Kane could see the refusal growing in her wary green eyes, the need for escape that was building in her body. He couldn’t allow it. He had nearly had a stroke knowing she was facing that bastard with the missile launcher. According to Merinus, Callan was more than worried about the progress of the heat, concerned it would lessen her wariness, her ability to track and fight efficiently.
“That should be pretty obvious,” he grunted as he moved closer to her. “If there are problems, I need you here to evacuate Merinus, Roni and Cassie. Besides that, we need to make certain the main Pride stays intact no matter what. That means you too, sweet pea.”
Sherra winced at the nickname. “Kane, can the bullshit,” she snapped, causing him to watch her with amused surprise. “You want me here for your convenience, nothing more. You keep hoping if I’m close enough that your round-the-clock f**k session will be harder for me to deny.”
He was praying she would. He wondered if he should explain the difference between a hope and a prayer to her. Then decided perhaps it best, considering the slow rise of anger in her expression, that he hold off there.
He tilted his head, watching her curiously. “Well, there is that consideration, mate,” he drawled instead. She glared at him, her eyes glittering with suppressed anger and heated arousal.
“God, would you just let up,” she muttered, surprising him with the quick about-face in her anger. “You act as though there hasn’t been another woman for you in all these years while I should just bend over and give it up as though it were your due.”
Kane sensed the underlying anger there. She was torn between what she knew was the truth and what she wanted to be the truth. His Sherra needed to hate, because loving hurt, but by God she wasn’t the only one who had hurt through the years.
“There have been others,” he finally acknowledged, hating it, hating the pain that flashed in her eyes. “It
never happened easily, and never comfortably, but it happened.”
He shook his head, remembering the few women he had touched, those he had f**ked while he dreamed of Sherra, while he forced himself to ignore the distaste for the few moments of ease.
“There was no one else for me,” she finally whispered, breaking his heart with the rough sound of her voice.
“And there is where you’re wrong!” he snapped, refusing to allow the guilt he carried to weigh heavier upon his shoulders. “I thought you were dead. Gone, Sherra. Forever. You knew I was alive, you knew where to find me and you didn’t. I won’t regret the fact that there were nights I couldn’t face alone. That there were memories that ate into my soul like a disease. I won’t feel guilty for believing what you allowed me to believe, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let you hide from it. You were my f**king woman, and because of some quirk of nature, my mate. You hid. I didn’t.”
She swallowed tightly, her eyes dark, ravaged by the battles he could see waging within her soul. “It was one f**king kiss. There were no swollen glands, nothing…”
Kane smiled tightly. “One was all it took. Don’t deny you’re hotter than ever. I bet your pu**y is so damned wet I could drown in it when I get my mouth down there. Just as it was then. The taste of spice and a spring rain. Your taste has haunted me, Sherra. All these years, endless nights that the craving for you nearly drove me insane.”
Her face flamed, her eyes sparking with the fires raging inside her.
“Stop.” She drew in a hard, deep breath as she backed away from him.
“Stop running from me, Sherra,” he whispered softly as his arm hooked around her waist, pulling her to him. “I won’t let you do that anymore. There’s no reason to run.”
“Look.” She pressed her hands against his chest as though to push him away. “I told you last night, I can’t risk this. Neither of us can. We don’t know what will happen, Kane.”
“I don’t care what will happen, Sherra.” And that was the end of the line as far as he was concerned.
“Aren’t you tired of hurting? Of aching? We could still the heat, baby.”
He lowered his head, nuzzling at her ear, letting his lips whisper over the small shell as she shivered in response. Her fingers curled against his chest, her nails kneading it through the thin material of his shirt almost unconsciously.
“We could both regret it far too much later.” Her voice was a hot little feminine sigh of need. “I can’t just jump into this, Kane.”
“Honey, I sucked every sweet drop of that drug out of your tongue yesterday and f**ked you last night until you exploded around me,” he told her harshly, his hands running down her back, over the flare of her bu**ocks as he allowed his fingers to clench into the smooth curves there. “If that wasn’t jumping into it, then what is? Kiss me, Sherra. Don’t keep punishing us both like this.”
She was breathing just as hard and fast as he was when he raised his head enough to stare down at her. Her eyes were dazed, heavy-lidded, her soft pink lips parted and glistening with moisture. He licked his own lips, dying to taste her, to do the one thing that would make her so wild it would burn them both
alive.
Her gaze centered on his lips, growing slumberous, her face softening with passion as she stared at them.
“I could eat you alive,” he told her gently. “From your lips to your pu**y, suck every sweet drop of moisture from them then get you hot and wet all over again before I slide my c**k so deep inside you that you can’t ever imagine refusing me again.”
The thought of it, the need for it, had his body on fire, not to mention what it was doing to the erection throbbing in agony between his thighs. And she was thinking about it. He could see the lust pouring into her eyes, softening her against him as a whimper escaped her throat.
Sherra stared into the heated depths of Kane’s eyes, seeing the determination, the lust raging through his body. His expression was tight, the flesh drawn over his cheekbones, his eyes narrowed, his lips heavy with sensuality. He was hard and he was horny and she had a feeling he was getting ready to drastically change the rules of the game they were playing.
“This is the wrong place for this.” She pushed against his shoulders. If she could just put some distance between them then maybe she could fight against the effects of the heat for at least one more day. One day could possibly turn into two, two into longer. The hormonal fires raging in her body never lasted longer than a month; she was already two weeks into it. If she could just hold him off a little longer.