ClosertoFire Read online

  It’s beginning, he thought. She needs. He didn’t have to read her thoughts. The lust-glazed confusion and fear in her eyes made his heart ache. She craved with an intensity that scared her. It was all he could do to be still—and wait.

  “It’s all right, Lily. But you have to decide. Either send me out of here—right now—or give yourself to me,” he rasped.

  Her eyes widened. For a second, he thought she might run. He held on to the shreds of his control, awaiting her decision. He watched, aching, as a drop of water traced a path down her chest and disappeared between her breasts. She opened her mouth as if to speak and closed it again. Just as he thought she was going to send him away, she reached for him with trembling hands.

  Give yourself to me. The words themselves weren’t what made her breathless. It was the look in his eyes, that of a man holding on to the last threads of his restraint. It touched an untamed, unfamiliar, hungry place inside her—the same part that had awakened in the alley the first time she’d seen Darek and Bane. It knew no logic, no reason, no clarity—just a vast, aching emptiness that only they could fill.

  Darek clasped her tightly, his ravenous gaze as magnetic as it was unnerving. His lips curved in a slow smile full of promise.

  She’d been so careful, ever since she’d realized how dangerous she was to the men in her life. She really, really should not take what he was offering. She bit her lower lip hard, hoping the pain would clear her head. It didn’t.

  “It’s all right,” he repeated.

  “I wish it were,” she murmured.

  He tipped up her chin with one knuckle. His expression was one of sympathy. “Trust me, Lily.”

  Something moved in the backs of his eyes—a flash of red, a hint of texture—something unearthly and ancient. Intrigued, she stood on tiptoe, trying to catch another glimpse.

  “You hunger, Lily. Let me help.” Before she could protest, he claimed her mouth with his own. His scent, like pine and campfires, brought her a pleasure all its own and she breathed deeply, wanting to drink it in until she was drunk with him. He pressed his hand against her lower back, drawing her belly tight against the thick ridge of his erection. Blindly, she worked at the buttons on his shirt, desperate to feel his bare skin.

  He cupped her face in his hands, warming her lips with his breath. “Lily.”

  She whimpered as he traced the line of her jaw with his mouth, tasting, kissing, grazing her skin with his teeth. She wrapped her arms around his neck, letting the towel drop to the floor between them. Her nipples rubbed against the fabric of his shirt, sending lightning bolts of pleasure straight to her core, where she ached and wept for him.

  She should know better—but she couldn’t stop herself.

  “Need you,” she managed, eliciting a deep chuckle from him.

  “Then you shall have me,” he purred in her ear. Lily realized she was shaking from head to toe. She’d been this close to a man before, but only once. And that went so well, didn’t it? Her stomach tightened with sick dread.

  He gathered her into his arms, carried her into the bedroom and set her on the bed. Stepping back, he finished the work she’d begun on his white Oxford shirt and tossed it on the chair.

  Lily inhaled sharply. His muscular torso was marked with multiple scars, many in groups of three, like talon marks. One, a red scar slightly wider than the others on his right forearm, looked recent. Lily scooted forward on the bed and reached for his arm, touching the scar. He watched her warily, motionless.

  “You broke your arm—when we fell, back at the library,” she said, remembering. He nodded slowly. “Is that when you got this one?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  He shook his head. “We heal when we shift,” he said, shrugging. “It hurt then. It doesn’t now.”

  “Shift?” It was clear to Lily that he was different—so was she, for that matter—but what did that mean? She was trying to formulate a question when he spoke again.

  “Can you conceive, Lily? I have to know.”

  “Uh…” Lily stammered, her mouth falling open. She hadn’t expected that one. Conceive? As in, a child? Her chest tightened.

  “I… No, I can’t.”

  He frowned. “You sound pretty certain,” he said, probing. He was watching her closely and she had the feeling he was reading every movement she made. She took a deep breath. I can’t believe I’m going to tell him this, she thought.

  “I sound certain because I am. It’s complicated…” Lily paused and took a deep breath. She’d never talked about this—to anyone. “When I was seventeen, I went to see the doctor because I hadn’t yet started my period. They did a lot of tests.” She leaned back, feeling vulnerable.

  “What did they find?”

  “I have fifty chromosomes. Normal people have forty-six. The doctor said she’d heard of this kind of condition in animals produced by interspecies breeding…like mules.” Lily winced. “She said it would probably be impossible for me to carry a child, and even if I did, there could be serious problems with the baby because of my genetic disorder. She strongly recommended an IUD. I’ve had one ever since.”

  Darek looked pained. “That must have been hard to hear.”

  Lily shook her head. “It was a long time ago. I’ve kind of accepted that if I ever want kids, I’ll be adopting.”

  He sat down beside her on the bed. “It may not be a disorder, Lily. Nonhumans have different numbers of chromosomes.”

  Nonhumans? Lily didn’t know what to say so she kept quiet. She didn’t know which was more unnerving—having this conversation with a near-total stranger or how comfortable, how right it felt to talk to him. This close to him, she could see the detailed ridges of his scarred, muscular chest. It was distracting. Very distracting. Curious, she traced the lines of three parallel white marks along his pectoral muscle.

  “You seem like you’re no stranger to sharp things,” she murmured. On an impulse, she kissed the highest of the scars.

  He moaned, a soft, low sound in the quiet room. She felt his fingers slip under her hair, touching her nape and urging her head up. Her heart pounding with fear, Lily reached for him. Last night, she’d been too drugged to think clearly. Now though, she was wide awake. Maybe Bane had been lucky. If she hurt another man, she’d never forgive herself.

  Darek’s mouth covered hers gently, his other hand moving up her belly to cup her breast. Instinctively she arched into the slow, intimate exploration.

  “You’ve been careful all the same though, yes, Lily?” he asked.

  She frowned, not sure what he meant.

  “You’ve practiced safe sex,” he added.

  Lily gawked at him, feeling a blush spread clear to her toes. Oh God. He had to ask that too? “I… Um… Don’t,” she answered, wishing Bane were there so he could just read her mind and she wouldn’t have to say it.

  He raised an eyebrow. “You don’t?”

  She waved a hand in a gesture of negation. “No, no…that’s not what I meant. I mean I don’t have sex.”

  Darek sat back, folding his arms over his chest. All of the warmth drained from his expression. Lily’s chest tightened.

  “Right,” he said, turning away. “You had me going there for a while.” He sounded sad. “I don’t like being lied to, Lily.”

  Chapter Three

  “I’m not lying,” she protested. He took a step back but she grasped his arm, following. “Listen to me. It’s not like this is easy for me to talk about,” she said, hurt.

  He shook his head. “You can drop the act, demoness. I wasn’t born yesterday.”

  Before she could stop herself, Lily slapped him—hard. “Stop calling me that, you asshole!” Tears came to her eyes and she reached for the bedspread, pulling it up over her bare body. When she met his gaze again he looked stunned, rubbing his reddened cheek with his fingertips.

  “Look, you asked. Now do you want me to answer you or are you going to insult me again?” she asked, her lips curli
ng back from her teeth.

  He studied her face, seeming to weigh her words. “All right. I’ll listen,” he said. “Tell me how it is that I’ve found my first idana virgin.”

  “My mother always said I was different,” Lily said in a rush, trying to keep her lower lip from trembling. “It was a nice way of saying I was a freak. Her little freak. She home-schooled me, kept me away from everybody my own age. I hated her then. I thought she was an overbearing, overprotective bitch. She told me once that bad things would happen if I had sex. I thought yeah, right. What girl’s mother doesn’t tell her that?”

  A muscle in his jaw twitched. She had his attention, at least.

  “So when I was fifteen, I snuck out of the house. This girl down the street was having a party. She had a lot of them. I could hear the music all the way up in my bedroom, three houses away. I didn’t even want to be there—I just wanted to act like everybody else for a change.”

  She paused, studying his face for signs of disbelief. He inclined his head—Okay, go on—so she did.

  “This boy came up to me and started talking to me. I remember he was wearing a jacket with the high school letters on it. It had a football patch on the arm. He asked me to go upstairs with him. I said I couldn’t and he got angry. Then he laughed and said he recognized me. I was that ‘frigid little freak from down the street whose mommy kept her hidden away’.” Lily put her hands over her face to hide the tears that spilled over.

  “What happened?” Darek asked.

  “I’m not saying any more until I know you believe me,” she said. Her hands balled into fists. He pried them gently away from her face.

  “I’m sorry, Lily,” he said simply. “Please, go on.”

  Lily pressed her lips together between her teeth, sniffing, swiping at her damp cheeks with the bedspread. “I was so mad and hurt,” she confessed. “Something in me just snapped, and I knew right then what I could do to hurt him back. Do you hear me? Hurt. That’s not supposed to be what desire is about—I knew that even then—but I still did it.” She leaned over, hugging herself tightly.

  “What did you do, Lily?” Darek’s tone was nonjudgmental but the underlying dread in his voice was clear enough.

  “I went up to him. I started unbuttoning my blouse,” she began, her face burning. “I still remember the look on his face—he wanted what he saw but he was scared too. Really, really scared. I didn’t care. I kissed him.” The tremors in her body reached her voice and she put her hand on her throat to steady herself. Darek laid his hand on her back, stroking gently. The touch soothed her and she pushed on through the wretched memory.

  “I kissed him until he was whimpering. Then I reached down the front of his jeans and wrapped my hand around his penis. I’d never touched a guy there before, but I knew exactly what to do. He was so hard. He came the second I touched him.”

  Lily took a deep breath, gathering her courage. “At first I was proud of myself. I showed him, right?”

  Darek said nothing, just watched her.

  She sighed. “I thought it was over, so I went to make my big, dramatic exit.” She turned her head away from Darek, too ashamed to tell the rest to those dark eyes that missed nothing. “But when I turned to go, he just went crazy,” she said, studying the wallpaper.

  “He grabbed me by the shoulders and pulled me back. He said I had to stay with him, that he loved me, that he would die without me. His eyes were bloodshot—they kept rolling back in his head. He pulled down his jeans, grabbed a handful of my hair and pushed me to my knees. Nobody stopped him—everybody was too stunned, I think.” Lily stopped, a shudder running down her spine. “He put his crotch in my face and begged me to suck him. When I wouldn’t, he hit me. He tried to shove himself in my mouth.”

  Darek swore.

  Lily faced him again, seeking understanding in his face. “I panicked,” she continued, her voice cracking. “I just…grabbed his balls and twisted. He screamed, let go of my hair and I ran. I just got the hell out of there. I didn’t even look back.”

  “Good. I’m glad you did,” Darek said firmly.

  Lily frowned. It wasn’t the reaction she’d anticipated. “But don’t you get it? I did something to him. Don’t try to tell me I didn’t,” she argued. He said nothing but there was no condemnation in his gaze. She went on, “When I got home, I locked myself in my room and showered for like an hour and a half.”

  “What did your mom say?” he asked gently.

  Lily shook her head. “I never told her. I couldn’t. But I figured it out that night—she was right. She wasn’t keeping me away from the evils of the world. She was keeping the world safe from me.”

  After a brief silence, Darek asked, “The letter-jacket dork. Did he survive?”

  Surprised, Lily glanced up at him. “Survive? Yeah… Of course he survived. He did have to change schools,” Lily said. Remembering a little detail, she tried hard to suppress a smile. “It didn’t help his reputation that his name was Peter Cockburn.”

  He roared with laughter. Lily giggled guiltily. It was a long moment before he regained his composure.

  “You’re kidding, right?” He swiped moisture from his eyes.

  “I’ll swear it on a stack of bibles,” she replied, the corners of her mouth twitching.

  “Alas, poor Peter,” he joked, coughing.

  “Anyway, I learned my lesson. Stay the hell away from men. It wasn’t all that difficult, actually. I mean, I was curious sometimes, but I never met anybody I really wanted to… What?”

  Darek was staring at her, open-mouthed.

  “What is it?”

  “So you’re serious?” he managed. “You never again… And you’re honestly…?”

  “A virgin. Yes. Like I told you.” She punctuated each word with her hands. She dropped her head back and looked up at the ceiling. How stupid was she, anyway? She’d met the first guy—okay, guys—she’d ever wanted to sleep with, and she’d started her Great Seduction by telling one of them first that she was barren and then that she was a virgin. Brilliant.

  When she looked back at Darek, he was gazing at her with something like reverence. Wary, she crossed her arms over her breasts, holding the bedspread tightly.

  “Oh man,” he said, running a hand through her hair possessively. “Bane was right. You’re perfect. Absolutely perfect.”

  He leaned forward until his gaze was level with hers. “I want to be first then.” His low, velvet voice gave her goose bumps. With one finger, he tugged at the top of the bedspread.

  “Uh-huh,” she said, pushing his hand away. “How do I know you won’t—”

  “End up like Peter Cockhead?” he finished, grinning. “Because I’m not like him and neither is Bane.”

  “That’s another thing,” Lily said, waving her hand toward the door to the adjoining room. “I don’t understand it. I want you. I want him too. What the hell…?”

  He laid his hand on her thigh. “Maybe you’re meant to be with both of us.”

  Lily gaped at him. “Say again?”

  His dark eyes were sympathetic. “What does your heart say?” He slid his hand up her thigh, eliciting a moan from her. “What does your body say?”

  “I want you,” Lily whispered, clutching the covers. “I want you so badly I can barely breathe. But this is insane. You grabbed me off the street yesterday and today I need you like I need air. I want you on me, in me, now. I want—”

  “Stop, Lily. Please.”

  Lily stopped, agape. His irises were crimson, lit from within. She should be frightened, she supposed, but she wasn’t. If anything, he was sexier like this, something savage, full of longing.

  “I know you’re afraid. What you’re feeling—it’s not human. Neither am I and neither is Bane,” he said.

  Lily coughed. “What are you?”

  “I think the latest name for Bane and me is ‘shape-shifter’.”

  “Okay,” she said, struggling to take all of this in. “Is that what I am?”

  H
e shook his head, grasping her arm and urging her to lie down next to him. She did, turning on her side to face him, and he propped himself up on one elbow, looking down at her. With one finger, he pulled the covers down to her navel. Shivering with excitement, Lily watched his finger trace the edge of her nipple. Her breasts felt heavy, her skin hot and tight. The questions began to fade in her mind and her eyes drifted closed.

  “I don’t think so,” Darek answered, nuzzling her neck. “But perhaps Bane can tell us?”

  A sound at the doorway startled Lily. Her eyes flew open. “B—”

  “Am I interrupting?” Bane was leaning against the doorway, dressed in jeans and a plain black T-shirt. Lily made a grab for the bedspread but Darek put his hand down before she could pull it over herself. Shooting him a nasty look, she hastily crossed her arms over her breasts, managing to trap his other hand, which continued to torment her nipple. She trembled. God, his hands felt so good. Having both of them in the room was overwhelming. She could barely think straight.

  “Not at all,” Darek replied casually. “In fact, I was just thinking that deflowering an idana is really a two-man job.”

  Lily’s jaw dropped and she began to tremble in earnest. Her thighs were drenched with wet need.

  “I heard,” Bane said, pushing away from the doorframe. “Your mother should have told you what you are, Lily. She could have saved you a lot of grief.”

  “My mother did the best she could,” she said defensively, trying unsuccessfully to ignore Darek’s teasing fingers.

  “Lily,” Bane said, strolling over and sitting beside her on the bed, “you’re truly a little puzzle. One we’d like very much to solve.” He stroked her cheek with his thumb, then allowed his fingers to trail along her jawline, down to her collarbone. He grasped her arm and drew it gently away, revealing her breasts. His eyes were a brilliant, shimmering blue.

  “God, you are beautiful,” he whispered. “Please, lie down for us.”