Shadow Alpha (15 page)

And maybe she had.

Once again Kat took note of the scar on Dair’s back as the two of them soaped and caressed each other in the heat of the shower spray. She
would
ask him about it, but at a time when they weren’t surrounded by the steam from the hot water pounding down on them, enclosing them in the complete intimacy of the moment.

“I hope you’ve regained your breath fully now, Kat, because I can’t wait any longer,” Dair growled, his gaze fierce before he turned her to face the tiled wall, his intention obvious as he placed her hands on the wall above her head, the tiles cold and arousing against her aching nipples. “Whatever I do, keep your hands there,” he instructed gruffly as he nudged her legs apart with his knee before stepping in close behind her.

Kat drew in a soft gasp as she felt the thick length of his cock sitting snugly along the slick crease of her bottom, her body suffusing with heat as she tensed with anticipation of what he was going to do next.

“You’ve been teasing me with this lushness,” his hands on her hips held her in place as he ran the length of his cock slowly along that crease, “since we went into the water earlier. When even a tigress should know to beware of the shark in the water. Still want to tease me, Kat?” he challenged softly as he pressed harder.

“Yes.” Kat quivered with pleasure, her anticipation having deepened at the dark promise she could hear in Dair’s voice.

A promise he fulfilled by placing a light slap on the left cheek of her bottom.

She gasped, in both shock and pleasure, the slap only stinging a little and forgotten completely as the heat blossomed, pulsed between her thighs.

“Still?” Dair slapped the other cheek.

“Yes…” she groaned achingly.

“I told you not to move your hands, Kat,” he warned, administering another slap, slightly harder this time, as her hands began to slide down the slickness of the tiles. “You like this,” he groaned his satisfaction and gave her another slap as Kat deliberately allowed her hands to continue sliding downwards.

“Yes,” she groaned again, pressing her breasts against the tiles, relishing the feel of their coolness against her hot and aching nipples, while the heat raged between her thighs as Dair continued to lightly slap the cheeks of her bottom.

“This is going to sting when I push you back against these tiles and thrust inside you,” he promised throatily as he cupped the tingling soreness of her bottom in his hands and squeezed.

Kat gasped as the fiery heat exploded between her thighs in wave after wave of pleasure, taking her into another climax that left her weak at the knees.

“Do you want me to stop?” Dair nuzzled the nape of her neck with his lips and tongue.

“God, no!” her denial came out as a plea.

“Do you trust me, little Kat?” His tongue rasped across the sensitive flesh beneath her earlobe. “Are you going to let me do whatever I want, and trust that I won’t hurt you?”

“Yes,” she groaned, her cheek turned to rest against the coldness of the tiles.

“I didn’t hear you…?”

“Yes, yes,
yes
…!” she gasped as she felt his heat along the whole length of her spine, his erection once again nestled in the cleft of her bottom.

“I take it that was an affirmative?” He chuckled throatily.

“I just answered you in triplicate, Military Man,” she murmured ruefully.

He pressed harder against her in warning. “If I thought of you as a subordinate you would have been over my knee long ago! Except I think now you might like it too much,” he added dryly as Kat drew in a sharp and shuddering breath.

She did like it. Oh not to the point of pain, or all that other stuff that seemed to turn certain people on; whips, chains, paddles. But she had liked being spanked by Dair. Just as she liked the feeling Dair gave her that he was in charge but that he would never hurt her, and that she only had to say she didn’t like something and he would stop.

Trust.

Yes, she trusted Dair Grayson with her body as well as her life.

For the first time in her life she felt in control, and for all that Dair was a dominant lover, she knew he would happily let her take charge too, as he had earlier. Kat had never even guessed there was this sensuous and daring woman inside her longing to break out.

“Kat…?”

That’s exactly what she was with Dair, a wild and feral cat in heat.

“Getting cold here, Military Man.” She wriggled her bottom suggestively against his erection. “Damn it, there’s never a chair around when you need one!”

Dair chuckled throatily. “Such impatience, Katya!”

She turned in his arms, looking up at him with those wicked dark eyes as she licked the hard bud of his nipple. “Impale me, Dair. Pick me up in these strong arms,” her fingers curled about his biceps, “and impale me. Fill me up,” her lips skimmed across his throat to his clenched jaw. “Now, Dair.” Her teeth nipped at the tautness of his skin.

Dair realized that air of fragility Kat had was only skin deep; inside she was tempered steel, unbreakable. And Dair respected her for it. Liked her for it.
Desired
her for it.

And damn it, he couldn’t wait any longer either, needed to bury his cock in the tightness of her sheath, wanted to feel her muscles clamping his cock in the way they had gripped his fingers earlier when she came.

“You are turning into one very bossy woman,” he warned even as his hands cupped beneath her hot and stinging bottom and he began to lift her.

“I’m being taught by a man who has a black belt in bossy!” Her hands moved up his chest until her fingers could clasp his shoulders for support as he lifted her feet off the floor.

“Put your legs around my waist, Kat.”

“You see?” She arched her back as she curved her legs about his waist, her face now just inches away from his. “I am so ready for you, Dair.” Her sharp little teeth nipped along his jaw line. “So, so ready,” she bit harder.

Dair drew in a steadying breath at the pleasure/pain inflicted by those teeth, pushing Kat up against the tiles as he reached between them to grasp his cock and—

“Shit, no…!” he groaned as he rested the heat of his forehead against hers. “Condom, Kat. I don’t have any condoms here.” Stupid, stupid,
stupid
!

It was this woman. Kat. She drove him crazy. So crazy he had forgotten all about protection. Her protection. He was clean, had himself tested regularly, but the last thing Kat wanted, or needed right now, was an unwanted pregnancy.

“Maybe in your wallet—”

“Not anywhere. Contrary to what you may have seen in the movies, not all men carry condoms about in their wallet,” he bit out impatiently as Kat looked up at him, frowning.

“It isn’t ‘regulation’ supply?”

“I’m not in the damned army anymore—” Dair scowled. “Are you laughing at me, Katya?”

Kat drew her top lip between her teeth to stop herself from doing exactly that. Apart from the fact that it was extremely frustrating, it was also reassuring to know that Dair didn’t carry condoms about with him, just in case he ‘got lucky’.

But good as that was to know, it was still frustrating as hell, considering their present position. “How about Lucien?” She frowned. “You can’t tell me he hasn’t brought women here with him?”

“None before Nicky, his wife. They were married last month,” Dair explained distractedly. “But they could have left some behind in the master bedroom—this isn’t funny, Kat.” He looked grim as he turned with her in his arms and turned off the water before stepping out of the shower.

Kat tried, but she really couldn’t hold back her smile any longer. “Admit it, Dair,” she held on as he strode out of the bathroom and out into the hallway, “it is just a bit funny…”

“It could bring a whole new level to blue balls if I have to draw back from this!” he warned in frustration.

“I won’t let that happen, don’t worry,” she reassured as she wrapped her arms about his neck and laid her head against his shoulder. “But I thought you said you could stop if you had to? You know, like Sumo wrestlers.”

He gave a snort. “Sumo wrestlers retract their balls to prevent them from being used as a weapon against them, and it has nothing to do with having sex. It also takes years to master the art—and I don’t have it!”

He really was quite deliciously easy to wind up, Kat acknowledged gleefully; condom or not, there was no way she wasn’t going to make love with Dair tonight. “We could just snuggle…?”

Dair arched a skeptical eyebrow. “Do I look like a ‘snuggly’ sort of guy to you?”

Kat held back another laugh at the total disgust in his expression. Who knew lovemaking could be such fun? She certainly hadn’t. Not until now. Until Dair. “I really don’t mind.”

“Well I fucking do!” Dair snapped his impatience as he lay Kat down on top of the spacious bed in the master bedroom before starting to pull open the drawers in the bedside cabinet.

Kat rolled over to lean on her hand as she watched him, so muscled and beautiful, with not an ounce of self-consciousness about his nakedness. “Should you be doing that?” she finally ventured. “After all, they were here on their honeymoon.” Her curiosity got the better of her and she peaked inside the drawer; it contained a pack of mints, an expensive perfume she recognized from the shape of the bottle, and—

Dair slammed the drawer shut again before Kat could decide whether or not that had been silk scarves she had seen in there or pretty handkerchiefs. Either way, she could think of only one reason for them being in the drawer beside the bed.

“I guess Lucien slept on the other side,” Dair muttered as he circumvented the bed.

“I think if they were on their honeymoon there wasn’t much sleeping done at all,” Kat teased.

“Ah ha!” Dair pounced on something inside the top drawer in the other bedside cabinet. “What the hell—?” He looked down in disgust at what he now held in his hand. “Strawberry flavor…? Or
cherry
?”

There was such a tone and look of disgust on his face now, that Kat was sent into convulsions of laughter, and after a couple of seconds Dair joined in.

God…! He was absolutely breathtaking when he laughed. He looked so much younger, his teeth very white against his tanned face, grooves in his cheeks—Kat doubted he would appreciate having them called dimples—and laughter lines fanning out from his light-colored eyes.

It didn’t hurt that he was completely, unabashedly naked, either.

Dair sat down on the side of the bed, shaking his head; he was seriously going to have to talk to his cousin about his choice of condoms. Ribbed ones, or with studs or dots maybe, but fruit flavored ones?

Although if he mentioned that to Lucien, his cousin was then going to start asking questions as to
why
Dair had been looking for condoms at all.

Maybe he wouldn’t mention it after all…

And what the hell, a condom was a condom, and as long as it did its job Dair didn’t give a damn if it was rainbow colored and tasted of caviar.

The silk scarves in the other drawer had distinct possibilities too.

Although whether or not he would be the one tied to the bed, or Kat, was anyone’s guess; his little tigress was full of surprises.

And Dair loved that. Loved that wild side of Kat as much as he loved the uncertainty as to which of them was going to be dominant at any given moment.

It wasn’t something he had ever thought about with any other woman; with his size and bad-boy image, women just assumed he would be in control. It was usually the reason they were attracted to him. And Kat was no different, she just enjoyed being in control too, and he liked giving it to her.

“Let’s take both.” Kat stood up now, as sleek and beautiful as her namesake. “We have to try the chair later, and we have all evening and all night to try lots of other things too.”

“In that case I’ll take half a dozen.” Dair hoped they weren’t going to be here more than a few days, because there were only another dozen or so condoms left in the drawer.

“Your bedroom or mine…?” Kat prompted huskily, her humor fading, her mouth dry as she saw the look of hunger in Dair’s eyes as he stalked towards her.

There wasn’t an ounce of spare flesh on his perfectly muscled body. Only that scar on his temple—and the one on his back—prevented him from being as perfect as one of the Greek statues that might have graced the outside of this marble villa.

“As long as it has a bed in it I don’t give a damn,” Dair growled impatiently.

“Mine is closer.” Kat grabbed hold of his hand and dragged him along with her as she led the way to the bedroom just across the hallway, feeling a thrill inside her as his fingers curled naturally about hers.

“Just for the record.” Dair dropped the condoms down onto the bedside table before turning to take Kat in his arms, eyes piercing as he looked down at her. “Whatever thoughts you may have had to the contrary, or what was said on the plane earlier, this stopped being ‘just a job’ to me the moment I saw you strapped to that fucking chair—” He was silenced as Kat placed her fingers lightly against his lips.

“I don’t want to talk or think about that now, Dair.” She looked up at him pleadingly. “It’s gone. In the past.” And to her it was; twenty-four hours with Dair had wiped those atrocities from her mind.