He was immersed in her.
Her pleasure, her release and his own, in the wild chaos of a sensual storm he couldn’t hope to control. In that moment, as the barb extended, became erect and locked him inside her, he realized he was being softened by her. Changed and overtaken by this one small woman with far too many secrets.
And he was all too aware that in too many ways, he was weakened by her.
CHAPTER 23
It was full noon before Gypsy awoke again, her senses clearer, her anger no longer simmering but fully cemented, and the independent streak that her brother had often declared was a mile wide hardened painfully inside her.
As she opened her eyes and stared around the still-dim bedroom, the narrow shafts of sunlight that spilled from behind her reflected on the wall across from her. They were mocking reminders that the danger of losing everything she cherished was staring her in the face.
Her choices, her ability to live as she chose, her very independence was in danger of being taken away from her. Even in the nine years that she had steadily become one of the Unknown’s best contacts, she had never endangered her life or risked her cover. She’d never had to fear her freedom or her independence.
Until now.
Rule had denied her the chance to leave the night before without so much as an explanation or the opportunity to argue her point. She’d seen it in his gaze. He hadn’t been willing to hear an argument, his mind was set.
She was going nowhere.
Gypsy was determined to show him differently at the first opportunity.
But first, as much as it offended her pride and sense of fair play, she would have to let him think he’d won. Besides, she needed answers first. Before she escaped him, she needed to know exactly the effects she would experience once she separated herself from him.
Exactly how factual were the gossip rags where this phenomenon was concerned?
Staring up at the ceiling, with the sheet Rule had pulled over them sometime in the night held snugly over her br**sts as the heat of his big body braced her back, she considered exactly how to broach the subject. Because she could feel the stiffness of his erection against her lower back, and the answering ache building between her thighs. And God knew she wanted nothing more than to rub against him like a cat and feel that iron-hard flesh pressing into her and overtaking her. But a woman had to draw the line somewhere.
“Would you like to explain to me exactly what happens there at the end?” Gypsy made certain her tone was calm, controlled.
After all, she didn’t do hysteria very well, and learning that the far-fetched stories written in the gossip rags had a chance of being true was definite grounds for slipping into hysteria.
Whether one was into that mode of existence or not.
The arm lying over her waist tightened momentarily as he took a deep breath at her back. “You’ve read the damned papers,” he growled.
“The gossip rags, you mean?” Giving a mocking, desperate little laugh, Gypsy felt her fingers tightening in the sheets. “We call them gossip rags for a reason, Rule. Because the stories in them are supposed to be lies. Remember?”
“For the most part, they are,” he admitted, though his tone of voice was anything but relaxed or amused, as it usually was.
“Why don’t you just tell me what I can expect,” she demanded, still and unyielding against him as she felt adrenaline beginning to gather behind the anger she was determined to keep him from sensing. “Exactly what is truth and what is lie? Because that whole orgy thing, it’s not going to work for me.”
“There are no damned orgies.” His palm flattened at her stomach, stroking over the soft flesh as Gypsy closed her eyes and tried to tell herself that she wasn’t going to allow him to distract her.
“Then what exactly is there?” The question was pushed from between her teeth as his fingers found the edge of intimate curls that led to the aching, swollen bundle of nerve endings throbbing below.
“Mating Heat. What you felt as I released inside you is the mating barb. About the size of the end of a man’s thumb, it becomes erect beneath the crest of a feline Breed’s cock, and not always in the same precise location. According to our scientists, the grip of the mate’s vagina determines where it thickens, because its main purpose is to reach that little spot behind your clit, rich with erotic nerve endings.” Acceptance filled his tone, surprising her. “And just as the articles suggest, Breeds secrete a hormone from tiny glands in their tongues. Those hormones fill their mate’s system, creating an inability to hide or run from the bonds that are being built between them. It increases the arousal as well as the pleasure, and makes it impossible for the couple to be apart for long.”
Great. Just wonderful.
“And what happens if they’re apart?” she retorted, her thighs tightening as his touch tried to move lower.
As if that pleasure, that temptation weren’t enough, his lips pressed to the area he had bitten into the night before, his tongue licking over the little wound with devastating results. With a liquid, brutal pleasure she couldn’t fight.
“If they’re apart,” he whispered, his voice rasping with sensual pleasure as Gypsy felt her thighs weaken, part and give him access to the flesh his fingers were searching for, “then the arousal only increases until it’s too painful to endure. Especially for the female mate.”
Maybe she was just trying to distract him, she told herself. She was giving him what he wanted so he would keep talking and be completely unaware of her intent to slip from the hotel later.
“That doesn’t sound particularly fair,” she gasped as his fingers slid past her clit to find the excess dampness building between the plump folds below. “There’s no way to make it stop?”