Lycan Christmas by S. Yule (best contemporary novels txt) 📗

you need to do to break the hold. I want you to be able to save yourself if you’re ever in a situation like this.”

She tried to break the hold again, but he held her easily. Her eyes sparked again, and he smiled.

“That’s it. I want you to get good and pissed.”

She tried to back up out of his grip, but he followed her without letting go of her throat. “You can’t get away from me, Melony. Not unless I let you.” When she grunted in frustration, he laughed at her in an attempt to piss her off even more in hopes that she would finally do what he asked of her.

“Stop it!”

“Make me,” he taunted.

Suddenly, she tucked her chin, turned, brought her arm down across his forearms as he’d instructed, then up, and knocked the holy hell out of his temple with such grace and fluidity it would have taken his breath away if he wasn’t trying to stop his brains from jiggling in his skull.

Her eyes grew wide, and her mouth hung open as she stared at him. “Oh my God! I’m so sorry!”

He grinned and hugged her to him when she tried to examine his temple, then picked her up and spun her around until she giggled. When he let her slide down his body until her feet touched the floor, the rub of her against him set his blood on fire.

“That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to get you to do. Don’t be sorry.”

“But I hurt you,” she whispered.

“No. You didn’t,” he whispered back next to her ear.

He’d never get used to the effect her scent had on him. Every time he breathed her in, his knees weakened, his heart thudded, and his body ached to possess her. He nuzzled his nose against her hair—the hint of jasmine 118

Lycan Christmas

S. K. Yule

clinging to the silky strands only enhanced her natural scent—and she sighed.

The sound was like an invitation, a temptation he couldn’t resist, and it had been entirely too long since he’d last kissed her. Denying himself the pleasure of taking her mouth was no longer an option as his wolf pushed to the surface, and he bent to taste her.

* * * *

Lorent’s mouth came down on hers, possessively, urgently, and stoked a fire inside her in two seconds flat. She’d missed his touch, his kiss. She’d missed him. When his tongue slipped inside to taste her, every cell, every part of her honed in on Lorent, lost to the passion sparked by his mouth devouring her, and the rest of the world was forgotten.

She linked her arms around his neck and pressed against his hard, hot body. When he growled, she took the sound as encouragement and rubbed against him shamelessly, needing to be close to him, craving to be skin to skin with him. As his kiss became even more urgent and possessive, need built deep in her belly and an insistent ache throbbed between her thighs.

When he touched her, it was as if her very essence melded with his until they became two parts of a whole.

She wanted him, and if the bulge pressed against her thigh was anything to go by, he wanted her. A moan escaped her throat when he ran one hand along her hip and around to cup her ass. She’d always thought she had a generous butt, but his big hand made her feel small and feminine. His other hand skimmed down her side and stopped just over her tummy, fingers splayed in a protective gesture as if in anticipation. Could he possibly be thinking about her carrying his child?

While the thought of having his baby was appealing to her, it brought things back into perspective, and just before his fingers made their way to her breast, she broke the kiss with a gasp. Her needy body cried out in denial of the sudden absence of his touch, but the passion-induced fog was clearing from her brain now.

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He watched her from under thick lashes as she took a step back from him. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No.” She shook her head. “I just can’t think clearly when you touch me.”

“I have the same problem.”

It was time to lay it all on the line, her heart, her soul, herself. She had to find a way to crack the wall—more like the fortress—he had erected around himself. She sat down, patted the seat next to her, and waited for him to sit down before taking his hands into her own.

“I want to tell you about my mother’s accident.” She swallowed hard around the lump forming in her throat. “And why I no longer believe it was an accident.”

The desire that had burned in his eyes only moments ago died, and the serious, more reserved Lorent returned.

“You don’t have to talk about it, Melony. Not if it hurts you to.”

“But don’t you get it? That’s why I do need to talk about it. I need to share it with someone else. I need to share it with you.”

“If you really need to, you know I’m here for you.”

She nodded. She did know that, but somehow she needed to make him understand that she wanted to be there for him as well.

She took a deep breath before continuing. “It started out as a day like any other. Mom had gotten up, and we both ate breakfast together—cereal, because as I told you, she wasn’t the best cook in the world.” She laughed halfheartedly. “She made up for it in so many other ways, though. She was an awesome mother.”

He squeezed her hand in encouragement, and she continued on. “I had planned to go job hunting because the diner I waited at part-time closed down. Mom wished me luck and headed out to work at the local vet’s office.

She’d never gone to college, since she got pregnant with me at a young age.

After Dad ran off