Savage Need (Temple of Luna, #2) (3 page)

Zahra needed
more
, but she couldn't speak at first, so she shook her head. Finally, she managed to whisper, "Harder."

He pinched her nipple harder and bit her earlobe with a low laugh. His next thrust slammed their hips together and he groaned. "Your cunt is so hot. Be hotter when you come around me."

She tried to answer, but all that came out was a rough moan. Pleasure had built too quickly for her to have anything but a hard, quick orgasm, and she wanted it desperately. It made her dizzy, the thought of clamping tight around his cock, of drawing the same sort of pleasure from him.

Zahra could barely move, but she caught the chains that held her and wrapped them around her hands. She used the leverage to stretch her back and lower her upper body to the bed. It shifted her hips, changing the angle of their coupling, and his next thrust made her scream.

He reared up with a satisfied snarl, and his hands landed on her hips. He rode her through the pleasure, stroking deep and hard with rough, panting growls that accompanied flares in his power. He didn't stop, not when she came again, or even when her body began to clench a third time. An open hand landed on her ass in a stinging slap. "Keep coming."

It was far from the quick peak she'd expected. Even if she'd wanted to stop, he kept driving her higher. Zahra bucked under him, moving to meet his cock even as he drove into her, and she was vaguely aware of speaking, but she had no idea what she was saying. She only knew she needed it to go on forever, the maddening twist of ecstasy that Jarek brought with every touch.

He pulled from her without warning and tore at the chain holding her right wrist. The magic in the chain didn't extend to the headboard, and iron snapped as he ripped it free. In the next second, Zahra landed on her back with her left hand still restrained and her calves on Jarek's shoulders. He slammed into her again and watched her face as he worked his cock deeper. "Touch yourself.
Now
."

The chain draped across her body, cool and tingling with magic, as she reached down to obey him. She was shaking so hard the chain rattled, and she jerked against him when she touched her clit.

"Good." His gaze stayed fixed on her face as he gripped her legs and resumed his hard, demanding thrusts. His blue eyes were wild, but under the surface she could feel his beast gathering. "Mine."

Zahra was beyond the rise and fall of pleasure, and she didn't trust her voice. So she nodded, squeezed her eyes shut and dug her head back into the soft pillows. All that existed was the way Jarek touched her, the way he
fucked
her, and she could only hold on and wait for him to join her in the maelstrom of never ending bliss they'd created.

She felt his breath against her calf a moment before the power swelled to dangerous levels. He bit her and the world shattered, the explosion of magic accompanied by a low, ragged growl.

As quickly as it had swelled, the magic retreated. She could feel it inside him, shattered pieces of it locking into place, reordering what had been broken, and the room calmed. They were silent except for their short, panting breaths, and Zahra lay under Jarek, trying to calm her own heart and mind.

Finally, he lifted his head. Cool blue eyes studied her, the wildness receding as intelligence returned. He drew in a slow, careful breath and withdrew from her with heart-stopping gentleness. When she was settled back on the bed he dropped to his side next to her and reached for the cuff around her wrist. "Are you all right?"

"You didn't hurt me." She raised her unbound hand to stroke his cheek. "What about you? Are you...better?"

He freed her and sank back to the bed, his eyes drifting closed. "I know who I am," he said finally, his voice still ragged. "But I don't know how I got to the Temple. Or what happened to push me over the edge."

He was barely conscious, and Zahra's chest ached. "Sleep. It will wait."

But he didn't drift off, even though his weariness was tangible. His arm lifted, then hesitated. "Will you stay with me?"

He needed her, now perhaps even more than before. She curled against his side and rested her cheek on the hard wall of his chest. "I'll stay with you."

His arm settled across her waist. His fingers rubbed slow circles against her lower back as the tense muscles in his body began to relax. "Thank you, Zahra."

She smiled in spite of herself. "You remember
my
name now too, I see."

Jarek's chuckle sounded rusty. "I seem to remember it being one of the few things I could say today."

"You said enough to get your point across." It came out all wrong, and Zahra blushed, her cheeks hot. "Get some rest, Jarek."

His hand stilled on her back, fingers spread possessively over her skin. His breathing slowed and he sighed quietly. "Good night."

Zahra closed her eyes and listened to his soft breathing and the steady beat of his heart. She'd forgotten, too--the way she'd felt years ago when Jarek had looked at her with those bright blue eyes of his. The thrill of excitement and the promise of pleasure, the butterflies in the pit of her stomach. And now...

Later, Zahra.
She'd think about it later.

Jarek settled his feet on the floor and stared at himself in the mirror on Zahra's dresser. He caught a glimpse of her in the reflection, of her smooth, dark skin hidden in shadows as she slept. She was every bit as beautiful as the student he remembered, but time had refined her features, turned a soft, gorgeous girl into a striking woman.

He forced his attention back to his own reflection and winced at what he saw. Wild, unshaven, he looked like his patients sometimes did after a hard month on the front lines. He recognized the brittleness in his own eyes as the result of trauma.

As for what that trauma was...
His memory held a frightening gap that made his heart hammer even though he
knew
the medical explanation. They'd co-opted the humans' term for it, but post-traumatic stress seemed a poor description of what happened to a wolf when his beast tried to protect him from something his mind couldn't handle. Madness was more like it.

Something had happened. Something so terrible it had shattered his mind and let the wolf inside him take control. It was rare for someone who wasn't a warrior, but not unheard of. Provisions would have been in place to bring him to the Temple and assign him to a senior priestess, one trained in handling feral men.

And none of it explained how he'd ended up curled around Zahra, a healer whose skills were rarely plied in the bedchamber. But he had, and she was the only memory he had of the past few days. Her scent, her skin, the way she tasted and the way she came for him...

His cock stirred, and he swore and closed his eyes.
No.

The bed moved, and she spoke, her voice husky from sleep. "Jarek?"

He hardened so fast he had to bite back a groan. "Yes?"

One soft hand skimmed over his back, and he felt her lips on the back of his shoulder. "Do you need anything?"

She'd be able to see him in the mirror, everything from his clenched jaw to his closed eyes to the erection that probably wouldn't subside as long as she was in the room with him. "My beast isn't in control anymore, but it's not quiet yet."

Satin rustled as Zahra climbed from the bed. He heard her kneel in front of him even before she rested her hands on his thighs. "I trust your beast more than most men. You were very gentle."

He'd seen the marks of his teeth along her shoulders and back. He'd seen the bruises on his hand, the ones that meant he'd closed his hand around her wrist or ankle hard enough to grind the jeweled cuffs into his skin. He opened his eyes and touched her cheek. "Didn't seem that way to me."

She looked debauched. Her dark hair fell in disheveled waves around her bare shoulders, and an amused smile curved lush lips still swollen from his kisses. "Don't I get to be the judge of your relative tenderness?"

He moved his fingers to her lips because he couldn't stop himself. "I hate the idea of hurting you. And I'm scared that I could have. Why did you take that risk, Zahra?"

Doubt flashed in her eyes, and she looked away. "When they told me you were here, I went to see you. They were ready to send you to another priestess, one with silver robes, but you said you wanted me."

"Of course I did." No point pretending surprise, not when his hazy memories included marking her with words as well as his body. He smoothed his fingers over the loose strands of her hair and sighed. "I wanted you. I still want you. But it would have killed me to hurt you by mistake."

"I think you might have hurt another priestess. You--" She bit her lip. "You attacked a Temple guard who tried to get between us. He's fine, but you were...insistent."

Another memory blessedly out of reach. Jarek reached for her. "Come up here so I can hold you. Please."

"Is that what you need?" Her fingertips feathered over his erection as she spoke.

Jarek fisted the blankets in his free hand as his body tensed. With Zahra on her knees in front of him, it was impossible to banish the fantasy, the image of her lips around his cock. But in his fantasy she hadn't been a priestess tending to a warrior, just a woman who needed him as desperately as he needed her.

He slid his fingers through her hair again, this time wrapping the strands around his hand. "Who's asking? A priestess or a woman?"

She stared up at him, desire etched on her delicate features. "A woman," she whispered, her hand closing around his shaft, "finishing what began a long time ago."

Jarek moaned and grasped her wrist, holding her hand still. "A long time ago, I was a man with fifteen years of service ahead of me. And you were too precious to become one of the brides of silence."

"I would have taken that chance." Her eyes grew bright with tears. "I could easily have loved you then. Maybe I did."

And the king wouldn't have been pleased to find his niece had promised to wait for a healer of no lineage--one who might not ever return--when every rich warrior freshly released from the army dreamt of wooing her. It hadn't stopped him from wanting her, or from kissing her the week before he'd been sent to the front lines. It had been a foolish, reckless decision, one that had branded the taste of her lips on his god damn psyche and left him wanting her for years.

"Fuck." He curled his hand around the back of her neck and leaned down, kissing her with all the hard desperation that had built inside him since that day.

She released his cock and slipped her arms around his waist as she rose to meet his kiss, her own ardor evident in the way she bit his lip and moaned into his mouth. The wildness inside him stirred, attracted by her pleasure and the need to possess her.

He pulled back just enough to bite her lower lip with a soft growl. "I may want the woman, but something inside me still needs the priestess."

"I'll give you everything," she whispered against his mouth. "Everything you need."

It was what he feared--Zahra losing herself in a man so broken he couldn't even remember the tragedy that had shattered his mind.

And, damn him for a selfish bastard, he couldn't turn down what she offered.

Jarek lifted his hands and curled them in hair, using the grip to tilt her head back. "I want to play with you. Discover all the things that make you scream."

She smiled and relaxed into his touch, baring even more of the soft line of her throat. "We have time for a little exploration, as long as I get my turn."

He indulged himself and kissed the smooth skin over her pulse. "And what would you like to do with your turn?"

Her pulse sped under his lips, and a blush darkened her cheeks. "I want your cock in my mouth. I want to taste you. Make you come."

A few more hot, open-mouthed kisses along her neck got his lips to her ear. "Maybe we should try that first."

She laughed. "That was the plan before you distracted me, Jarek."

He straightened, leaving one hand wrapped in her hair and dropping the other to the bed behind him. "Stupid of me. Take me in your mouth." But he had too many plans to let her drive him over the edge quickly.

Her hands trembled on him, and she licked her lips a moment before licking
him
, drawing her tongue slowly around the head of his cock. The hot wetness of her mouth made him ache with the need to thrust up against her lips, but he held himself still and indulged only in tightening his fingers a tiny bit in her hair. "Like that, sweetheart. Just like that."

Zahra's eyes met his. She paused with her open mouth hovering over the tip of his cock, then closed her lips around him with a low moan.

It was better than any of the dreams. Better than the most wicked fantasy. His imagination hadn't provided the scent of her or the heat of her tongue, hadn't conjured the sounds she'd make as she licked him with an enthusiasm he would never have believed possible.

It was hot enough to burn him up, and the very heat of it eased some of the crushing pressure inside him.

She gripped him again, her hand tiny around the base of his shaft. The metal loops on the cuff around her wrist jingled as she jerked her fist over him, and she braced her other hand on the edge of the bed, her polished nails digging into the sheets.

Pleasure sank its claws into him, making it impossible to keep from tightening his fingers in the soft fall of her hair. "Slower," he whispered, tugging her head back until her mouth barely covered the head of his cock. "I'm not ready to come yet. Not until I'm inside your cunt again."

Zahra released him and leaned closer, until his shaft nestled between her breasts. Her tongue skimmed over the head of his cock again, and she looked up at him. "We have time to do both."

Not nearly time enough. Jarek dropped his fingers to the curve of her breast and pinched her nipple until she gasped and shuddered. "Has it been so long since the last time you served Luna in a bed? Only one thing soothes a wolf on the edge, and it isn't his own pleasure."

Her cheeks reddened. "I know I ask too much. I
want
too much."