Sexy In A Bottle: A More Than Men Novella (6 page)

Nothing happened. She did it again and this time
was rewarded with a loud, clanking sound, then nothing. Valerie growled low in her throat as she pressed the bulb again, forcing fuel through the system, but her third attempt to start it was a failure as well.

This was going to take a little magical assistance. Raj slipped out of his own coat and started to approach the machine. He stopped when he noticed the furious red tinting her skin and the tight balls of her fists. His quiet, reserved mistress was about to blow.

"Stupid, old piece of crap!" she yelled, kicking at the machine with her boot. "Just leave me out here with a rusty, unreliable power source! Put in solar panels for the lighthouse, but for the keeper, who cares? She’s just a sad, miserable woman waiting to die anyway! I wish they wouldn’t be so cheap and would replace this thing."

Raj felt his whole body light up with excitement
and power. She’d said “wish.” Finally. The roaring flame in his gut surged out of him, enveloping the tiny room in bright light like a bomb detonating. When it faded and their eyes adjusted to the suddenly dim room, the old generator was gone and in its place was a brand-new, top-of-the-line generator.

"
What the hell?" Valerie exclaimed, stumbling backward from the sudden change. After a moment, she reached out and touched the new generator as she had with Raj’s coat. She examined the controls, her head shaking slowly in disbelief as her fingertips glided along the shiny, red paint. "This is real. It’s really real."

"
Of course it is. Turn it on."

She turned the key and pressed the start button on the control panel. With a loud roar, the generator started right up. The overhead light
kicked on. Power had been restored.

Valerie
circled around slowly and looked at Raj. The words had been stolen from her, despite the fact that her mouth was open and ready to speak. "Did you do this?" she finally asked with a quiver to her voice.

"
I did. Your wish is my command, Mistress. You now have two wishes remaining."

Chapter
Four

Not once since Raj washed up on her island had Valerie considered that he might be telling her the truth. He was confused, disturbed, injured somehow. That had to be the answer
, because there was no such thing as a genie. There was no such thing as magic or sorcerers. Men did not live inside gold necklaces.

That knowledge had been what got her through the last day.
It had allowed her to reason away breakfast and laundry. The coat and the fire. But
this
… Valerie couldn’t reason away this.

Raj was a genie. He wasn’t crazy. The beautiful, mysterious man that haunted her dreams was an ancient, powerful being focused on granting her every desire.

So, what exactly was she going to do about it?

She was going to start by getting the hell out of this shed.

Without thinking, she bolted from the building and charged into the rain leaving her coat and her flashlight. She didn’t care. The wind whipped her wet hair across her face, making her stumble on the rocks. She was almost to the house when her toe caught a ridge and she smacked down onto the wet stone. She scraped her knees and palms, but even that sharp pain wouldn’t slow her down. Crawling back to her feet, she shoved her hair out of her eyes and ran the last distance to the door.

By the time she made it inside, her wet hair had started to get icy. She was soaked through her clothes
to her goose-bumped flesh. Her lungs burned, and her face was screaming from the cold. It took a few minutes inside next the fire before she thawed out enough to feel the aftereffects of her fall. The rocks hadn’t been kind. When she brought her hands up to inspect them, the palms were raw and bloody, tiny bits of stone wedged into her skin. Her knee hurt worse, but she couldn’t bear to check it yet.

She was
still looking at her palms when Raj finally came inside. He was calm, not rushing despite the cold. He had left his coat behind as well and was as wet as she was. It didn’t seem to bother him, though. He was born of fire, right? Isn’t that what he’d said? She’d dismissed it, along with everything else, but how else could a man lie naked on the freezing rocks and not be cold?

Raj
frowned when he saw the blood on her hands. He moved slowly toward her, probably worried she would spook again, but Valerie didn’t move. With a banged-up knee, she wouldn’t get far, even if she had somewhere to go.

His
blue eyes gazed into hers, his presence suddenly as calming to her nerves as chamomile tea. Heat stirred inside her as he got closer. At first, the feeling chased away the bone-deep chill, but then it started to build into something more. Something wanton. Was he doing that to her on purpose, or did his mere presence light a fire in her belly?

He held his hand out to
hers. "May I?" he asked.

Valerie
had no idea what he was going to do, but she was in no condition to argue with him. She nodded softly, sending drops of water from her hair to the wooden floor.

Holding her hand palm
up in his left hand, he touched her skin with the index finger of his right. The heat of his touch drew a sharp hiss as he made contact with her raw, bloody skin, but the warmth grew until her whole hand felt like it had been plunged into a hot bath. When he pulled away, her injury was gone. He did the same with her other hand, and this time his gaze didn’t leave hers.

He was so beautiful. Valerie hadn’t really allowed herself to appreciate his perfection because it came with a mentally unstable price tag. But now when he touched her, she couldn’t help it. His dark hair was wet and dripping, falling in his eyes. His soaked
black T-shirt clung to every ridge of his chest as his breathing caused it to rise and fall.

When she forced herself to look away, she saw that both her hands were
now healed. She swallowed hard. There was no more denying this. "Thank you," she said, her voice little more than a whisper.

He responded with a crooked, embarrassed smile. People must not thank him very often for what he did.
"You are most welcome. But what of your leg?"

Valerie had forgotten her leg hurt
as she lost herself in the depths of Raj’s eyes, but looking down, she could see the blood soaking through her favorite jeans. "Oh," she said, not sure what to do next.

"
I shall care for you." Raj reached for her, and before she knew what was happening, she was in Raj’s arms. He lifted her like she weighed no more than a feather, carrying her down the hallway to her bedroom. He set her down on the edge of her bed. "We need to get you out of these wet clothes."

"
I can—" she started, but with a snap of his fingers, she was wearing nothing more than a dry pair of panties and a fitted T-shirt she often slept in. She gasped at the sudden exposure, but the look of unadulterated desire on Raj’s face silenced her.

He knelt slowly in front of her, letting his palms glide leisurely up her legs to her skinned and bruising knees. He cupped one in each hand, the heat once again building until he pulled away and revealed fresh, creamy skin.

"Perfect," he whispered, but Valerie realized he wasn’t admiring his handiwork. He was looking at her. Like he was set to devour her. No man had ever looked at her that way before. His hands traveled up her thighs, stopping as his fingertips brushed the scalloped, lace edge of her panties. "May I?" he asked again.

Valerie’s heart was pounding dangerously in her chest
, but she didn’t care. She wanted this, wanted him. If it killed her, at least she would’ve died while in the process of finally living. She licked her lips, watching his gaze drop to her mouth. "Yes," she said.

A smile curled Raj’s lips.
His rough fingertips hooked around the edge of her panties, slipping them over her hips and down her legs. She thought at first he might snap them away, but there was something to be said for the seductive quality of him undressing her slowly.

He lifted the edge of her
T-shirt, pulling it over her head. Her breath was ragged in her chest as he threw it aside and let his gaze roam fully over her bare skin. Her breasts tightened under his scrutiny, her nipples drawing up into hard peaks. Raj leaned in to taste one but paused when Valerie hissed in surprise. His freezing-wet clothes were pressed against her legs.

"
My apologies," he said, pulling away. He snapped his fingers, and his own wet clothing disappeared. In an instant, he was as naked as he was when she’d first found him. He wore only the gold cuffs at his wrists.

She watched the cuffs as
he reached for her knees and gently eased them open. He nestled between them and leaned into her again, this time her bare skin coming into contact with his own searing heat. "Much better," Valerie said with a smile. She couldn’t wait to have his whole body covering hers.

Raj smiled back at her, his eyes focused on hers through his dark lashes as he took one nipple into his mouth. The moist, wet heat enveloped her, eliciting a sharp cry from deep in her throat. Her
brought her hands to his head, and laced her fingers through the damp strands of his hair to tug him closer.

He took his time with her body, kneading and teasing one breast, then the other, with hi
s tongue and teeth and hands. By the time he pulled away from her, she was squirming and panting in his arms. Each touch was like dumping gasoline on the flame inside her. The blaze roared with a throbbing, aching need.

"
Tell me what you desire," he whispered, his lips grazing over the inner curve of her breast.

She didn’t know what to tell him. She wanted everything.
Anything. Just as long as he was touching her.

Valerie didn’t speak, but Raj seemed to know exactly what she wanted.
He pressed against her shoulder, pushing her back until she was lying across the comforter. He planted a searing kiss in the valley between her breasts, then leisurely made his way down her body. He left no inch of her unexplored between his mouth and his hands.

When his lips hesitated just at her pubic bone, she squeezed her eyes shut. She was overwhelmed with anticipation and nervousness.
Need and anxiety. His hot breath teased her sex, his palms pressing her thighs farther and farther apart. At that point, Valerie simply ceased to breathe. Her chest tightened as she waited for his touch.

The first flick of his tongue across her aching flesh sent her back arching off the bed. A strangled cry escaped her throat, cut off by another as his mouth moved over her. The sensations shooting through her body were amazing. Within seconds he had her quivering and on the verge of losing it.
She felt one finger, then two, slip inside of her.

Valerie’s inner muscles clenched
around the invasion. Her body yearned for more, for the rest of him, but he wasn’t about to stop what he was doing. His tongue furiously worked against her sensitive nub as his fingers pumped rhythmically into her. It was a combination she wouldn’t withstand. With a cry, her release came over her. The pleasurable shock waves pulsed through her body, making her gasp and thrash against his hand.

It wasn’t until she collapsed, still and panting against the mattress, that he relented
in his pleasurable assault. Valerie watched him through fluttering eyelids as he stood.

She’d seen him naked and aroused before, but it was different this time. On the beach it had been a startling and embarrassing moment. Now, the heat was rushing to her cheeks for a different reason. She pushed herself up to a seated position, placing herself perfectly at eye
level with his arousal. Her powerful orgasm had left Valerie feeling brazen. She wrapped her fingers around the length of him and squeezed gently.

Raj groaned and closed his eyes.
"What are you doing?" he asked.

Valerie arched an eyebrow.
"What does it look like I’m doing?" she replied before taking the tip of him into her mouth.

"
Mistress, please," he said, his voice a combination of painful restraint and sharp need. "It is my duty to pleasure
you
."

His protests were silenced as Valerie took him deep into her mouth, caressing every inch of him with the glide of her tongue. She drew down the length and back, flicking her tongue across the tip as she looked
into his eyes. "I find this pleasurable," she said.

Raj’s dark brow furrowed, but he didn’t argue with her.
Instead he closed his eyes and clenched his fists at his side as she gave as good as he’d given earlier. It was only when his hand shot out to grab her wrist that she stopped.

"
Enough," he groaned, clearly near the edge. It was the first demand he’d ever made of her, and she liked it.

"
Do you want me, Raj?" she asked.

"
Do you wish me to make love to you?" he replied with another question.

He seemed focused on her pleasure, but Valerie liked knowing he wanted her. It made her feel powerful and desirable. That only enhanced
her own experience. "That’s not what I asked. I asked if
you
wanted
me
. Answer," she added, knowing it might be the only way to get him to voice his own needs.