Zane looked unhurt, but Shang-Da's face had been opened from forehead to chin. His eye sat in a mask of blood. He closed the door and looked at me with cool eyes.
I was glad to see all of them. But I couldn't move. If I moved, it was over. I was putting everything I had into just staying where I was. If I moved anything, the control was gone. A tear squeezed out of one eye and fell in a hard, hot line down my cheek. I stared up at Richard and wanted to say so many things and couldn't say any of them. Words would break me into a million glittering pieces.
Richard walked to me. He stood over me, staring down. I didn't look up. He didn't so much kneel as collapse to his knees in front of me.
I put out a hand to steady him, and the munin spilled across my skin like a flame. The Firestar fell to the floor with a thunk. I grabbed a handful of the torn T-shirt, balled it into both my fists, and pulled him those last few inches into a kiss.
His lips were dry. I licked his mouth, running my tongue over his lips until they were like wet, rubbed velvet to kiss. I slid my hand inside one of the tears to trace the cut I'd made over his heart.
His breath came out in a sharp hiss as if it hurt. He grabbed my wrist. I slid my other hand inside the tear and found another wound to probe. He grabbed both my wrists in his hands. You forget how large Richard is. He doesn't seem intimidating physically, but he could have held both my wrists in one hand. He forced my arms back at my sides. I tried to pull my hands free, and his grip tightened. He leaned over me, but not for a kiss.
He licked the edge of the knife wound on my chest.
I gasped, half in pain, half in pleasure.
He ran his mouth down the wound until he came to the soft upper part of my breast. He bit gently into my flesh, not hard enough to leave a mark, just hard enough that I felt his teeth. I made a small moan.
He raised his face to look at me. He let go of my wrists and put a hand on either side of my face. He trapped my face between the strength of his hands and forced me to stare into the perfect chocolate brown of his eyes.
"Anita, can you hear me?"
I tried to move forward for a kiss, but his hands held me trapped. My hands found his chest, explored the smooth flesh, the torn wounds. I tried to press my body forward against his, but his hands held my face, and I couldn't go closer.
"Anita, Anita, talk to me. Are you in there?" The grip on my face was almost painful.
I didn't push the munin aside. It fell back. I felt Raina leave me enough for me to answer. "I'm here." It was a whisper.
"Do you want this?" he asked.
I started to cry; huge, silent tears slid down my face.
"Do you want me now, like this?" He shook my face between his hands, as if he could shake me back to myself.
I slid my hands over his, cupping him against me while I cried. Did I want him? "Yes," it was a whisper.
"Now, like this?"
The question was too hard for me. I curled my fingers against his hands, trying to move them from my face. I started tugging at his hands. "Kiss me, please, kiss me. Please, Richard, please!" I was crying again and couldn't have said why.
He leaned into me, hands still on either side of my face. He kissed me. His lips pressed against mine like heat. His tongue parted my lips, and I tried again to move forward, but his hands held me. He leaned into me, pressing his mouth against mine. He kissed me like he was tasting me, as if he'd reach into my mouth with his tongue and his lips and pull me inside out.
I shuddered in his hands from the feel of his mouth. Eyes closed, my hands limp at my sides, letting him do it all. His hands slid, very slowly, from my face. He never stopped kissing me as his fingertips slid down my bare shoulders. His hands hesitated over the shoulder straps for the spine sheath, as if he didn't know what to do with it.
I opened my eyes, started to lift my hands up to help him. He grabbed my hands and held them down at my sides. "I'll figure it out," he said softly.
I stared up at him. I could barely breathe around the need. I wanted his na**d skin pressed against mine. I grabbed one of the tears in the T-shirt and ripped it wider. "Off."
He shook his head. "Not yet."
I wanted to fall on him like a ravening wolf, and he was so controlled. I could feel his need. Feel his need as great as my own, and yet he could kneel there, so close, so very close.
"Everyone out," Richard demanded.
I'd forgotten that we still had an audience. I hid my forehead against Richard's chest. My hands slid behind his back, trying to press myself against him.
Asher said, "What of the other wolves?"
"I made a pact with Verne. It's over except for this."
I stared past Richard's broad shoulder into Asher's scarred face. His face was carefully blank, empty, unreadable. I had a thought: what was he hiding? But most of my thoughts were the scent of Richard's skin. The smell of fresh blood. The clinging scent of earth and pine and leaves. The light, salty dew of sweat on his body. There was no room for regrets. There was only the warmth of his body pressed against mine.
"If you take her like this, it will be very like rape," Asher said.
"I'm going to try very hard for it not to be," Richard said.
Asher gave a small sound that might have been a laugh. "Bonheur," he said, and left. Good luck, he'd said. He'd said it in French, and it made me think of Jean-Claude.
So close to the warmth of Richard's body I could feel him hard and ready, and I thought of Jean-Claude. I wanted to wrap myself in Richard. I wanted to pull him around me like a blanket, but what would my other lover say? That thought pushed the munin away better than anything else had.
Months in Jean-Claude's bed, and I still wanted Richard. Iwanted Richard, not Raina, not munin. Iwanted him. I wanted him so badly I couldn't think about anything but the feel of him in my arms. But it wasn't fair, not like this. Not with Raina riding me.
She poured over me like a warm bath. This was her price. This. That she be here with us for the first time. That even this would always be part hers. My skin ached to be touched. My body hurt with a need I'd never known.
When the door closed behind them, Richard pulled me away from his body. He held me away from him with his hands on my forearms while I struggled to get closer. I needed him. Needed him.
I reached for him, crying, "Richard, please, please."
He spun me around until I fell against the foot of the bed. He put a hand in the middle of my back, keeping me turned away from him. He slipped the shoulder straps of the spine sheath off, sliding them down my arms. He threw the sheath across the room to bang into the wall. Then he leaned over me, a hand on either side of the bed. He leaned his face over until his hair brushed my face. He molded his body against mine, arms wrapping my arms against my chest. He held me with his body and his arms, pressing us so close I could feel his heart beating against my back.
He whispered against my cheek. "If at any time you want to stop, say so, and it's over. I'll go."
I made a small sound very like a whimper, and said, "Fuck me, Richard, f**k me, please."
A shudder ran through his body from toes to head, and his breath fell out in a long sigh. He pulled back enough to undo the back of my bra, then he slid it slowly off my shoulders. He used the bra straps to lower my arms to my sides again. He pushed the bra off my arms, and it fell to the floor.
His hands slid over my waist. His hands felt hot. He slid upward slowly, so slowly that I wanted to cry out. His hands spilled over my br**sts, cupping them, kneading them. His fingers rolled my ni**les, and I did cry out.
He turned me to face him, almost throwing me against the bed. His arms locked under my bu**ocks, and he lifted me, still on his knees. His mouth found my br**sts. His tongue flicked across my nipple, fast, quick, wet.
I leaned into him, and his mouth slid over my breast, sucking it. The feel of his mouth on me was almost too intense. It made me want to cry out, to squirm, to say stop, and never stop. I made a small sound like a sob as he released my breast in one long pull so that the nipple stretched between his teeth. He moved to the other breast, harsher this time, using more teeth. He bit gently around the soft tissue of my breast, then licked the nipple, rolling it with his tongue. He gave one quick bite that hurt, and I was suddenly on the floor looking up.
He knelt over me and put his hands into the tears in his T-shirt and ripped it open, exposing the hardness of his chest, his arms. There were two slashing claw wounds, one high and one low. The high one had gone over his nipple, and blood had dried on the tip of it.