Blayne Edwards (5 page)

Chapter Three

Chloe stared at the man in front of her with a mixture of awe and intrigue.

“…so he got away from me and we’ve been looking…”

“What did you say your name was?”

The man rolled his eyes and reached into his back pocket. Chloe eyed the badge and the identification.

L. B. Caine.

Homicide.

“So your name is L.B.?” Chloe smiled at the man and felt the wet nuzzle of wolf nose against the back of her bare leg. She reached down to scratch Barklee behind his ears before absently tightening her robe around her.

The man shook his head and then nodded. Nervously. Chloe smiled at his state.

“My name is Luke,” he said almost reluctantly. “The L stands for Lucius.”

“That’s a beautiful name.”

The man looked stunned at her words. Chloe watched him look around the front porch of the cabin and then down at Barklee.

“Is he all right?”

Chloe nodded and then patted the dog’s head. “As a matter of fact, he’s perfectly healthy, Mister…”

“Luke.”

She smiled at him and then patted the dog again. “All right, Mr. Luke.”

He almost smiled. Chloe wished he had.

“It’s just Luke.”

“Okay.”

The silence between them was loud enough that it hurt Chloe’s ears. She felt Barklee nudge against her leg when she stopped rubbing.

“He’s spoiled,” she chuckled.

“You have no idea.”

The statement caused her to laugh and the man in front of her let the smile she’d almost seen show this time.

Goddamn, he was gorgeous.

Especially with that scar.

Chloe watched the man lean over and motion for the wolf to come to him. Barklee whimpered and nudged the back of her leg again.

“I don’t think he wants to go,” she laughed.

“Wonder why.”

She almost smiled at the comment but the tone he had used stopped her. Chloe was hesitant to pose her next question to the man after hearing his voice. There was an edge to it that made her uncomfortable. And not in a good way. Evidently the runt felt the same way.

“So is he a police dog?”

The man shook his head and stared down at the cowering animal. Chloe felt her anger grow even more as she felt the wolf push against her again and heard his whimper.

“So he’s a pet?”

“You could say that,” the man nodded and then crouched down to try and coax the wolf to him. “He’s more like a member of the family.” He nodded again and Chloe thought she heard him try to force compassion into the statement. “You know how that is, I’m sure.”

Chloe nodded her agreement and stepped back and stooped to try and reach down for the wolf’s collar. The brush of the man’s hand against her hair drew her attention back to him.

Their faces were mere inches apart and although he had already pulled his hand away from her, she could still smell where it had touched her. His scent was strong and woodsy. Masculine. Like warmth feels. With him this close to her, Chloe could see the dark pink scar even more clearly now. Without her mind even knowing that she was going to do it, she reached out and traced down the puckered skin with her fingertips.

“They can be dangerous animals.” Chloe couldn’t help but notice how low and seductive her tone had been when she’d spoken to him as she examined the scar. Nor could she help but notice that her fingers paused at the bottom of the scar but didn’t leave his face. “Did he do this?”

The man shook his head slowly. As if not to disturb her touch on his flesh. Chloe watched his pupils dilate as he looked at her with eyes that reminded her of flames. Intense. Consuming. The blue of fire when it burns hottest. He drew in a ragged breath before speaking.

“His brother did.”

She felt her fingers slide down the rest of his face and away from his skin. “How many do you have, Luke?”

He shook his head at her question. She almost smiled at the look on his face.

A look that said he too wished they didn’t feel so wrong together.

“How many wolves do you keep?”

“Oh.” He looked a bit surprised at his own voice coming from him. Chloe watched him stand up in front of her and she fought to keep the smile from her face as she noticed the very pronounced bulge in his jeans. “I don’t really keep any,” he said slowly.

“But this one has a collar…”

“This one’s special.”

Chloe nodded an understanding. And then reached around to find the wolf again.

“Come on, Lee.”

“Is that what you call him?”

The man nodded without taking his eyes off of the dog behind her. Chloe felt the animal cower again at the man’s now impatient gaze.

The man blew out in irritation and put a huge hand on his hip. “Lee!”

Chloe watched the way the man’s fingers dug into his own side as he spoke to the wolf. At the sight of his lack of patience with such a beautiful animal, she felt an anger rise up in her that only came out when a four-legged friend was being mistreated.

“Sir, maybe we should let him stay here for a couple of days,” she suggested calmly as she stood up in front of the wolf. “I think he’s a little traumatized by what’s happened to him.”

She watched the man grind his teeth together and his hand flex as he continued to stare at the poor animal behind her. Barklee’s nose had grown warm against her calf.

“He’s going to think traumatized when he gets home,” the man stated with a low, vibrating growl in his voice that made Chloe have to wrap her arms around her to hide her hardened nipples.

“Mr. Caine, if you think…”

“My name is Luke!”

Chloe clicked her tongue against her teeth and tightened her arms. “Well then, Luke,” she spat out, “if that’s how you speak to this poor animal at home, no wonder he doesn’t want to go home with you!”

She watched a rage grow in the man’s eyes that frightened her more than even she enjoyed. Chloe immediately either pitied or respected this man’s wife. She just wasn’t sure which.

“He can stay here for a while,” she stated and nudged Barklee back with her foot.

“He can not stay here…”

Chloe watched the man run his hand down his face in irritation. The scar on his cheek reddened and then smoothed out when he relaxed his face again.

“He can’t stay here, Miss…”

“Doctor.”

“What?”

Chloe held back a chuckle at his confusion. She was used to it though. Dr. Evans had never been a title that fit her physically. And she damned sure didn’t look like a zoologist.

Plus sized model, maybe. Stunning, redheaded, large-breasted, size fourteen woman definitely. But not a jungle hopping, outback exploring, PhD in zoology.

She had always found that her brains freaked most men out. Especially since they were sitting above tits the size of a man’s head and covered with enough red hair to stuff a couch.

“My name is Dr. Chloe Evans,” she stated proudly as the man resituated his stance.

Chloe grinned at the obvious discomfort he felt in his jeans and at the thought that perhaps in L.B. Caine, she had found one of those rare men who thought intelligence to be a much bigger turn on than silicone breast implants.

“Doctor of what?” he asked with a slightly flirtatious tone to his voice. A tone that made Chloe wish so badly that the chemistry between them wasn’t so wrong. He could have been great fun tied down in her uncle’s four-poster bed, she bet.

“Zoological studies,” she said absently, eyeing the way his pants had stretched even tighter at the crotch.

He smiled and Chloe saw his scar pucker with the motion. “So animals are your passion.”

Chloe felt her pussy immediately moisten at the way he had spoken those words. And at the definite inference he had added silently with his eyes roaming up and down her frame. She returned the smile and tightened her robe again before moving back to allow the man to enter the cabin.

At the least.

He shook his head. Reluctantly, Chloe thought.

Married. Two kids. A mortgage the size of the national debt.

But an awesome lay.

“Sure you don’t want to come in?”

He smiled again and nodded. “I just need my dog.”

He’d made the statement without any conviction whatsoever. Chloe watched him look over her shoulder and out the glass doors at the back of the house. As he focused past her she wanted to keep her eyes on the mouth watering man in front of her, but when she turned to reach for Barkley and found nothing there, she was forced to turn her head and search for the wolf. Her own gaze caught a glimpse of the dog scampering across her back yard and into the woods.

“How did he get out there so fast?”

Chloe turned back just in time to see Luke moving closer to her. Once again, Chloe smelled the warm, musty odor on him that she knew was created by nature only to drive normal, sane, respectable women into acting like shameless hussies at one whiff. She shook her head to disperse the smell. Luke closed the gap between them even more.

“Barklee?” Chloe called over her shoulder without taking her eyes off of the man in front of her. She knew the wolf was far out of hearing range, but calling for him again, if only to try and ignore the tension in the room, seemed like the right thing to do.

The man stepped just within reaching distance of her and then stopped before pushing her front door closed with the toe of his boot. Chloe watched him fix his gaze on her without any interest at all for his dog now.

“Do you think he’ll find his way home?”

Luke nodded sharply without speaking. Without caring one way or the other whether or not his pet made it home, Chloe thought as she continued to stare into the hypnotic blue eyes that this man had locked onto her.

L.B. Caine was physically the closest thing she had ever found to the embodiment of her fantasy. But they would never be a couple. He was not the man she was supposed to fall in love with or spend her life with. Even as she stood in front of him and felt her body grow wet simply by looking at him, Chloe also felt the twinge of knowing that something was very wrong between them.

She let her eyes travel down the length of his body, stopping to evaluate his arousal. His cock bulged within its denim confines and its impressive length was easy for her to evaluate, as he did nothing to try and hide it from her with his stance. Chloe found the fact that she had been the woman to produce such a reaction from the gorgeous man in front of her one of the most arousing things about the entire situation.

She knew he was going to reach out for her. Long, lumbering seconds before she felt the scorch of his fingertips on the back of her neck, Chloe understood exactly what Luke Caine was going to do.

Whether she wanted him to or not.

This man’s fingers gripping the back of her neck to pull her toward him felt more unnatural than her body’s reaction to the alpha had. Luke was strong. Very strong. And although his hands at the back of her head and his mouth pressing into hers felt like something that should never be allowed to happen, they also felt good. If only to her lonely, horny flesh. It had been almost a year since Chloe’d had a lover and even then, the last man she had dated had left much to be desired in the sexual arena.

As Luke Caine roughly broke the kiss before pushing her down to the couch and spreading her legs, every man on that list lost a position. And when the man shoved her robe out of the way, reached under her and gripped her ass with both hands before hungrily driving his tongue up into her wet, starving sex, Chloe forgot she’d ever had any other man touch her.

The man began to devour her cunt with his mouth. Without ever foreseeing this as something a total stranger would do, Chloe had allowed her defenses to lower somewhat as he had used his tongue and lips to introduce his mouth to her own. But now, as that same tongue and those same lips and even the sharp, honed edges of teeth belonging to a man she didn’t know began to free her pussy of all evidence of her excitement, Chloe’s common sense began to regroup and rebuild its forces.

“Luke.”

He ignored her voice and the fingers she had dug into his hair. No doubt because what had been intended as a request that he give her a minute to think about what was happening to her had come out sounding more like the breathless calling of a lover’s name. And the flexing of her hands told him that her body was enjoying what he was doing to it. But her mind still felt the same unease under his touch. Chloe pulled her fingers from his hair and gripped the weave of the couch with both hands and tried to make her voice more forceful and less like that of a woman being pleased.

“Luke, please…”

The man glanced up at her briefly before letting go of her ass with one hand and bringing it to the lips of her sex. Chloe felt the harsh brush of calloused fingers run through the reddish-blonde hair that hid the cleavage of her aroused and empty slit. Fingertips searched, parted her curls and explored, each time barely and, she suspected, purposely missing the hard, inflamed bud of her clit.

Chloe felt her back arch without her permission. Her mind had nothing to do with her pelvis as it tilted and raised to offer its assistance in subjecting the hidden pearl between her thighs to his stroke. Luke’s hand continued to roam the wet, dewy landscape of her mound, sifting through curls and caressing swollen flesh without once blessing the tiny head of her female member with his touch.