She stopped an indignant response with her mouth, pushing hard, as hard as he had done those times when he had been so set on claiming her. He answered fiercely, lacing his fingers through her hair to trap her against his lips. For a blazing instant he almost took control away, and their kiss became a battle, his tongue thrust deeply into her mouth with such harsh possessiveness that she wrapped her own around it to still it, pushing it back and following its retreat. She traced the sharp white keenness of his teeth.
“Even your teeth,” she breathed into his mouth, “should have given you away after that first kiss. You remember that, don’t you? Only this time, you aren’t going to find it quite so easy to run away.”
The physical attributes in question closed over her lower lip, ever so gently. “It’s too late to run, Joelle,” he murmured roughly when he released it. “For either one of us.”
If the demands building within her had been less overwhelming, Joey might have pursued the conversation. But there was a far more urgent communication making itself known rather forcefully in a very receptive location, and Joey answered without words, trailing kisses and bites back down the path she had followed, pausing to stroke each nipple and tease the sensitive skin at the base of his belly.
Luke’s muscles bunched so tightly as she worked at the buttons of his jeans that they shuddered with the strain. His hands moved almost helplessly over her arms, the fingers settling at last on the buttons of her shirt, undoing one and then another. By the time she had the final obstruction cleared, he had pushed the shirt halfway off her shoulders, and for a moment his hot, callused hands closed over her breasts. Joey stiffened, closing her eyes at his touch, faltering with her hands inches from their goal, warm air licked over her skin like his fingers, and then she drew back out of his reach with firm discipline.
Her objective was firmer still. It was heavy and impressive against her palms as she stroked it, lightly at first, savoring the contrast of textures and the incontrovertible proof of her effect on him. She tried to remember if she had ever enjoyed the feel of a mans arousal so much, but memory remained a blur that refused to sharpen into focus, much easier to accept that the mere touching of him roused the need within her to an unbearable ache. She wanted more than to hold him in her hands. She wanted to feel him far more thoroughly than that.
Somehow she found the strength to tug his trousers down and away, so that none of him was hidden, she cupped the part of him that seemed made to fit the curve of her palm and slid down, down, until her breasts brushed his thighs and her mouth slid over his yearning length.
He surged against her so powerfully that she got more of him much more rapidly than she had intended, but she adjusted quickly and grinned around the hardness as her tongue tested the subtle ridges and varied patterns. She closed her eyes to savor the familiar strangeness of it, and his harsh breathing that was an accompaniment to each movement of her seeking mouth.
“Did I ever tell you,” she began, pausing for breath, “how magnificent you are?” His answer was a groan as she plunged down again. “I mean, when you change, of course.”
Luke muttered a curse in French. “There is one change,” he managed at last, catching her hair in his fists, “that I have no control over. With you Joelle. He arched up as she gave him her full and undivided attention, until he was vibrating and pulsing with every stroke.
Joey would have been content to go on for some time, reveling in her power, but Luke had other ideas. As if he’d read her triumphant satisfaction, his hands closed like vises on her shoulders, pulling her up and away, all the pale light of his eyes shadowed with dark passion “Don’t forget,” she gasped, hardly noticing the savagery of his grip, “my ribs!” It was a token protest, she was too lost in the wild need in his eyes to care.