Claimed by the Pack

She turned, and her robe had fallen open. Intentionally so, of course. I could see her skin beneath, all creamy and smooth and scented with oils. I could make out the sensual curve of her neck. Her alabaster breasts, set above the flat of her taut stomach.

And below that: the well-kept thatch of soft red hair. Forming a pretty little ‘V’ where her legs met…

A thought occurred to me suddenly, sending my heart into my throat. But when I reached up to check, it was there. My totem, still hanging securely and reassuringly around my neck.

“I didn’t take it,” she said, stepping closer. “Not this time.”

I was otherwise naked. Naked except for a thin pair of silken boxers. I couldn’t remember if I’d been wearing them in Paris, or if they’d come from somewhere else.

“I could’ve though,” she told me. “I could’ve easily done anything I wanted…”

Warning lights flashed in my skull. Klaxon horns alerting me to danger, even as she shrugged the robe from her shoulders and let it fall to the floor.

“What do you want Karessa?”

She hooked one finger into the corner of her mouth. “Want?”

I gulped hard. She looked pretty damned amazing. Even better than before we’d left.

Lack of sleep. Not eating. Not leaving the citadel…

No-so-foreign thoughts floated into my mind. They were feelings. Connections.

Missing you…

They were fact.

“What makes you think I want anything?” Karessa asked.

She put one knee on the bed.

“I have everything I want, really.”

Climbed on with the other.

“Almost everything,” she said coyly. Reaching out, she laid one hand on my bare chest. Somehow, I let her.

“Except you…”

Her eyes were emeralds. Her skin, like white fire. There was a heat to her that had always been undeniable, and in the past there’d been no reason to deny anything. But now that heat burned with such brightness and intensity I had to look away.

Damien… just go.

She knelt face to face with me, daring me to give ground. Stubbornly I refused. Both outcomes were in her favor, though. I was playing into her hands.

I held fast and our lips brushed… ever so slightly. I inhaled deeply, and her scent was intoxicating.

DAMIEN!

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She leaned in to kiss me, as she’d done a thousand times before. Only this time… this time I pulled back. This time, I actually refused her.

“No,” I shook my head. “You’ll never have me. Not anymore.”

Her look flashed from one of sensual seduction to utter hatred, all in the span of a single heartbeat. It was almost inhuman, the way she could do that. The way she could turn off emotions of love and adoration, and channel them instantly into hate or ruin.

“So that’s it then?” she snarled. “You’re both throwing in with that dark-haired slattern?”