Instinctive (7 page)

Slyck’s ears perked up as she punched up the volume on her stereo. With her hands on her hips, Jaclyn bit down on her bottom lip, and then, with a look on her face that Slyck didn’t understand, she scanned her living room. Seemingly unsettled she paraded across the carpeted floor. After a quick glance out her sheer curtains, she picked up a blue vase. With tension visible in her stance, she crinkled her nose in thought. Turning, she positioned the vase on an end table, then paced back to her stereo, where she fidgeted uneasily with her blouse.

Then suddenly, in a move that took Slyck by surprise, she let out what appeared to be a long, resigned breath, sensuously widened her legs, and leaned against the wall. Her hands left her waist, slid over her stomach, and then climbed higher, until she reached her breasts.

His brain stalled and liquid fire pitched through him as he perused her, immediately understanding her strange look, as well as what her agitated state was all about.

Arousal.

With her body shrouded in darkness, her hands spent a moment teasing her nipples before continuing to explore her flesh. She caressed her flat stomach and then dipped her fingers into the waistband of her pants.

Slyck’s entire body moistened. He moaned, a heady mixture of agony and pleasure rushing through his blood. He shook his head to clear it, not wanting to focus on his own lust and miss a thing as Jaclyn licked her lips and threw her head back.

His cock grew another inch and he ached to sink into her warm, wet mouth as she pulled her pants wide-open and shimmied
out of them. Her panties quickly followed. When she turned toward the window, he got a gorgeous glimpse of her naked pubis. He stroked his cock. Hard.

His mouth watered, thirsting to taste her pretty pink clit, to watch it swell before his eyes as he laved it with his tongue. He was dying to taste her entire body, and his mind conjured up the path his tongue would take, and the ways he’d make her quiver beneath his erotic assault.

She stroked the nub between her soft feminine folds and his thoughts went haywire. White-hot desire claimed him as lust hit him like a high-voltage jolt.

“Come on, sweetheart. Spread your legs for me, just a little bit,” he whispered in a quiet plea as basic, elemental need took hold.

What she did next blew his mind and fueled his hunger in ways he never knew possible.

Jaclyn disappeared into the bedroom for a moment and came back with a pink rabbit vibrator. She stripped off the rest of her clothes, dropped down on the sofa, and widened her legs to give him a beautiful view of her sweet pussy.

Little white beads moved in a circular motion when she turned her vibrator on, and the clitoral stimulator lit up and buzzed to life.

She spanned her legs even more and brushed the tip of the fake cock over her clit before pushing it all the way up inside her.

Holy fuck.

His eyes widened in surprise. His body began shaking; air rushed from his lungs. Feeling crazed and frantic, he began morphing, his flesh stretching, his bones elongating. His skin itched
and burned with his panther clawing to get out. Everything inside him urged him to run naked in the wild with Jaclyn, to fuck her hot body beneath the star-studded night.

Summoning all his strength, he quickly focused on something else. Now was so not the time to shift to his primal form, where his senses were enhanced, his strength was doubled, and his sexual appetite was most powerful and would be clamoring for attention. Jaclyn’s attention.

Good goddamn thing he had control over the animal inside him; otherwise, like any one of his undisciplined teenagers, he’d have already been on all fours. With the inexplicable pull he felt for her, and the raw need ruling his baser instincts, he feared he’d turn into a mere kitten himself, unable to harness his animal urges for any length of time. Once in animal form, panthers, like other shifters, couldn’t always be held accountable for their primitive actions—hence shifting outside the home was prohibited.

Slyck shook his head to clear it, and once he had himself under control he turned all his attention back to Jaclyn.

With a heated expression on her face, Jaclyn slipped her hand between her legs, parted her twin lips and worked the stimulator over her clit. He was sure he could hear her moans of pleasure clear across the street as she ravaged her sweet fissure.

Her eyes glazed with heat and hunger, and with slow controlled movements, she began to rotate her hips. He studied her carnal expression as the erotic show mesmerized him. Oh Jesus, he wanted her. Needed her. But he couldn’t go over there and fuck her like she needed to be fucked, and he damn well knew it.

As his body thrummed with need, she shifted her position
and started to pump the cock in and out of her pussy. Raw lust flashed inside him and he almost came.

Okay, so maybe he couldn’t physically be with her while she masturbated, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t talk to her, to hear her aroused voice while she pleasured herself with that sexy toy.

Even though he knew he should just walk away, as every instinct he possessed told him to, and even though it went against his better judgment, he picked up the phone and dialed her number anyway. It was a mistake. He knew it. But he couldn’t help himself. That little vixen had him acting out of character and breaking policy—responding with his own best interests in mind, not the town’s.

Wasn’t that the very thing he always accused Vall of doing?

He pushed that thought to the back of his mind because he
needed
to talk to her, more than he needed to release the panther inside of him as it strived to claw its way out and ravish the hell out of her. He also needed to find out why she hid her sexy vivaciousness—a quality that she’d tried valiantly to hide, but he’d caught fleeting glimpses of over the last couple of days when she thought no one was looking.

The sexy vivaciousness of a female panther.

A surprised expression crossed her face at the sound of her ringing phone and he hoped—no, prayed—that the distraction wouldn’t deter her from her solo act. Although he had to admit, the carnal look on her face told him it wouldn’t slow her down one little bit.

Jaclyn leaned over, turned the music down until it was barely audible, hooked on a handless earpiece, and said, “Hello.”

Her soft cadence quickly pulled him under and every nerve in his body immediately came alive. He tried to keep his voice light but failed. Need thickened his tone when he said, “Hello, Jaclyn.”

She drew a shuddery breath. “Slyck?”

It pleased the hell out of him that she recognized his voice. Then another thought struck. Was it possible that she’d been thinking of him while she masturbated?

He pitched his voice low. “Yeah, it’s me.”

Without slowing down her sexy pumping action she asked, “What’s up?”

Before he could formulate an intelligent response, she furrowed her brow and went on to question in a low tone, “How did you get my number?”

“I, uh, small town, and the number on that rental property has been the same for years.”

Lust danced in her simmering blue eyes as her gaze passed over her lace curtains cautiously. “Oh. What can I do for you, Slyck?”

But he couldn’t fuck her. Hadn’t he said it himself earlier—no council member was to “play” with her or “mark” her before judgment, if a judgment call was made.

He took a quick moment to compose himself and for a lack of anything better said, “I was just wondering how you’re making out at the department store. Cosmetics sales still down?”

“My, news sure travels fast around here, doesn’t it?” She
drove the base of the shaft between the cushions. With the toy supported upward, she lifted her hips and slowly sank down onto the cock. An erotic whimper bubbled in the depths of her throat.

Sweat broke out on his forehead and he struggled to keep the lust from his voice. “Yeah,” he managed as all his blood rushed south. “Real fast. So how are things going?”

He heard her sigh. “Not so great. The cosmetics clerks, Brandy and Gina, are more interested in gabbing and painting their nails than they are in listening to my strategies. And have you seen the women around here?” She laughed and said, “Of course you have. Silly question.”

“What about them?” As chaos erupted inside him, Slyck rubbed his palm up and down his cock, moving his hand to the rhythm of her body. He pinched his eyes shut for a brief second as he stroked himself, imagining he was the one sitting on that sofa beneath her while she rode him hard.

“The women are gorgeous,” she said, her voice pulling him back. “Flawless, really. No wonder the cosmetics don’t move. These women don’t need them. Everyone looks . . .
ethereal
. Must have something to do with clean country living.”

Slyck’s body tightened. Shit. Jaclyn was too observant for her own good. For the town’s good.

“So tell me, Slyck. You’re a local. What do you think is the key to selling cosmetics to these women? And please don’t tell me I have to throw a backyard barbecue.” Her soft chuckle curled around him and nearly drove him to his knees.

“What do you have against barbecues?”

“Uh, let’s just say I never really learned how to play well with others.”

“Well, since the women don’t seem to need the product for wrinkles, why don’t you market it as a product that can make them look and feel sexy. All women want that, don’t they?” He couldn’t believe he was actually giving her advice. Then again, maybe that was the key to getting her out of town. Which was exactly what he wanted, and the town needed. Right?

Her voice came out low, sexy. “You’re a marketing genius, Slyck,” she whispered, not bothering to mask her surprise.

After nine hundred years on earth, he’d learned a thing or two.

Her mouth curved enticingly when she went on to ask, “What exactly is it you do around this town, anyway?”

“I own Vibes.”

She rocked her hips and he could hear the light buzz of the beads working her G-spot. “Oh. Nice. What kind of music do you play there?”

“The kind you’re listening to,” he said automatically, and then winced, realizing he’d given himself away. Before she’d answered the phone, she’d turned her music down so low; there was no way a mere human could hear it on the other end.

Her body stiffened. “How do you know what kind of music I’m listening to?”

His pulse leapt and his mind raced. “I heard it earlier when I was walking home from Vibes.”

“You live near me?” Her voice sounded husky, sensual.

“Yeah. Listen,” he said, redirecting the conversation. “I’m
heading back to Vibes shortly. Maybe you’d like to come and listen to some music.”

Okay, that was a mistake. A big, fucking mistake. Talking to her on the phone from the privacy of his house was one thing, but meeting her in public was something else entirely. Something that Vall could grab on to and use against him. And if there was one thing Slyck was certain about, it was that Vall would love to see him taken down a notch, and for Drake, Slyck’s first-in-command, to move into alpha position. After his last first had been decapitated, he’d chosen Drake to replace him. Slyck recognized that Drake possessed all the qualities of a good leader—intelligence, power, speed, and authority—thereby making him the next logical choice. Unfortunately he’d yet to develop the ability to fight with intellect instead of emotion—such things took time and had to evolve naturally—and therefore he wasn’t quite ready for the role. Both Slyck and Vall knew it, which led Slyck to believe that Vall wanted to overpower Drake, manipulate him, and use the shift in balance amongst the community for his own gain.

After a long moment of hesitation, she said, “I, uh, no. I have an early morning tomorrow.”

He blew out a breath, not sure whether it was disappointment or relief that stirred his soul. Since he knew better than to voice an argument, knowing her decline was for the best, he continued to rub his cock, and when she began to pump harder, faster, there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to stifle the groan in the back of his throat.

Jaclyn undulated her hips. “You okay, Slyck?” she asked, her voice breathless. “You sound funny.”

He could feel his composure vanish. Urgent need colored his voice. “Yeah, I’m doing just fine,” he lied and rubbed his precome over the tip of his cock. Any second now he was about to lose it.

Squeezing her legs together she rocked harder, her voice coming out a little deeper as her pussy muscles gripped the cock. The sight of the sweet torture made him throb.

“What exactly are you doing?” she baited.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me.”

He drew a fueling breath. How would she react if she knew? Would she be angry? Excited? Damned if he didn’t want to find out. Figuring nothing ventured was nothing gained, he took the bait and said, “I’m watching you.”

Her body froze and her glance darted to her window. After a moment she squared her shoulders and asked in a suspicious voice, “Where are you?”

“I’m across the street.”

Her glance swept over his windows in search of him. He took in her watchful eyes. “How can you see me?” she asked. “It’s dark in here.”

Fuck.

How was he supposed to answer that? Oh, I’m a were-cat with exceptional night vision. Jesus, if he kept this up by the end of the night he could write the manual
101 Ways to Give Away That You’re a Shape-Shifting Panther Living in a Town Full of Deadly Secrets
.

“The kitchen. The light above your stove is on. It’s casting shadows.”

“Oh,” she said, sounding a bit skeptical. She made a move to get up.

“Don’t,” he said firmly, stilling her.

He was almost certain he saw her whole body quiver at his commanding tone. “Why?”

He sucked in another tight breath and went for broke. “I want to watch. It’s hot. You’re hot, Jaclyn.”