The Witch Thief (Harlequin Nocturne) (16 page)

She didn’t need to ask twice. Standing close, he swept his hand down her body. She radiated heat. He responded, releasing new heat of his own. Her legs wrapped around his waist, the leather of her boots cool against his backside. His sex nudged against hers, and unable to wait, he positioned himself to plunge inside her.

She clung to his shoulders. He placed his hands under her thighs, but she did the work, raising and lowering her body. She pressed her face against his neck and flicked her tongue over his skin, tasting him. He wanted to taste her, too. He swirled his tongue over the skin between her breasts, savored the saltiness of it. He inhaled; she still smelled of spring—of sun-warmed earth.

He slid his hands up and down her thighs, encouraging her as she moved. Her speed increased; their fire increased. And the fire was theirs this time, something they had created together. There was no sharing; they were past that. This heat was from both of them and from neither of them—it was just theirs.

Her speed increased and he helped her along, raising and lowering his arms to increase the depth of each plunge. Ragged breaths left her lips; puffs of smoke escaped his. Fire tickled at his throat, threatened to erupt.

Her head fell back and her body arched. The walls inside her constricted, hugging him with such sweet pressure he did explode. She shuddered again and again. His arms trembled; his body trembled. Then when he knew his fire was exhausted, they were exhausted, he pulled her tight against him and enveloped her in heat.

Chapter 15

A
mma didn’t want to move. Being curled around Joarr’s body felt right, more right than anywhere she had ever been. Even naked, except for her borrowed thigh-high boots, in an elevator, she felt good.

Still, she had to move. This moment couldn’t last. She couldn’t pretend forever, couldn’t block out reality forever.

Joarr pressed a kiss against her shoulder. A sweet touch of his lips. So in contrast to the frenzied way she’d attacked him. She smiled.

He’d said she looked delicate, although he knew she wasn’t. It was a compliment, she supposed, but it had lit something inside her, a need to show how strong and unrepentant she could be. She’d wanted him, and she’d let him know. She wanted her baby and she would have him. Him she could keep, but only if she kept his existence from Joarr.

Joarr she could only have for now, and she’d decided to make the most of it.

He lifted her off the bar she’d been perched on. Her legs slid down his hips and thighs until her feet touched the ground.

From somewhere above them there was a bang, then someone pounding—with the flat of their hand against the closed elevator shaft’s door.

“They found us,” Joarr murmured.

“Yes.” Amma sighed and bent to retrieve her clothing. Without glancing at Joarr, she pulled them on—except the panties. They were nothing but a scrap now. She tucked them into her bra. When she looked back, Joarr was dressed, too, or as dressed as he could get without shifting and creating a new wardrobe. With buttons littering the floor, his shirt hung open.

He looked wild and raw—not at all the under-control male he normally presented himself as. His hair was ruffled and she could see the muscles of his chest. She wanted to touch them—again. But she folded her hand closed and forced herself to keep it at her side.

His pants, she realized, weren’t completely closed, either. The button that had joined the waistband had disappeared, too, revealing a V of skin. Hair that was sprinkled across his chest condensed into a line there—like an arrow pointing lower, reminding her what they had done and with how much abandon she had embraced the act.

There was another noise, louder than those before, then voices.

“Are you okay down there? We’ll have you out in a jiffy.”

She looked at Joarr. His eyes were shadowed, unsure. He held out a hand.

She stared at it for a second; after what they had shared, taking his hand, accepting his support should have been nothing, but it wasn’t. Somehow it was far more intimate than anything else they had done in this space.

There was a jolt of movement, then a grinding noise. The car jerked, then jerked again. Amma teetered on her borrowed heels. Joarr’s hand stayed where it had been, his offer apparently still open.

Another jerk and she laid her palm against his.

Slowly, he pulled her against his chest, and the heat, sweet, welcoming heat, was back.

She sighed and relaxed against him.

It was just for a few minutes. It didn’t mean she was falling for him, didn’t mean it would hurt when she had to walk away.

* * *

After the elevator was ratcheted up even with the floor and the door pried open, Joarr had led Amma through the waiting crowd of workmen and hotel employees. He’d waved aside the manager, whose practice at hiding his true thoughts showed as he apologized for the inconvenience and insisted both lunch in their room and the room itself were free.

Once past the gaping humans, Joarr had lifted Amma into his arms and taken the stairs to their floor. She hadn’t objected. In fact since her reluctance to take his hand in the elevator, she’d done nothing but snuggle closer to him. He enjoyed the feeling of her clasped against his body, enjoyed warming her with his heat.

But he also knew something besides sex had happened in that elevator. She’d gone into the act with complete abandon, then stared at his offered hand, her eyes wide with fear. Of him? Of the people waiting? Or of what had passed between them?

He guessed the latter, because it had shaken him, too. Amma shook him. He had never felt this way before—didn’t think he was supposed to feel this way.

Dragons didn’t take mates. He knew other forandre did, but dragons didn’t. It was unheard of, but he couldn’t imagine walking away and leaving Amma—not now.

Joarr had rebelled before. Hell, he was known for it, but this? The Ormar wouldn’t stand for it. Male and female dragons did not live together, did not make lives together.

If he tried to, the Ormar would do what Rike had threatened, take everything—his home, his cavern and his treasure—doom him to life as a wyrm. Would Amma want him then? He knew the answer.

Inside the room now, he set Amma down. She didn’t look at him. She wandered to the window instead and looked out.

“It’s a nicer part of town at least,” she murmured.

“Yes.”

“I’ll need clothes.”

“Yes.”

Silence settled around them.

Amma pulled her hand away from the curtain and ran a hand through her hair.

It was wild and golden and alive, like the fire he knew was inside her.

Dragon fire. He didn’t know how it was possible, but he knew Amma had it. Did she know?

“When you took the chalice, you traded it to the Collector. For what?” He knew the answer. He’d figured it out; after she’d left him she’d gone to Alfheim, claimed to be half elf. They hadn’t welcomed her, had actually denied her claims. A war had broken out between her and Alfheim, a war that ended in her being separated from her body and her spirit sent to Gunngar.

“Information,” she replied. She wandered to the bed and traced her fingers over the quilted comforter.

“On your family,” he added.

She looked up, surprised. “Yes. He gave me their names.”

“Did it occur to you he might be lying?”

Her head jerked and her shoulders stiffened. “Why would he do that?”

Joarr shrugged. “Maybe he didn’t have the answer.” Or maybe he did and was afraid if he told her the truth she wouldn’t give him what he wanted—wouldn’t give him a chalice tied to the dragons.

* * *

Back in his office, Fafnir sat behind his desk and poured the dragon blood he had harvested into a mundane tumbler. He stared at the glass. This was it, the last bit of blood. His flask had been damaged when the warehouse had exploded. He’d lost over half of what he had taken, and all that had still been waiting inside the dragon’s corpse. He pressed his index fingers to the bridge of his nose, trying to stop the pain that threatened to split his head in two.

He should ration the blood, but after seeing what had happened, after being thrown to his knees by the explosion and feeling the heat, he needed the reassuring strength of this drink—more than just the one sip a day he allowed himself from the chalice.

He picked up the glass and sipped.

A smile curved his lips. The taste was the same as from the chalice. He set the glass back down and waited for the warm zing of power to surge through his body.

It didn’t. His fingers tightened around the glass and he glanced at the mirror and the safe hidden behind it. The chalice was empty and waiting…and he had blood.

He’d had his sip for the day, but how bad could an extra sip be? Besides, this was old blood. The warning had been for new.

He gritted his teeth. The temptation was like a physical pain, an ache deep in his core.

His fingers tightened even more. The glass cracked, then snapped. Dragon blood spilled over his fingers and onto the papers covering his desk.

He stared at it, horrified. His blood, his glorious blood. It was gone…all of it.

He picked up the empty flask and flung it across the room. The few last drops of blood hidden inside splattered against his wall.

He cursed and swiped his arm across his desk, sent the bloodstained papers and the shards of glass onto the floor.

He couldn’t live like this. He had to get more blood—new blood from a new dragon that he could drink from the chalice.

He stalked to the mirror, his hand automatically reaching for the latch. Then he dropped his hand to his side. First the dragon. He had to find the dragon.

He paced back and forth in the small space between his desk and the mirror.

A dragon had taken his bait, come through the portal into the human world, but then something had gone wrong. It was clear neither of the couples the previous evening had been dragons—they were nothing, humans. He pulled his dagger from his sleeve and slammed it into the back of his office door.

Shaking with frustration, he resumed his pacing. Calm. He needed to calm, needed to think. The dragon was near. He had to be.

And he hadn’t got what he’d come for yet—Fafnir still had the chalice. The dwarf glanced at the mirror. He was tempted to check, even though he had looked at the artifact just moments earlier, but he shook his unease off.

He didn’t have time for weakness. He needed to find that dragon.

A dragon and a female—where could they be?

* * *

Amma awoke, warm and content. She pushed her arm up over her head and stretched. Beside her there was a mumble; then an arm tightened around her waist and pulled her snug against a strong male chest.

She purred and snuggled deeper under the covers, tighter against Joarr…

Joarr.

Amma stiffened, then pulled his arm free of her waist and rolled to her feet beside the bed.

She rubbed her eyes and blinked, earlier events returning to her.

After they’d made their way to the room, she’d been tired and confused. She’d lain down on the bed to give herself time to think, and she must have fallen asleep.

She’d slept soundly, more soundly than she could ever remember sleeping before. And she’d dreamed. She never dreamed, but last night…today—it had been morning by the time she’d fallen asleep—she had. And her dreams had been good, pleasant even. She’d been curled in front of a fire, the heat lapping against her skin. Animal furs, soft and luxurious, had caressed her. The room had been dark, nothing to be seen beyond the light of the fire, but it had smelled of spice, exotic, enticing spice.

A lot, she realized now, like Joarr.

She ran her hands over her arms, tried to wipe away the temptation to crawl back into the bed and under the covers beside him.

She had almost lost the battle when there was a knock on the door.

The dragon didn’t stir.