CHAPTER NINE #3
He moved harder and faster now, with more urgency, his seed burning.
Impossibly, Sam wanted even more, because the rapture was so raw, so intense, so otherworldly.
Flying, she raked his back with her nails.
He caught her hands to restrain her, growling, still thrusting repeatedly.
He lost his balance as he tried to hold her still and Sam hit him with her thigh, her knee in the hollow between his ribs.
When he choked in surprise, she drove him off the desk.
They crashed against the near wall and fell hard to the floor.
Maclean actually tried to break the fall for her. As his shoulder struck the floor, he pulled her against his body and on top of it.
Sam pushed a knee on each side of his hips. His eyes widened; he grinned.
She looked down at what reared between them and inhaled harshly. “That has to hurt.”
He seized her wrist, his grasp brutal. “I like pain. Fuck me, Sam.”
She forgot about the ring and the pain it might cause. Sam drove her body down his shaft, hard and fast.
This time, Maclean was the one to break first.
SHE NEVER FELL ASLEEP after sex. But she’d fallen asleep and Sam slowly opened her eyes.
She was on the floor of the living room and she was alone.
Pale early-morning sunlight was creeping inside from the two east-facing windows which overlooked Park Avenue.
And as a pain went through her lower back, as she sat up, her head throbbing slightly, she saw her broken nails.
There was absolute recollection. She was coherent now. She was also stunned.
They’d had sex like it was a matter of life and death.
If he wanted her on her knees, she wanted to stand over him; if he was being dominant, which he was most of the time, she had to make him submit to her.
She touched her jaw, which was sore. At some point she’d hit it on the edge of a coffee table.
The back of her head also ached from slamming against the wall.
As for her lower back, well, she’d been on her hands and knees, enjoying it far too immensely.
The moment she’d realized, she’d reared up. Man, it hurt.
They’d gone at it wildly, violently, insatiably, for most of the night—if not all of it.
She was unusually strong, he had his superpowers, making him even stronger, and they’d exhausted one another by trying to control each other, by trying to overpower the other.
Sitting up now, starkly naked, Sam wasn’t sure what to think.
They hadn’t even kissed.
It had been the rawest, most brutal, most urgent sex she’d ever had.
Or had that even been sex? She was grim.
She had never wanted anyone the way she did Maclean and there was no explanation for it, not when he was such a mess.
The arousal was stunning, the urgency more so, and later, she’d try to figure out why she needed him so much when he was so scarred and so defective, and so incapable of normalcy.
And damn it, he had won. It hadn’t been the way she’d thought it would be.
She’d been out of her mind with desire, as never before. He’d controlled most of the night.
On the other hand, he’d wanted her desperately.
At one point, when they’d stopped for a moment, he’d pulled her back beneath him, the oddest look in his eyes, as if he feared a return to reality.
She hugged herself, the gesture rare for her. She was truly shaken.
Because desperate was the best way to describe Maclean’s passion, his sex drive, the shattering urgency. Pain and pleasure had become wrapped up together in one big ugly package—and it had begun when he was a prisoner. She had no doubt.
Her heart stirred. There was compassion…there was concern.
She recalled the look on his face she’d seen so many times last night. When he was on the brink, his expression became raw and revealing, the mocking facade was stripped away. And the emotions that cycled through him had been obvious—she’d seen anguish, confusion and relief.
Sam cursed uneasily now.
And what about the incredible ecstasy she’d experienced?
She thought she felt herself flush. The sonuvabitch had been right.
He’d been able to give her more pleasure than she’d ever had.
Was that one of those god-given attributes, too?
Mortals couldn’t climax a dozen times in one night—almost ceaselessly.
She suddenly pulled her legs to her chest. Why was she even analyzing what had just happened? It was only sex! She avoided intimacy and entanglements like the plague and she never bothered to think about her conquests. Why should she? It was always fun. Easy come, easy go.
But Maclean wasn’t one of her boy toys. Sex with Maclean had been savage and stunning.
She couldn’t compare it with any other experience.
They hadn’t had fun. They hadn’t kissed.
They’d even hurt one another. She’d been satisfied—more than ever before.
But she felt an odd nagging, almost like disappointment or dismay.
It almost felt as if something had been missing from the experience.
Since she couldn’t possibly be disappointed, since she only wanted sex, she was mistaken.
They’d both gotten what they’d wanted, right?
There was one more thing. What they’d just done was nothing like what was on that DVD.
Sam slowly stood up, unable to shake her sense of unease. The DVD had to be a fake after all, because those two people had cared about one another. As for last night, there was no reason to brood about it or him. If she let herself feel sorry for him, she’d soon be toast on his plate. Burned toast…
Grimly Sam glanced around and saw her dress on the floor, not far from the desk. She recalled Ian ripping it apart and tossing it aside. She got to her feet. She’d known from the get-go that Maclean really was bad news. And that meant she had to stay away from him.
It meant no more hot rounds like this one. It meant there’d never be a DVD from the future.
Hemmer…They’d stood him up. He was probably furious and making all kinds of plans for them.
Sam walked over and picked up the dress; it was literally ripped in half and useless.
She did not feel better. Her resolve felt shaky.
Staying away from Maclean was impossible—he had the page.
She started a search for her purse, which was on the console not far from the sofa where Jan had sat last night.
Then she almost smiled. Jan could have never handled Maclean; he’d have been bored to death with her.
She found her cell phone. Then she decided that she couldn’t call Kit again. She didn’t want to have to explain what had happened—not that she really could.
He was a mess and she was confused. She, Sam Rose, a Slayer feared on all the city streets, was confused.
She was never confused. She was always on course, climbing whatever mountain stood in her path.
If she ever needed a friend, she needed one now.
Maybe it was time to test her friendship with Kit.
She shivered. She didn’t have any clothes and Maclean kept the AC on an unapologetically and environmentally unfriendly setting. She glanced at the time on her cell phone. It was half past five; she doubted she’d run into Gerard if she went up to the third floor and tried to find some clothes.
Then she felt his stare.
Slowly, her nape tingling, Sam turned and looked at the doorway.
Maclean stood there in the shadows of the dawn, wearing only his jeans, which weren’t even buttoned, and the cross on the leather cord. He was watching her like a hawk. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking, because his face was expressionless.
Her heart turned over. Sorrow and desire melded…
She didn’t even want to try to make light of the moment.
There was nothing light about having sex like it was war.
He walked forward, his muscles rippling. Now she saw that he carried clothes in his hand. She tensed, almost expecting him to throw them at her, but instead, he handed them to her. “I called ye a car,” he said.
He had a red scratch on his jaw, another one on his shoulder. They were deep and one was still bleeding.
Sam took the clothes. Suddenly modest, she held the bundle in front of her body. Prior to last night, she’d have made a mocking remark about his being eager for her to leave. Instead, she said, “Thanks.”
He shrugged and walked back out.
WHEN SHE WAS GONE, Ian lay back on his bed, still clad in his jeans. He stared up at the ceiling, grim. What had just happened?
His heart was racing uncomfortably. Heated images kept replaying in jagged bits and pieces in his mind, when he never thought about his conquests afterward—not ever.
But he wasn’t sure that Sam Rose had been a conquest. He wasn’t sure what had happened earlier that evening.
He’d never been to bed with any woman and had such physical and violent sex.
He hadn’t ever wanted any woman the way he wanted her.
He touched himself, still aroused. She’d fought to dominate him. He’d fought back. He wasn’t sure who’d won. Maybe he had. She now knew how good he was. But he was sorry he’d let her leave. He could easily take her again.
Why had he taken her so fiercely—why had he been so insatiable? So desperate?
Ian was uneasy, uncertain. He’d been extremely attracted to her from their first meeting.
He’d even wandered through time once or twice after that day in Oban, when he avoided leaping like a medieval man avoided the plague.
But the attraction was worse now—constant, consuming.
He didn’t like having an attraction he could not control or walk away from.
He thought about the DVD, and wondered how two such savage lovers could get to that other place.
His gut tightened so badly it hurt.
He never let women touch him the way she had in the DVD—with tenderness or affection. If a woman smiled at him during sex, the way Sam had in the DVD, he ignored it, pretending not to see.