She hoped to feel his touch move away from the hideous marks, but instead it lingered. He drew up onto his elbow and slowly took her in from head to toe. His hot gaze took its time studying the scars left behind from frequent electrical torture and the various punishments that had often gone on for weeks without end.
She knew how terrible she must look to him, but Hunter was gazing at her with open admiration, as though she were the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
"Nothing about you is unattractive to me," he murmured. "The scars are just scars. Your body is soft and strong, perfect to me. I could never tire of looking at you. I know I could never tire of touching you like this."
As though to emphasize his point, he brought his head down to her torso and kissed the worst of her flawed skin. Slowly, he worked his way up to her mouth and pressed another achingly possessive, dizzyingly hot kiss to her lips.
His glyphs were surging with dark color now, the elegant tangling of his Gen One patterns alive with indigo, gold, and wine - all the lush colors of Breed desire. Corinne touched the beautiful swirls and arcs, tracing her fingers down across his abdomen, where the otherworldly skin markings disappeared beneath the waistband of his fatigues.
She ran her fingertip along the edge of the loose black pants. Heat permeated into her palm as she tentatively moved her touch a bit lower. Beside her ear, Hunter let out a low groan. His big hand came down over hers, his long fingers engulfing her, pressing her caress toward the hard ridge of his erection.
She knew no apprehension or uncertainty as she touched him over the straining zipper. His sex felt enormous, hard as stone. To her amazement, the thought gave her a dark, sensual thrill, not the jolt of panic she feared would ruin everything.
Hunter buried his mouth in the crook of her neck, driving her mad with his tongue as she took her time exploring the breadth and feel of him through the thin barrier of his clothing. She felt his hand drift tentatively down between her legs, felt him cup her with his palm, kneading her gently. Pleasure unfurled deep inside her, spreading a delicious heat all the way to the tips of her fingers and toes. All too soon, he moved on, and then his hand was guiding hers over him, helping her to unfasten his fatigues, pushing the rest of his clothing away. Both naked now, they lay side by side, indulging in long, unrushed moments of kissing and touching, caressing and stroking as they learned each other's bodies. Corinne could feel the steely jut of his sex against her hip. It stoked a heated curiosity in her, a need to be closer ... to take him deep into her body.
She hooked her leg over his, bringing their hips together even tighter than before. Hunter was gritting his teeth, his jaw clamped so tight she thought it a wonder he didn't crack his molars. When she stroked her fingers over his bulky shoulder, delighting in the rush of color that flooded his glyphs in the wake of her touch, she noticed he was shaking. He was holding himself back, letting her set their pace.
She leaned forward and kissed him, using her tongue to show him that she was ready. That she knew what was going to happen between them now and she welcomed it. Hunter groaned and dragged her flush against him. The thick length of his arousal kicked hard between her thighs.
"Come inside me," she whispered against his mouth. She reached down and guided him there. "Make love to me, Hunter."
The broad head of his sex nudged at her core, hot and unyielding. She shifted to meet him, then sighed with pure, unabashed pleasure as he cleaved into her in one long unhurried stroke, filling her completely. Tears sprang behind her closed eyelids at the intensity of their joining. Sensation flooded her, every fiber in her being responding to his glorious invasion. His entire body felt as rigid as stone beneath her hands. He shook with immense restraint, moving within her gingerly, so carefully, so reverently, she wanted to weep. Rocking into her, pushing her toward a bliss she'd never known let alone imagined was possible, he caught her moan in a sensual kiss. And then she was shattering, a sweet detonation of pleasure and emotion that broke loose inside her as the wave of her first orgasm carried her senses heavenward on a choked cry of release.
Hunter lost himself in the sweet sounds - the stunning power - of Corinne's passion. She felt so good wrapped around him, her petite body shuddering and quaking, one tiny tremor after another stroking the hard length of his shaft as he pumped his hips against her. Never had he felt anything so glorious.
Never had he imagined pleasure like this could be possible. It ruled him in that moment, demanding that he give it full rein even when he wanted to take his time, make this moment last so he could savor every second of it.
He wanted to take care with Corinne. He wanted to be gentle with her after all the abuse she'd known from other males. And so he held himself to a controlled pace, even as she was coming apart beneath him, every sweet convulsion of her sex a hairbreadth from undoing him. He kissed her and caressed her, holding her close against his body, thrusting and withdrawing with utmost restraint until her climax reached its crest and began to ebb. Her breath trembled near his ear. Then it hitched softly and he felt a warm moisture against his cheek. She shuddered in his arms again, and through the dizzying haze of his pleasure, he realized she was crying.
"Corinne," he gasped, drawing back to look at her in concern. He froze, unable to move in the face of her tears. "Ah, God. I'm hurting you - "
"No," she whispered around a quiet little sob. "No, this doesn't hurt at all. It feels so good. You're making me feel something I've never known before, Hunter. I didn't know it could be like this. It's overwhelming how good you feel to me right now. I don't want it to end."
Relieved that she was all right, he kissed her and settled back into his rhythm. That she was weeping with pleasure because of their joined bodies made him want to pound his chest with his fists and roar his pride to the rafters. It was a strange impulse, animalistic and possessive and raw, but he felt all those things and more when he gazed down at Corinne's tear-streaked, beautiful face, her breath puffing softly from between her parted lips as he rocked into her with long, indulgent strokes.
She moaned as he found a stronger tempo, her short fingernails digging into his shoulders as she clung to him. Her thighs circled his hips, pulling him into a tighter hold against her body. Her wet heat gloved him so firmly, wringing him inside out as a furious wave began to build and swell at the base of his cock.
He tried to hold it back. He growled with the force of his will, but it wasn't enough. Corinne's body continued to milk him, driving him toward a fevered pace that only made him hunger all the more. He thrust deeper with each hard stroke, faster, until the coiled pressure snapped its leash and roared through him like fire in his veins.
He bit back the shout that would have rattled the house, burying his face in the curve of Corinne's delicate neck as his whole body jerked and convulsed and the first true orgasm of his life jetted out of him in a scalding stream of release.
He murmured something unintelligible as his cock spasmed with delicious intensity against the tight, warm sheath of her sex. He couldn't hold back the ragged curse, no more than he could hold back the instant reanimation taking place inside her. He was hard again, every nerve ending enlivened and ready to start all over.
Corinne's fingers trailed lazily across his back as she moved subtly beneath him, a wordless invitation he wasn't about to refuse. "You don't need a moment to catch your breath?"
she asked, a sensual smile in her eyes when he glanced down at her.
"All I need right now is more of this," he growled. "More of you."
"I need that too." Her arms looped around the back of his neck and she drew him toward her for a slow, heady kiss. Her tongue teased the seam of his lips and he was lost. Hunter thrust deep, inch by inch, filling her up. There was no staving off his desire for her now. No amount of discipline strong enough to hold him in check now that he'd had a taste of true pleasure with Corinne. Cupping her breast in his palm, he returned her fevered kiss, their tongues tangling as their bodies undulated in a shared rhythm, giving and taking with equal measure.
Chapter Twenty-four
She broke first, panting and moaning, her graceful spine arching up beneath him as her sex clenched his in a rippling fist of sensation. His own release was right behind hers. He shuddered hard, driving home with a need so fierce it owned him.
As he gathered her close and felt the hot rush of his seed erupting deep within her, Hunter knew a bliss that eclipsed everything else. He entertained - just for a split second - the notion of living a normal existence, without the dark past that had shaped him. He wondered - pointlessly, his logic warned him - what it might be like to have a female at his side, to experience what some of the other warriors had with their mates.
It was a dangerous indulgence, dreaming. But no more dangerous than the sudden rush of protectiveness, of primal possessiveness, he felt when he thought about Corinne. He'd killed for her tonight, and he would do so again without hesitation, if he thought she might come to harm. And in the back of his mind, as he sated himself in her body and took his comfort in her tender arms, he wondered if he might be the biggest threat to her happiness of all.