The Dark-Hunters (750 page)

“Well, I got a fear here that I ain’t doing it right, and I don’t want this to be wrong.”

She smiled then. A real one that reached all the way to her eyes and warmed him to his toes. Licking her lips, she lifted herself up so that he could undo her pants. “I promise you, it’s all good.”

Maybe, but wrangling her pants off her was another matter entirely. She actually elbowed him in the eye as she tried to maneuver.

She gasped in horror at what she’d done as she cupped her hands around her mouth. “Oh my God, are you okay?”

He rubbed at his eye and considered knifing his Squire when he got home. “Andy needs a bigger car.” Damn it. Why did pain have to intrude right now?

She laughed again. “You poor baby.” She leaned forward to kiss his eye, and that drove away most of the pain.

When she leaned into the passenger seat and pulled her pants off, that took the rest of it. She had long, shapely legs that begged for a tongue bath. Another thing he couldn’t do in this infernally small car.

I’m torching this thing when I get it home.…

She hesitated at the waistband of her black panties. It was sheer torture for him.

“You changing your mind?”
Please, don’t change your mind.
That’d be downright cruel, and he wasn’t sure he could survive it. Not after they’d come this far.

Shaking her head, she slid them down her legs slowly. Seductively.

Dayam …

He thought he was going to die as he saw her naked. She was exquisite. And he was so hard now, he felt like he was about to explode. Before he could catch another thought, she was back in his seat, straddling him again as if she was as eager for him as he was for her.

Ah, yeah … he could die right now without regret. This was what he’d been craving.

She raised up on her knees and pulled at his shirt.

Gladly, Jess let her strip him. He was as desperate to feel her skin on his as she was. Never in his life had he seen anything hotter or felt anything sexier than her breasts pressing against his bare flesh. He ran his hands through her hair, inhaling the scent of it as it stirred around them.

While he was far from celibate, he’d never been with a woman before who knew him. As a human, because of Bart, he’d been branded an outlaw at age thirteen. So by the time he was with a woman, he’d known better than to let her know his real identity. Or anything about him that she could tell or sell to someone out to put a bullet in him.

Then after he’d become a Dark-Hunter, he’d been expressly forbidden from telling anyone about their existence. He’d had to hide his fangs, his age.

Everything.

Only Abigail knew the truth about him. And it made this moment all the hotter. There was no fear of slipping up by letting her tongue brush against his fangs. Or having to be careful when he nibbled her since she might notice his longer teeth.

For once he could be himself, and that was the most incredible feeling of all.

He ran his tongue over her breast, savoring the ridges in her hardened nipple. Her skin smelled like the sweetest nectar imaginable. And the sensation of her hands in his hair …

If he died tonight, it’d be worth it.

She
would be worth it.

All of a sudden, she let out a soft giggle. The uncharacteristic sound surprised him. “What are you laughing at?”

Her face turned bright red. “It’s too cheesy to even mention.”

Yeah, there was something a man didn’t want to hear in this situation.
What did I do?
“Now, hon, you can’t leave me hanging like that. I have to know.”

Please don’t be laughing at me.

She bit her lip. The expression was so playful and adorable that it made his stomach flutter. “I was thinking of the phrase, ‘Save a horse, ride a cowboy.’”

He laughed. “Well, baby, you can ride me any time you get the urge.” He feigned deadly earnest. “I’m here for you.”

She wrinkled her nose as she leaned him back in the seat. Damn if she wasn’t the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

He slid his hand up her thigh until he found what he was seeking. She was warm and wet and she let out a deep moan as he lightly fingered her.

Abigail couldn’t breathe as Jess slid his fingers deep into her body. Oh yeah, that was what she’d been desperate for. And it set her entire body on fire. Kissing his lips, she rose up and allowed him to guide her down onto him.

She sucked her breath in sharply at the sensation of him hard and full inside her.

This … this was heaven.

Her heart pounding, she rode him slow and gentle, savoring every inch of him. She laved his neck as she ran her hands over his muscled chest. He had a number of scars marring his flesh. Most looked like knife wounds or from barbed wire. But a few were obvious bullet wounds.

Anger whipped through her that anyone would hurt him like that.

Until she remembered that she would have killed him, too.

Thank God I didn’t.
And she was grateful to whatever power had brought them together. Most importantly to the one that had kept her from hurting him.

Not even the sight of the double bow-and-arrow mark of a Dark-Hunter on his arm could detract from this moment. Even that looked like it had hurt when he received it.

She’d never thought about that before. Dark-Hunters had their souls stripped from them. How much agony did Artemis put them through when she took it?

Abigail knew from her own experience when her own soul had withered and died the night she lost her parents, how bad it hurt to lose one. Her scar had never healed.

Neither had his …

Jess let her take control of their pleasure as he ran the back of his hand across her breast. He enjoyed watching her love him, watching the light in her eyes that touched a part of him he liked to pretend didn’t exist. It made him remember long-forgotten things that he’d buried deep inside.

As a human, all he’d ever really wanted was a calm, peaceful home with a good woman by his side. Someone he could grow old with, who would make him laugh and give him a reason to look forward to the next day.

And the ones thereafter.

A woman like Abigail.

She was a little more challenging than what he’d had in mind. But sometimes, cravings left out important, if not irritating, details. He actually liked her stubbornness. Most of all, her spirit.

More than that, there was a spark inside her. A fire that warmed him through and through.

Abigail smiled as Jess took her hand and led it to his lips so that he could kiss and nibble her knuckles. It was so sweet. Until he nipped her flesh with his fangs. Not too hard, but enough to send a quick rush through her.

There was nothing sexier than her cowboy. Nothing hotter than feeling him inside and outside her body while he held her close and loved her.

It was the headiest of mixtures. One so hot that it sent her straight over the edge. Throwing her head back, she felt her body release. She lost herself to that one moment of sheer perfection.

Jess smiled as he saw and felt her climax on top of him. Her body clutched his, heightening his own pleasure. He lifted his hips, driving himself in even deeper, while taking care not to bump her head against the low-hanging roof.

She cried out in ecstasy.

And he quickly joined her there. His head reeled as wave after wave of pleasure rolled through him. Yeah, he needed this a lot more than he’d thought. For the first time in weeks, his head was clear and his body calm.

Right now, he was the happiest man on the planet.
That’s right, all you badass punks. Bring it.

’Cause right now, he felt like he could take on anything or anyone. And he was more than ready to.

Abigail lay flat against Jess’s bare chest, listening to his heart pounding under her ear. A fine sheen of sweat covered them both as she slowly came to her senses.

I’m sitting naked in a car wash surrounded by angry wasps trying to kill us … with a man I’ve only known about forty hours.

Yeah, this was one for the books. And she definitely deserved the I-Have-No-Shame and What-the-Hell-Was-
I
-Thinking Award.

I can’t believe I just did this.

But then, she’d have had it no other way. She really didn’t regret it.
And at least I don’t have to worry about getting pregnant or diseased.
The one good thing about a Dark-Hunter was that they couldn’t have children or carry any kind of STD or other illness.

Still, it was embarrassing. Anyone could walk in on them. Any minute.
I would die if anyone did.

Jess kissed the top of her head. “We’re all right, Abs. I have the doors sealed, and no one’s coming.”

That went over her like an ice-water plunge. Her entire body locked up in horror.

“You heard that?”

“Um, yeah,” he answered without reservation.

She shot up to stare at him as a new terror went through her. No … she better be wrong.

Surely …

“You can hear my thoughts?”

Now his gaze turned panicked. He glanced around as if trying to access some cosmic database in his head that would funnel a correct answer to him and get him out of this. “Uh…”

Good answer …

Not. His inner computer must be on the fritz, and her fury was mounting by the heartbeat. She could absolutely kill him! This was awful. Horrible!

Why didn’t he tell me?

Abigail curled her lip. Yeah, okay, she vaguely remembered seeing that ability in one of those weird psychotic flashbacks of his past, but it hadn’t sunk in and stayed with her.

Now it did.

“Oh my God, you can hear my thoughts!” She was thoroughly humiliated. Anger whipped through her as she returned to her seat and snatched for her underwear.
Oh, don’t even get me started on the indignity of this.…
She wanted to crawl under the seat and die.
I should throw myself outside and let the wasps have me.

Oh wait, he can hear me. He’s probably listening in right now like some psychic pervert, getting his jollies off my embarrassment.

You suck, Sundown. You. Suck.

That
she hoped he could hear.

She glared at him. “Why didn’t you tell me you could do that?”

He held his hands up in surrender. “It’s all right, Abby.” His tone was soothing, but his eyes still showed panic.

And she wasn’t ready to listen to any form of reason. She was too humiliated. Gah, if he’d heard everything she’d thought …

She couldn’t stand it. “It’s not all right. How dare you not tell me about this. What kind of sicko are you? I can’t believe you’d do that. It’s so intrusive and … and…” She couldn’t think of a word bad enough to convey how very bad it was, and she was too angry to have full access to her vocabulary, anyway. “Have you been spying on me the whole time?”

Jess silently cursed as she continued to rant at him and snatch her clothes on. Damn, the woman was hotheaded. Not that he fully blamed her for it. He’d be pissed, too, if someone was traipsing in his mind.

Still …

“Abby, listen to me. I can hear thoughts—”

“Little late now, bucko.” The last word was said with such snapping venom, it oddly reminded him of a chicken clucking. She snapped her head up to pierce him with a look that really should have splintered him into pieces. Damn, someone should bottle that. It’d make entire armies drop arms. “I noticed. Thanks for volunteering
that.
Let me give you a Hero Award for your first confession. Big flippin’ hairy doo dah…” Then she added an extremely sarcastic, “Woo. Hoo.”

“But,” he continued in what he hoped was a calming tone while he ignored her outburst and go-to-hell-and-roast-your-nuts glare. Now, that was what he deserved a Hero Award for. Took guts to face a woman this angry. “I don’t. Not normally. Just every now and again, something comes through and pops into my head, like your question. I don’t know how it got past my defenses. Maybe ’cause I was in my zone and not thinking of anything other than how good you felt.”

She covered herself with her jeans. “Like I believe that. How stupid do you think I am?”

“I don’t think you’re stupid at all.”
He
was the rank idiot who’d opened his mouth when he should have kept it closed. His mama had always said 90 percent of intelligence was knowing when to shut up.

Other 10 percent was knowing when to nut up—which he was trying to do, but it wasn’t easy.

She finally paused and locked gazes with him. That look paralyzed him because he knew if he so much as blinked wrong, it would set her off again, and that was the last thing he wanted.

Don’t smile. Don’t sweat. Don’t do nothing.

Don’t even breathe.

It was like watching a salivating bear you knew would either lumber past and go on its way …

Or rip your arm off and beat you with it.

“How do I know you’re not in my head right now?”

He ran various answers through his mind.
’Cause I said so.
Nah, that’d get him bitch-slapped for sure.
I wouldn’t dare.
Made him sound like a coward.

Think, Jess, think.

Finally he opted for the simple truth. “It’s rude, and I wouldn’t want anyone to do it to me, so I try hard not to do it to others. Honestly, it ain’t my favorite power. You have no idea how sick people are, and I really don’t want to know most days. The world can have their thoughts. I got enough of my own to deal with.”

Abigail hesitated as she considered his words. For reasons that made no sense whatsoever, she believed him. Not to mention, what he said made a lot of sense. She wouldn’t want to look into other people’s minds and find out their psychoses and insecurities, either.

And he hadn’t said or done anything previously that led her to believe he had that ability. Her only clue had been that one snippet with him and the lawyer.

He’d been stressed then, too.

Okay, I’m going to trust him.
But if she ever found him near her thoughts again without her permission … It definitely wouldn’t pay to be in his boots.