Marked by the Moon (Nightcreature 9)

Julian stared into her flushed face, her dazed eyes, and understood. She was coming, too.

Oh, what the hell, he thought. Too late now to pretend this was a dream. Might as well make her scream. He wanted to.

He slowed his hips as he lengthened his thrusts. All the way out until she strained forward, all the way in until her breath caught at the back of her throat. Again and again, slowly increasing his speed, plunging ever deeper until neither of them could stop the inevitable.

She cried out. He took her mouth, drinking the sound, and at last she closed her eyes, releasing him to do the same.

He hoped he could now imagine she was someone else, anyone else, even no one, hell his hand was better than her—but just because he wasn’t seeing her didn’t mean she wasn’t there. The scent of her, the taste of her, the feel of her was all around him. And the orgasm…it went on and on and on.

He was still enjoying the final tremors—her, him, he didn’t know and he didn’t care—when her body, so warm and soft, turned cool and stiff. Before she could shove him off, he rolled away, staring at the roof of the cave as she sat up and rested her head upon her knees, curling into herself as if he’d just violated her.

Her thin back, the bones of her ribs standing out in sharp relief, that faint shadow of the bruise still upon them made her seem fragile, vulnerable, womanly. He didn’t even realize what he was doing until he saw his hand reaching out to touch—

“Don’t,” she said. “Just…don’t.”

Her voice was full of disgust and because of that, when she muttered, “Fuck me,” he dropped his hand and said, “I did.”

She punched him. He couldn’t say that he blamed her.

Alex didn’t realize she’d rounded on Barlow until her fist connected with his face.

He could have stopped her. That he didn’t confused her, and when she was confused, she lashed out. A lot of people did.

“What did you do to me?”

He rubbed his jaw as he looked her up and down. “Isn’t that obvious?”

She’d been shaking her hand, trying to make the numbness fade. He had a hard head, no shock there. But his words made her fingers curl inward once again.

He noticed and lifted a brow. “I gave you a shot,” he said. “I deserved it. But one’s all you get.”

She rolled her eyes. If she wanted to punch him again, she would. Alex let her fingers go limp. Right now she didn’t want to.

Just to be pissy, Alex yanked the blanket off Barlow and around her. Unfortunately that left him naked when he sat up, resting a wrist on his knee, open to her gaze.

She yanked her eyes from what lay below his waist and focused on an area just below his face. She’d left a mark on his neck.

“God,” she muttered, and ran a hand through her tangled hair. What the hell had happened?

Suddenly everything came back—the bear, the fight, then…everything went fuzzy.

Alex glanced down. The only remnants of the attack were some dried blood, a few bruises, and several scabbed-over claw marks. “What the—?” She ran her fingers over the wounds, wincing. They might be nearly healed but they still hurt.

Alex glanced up, but he was staring out the opening of the cave and not at her. “How?” she murmured.

He lifted one shoulder, lowered it. Alex had a flash of those muscles bunching beneath her palm as he thrust into her so deeply—

“Magic.”

She blinked, and the memory went away. “Magic,” she repeated. “Like shifting in the daytime.” He nodded. “Putting an invisibility cloak around us in LA.”

“A what?” he asked.

“Harry Potter.” She’d done a lot of reading in those hotel rooms. Alex waved her hand. “Never mind. You know what I mean.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “Like

that.”