good little soldiers and stood down when Olivia’s slender hand shot out to stop them. What would it take to push them too far?
Ah, wouldn’t it be fun to find out.
His gaze skimmed over Olivia’s pretty face, dipping to her shoulders and lower, before returning to her eyes. “Did you dream about me, Sugar?”
“And why would I dream about you, Jag? You’d have to cross my mind first.”
He smiled with true enjoyment. Matching wits with this one was the most fun he’d had in…he couldn’t remember how long. “Why, Sugar, I dreamed about you.
The feel of you beneath my hands, your sexy little cries as you rose toward release.”
Niall’s mouth tightened, but he made no other indication he’d heard. Ewan didn’t seem to care at all, but really, why should they? The two men probably just assumed he’d coaxed Olivia into his bed.
Pity that wasn’t the truth.
To hell with the truth. He needed something more.
Mouth twisting unpleasantly, he leaned forward. “In my dream it wasn’t my fingers I shoved inside your wet heat when I trapped you in the media room early this morning, Red, it was my cock.”
Deep inside him, his animal growled with disapproval, the damned beast. Everyone was a critic.
Olivia jerked, staring at him in shock at the blatant lie.
Niall and Ewan lunged to their feet as one, their hunting knives in their hands.
And looky here. His little ploy had worked like a charm.
“He’s lying,” Olivia snapped.
Jag just grinned at her. “My fingers are still throbbing from the squeeze of your tight, wet little sheath, Red.”
Niall started around the table as if he intended to defend her honor. But the daggers in Olivia’s eyes had Jag wondering if she wouldn’t slice him and dice him herself.
Olivia shot to her feet. “Niall, stand down!”
Lies or not, Jag’s words reeked of disrespect, and her men weren’t having it. Olivia fisted her hands on the
table. She appreciated their loyalty, she really did. But dammit! A fight could only end in disaster. Instigator or not, Jag belonged here, and they didn’t. If there was trouble, she had no doubt who’d be out on their asses.
The Therians.
And she was not ready to lose this one chance to work with the Ferals.
Damn Jag!
He rose lazily to his feet, the muscles rippling beneath his T-shirt.
Olivia glared at him. “You are one messed-up fuck.”
The jackass winked at her. Winked! But there was nothing lazy about his stance, or his eyes, as he followed Niall’s progress around the table. Every line of his body said he was itching for this fight.
“Niall,
stand down.
” When he didn’t respond, she slammed her fists onto the table, sending the china hopping.
“Now!”
The last of Olivia’s hopes of escaping Jag sank like a rowboat in a storm.
A deep, rumbling growl came from the doorway, and Olivia turned to find Lyon and Kara walking in, Tighe and Delaney close behind. Lyon’s gaze slid from Niall, now standing stock-still three feet from Jag, his knife gripped tight in his hand, to Jag. Lyon’s face turned dark as a draden cloud.
Niall sheathed his knife and quickly retreated to his seat, as if that warning had been directed at him. Olivia
felt certain it hadn’t been. Lyon had no illusions about the troublemaking nature of his jaguar Feral.
The frustration and resignation clouding Lyon’s eyes as his gaze met Jag’s confirmed it. She commiserated with the Feral leader. How did you manage a man like Jag? A man so adept at antagonizing others. A man you were forced to keep on your team through circumstances far beyond your control. Only eight Feral Warriors currently existed in the world. Eight with the strength and power needed to fight the Mage, who sought to free Satanan and his horde. And if one of those eight happened to be a trouble-causing asshole, what choice had you but to deal with it?
Just as she had no choice but to partner the jackass. Sending either of her men with him would only end in disaster. Niall might be the more even-tempered of the two, but not when it came to her. As he’d gone after Jag, his feelings for her had shone from his face as clearly as a beacon on a clear night. And Jag had seen them. She was sure of it.
If she tried to pair either Niall or Ewan with Jag, he’d goad them into attacking him, she had little doubt. Which could well prove fatal. And not to Jag.
Dammit, I am going to have to partner Jag myself.
Olivia sighed. Such was the price of leadership. Though her situation was considerably more complicated than merely dealing with a surly warrior.
Jag was a danger to her in a way he was to no one
else. Because he could feel her feed. Which meant she was going to have to find a way to escape him on a regular basis. Either that, or they’d end up spending hours a day trying to keep food in her, which would only raise his suspicions as well.
As the others joined them, Tighe met her gaze across the table. “I’d like for you to accompany Delaney and me, Olivia, if that meets with your approval.”
Olivia glanced at Jag, unable to help herself. The gleam in his eyes laughed at her. He knew he’d backed her into a corner. That was exactly what he’d meant to do.
“I’ll be sending Ewan with you, Tighe. I’ll be partnering Jag.”
She felt the sharp disapproval of her men, but neither showed disrespect by undermining her position out loud.
Tighe looked at her askance. “Are you sure? He’s an ass.”
Olivia’s surprised gaze slid to Delaney, beside him, and they shared a moment’s amusement. Tighe wasn’t averse to calling it as he saw it.
“I’m aware of that, Tighe. I can handle him.”
She glanced at Jag, daring him to make one more inappropriate comment.
But for once the shifter remained silent, satisfaction written all over his face. He’d gotten just what he wanted.
“Niall will partner with Hawke,” Olivia continued, turning her gaze back to Tighe.
The tiger shifter nodded, his eyes holding a mix of concern and respect. And no small amount of speculation. Did he believe her interested in the jaguar? Did any woman have so little self-respect that she willingly sought such crass dominance in a male? It didn’t please her that he might think she was such a female.
Then again, what did it matter what anyone thought so long as her reasons were sound? And they were.
Tighe nodded. “All right, then. As soon as we eat, we’ll head out.”
Jag smiled a thoroughly self-satisfied smile as she took her seat again. “I’ll make all your dreams come true, Sugar.”
Beside her, Niall growled low in his throat.
“I suspect you’re right, Jag,” Olivia said coolly. “Since my dreams all involve knives. And blood.”
Several of the Ferals snorted, someone chuckled.
“She’s got your number, Cat,” Wulfe drawled.
Olivia had expected to draw a glimmer of anger from Jag at the reminder of what had really happened early that morning, but he disappointed her. The smile that lifted his mouth was hard-edged, but genuine.
“Bring it on.”
Jag glanced over at Olivia, sitting in the front passenger seat of his Hummer as he drove to Harpers Ferry a short while later. She’d donned a leather jacket over the tank and black pants—not a prissy, tailored little jacket, but
one that had clearly seen its share of battle. She might still be the haughty ice princess, but she looked the part of a warrior now.
Goddess, she turned him on.
They’d left the crowded D.C. suburbs quickly enough and now drove along the narrow roads winding through tiny towns and across farms and vineyards.
“Why does a pretty little girl like you want to get her hands dirty fighting draden? That’s what I can’t figure out.”
Though she barely moved a muscle, he felt her annoyance at the
little-girl
crack. He enjoyed annoying her, enjoyed watching the anger snap in her eyes.
Unfortunately, the crack failed to get a rise out of her.
“What’s with the Scottish accent? Your words and phrasing are all American.”
Again, she didn’t answer, and he figured she’d decided simply to freeze him out. He wasn’t sure why he wanted her talking to him, but he did.
“I’m an ass, Olivia. We both know it. But I’d like to know a little more about you.”
She cut him a look, assessing. Contemplative. Then slowly turned to the front again. “I was born in Scotland and lived there for several hundred years. But I spent half the nineteenth century and all of the twentieth in the New England enclaves, mostly Boston and New York. Six years ago I was promoted to the rank of team leader and reassigned to the British Guard.”
Her voice had a depth to it, a feminine richness that slid over his skin like satin. The brogue added just the right touch of texture and warmth.
“And now you’re back.”
“I am.”
“Why did you join the Guard?” He found himself genuinely interested in her. Not just her body, even though that interest continued to erupt like fireworks in his blood, but in the person. Olivia. She intrigued him more than any woman had in a long, long time.
But again, she was silent so long he didn’t think she intended to answer. When she finally did, her words surprised him.
“My mother was killed by draden when I was seven. You might say I have a score to settle.”
“If you’ve been doing this for centuries, I’m thinking that score’s been settled a few hundred times over.”
“You’re wrong, Feral. That score will never be settled so long as draden continue to exist on this Earth.”
He heard the conviction of her words, felt it all the way to his bones, where it resonated deeply.
“I’m good at what I do,” she said simply. “And I enjoy it.”
“I get that. I feel the same,” he added, surprising himself with his honesty.
Surprising them both. Her brows rose as she shot him a curious look. “You
like
being a Feral Warrior? You have an odd way of showing it, Jag.”