Navarro's Promise (16 page)

But it was there. That taste, so beguiling, mixed with the heat and surging adrenaline born of a hunger she could no longer control. As she sucked at his tongue, that taste seemed to spread through her system, still light, with a heated nuance that had her moaning into his kiss as he began moving once again.

His hips shifted, the hard shaft dragging across her sensitized clit as the engorged crest raked over the swollen, slick folds.

He tucked against the entrance as Mica shifted her knees and felt the blooming ache, a sense of wantonness that filled her veins as the sensation of heat began to build.

Navarro tensed further, a muttered groan dragged from his chest; she could have sworn she heard a growl, a desperate rejection of something as his body jerked against her.

Then her breath caught. That heat that had begun at the entrance seemed to fill her vagina, at first bringing almost a sense of numbness before it became so sensitive, the nerve endings so incredibly acute, that nothing mattered but easing the internal ache building out of control.

“Mica. I’m sorry.” The words whispered at her ear made no sense, but a second later, the feel of that heat suffusing her again, the feel of his cock flexing, thrusting into her, almost had her pausing.

She should be frightened of something. Wary. But there was too much pleasure, too much need. Her knees tightened at his hips, her hips shifting, pressing against him until the engorged head wedged inside the tender opening and sent pulses of exultant pleasure raging through her pussy.

The impression of heat surging through her, the flex of the wide head of his cock, the feel of the iron-hot flesh working inside her, rasping over the hypersensitive nerve endings, sent her senses spinning. Desperation was building inside her, incoherent pleas escaping her lips as she writhed beneath him.

“Mica.” Hard, rasping, the growl that left his throat was primal, hungry. “Hold on to me, Amaya.”

She was holding as tight as possible. Arching forward, she worked her pussy against the hard stalk of flesh beginning to penetrate her.

Then he was moving, his hips shifting, rotating, screwing the throbbing flesh deeper inside her as elation surged through her.

If pleasure could be violent, painful, then that’s what this was. Each sensation was so sharp, so incredibly vibrant she wondered if she could bear it.

Each thrust stretched her farther, his hardened flesh raking over the tender muscle as he worked his cock deeper. The impalement was agony and bliss. Each stroke, each thrust that lodged him farther inside her sent her senses spinning further out of control.

“Please, please.” She could barely breathe; there was no thought, no reality but the feel of him taking her now. “More, Navarro. Oh God, I need you.”

She couldn’t get enough. He wasn’t deep enough inside her. She wanted more of him. Harder. Hotter.

The next thrust speared to the center of her and dragged a breathless, agonized cry from her throat.

She could feel his cock throbbing, heat spilling into her, and a distant part of her realized, knew what was happening. The unthinkable.

Her fingers clenched against the powerful muscles of his biceps, nails digging in as her hips writhed beneath him, her knees tightening further against his hardened thighs as he began to thrust inside her.

Spearing into her, the wide shaft of his cock began stroking, surging over tissue and nerve endings that screamed out for release. The burning ache that centered beneath her clit seemed impossible to sate, to satisfy. Each stroke only intensified the need, intensified the fire burning in the pit of her womb.

She couldn’t get enough of him.

She wanted to scream in desperation, in a hunger that tore at her senses and had her thrusting desperately against him.

His hand locked onto her hips, and still she fought his hold.

She couldn’t get close enough. He wasn’t thrusting hard enough.

“Still,” he commanded, his voice rough, so primal it stroked against her senses with the same reaction as to his cock stroking inside her pussy. It pushed her higher, yet she couldn’t seem to fly, couldn’t seem to find the release she was suddenly craving like an addict craving a fix.

She ignored the order to stay still, to simply take. Her hips jerked against his, fought his hold until suddenly, he jerked back from her.

“No!” She was reaching for him, her eyes flaring open to stare up at the savagely hewn expression on his face as he suddenly gripped her shoulders, pulled her to a sitting position, then flipped her to her stomach.

Before she could fight him, his knees spread her thighs, his hands jerking her hips to alignment with the thick penetration of his cock as he pushed inside her with a desperate thrust.

Mica’s back bowed, a wail of pleasure tearing past her lips as she thrust back to him, following the hard grip of his hands at her hips.

She felt him cover over her, blanketing her with primitive possession as his cock shafted hard and deep inside her. His hips rotated, his cock stretching her farther, stroking desperate nerve endings closer now, pushing her higher, harder, until finally, she felt herself shattering and falling over the edge of rapture with explosive force.

The detonation tightened through her before the upheaval ruptured her senses and left only the barest minimum of thought for the sudden, agonizing, rapturous explosion that surged through her again, pushed higher harder, and stretched the delicate muscles of her pussy wider.

The pleasure destroyed her. But she knew, once her senses returned, it would be more than the pleasure that had suddenly changed her life.

Navarro could feel the rejection of everything he knew was happening, but pulling away from her was impossible. Breaking the connection he could feel building between them wasn’t happening.

The animal had awakened inside him, and there was no pushing it back to its corner to sleep again.

He’d felt the first pulses of pre-cum, the silky fluid that ejaculated into her at the first touch of the heat of her slick pussy against his cock head. As though the animal had known instinctively the moment when his cock was aligned with her, when the perfect opportunity had arisen to shock Navarro with the primal impulse.

The fluid enabled the delicate tissue of the feminine flesh to ease, stretch, to grow hungrier, to need more, to accept what would come when Navarro achieved his own release.

Still, he’d fought it. With everything inside him he’d fought what was coming, a part of him begging, praying it wasn’t happening, though he knew it was. And still, another part of him rejoiced.

Now, lying over her, the feel of his cock pulsing in release, the heavy, swollen Wolf Breed knot throbbing in the delicate, tight clench of the heavy muscles surrounding it, he could feel his Mica, his mate, her flesh rippling, sucking at the primal swelling in bliss as her climax shuddered through her exhausted body once again.

But even more shocking, more troubling, was his inability to pull his head back, to release the flesh of her shoulder from his teeth, despite the fact that there were no canines to pierce it. Still, he bit her hard, his tongue laving the area he held as hard shudders continued to jerk through his body.

For the first time in his life he was experiencing what other Breeds took for granted. The animal rising instinctively inside him, locking into him, seeing through his eyes, tasting with his tongue and living through each sensation, each scent, each sight Navarro experienced.

Like another entity sharing his body, one he wasn’t familiar or wholly comfortable with. One that he could sense would refuse to ever become recessed again.

His body bowed as another wave of violent pleasure swept through him.

He’d never felt another resembling this. He’d never known such complete pleasure, such heady satiation. He wanted to lie here forever, locked to her, lost within the waves of pleasure that washed over him again and again.

He couldn’t imagine ever being without it, being without her. He couldn’t imagine a moment, so much as breath being taken, without the scent of Mica infusing it.

And he knew the dangers of that. He knew the folly of what his body had just forced on both of them. He knew exactly what it meant, not just to him but also to several other Breeds within both Sanctuary as well as Haven.

He knew.

And he prayed as he had never prayed before that this time, he wouldn’t fail.

CHAPTER 9

Mated.

She was mated by a recessed Breed that had shown absolutely no signs, not a single one, that he was even on the verge of mating.

But there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that it had happened.

There was no way she could deny it, even if she wanted to, not after she’d felt him lock inside her, his already wide shaft thickening farther halfway up the heavy organ and fitting firmly inside the narrowest part of her sex.

And the moment he’d been able to remove himself, he’d come right out of the bed, dressed and stomped out of the bedroom.

So much for whispering sweet nothings, cuddling and doing all that growling and chest thumping “my mate” crap like she’d heard happened with other Breeds and their mates.

Wasn’t it just her luck?

Her mate was out stomping, cursing and railing at fate because he had a mate.

Yep, it was just her luck. She should have expected it.

Rising from the bed, Mica moved to the attached bathroom, took another shower, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt and left the bedroom with a sense of resignation.

The anger was there, but she had spent so many years hiding her emotions that she barely felt it as she descended the curved staircase to the wide marble foyer.

Night was easing over the mountains, the cold rush of the evening air moaning outside the wide double front doors as it heralded a storm.

Rain or snow? At this time of the year, it could be either or a mix of both.

She shivered at the thought of any of those options. The thought of rain only reminded her of that mad dash through the dark streets of New York City, while the thought of snow in the mountains made her wish she had simply stayed at her parents’ ranch in Colorado rather than returning to her job at the paper after she finished at Haven.

“There you are.” As Mica stepped from the stairs, Merinus stepped from the kitchen entrance farther along the foyer.

Still slender despite the two children she’d had, and the fact that she had passed her fortieth birthday, Merinus still looked the same as she had the day she stood in front of those journalists by Callan’s side while he told the world what he was, and what he was created to be.

“Yep, here I am.” Mica pushed her hands into the pockets of her jeans. “It’s quiet here today.”

“There’s a storm moving in.” Merinus’s smile was quiet, confident.

She was the pride leader’s wife and mate, the prima they called her, and she carried her title well.

Moving toward her, Mica suddenly felt self-conscious, wondering if Navarro had spoken to this woman after he left, if she knew what had happened in the bedroom Mica had slept in whenever she visited, since she was a child.

“Come on into the kitchen. There’s coffee and chocolate cake. I’ve been indulging today.”

Turning, Merinus led the way back into the spacious, cheery kitchen, the jeans and sweatshirt she wore looking incredibly comfortable when paired with the thick, white socks on her feet.

Stepping into the kitchen, Mica almost breathed a sigh of relief at the fact that Merinus was the only one there.

“Cassie called earlier,” Merinus stated as she poured coffee and slid a cup across the wide center island, as Mica took a seat on one of the high bar stools in front of it.

“I lost my cell phone,” Mica sighed. “I’ll have to see if Jonas will get me another.”

The Breed-secured sat phone she carried had been in her purse along with her ID, cash and credit cards.

“Cassie told me to assure you she was taking care of things in regards to cards and so forth,” Merinus stated as she pushed the cake across the counter. “She assumed that since the sat phone was disconnected that something had happened.”

Mica gave a short nod. It was an agreement they had. If the other even suspected that somehow one of them had been hurt, robbed or taken, then they’d take the precaution of canceling all credit cards. The last thing they wanted, or needed, was some bastards cashing in after they’d possibly been killed by one of them.

“Callan, Jonas, Kane and Navarro are at communications headquarters going over mission stats,” Merinus told her. As though she needed to know, Mica thought resentfully as she dug into the cake.

“I just need to know when the heli-jet will be here to take me home, Prima.” Mica stared back at the other woman questioningly. “As much as I enjoy Sanctuary, I think I’d feel better if I were at my parents’ ranch.”

“Your parents are at Haven, Mica,” Merinus revealed gently. “The ranch was hit at the same time you were targeted in the city. Your father and mother were, thankfully, not at home at the time.”

Mica inhaled slowly, carefully. “Does Jonas know why they were targeted? Does he know why I was targeted?”

Merinus gave a quick shake of her head. “I know he’s working on it. I promise, we’re doing everything we can to figure this out and to get you safely home. But the key word is safely. We’re not certain that even the heli-jet would be a secured means of transportation at the moment. Until we know for certain, it’s not a chance we want to take.”

Mica took another bite of the chocolate cake, sipped at her coffee and simply allowed the information to settle inside her.

She couldn’t leave yet. She was stuck here, which meant the support system she would have counted on at any other time wasn’t available.

Hope, Faith and Charity, and especially Cassie, as aggravating as she was sometimes. They were her friends, her support system. She could have talked to them, and they could have helped her figure out which way to go at this point, with a Breed mate MIA only hours after said mating.

“Does Jonas have any idea how long it will take?” Mica finally asked Merinus.

“I’m sorry, Mica.” Merinus shook her head, her shoulderlength brown hair emphasizing the compassion in her expression. “I do promise you, he’s not the only one working on it. Callan, Kane and Navarro are investigating as well. I’m certain it won’t take them long.”

What was she supposed to say at this point?

She wanted to go home. If it was up to her, she would have gotten in a car and simply driven. She was one woman, and as long as no one saw her leave, then there would be no one to report it to whoever the hell was out there looking for her.

That wasn’t going to happen though, and she knew it. She wouldn’t make it to a vehicle, let alone past the gates of the compound, before Jonas, Navarro, and any number of Breeds who had watched her grow up, would stop her.

“Cassie asked that you call her whenever you have time.” Merinus leaned against the counter and sipped her coffee. “She said to remind you to beware of contentment?” It was obvious Merinus was very curious as well as partly amused.

Mica sipped her coffee.

She was going to strangle Cassie.

The moment she had the chance, she was going to wrap her hands right around her friend’s throat and just start squeezing.

Cassie deserved it.

She was hiding the truth of whatever she had sensed that day from Mica, and Mica knew she was.

“You’re not going to explain the contentment reference?” There was an edge of laughter in Merinus’s tone.

“I might explain it if I understood it myself.” Forking another piece of cake, Mica shot Merinus an irate look. “Do you always understand what Cassie’s talking about?”

“Sometimes.” Merinus didn’t sound as confident as Mica was certain she wanted to. “Does that idea of contentment have anything to do with the repeat mating tests Navarro insisted Ely run this morning?”

Yeah, that was Merinus, right to the point there.

Mica sighed wearily. “According to Cassie, she has no idea what it has to do with. As for the mating tests, Navarro simply wanted to be certain.”

“I see.” Merinus nodded somberly. “And that would have nothing to do with him nearly losing his sanity when Brandenmore escaped confinement and managed to pin you against the wall either? Or how he threatened to kill Brandenmore after he managed to free you from him?”

Merinus was more perceptive than many wanted to admit.

“What do you want to know, Merinus?” Mica asked quietly as she pushed the cake and coffee back.

She could tell when someone was fishing, and at the moment, Merinus was throwing dynamite in the water.

“Are you his mate, Mica?” she asked.

She wasn’t going to lie to Merinus. Mica had lived her life amid lies, deceptions and double-talk, and she hated it. She could mark her life divided by one event. The years of contentment and safety before the night Cassie Sinclair and her family arrived at her father’s ranch. The years filled with double-talk, lies and danger had been every day thereafter.

She understood, she truly did. There was only so much you could tell most children. But Mica hadn’t been most children, and the resentment had only grown over the years.

“So it would appear.” She shrugged, the attempt to appear casual, unconcerned, took nearly every ounce of control she possessed.

There were times she forgot Merinus wasn’t a Breed herself. She’d been a mate for so long, the mating hormone now so firmly entrenched in her body, that her senses were so much more sharply advanced that she could detect emotions herself, if not scent them.

Although Merinus was by no means a Breed. Yet.

She continued to watch Mica, making her extremely uncomfortable as her dark gaze remained intent. She wasn’t a Breed, but she was developing the senses of one, which meant she was no longer a person Mica could pretend to be calm around.

“How long have you known?” the Prima asked.

This was no longer the friend who had sheltered Mica along with Cassie when they were kids. She wasn’t the woman that cut Mica’s hair the first time, or the one that taught her to use makeup when she was a teenager, when her own mother refused to so do.

She was now the Prima, the dominant feminine force within Sanctuary, and there wasn’t a Breed male or female within the compound that didn’t inherently recognize her quiet, intuitive strength and power.

Mica glanced at the clock on the microwave. “Oh, two hours maybe?” she answered blithely. “Could be a minute more, could be a minute less. So let’s not get into the whole psychological mishmash that goes with it quite yet, if you don’t mind? I’d like another minute or two to adjust.”

There was the odd situation or two when her need for truth was almost outweighed by her need for privacy.

Breeds and their mates were just too damned nosy. And she couldn’t tell Merinus to mind her own damned business as she would most other Breeds.

“You’ll likely need more than a minute or two to adjust,” Merinus said ruefully. “It’s been fourteen years since I met Callan and I still can’t say I’ve adjusted.”

But she was happy. Mica could see the happiness as well as the contentment in the Prima’s gaze. She might appear now no more than twenty-four or -five, but she was fourteen years older and wise well beyond her years, Mica often thought.

That didn’t mean she wanted to discuss with Merinus something as private and as confusing as what had happened in her bed earlier with Navarro though.

“I wondered what was going on when Navarro stomped downstairs and out the front entrance.” Picking up the plates and cups, Merinus deposited them on the sink counter before turning back to Mica, leaning against the counter and bracing her hands on the edge behind her. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Navarro stomp before.”

Mica was quite certain no one had ever seen Navarro stomp before, simply because he so rarely stomped.

Just as he so rarely kept the same lover for longer than a week or two.

She imagined he was stomping because it wasn’t as easy to walk away from a mate as it was a one-night stand.

Poor Navarro, she thought mockingly.

Her shoulders almost slumped in dejection, “poor Mica” was more like it. She was the one sitting here alone with Merinus rather than trying to figure out exactly how she was going to keep her father from killing Navarro.

It would be hard, especially considering the fact that at the moment, she wouldn’t mind killing him herself.

After he fucked her again.

She wondered what it would take to convince him to fuck her again just before she killed him?

She glanced at Merinus as the other woman watched her compassionately. And that compassion grated. As though someone should feel sorry for her. They should feel sorry for Navarro, because her father really wasn’t going to be happy.

“Did you and Navarro argue before he left?” Merinus finally broke the silence between them.

“No.” She brushed her hair back from her face as she gave Merinus a tight smile. “There was nothing to argue over.” Moving from the bar stool, Mica tucked her hands into the back pockets of her jeans.

The sudden memory of Navarro’s hands cupping her rear, lifting her to him, flashed through her mind as a shiver chased up her spine.

Just as quickly, her womb clenched, a second before a rush of heat flashed through her pussy.

Mating heat.

Swallowing tightly, she jerked her hands from her pockets and stared around wildly for a moment, thrown so off balance that she knew Merinus couldn’t help but realize.

She could feel herself flushing, knowing that if Merinus’s sense of smell was anywhere close to a Breed’s, then she would know what had just happened.

Mica hated this. There was nothing worse than allowing anyone at all to realize something as intimate as her arousal.

“There’s always something to argue over if mating heat affects you. And I can imagine Navarro, as quiet as he is, could be a force to be reckoned with if he became angry.” Merinus sighed as though she had no idea of the sudden flames of aroused heat that were beginning to burn inside Mica.

“Navarro wouldn’t hurt me.” Mica shook her head dismissively.

She just wanted to escape. She wanted to run to her room, or outside, get away from Merinus’s too perceptive gaze or her possibly too sensitive ability to smell.

“No, Navarro wouldn’t hurt you,” Merinus agreed. “But, in mating heat, even the most self-controlled Breed can become unpredictable.”

“Merinus, I really hate to be disrespectful, because I have the highest regard for you,” Mica stated as she struggled to hold on to her patience now. “But I don’t understand what you’re getting at, and I don’t understand why we’re having this little chat. So if you would be kind enough to either explain it to me, or excuse me, I would really appreciate it.”