“Niko.” His name came as a breathy whisper instead of the protest she intended.
He muttered a low curse as his head lowered so he could brush his mouth along the sensitive curve of her neck.
“I like hearing my name on your lips.”
Her hands lifted to clutch at the cashmere softness of his sweater as he nuzzled a path upward. Oh . . . crap. It felt soooo good.
The sort of good that made smart women do stupid things.
“I’m mad at you,” she managed to mutter.
He found the pulse that thundered just below her jaw, stroking it with the rough rasp of his tongue before giving it a tiny nip.
“I know.”
Angela gasped at the primitive stab of pleasure that arrowed through her.
Her limited experience with the opposite sex included a few fumbled kisses, even more fumbled squeezes of her breasts followed by a quickie in her long forgotten boyfriend’s dorm room.
Nothing that made her anxious to find a new lover in the past three years.
Not until Niko had prowled into her lab.
Clearly even a female as embarrassingly naïve as she was could sense a man with the ability to please a woman.
She moaned as he outlined her mouth with the tip of his tongue.
“I don’t trust you.”
“You will,” he promised, stealing a deep, drugging kiss.
She briefly savored the taste of warm male desire, her stomach clenching with anticipation as she felt the hard thrust of his arousal.
This was what she’d sensed the minute he’d walked into the lab.
This smoldering attraction that could burn her to cinders.
Reluctantly she pulled back, her rasping breath the only sound to disturb the silence.
“Just because you can get me into bed?”
“Because I’m going to devote myself to proving I’ll never hurt you again,” he promised, his gaze locked on her lips that still tingled from his touch. “No matter how long it takes.”
She struggled to think.
Who knew it could be such a difficult task?
“Why?”
His finger brushed her heated cheek. “Hmmm?”
“Why are you concerned that I would be hurt now?” she persisted. “It’s not like you gave a rat’s ass for the past six weeks.”
He met her accusing gaze, his expression somber. “The Sentinels—the ones who Dylan murdered—were two of my closest friends.” He grimaced. “The pain of their loss blinded me.”
She refused to be swayed by the edge of pain in his voice.
“So not all Sentinels are so cold-blooded?”
He gave a short laugh. “Oh, we’re cold-blooded, especially when we’re tracking prey.” His hand gently tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “But a part of our mission is always to protect the innocent.”
A tiny part of Niko knew that he was behaving badly.
Again.
The poor female had nearly been kidnapped by a homicidal freak who looked like the definition of a monster. She’d discovered the man she’d come to trust had used her as a pawn. And then forced her against her will to travel to this remote cabin.
And that didn’t even include the revelation she was also one of the freaks. Something she’d obviously refused to process.
She was shaken, scared, and mad as hell.
But was he offering her comfort? Giving her the space she needed to come to terms with the upheavals in her life?
No.
He’d barely got her through the door before he had her in his arms, kissing her as if he’d already claimed her as his own.
But while the small shred of decency that had survived his years as a Sentinel urged him to release her, he knew there wasn’t a chance in hell of that happening.
He needed to touch her. It was a physical ache that he couldn’t deny.
“And now?” she asked, her defiant expression doing nothing to hide the vulnerability in her wide, velvet-brown eyes.
His fingers skimmed down the curve of her neck. “Now my first priority is to make certain you’re out of harm’s way.”
A fine tremor shook her body as his fingers continued down to trace the prominent line of her collarbone exposed by the drooping neckline of her sweatshirt.
Not that she was about to admit her ready response to his touch.
Once—before she’d discovered the truth—she would have eagerly shared her desire. It had been obvious in every shy smile and charming blush when he walked into a room.
The fact that he’d driven her to hide her desire was a raw regret that was going to torture him for the rest of his life.
“And then you’ll return to the hunt for Dylan?” she pressed.