Breath of Night Read online

  She jerked her head around to stare at him in shock. “You can’t be serious.”

  Rafe reached a hand up to hers where it was still tightly clutching her necklace. She let her fingers drop and he stepped closer to her. His fingertips lightly brushed her throat when he picked up the small medallion and inspected it.

  “I believe he belongs to you, Rowan, but I have one condition.”

  He stood so close to her she could feel the heat radiating off him. His fingers let the pendant fall back against her throat but he kept contact, tracing her collarbone to her shoulder. The same little zings of electricity seemed to shoot into her skin wherever he touched.

  Anything, she wanted to say, but the word caught in her throat. Anything to keep him touching her like this.

  “He is yours, but he stays here, and you visit him frequently.”

  She swallowed and pulled back from his touch, suddenly needing a breath. Being close to Rafe was like standing next to a black hole and trying not to get sucked in. If she wasn’t careful, she would lose herself completely.

  “Are you thirsty?” he asked in a low voice. The reminder of his original offer only released her slightly from the pull of him.

  “I could use a drink, yes.” She didn’t think it mattered what he served her now. She just needed something different to focus on for five minutes so she could come to her senses. She’d come with him merely seeking a night of sexual release. Not even three steps through his door, and she already found herself craving more than his attention. It wasn’t even his obvious wealth that interested her, but the atmosphere in which he lived. Why did this huge house, decorated to the hilt with some of the oldest, priceless artifacts feel more like home to her than her comfortable Midtown apartment?

  Impulsively, she kicked off her shoes in the entryway before following him barefoot through a wide, arched doorway into another room. This one at least had more modern furnishings, but they were no less exquisite in their craftsmanship. The value was in the artistry, not the age, she decided.

  The allure of all these things he surrounded himself with was nothing compared to the draw of Rafe himself.

  Rowan downed the tumbler of liquor in three quick gulps and contemplated leaving again. Her need to maintain control was quickly eroding amid her desire to let him take her to bed and keep her there forever.

  He refilled her drink and studied her quietly while she moved to stand by a nearby bookcase, feigning interest in the leatherbound volumes on one shelf.

  “You’re afraid of me,” he said. “Why?”

  She sipped the smooth tequila this time and turned to face him. “I’m not afraid of you. Just my reaction to you. To everything.” She let her eyes take in the rest of the room before settling on him again. “I never had this growing up, but…”

  “Where did you grow up?” Rafe remained standing near the liquor cabinet, sipping his own drink

  “Foster care, mostly, until I learned I had a knack for finding treasures in the most unlikely places. I have my own small collection like this, you know.”

  “We’re alike in a lot of ways, I believe. You’re a very special woman, Rowan. I think you know that, but what I don’t think you know is precisely how special.”

  “I’m simply a confident woman who gets what she wants. That’s all.” She believed she enjoyed sex more than the average woman, too, but until today had always managed to keep her emotions out of the equation.

  He smiled slowly and nodded. “Yes, but you are much more. Take out your contact lenses so you can see.”

  His request confused her. “But I need them to see.”

  “You don’t. You’re only hiding behind them because no one ever told you the truth of how beautiful you are. Did you ever wonder what it meant? What it is about you that causes men to fall at your feet and women to despise you? It’s more than just your beauty.”

  His commentary chilled her. It was like he’d gotten deep into her head. He set his glass down and walked closer to stand just within reach.

  “Let me see your eyes.”

  “Fine,” she said. With two quick swipes of a fingertip, her flimsy disposable contacts fell to the carpet. She met his eyes, prepared for the startled horror she usually received when anyone saw the true blood-red of her irises.

  Rafe only smiled, but before her eyes his own changed color, shifting from a steel gray to an almost bottomless, inky black with flecks of silver. The sense of falling was so pronounced as she gazed into those dark depths, she lost her balance.

  He caught her and held her against his broad chest. He whispered into her ear, “Believe me, when I look in your eyes I feel the same way, only touched by fire. You have no idea what you are, do you?”

  Rowan didn’t care anymore about his questions. Whoever, whatever, he was, that look had sent her past the brink. All she could do now was let herself fall and hope she emerged from the other side still sane.

  She clutched the back of his neck and pulled him down into a deep kiss. The delicious taste of him tingled on her tongue when he let her invade his mouth. He gave as good, plunging back in return and pressing her hard against the bookcase.

  Rafe’s hands tangled in her hair then slid lower, tugging at the straps of her dress. He found the zipper at her back and tugged. Soon the tailored black silk was in a puddle at her bare feet, leaving her in matching black bra and panties.

  Dissatisfied with only the touch of his hands, Rowan tugged at the buttons of his shirt. She needed to feel his skin against hers, but grew frustrated in the rush, gripped the front of his shirt, and ripped. The buttons went flying, pinging off the priceless objects in the room. A deep rumble rose from Rafe’s chest when her hands slipped inside and splayed across the smooth, hard planes of his chest.

  She slid her hands down his stomach and gripped his erection through his trousers, stroked up along the length until reaching his waist. With a few quick tugs she managed to unfasten his belt and pants without more damage to his clothing.

  “Take these off and fuck me,” she demanded.

  Rafe’s dark eyes flashed with a strange inner light she was sure must be her imagination. He quickly stripped the rest of the way and pressed against her again, but not before she got a good look at him from top to toe. Never had she seen a man so perfectly put together. Godlike, if she had to put a word to it. The sense of being consumed by some strange energy persisted as strongly as the feel of his mouth tasting her skin. He unfastened her bra with one quick motion and it fell to the floor.

  He spun them both and pushed her against a ledge in a shallow alcove. A flower arrangement teetered and he picked it up and tossed behind him. The vase crashed into splinters on the floor, leaving colorful petals and green stalks in a pile of crystalline pieces.

  Before she could react he’d turned her around and pressed himself against her from behind. She met her own eyes in the mirror on the wall and was startled to see the same strange flash of light she’d seen in his. She must be going crazy, but it happened again when Rafe shoved her hair aside and bent his head to her neck, kissed his way to her shoulder. Both his large hands cupped her breasts, squeezed and tweaked her nipples.

  She braced herself against the marble-topped ledge in front of her to keep her balance, too overwhelmed by every touch to process the strangeness of him and her reaction to him.

  Except it wasn’t strange at all. It was exactly how it should be. The grip of his hand on her hip and the harsh rip when he divested her of her panties was perfect. The kneading clutch of his hands on her ass when he kneeled behind her, then spread her open and sank his tongue between her pulsing, swollen lips.

  Even his tongue felt like it filled her completely and she cried out. She pushed back against him and raised her hands to brace herself against the mirror. Her eyes looked like fire now, glowing bright orange. “You have no idea what you are, do you?” His voice resonated in her mind for a fleeting moment then faded out beneath her harsh cries of ecstasy over the feel of his mouth
and hands working her into a frenzy. His tongue felt impossibly long and agile as it plunged into her, his fingertips teased at both her clit and her ass.

  Rowan lost herself completely, giving over to the sensations, falling into the heat of her own gaze. It was so good she hallucinated red smoke for breath as she panted against the mirror. The tingling rush of sensation quickly grew to a flood, inundating her with pleasure. She clawed at the glass as her entire body tensed with her climax. Her back arched and she cried out to the ceiling above her.

  Dazed and still vibrating from the orgasm, she let him turn her to face him. She lifted her feet off the floor at his urging, wrapping both legs around his hips. His skin seemed to glow from within and she blinked for a second, sure she’d seen a forked tongue dart out to lick his lips before they were pressed hard to hers, his tongue penetrating her mouth as swiftly as his cock sank to the hilt into her still spasming pussy.

  She writhed against him, meeting each plunging thrust with an eager surge of her hips. The heavy thickness of his shaft stretched her more than any other man ever had. She believed she had felt pleasure before, but the depths to which he could go were beyond anything she’d experienced. She clutched at him, every muscle tightening, her pussy clenching, seeking to pull him in even deeper, but he was already fucking her as deep as he could go.

  Rafe pulled away for a breath and reached up to cup her face in both his palms. His eyes glowed with strange, ultraviolet light, and his face was not only seeping light from his pores, but bathed in an orange-red glow.

  “You are like me, Rowan. You will never be alone again, I promise.”

  With that missive, his mouth crashed against hers again and he thrust violently into her. His cock seemed to swell and grow hotter inside her. With a heavy pulse the heat of his orgasm filled her and sent her rocketing to another crest.

  She held him tightly and closed her eyes. His orgasm persisted, but the hot flow of it seemed to sink into every cell of her body, not just the tight, dark recesses of her womb.

  Her body was on fire. From pleasure. From some unseen energy that infused her. Her eyes flew open and locked onto Rafe’s. He watched with that strange, black gaze, smiling as though he were enthralled with her reaction to his climax.

  After a moment, their breathing slowed and Rowan’s heartbeat felt halfway normal again.

  She let her hands slide away from his shoulders and he winced at her touch.

  “What happened? Are you hurt?”

  “Nothing a little breath won’t cure. I see you found your talons.” His fingers encircled her wrists and held her hands up for her to see. Shimmering, red scales had replaced her skin and instead of fingernails, she had long, sharp, black claws at the tips of each finger.

  Rowan yelped in alarm and jerked backward, but there was nowhere to go and he held her tight.

  “What the fuck did you do to me?”

  “Calm down, love. This is only a glimpse of your true form. The young ones require an infusion of another’s energy to unlock it. Have you never seen yourself like this before? Has it always been only your eyes and hair that were different?”

  The slightest stroke of his steel-hard erection inside her sent a buzz of pleasure up through her body. How could she process having talons when he was fucking her like that?

  “Here, turn around,” he said, pulling out of her and lifting her off the small ledge she’d been perched on while they fucked. He turned her around to face the mirror.

  The image that greeted her was alien and beautiful. The edges of all her features were covered in the same shining red scales—at her hairline, along both sides of her neck, down the tops of her shoulders and arms, and down over her hips and thighs. Only her face and the front of her torso from breasts to crotch did she still have fair, normal skin showing through. And at the top of her forehead, extending in dark red coils were a pair of graceful horns, curving back and almost touching Rafe’s chin behind her.

  “Glorious,” he said.

  When she looked in the mirror at his reflection, a similar sight greeted her, except his features were framed in shining black scales, with a pair of large, deadly looking black horns sprouting from his head.

  “What…what are we?”

  “Darling, we are dragons.” He said it softly, almost mournfully and his eyes grew sad for a split second before his features smoothed over. “Now, come to bed and I’ll tell you everything.”

  Chapter Four

  They navigated their way around the minefield of broken crystal, leaving their clothing behind. His taloned hand gripped hers and led her toward a wide staircase off the other side of the foyer. When he turned, she caught a glimpse of the damage she’d caused to his back. Both his shoulders and ass were criss-crossed with bloody stripes.

  “Jesus, Rafe! Why didn’t you stop me?”

  “Because you were enjoying it so much and I was at the point of no return, myself. It’s nothing to worry about. I’d normally let it heal on its own, but there’s one thing you can do.”

  Rowan see-sawed between mortification and confusion, but those feelings seemed inconsequential compared to the buzzing well of energy she seemed to have inside her. The urge to feel him in her again was overwhelming. And not just fucking her, either. She’d always taken more satisfaction from making men come, often not even caring whether she found her own release. Rafe, however, had given her more with that single orgasm of his than she’d enjoyed from all of the other men she’d been with. Humans? I’m not like them, am I?

  “No, my love, you are not. We are a different race entirely.” He hadn’t spoken out loud, she was sure of it, yet it was unmistakably his voice she had just heard.

  “You can hear my thoughts?”

  “If you project with enough intent, yes. And you very much wanted an answer to that question. You can ask out loud, though. Anything you want to know, I will tell you. My staff are off for the weekend.”

  “You have a staff…of course.”

  “Someone has to polish the dragon.”

  She smiled in return to the smirk he cast over his shoulder.

  “Alright, first question: How do I get my hands back? And I sure as hell can’t go out in public with a pair of horns.”

  “It just takes a little concentration and some dragon magic. You’ll be able to change your hair and eye color as it pleases you, too. You may need to build up more energy first, however.”

  “And how do I get the energy?”

  “Darling, I believe you know the answer to that already.”

  He urged her through the door to a huge bedroom, closed it behind her, and stood facing her. He waggled his fingers in front of her face. “First, picture what you’d like them to look like.”

  “Just my hands, please.” She made a cattish clawing motion at his face with her new talons that earned her a smile. Not only was he rakishly handsome when full of lust, but almost boyishly cute when he was amused. Her heartbeat fluttered at the contradiction.

  “Right, now feel that warm burn of power I gave you, deep down inside.”

  “Hmm, how deep?” She quirked one eyebrow.

  He stepped toward her and slid his now very human fingertips down her belly. “It may be here, or a bit lower. Shall I give you an anatomy lesson or do you want your hands back?”

  She did feel the warm glow in her center, not unlike the sensation of a lingering orgasm, only much more subtle. When she focused on it while picturing her long, pale, and human fingertips, she could feel the energy surge forth and fill her limbs. A moment later the claws and scales disappeared. The weight of the horns left her head.

  “So that’s how it works!” she said. “Now turn around. I think I know what your back needs.”

  Rafe hesitated. “Healing breath has a trick to it, are you sure?”

  “How am I supposed to learn if you won’t let me make mistakes?”

  He reluctantly turned. Rowan reached for the energy, enjoying the slight tingle that encompassed the flesh between h
er legs.

  “Just be sure not to breathe fire on me by accident. Smoke is what you’re aiming for.”

  Just as he said it, she clamped her hand over her mouth, cutting off the tiny gout of flame that had erupted from between her lips. In a muffled voice she said, “Okay, what’s the trick?”

  Rafe’s shoulders shook with mirth. “Picture life, creation, sustaining powers. Avoid thoughts of destruction.”

  She rested her hands on his shoulders and focused, pulling on the now somewhat familiar well of energy, and expelling a breath. The red smoke spilled forth in a cloud.

  “You can command it where to go, once it’s left your body. Aim it at my scratches.”

  Wonders never ceased. With a thought, she did precisely what he said and watched in amazement as the smoke condensed against his wounds, tracing them like a series of small, delicate tongues and sealing each cut. When her breath dissipated, she smoothed her hands lightly over her handiwork. Not even a scar marred his skin.

  Distracted by the feel of him under her palms, she continued caressing, moved closer and slid her hands down to cup his firm buttocks. He remained still, letting her explore. She pressed her breasts against his back and slid her hands around his waist, embracing him and pressing her cheek against his back.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  He clasped her hands in his, drew one to his lips and laid a lingering kiss against her palm. He released her and she let her hands slide lower, over his muscular chest and stomach. The hot tip of his cock brushed her palm when she reached out from his midsection. Rafe let out a deep sigh as she caressed the velvet length of him. His balls were heavy and soft in her palm.

  She ached for him again, but much more deeply than she had before. The understanding of a shared bond she had never had before with anyone frightened her a little bit, but also left her uncertain. Sex was one thing… the easy thing. This was the first time she’d ever been with a man who she hoped for more with. One night would never be enough.

  He turned to her and kissed her, the strange forked tongue of his teasing into her mouth. She hadn’t hallucinated any of it. Remembering her well of magic, she tried to mimic the shape and found it was natural to make her tongue like his. When the two tangled together, Rafe groaned out a deep laugh, then pulled away.