at the same time his teeth gripped her nipple, pulling at it, his tongue stroking across it, creating a vortex of sensations that rippled through her womb. he stared up at her, his eyes so brilliant, so hot, it hurt to stare into them. his expression was intent, savagely hungry, yet softened with gentleness. how many nights had she dreamed of him touching her this way, holding her?

her fingers tightened on his muscled forearms; something was rising inside her that she didn't know how to contain.

"i need to touch you." she was restless, a heat and a yearning blooming inside her that she wanted to fight-wanted to and yet couldn't.

it was that look in his eyes. despite the lust, despite his pleasure in touching her, there was a sadness she barely glimpsed. she wanted to wipe it away and replace it with something more. with a pleasure as destructive as what he was giving her. something beautiful, something so soul-deep it would wipe the shadows from his gaze.

he licked her nipple again, purring-oh god, he was purring-his chest vibrating with such a sexy sound that her pussy gushed with the force of her excitement.

"not yet," he whispered, his breath whispering over her flesh as he moved farther down her body. "let me touch you, roni. let me drown in your taste. you have no idea how much i've needed this."

his voice was tormented, hoarse. as though his only thought, his only need, was the hunger for her. but in his eyes she saw another need, one that came much too close to what she had seen in her own eyes

over the years every time she looked in the mirror.

when he moved again she couldn't think of anything more.

"taber." her voice was a squeak of dismay as she felt his breath between her thighs. startled, she looked down her body then moaned weakly as she watched and felt him spread her legs further, opening her to him, his eyes locked with hers.

"cats love cream, roni," he whispered wickedly. "and i bet you have the sweetest cream in the whole damned world."

the breath locked in her chest as she watched his tongue distend then disappear within the curl-shielded slit that guarded her sex.

"oh god!" she tried to scream but the sound was weak, breathless, as her hips rose from the bed, her body shuddering at the feel of the long slow lick that parted her feminine lips and delved to the secretive opening into her vagina.

his hands cupped the cheeks of her bottom as he lifted her from the bed, angling her to the stroke of his tongue. then he began to lap at her, small, hungry licks through the thick essence of her desire. he growled as he ate her, his tongue dipping into the furnace of her pussy, drawing yet more of the frothy sweetness into his mouth.

roni stared unseeing up at the ceiling, wracked by a pleasure so exquisite she feared it would destroy her mind. his tongue was ravenous, merciless. it plunged into the small channel, stroking sensitized tissue, driving her to the edge of madness as she writhed beneath it. he slurped at the cream he drew from her, the sounds of the moist excess joining his rumbling groans as his tongue fucked her with slow, even strokes.

it went beyond her most desperate dreams. the pleasure filling her was like nothing she could have imagined, nothing she could have dreamed of ever sharing with him. the intensity began to build. the rippling in her womb strengthened, the convulsive tightening of her vagina became spasms of almost painful pleasure.

"taber," she panted, shuddering in his grip, her legs tightening against his broad shoulders as she fought the rapidly building sensations streaking mindlessly through her body. he growled again, the sound vibrating against her clit as he lifted her closer, his tongue stroking deeper, his nose grinding against the little bud in a caress that devastated her. she screamed. the sound echoed around her as he destroyed her. her orgasm exploded through her, ripping the world apart as light and color splashed behind her closed eyelids. her hips gyrated, grinding her pussy against his mouth, intensifying the excruciating sensations as every muscle in her body trembled in protest against the strength of her release.

"mine!" taber's hoarse shout was the only warning she had before he rose to his knees, lifted her, and buried his cock into the snug depths of her tightening channel. death couldn't be as painful, as exquisite, as completely shattering, as the feel of his heavy erection

separating her, forcing its way into the ever shrinking depths of her pussy. roni shattered. everything inside her collapsed around the desperate penetration, the hard, almost brutal thrusts of his cock inside her gripping cunt. he fucked her like a man gone mad, but even worse, her body accepted it, screamed out for more. she couldn't believe that was her voice she heard. shattered screams. pleas for more. deeper, faster, oh god...

"harder..." her hands were locked around the tight muscles of his forearms, her nails biting into his flesh, her legs lifting, her ankles crossing above his driving hips. "harder... fuck me, taber. fuck me harder..."

not her, she thought distantly. she wouldn't scream such words. she wouldn't plead so desperately...

"god! you're too tight! too tight, too hot..." he was gasping, sweat dripping from his body to hers, his cock stroking inside her, pistoning desperately until he threw her higher, harder into yet another orgasm. she felt the change in his cock again-the locking, the stroking against the most sensitive area of her quaking cunt-and lost all sanity. she didn't know what she cried out. didn't know she could have the breath to voice a word. the sounds echoed around her, guttural, primal, as a roar exploded from his chest and she felt the deep, heavy pulses of heated sperm shooting hard and hot inside her. roni was only barely aware of taber collapsing over her. his breaths were hard, gasping; his voice rough as he whispered words she could make no sense of. their bodies were damp, locked together, and loath to separate. they could have stayed that way for eternity and she wouldn't have protested. her eyes were closed and as the last violent pulse of her climax shuddered through her body, she allowed exhaustion to capture and take her away.

darkness swept around her as taber's body blanketed her, warmed her. she sighed, for the first time in years sated, replete and safe. she allowed herself to sleep.

chapter fourteen

taber was aware when roni slipped into an exhausted sleep. her body relaxed beneath him, becoming boneless, accepting of his weight as he struggled to learn how to breathe once again. his hands were clenched in her hair, his face buried at her shoulder, his teeth still locked into the mark he had given her so long ago. he could taste the sweet essence of her blood in his mouth where the skin had broken and he had lapped at it like a man dying for the taste of ecstasy. moving away from her was the hardest feat he had ever attempted in his life. pulling away from the fisted grip her pussy had on his cock was torture, an agony of pleasure nearly as intense as achieving the soul-destroying release that had ripped through him.

the animalistic barb had receded, drawing back beneath the head of his cock, releasing him from the sweet heat he had been locked inside. he dragged his body off her, amazed at the incredible weakness that had overcome him.

god, he felt as though he were dying and would be more than willing to give himself to the arms of the grim reaper. anything to stay there just another second, to relish the sublime pleasure he had found

locked inside her heat.

it was unlike anything he had ever known. every cell in his body had gloried in touching her, making her scream, making her beg as the rush for release came upon her. he moved from the bed almost drunkenly, a wry grin tilting his lips as he forced his legs to hold him up, albeit a bit unsteadily. then he made the mistake of turning back and gazing at the woman responsible for it all.

his chest clenched. a brutal ripping agony swept over him as he stared into her pale face, the gentle line of brow and cheek. her lips were slightly parted, kiss-swollen. god help him, she was his life. he stared at her as though seeing her for the first time, realizing what he had forced himself to deny for months. the woman had the ability to destroy him. hell, she had already nearly killed him with her first rejection. what would it do to him now if she walked away? how could he force her to stay if she conceived and being with him wasn't what completed her heart? would nature be cruel enough to have mated him with a woman who couldn't-or wouldn't-love him?

taber reached out, pushing back a thick strand of golden-brown hair as he slowly pulled the sheet over her body before turning quickly away from her and walking to the bathroom. as he did, he remembered the first time he had ever laid eyes on her, over ten years before. he had found her huddled in the woods, her arms wrapped around her small body. her eyes were gazing into the wilderness, though he had known it was something inside her, not without, that she was focused on. he knew that feeling. he had been a young age, but the brutality of the labs and the horror of their escape had forever wiped away a part of his humanity. how can you miss something you never remembered having, he wondered as he braced his hands on the sink and stared into the feral expression staring back at him. he had been no more than an animal in those days. furious, wounded, unwilling and unable to fit into the carefree lifestyle maria had tried to give them. he had been stalking the woods, escaping, allowing the savagery that filled him to release itself in the hunt. until he found roni. her face was tear-stained, her knees scraped, her eyes vacant as she lost herself in whatever horrors filled her young mind.

he had imagined they saved each other that night. he had picked her up and taken her to maria, holding her against his chest, feeling a sense of rage, of protectiveness that anyone so fragile, so innocent and pure, could be forced into such pain. the look in her eyes had reminded him of his sisters, their minds as violated as their bodies had been before their escape.

roni hadn't been raped; rather, she had been terrorized. left alone, with no food, no one to care for her, and her father's enemies stalking her, striking out at her when the bastard who sired her couldn't be found.

from that day on, roni had been his. at first, it had been friendship, a protectiveness, a need to care for her. later, it had grown, terrifying him with the depth of emotion and desire she inspired in him. he drew in a hard, deep breath. the child had grown into a woman before he could make sense of his own changing feelings for her. her smart mouth and wild ways had worried him incessantly, but he had always known what she was thinking, what she was feeling. the woman whose screams had rocked his lust moments before was not the woman who had sworn her love to him the year before. this roni was too quiet, too self-contained, shut down. as though life had dealt her one blow too many and now she refused to trust or to try again.

he breathed in tiredly as he pulled a cloth from the small shelf beside the sink and wet it with warm water. she would be sore, and wouldn't rest comfortably with her thighs slick and damp from their mating.

taber moved back to the bed, feeling his cock harden, lengthen, as he stepped closer and drew in the faint, distinctive scent of their combined releases. it was reminiscent of a wild wind after a summer thunderstorm, untamed and earthy.

he drew the sheet back from her slumbering body, grimacing at the effort it took to keep his hand from trembling as he began to clean her. from her neck, along her arms, her full, firm breasts-rosy from his earlier suckling attentions-down to her slender torso, her delicately rounded tummy to her thighs. he swallowed tightly as he spread her legs, ignoring her pleasured moan as he cleaned the slick, inner juices from her body.

he was breathing hard and heavy by the time he covered her once again and dragged his own weary body into the bed beside her. dawn was approaching and it felt like weeks since he had slept. he pulled her close to him, ignoring her first instinctive move to pull away from him, shushing her gently, wrapping his arms around her and tucking her against his chest.

"what happened, roni?" he whispered into her silken hair before bestowing a soft, gentle kiss to her forehead. "what the hell happened to you?"