Read A Love For Lera (Haikon) for Free Online Page A

offhandedly. “But, not exactly anything I could tell
the cops.” She moved to his side. “I need to go.”
    “Go where?”
    “Out. I don’t much like sitting still.”
    “We’re not done talking.”
    “What more is there to say?” She looked at him
and arched a brow. “You’ll go on about how dangerous it is for me and how I
should let you do it. I’ll listen, all the while planning to do what I will
anyway. You’ll escort me to the bar, even though you don’t want me there, and
things will happen how they will. So, see, there’s nothing else to talk about.”
    Kori almost laughed. She was dead on. For almost
everything. But there was something else to talk about. “Are you running away, mo
ghrá ?” he asked in a rumble.
    “From what?”
    A predatory smile turned up his lips. He stalked
her, backing her up until the wall prevented her from going any farther.
Putting his hands on either side of her head, he lowered his face to hers.
“From me.”
    He expected her to deny it. Expected her to lift
her chin and look down her nose at him with ice in her veins and that damn
cool, composed look on her face. Her eyes met his, and he almost drowned in the
deep pools of brown.
    “Yes.”
    It was hard to breathe. Her simple admission did
things to him no one in the world had ever done. She did so anyway, but that
one word, that single word…made it so much more. “Why? You know I won’t hurt
you.” Kori smoothed some hair back from her face. He was addicted to touching
her and couldn’t seem to stop. Her skin was so soft and her hair like silk. “I
would never do that, mo anam .” I could never do that.
    “Not intentionally.”
    He stared at her. “Not at all.”
    “You make me feel things I’m not sure about. You
know I don’t like being close or being touched, and yet, when I’m near you,
that’s all I want to do. And it scares me.” Lera nibbled on her lower lip.
“I’ve tried, you know, tried burying my memories so I could experience what my
friends talked about. The supposed amazing experience of sex.”
    Kori forced himself to remain immobile and not
react. It killed him to imagine her looking for another male to sleep with, to
share the pleasures of her body with. He wanted to maim every single male who
had looked at her with lust.
    “Twenty-five years,” she mumbled, as if unaware
he stood right there listening. “I just wanted to know what was so good about
it. But I can’t.” Her voice caught. “I can’t . I’ve barely tolerated guys
putting their arms around me, much less a kiss. Not a good way to be. In
college, I was dubbed ‘The Ice Queen.’ So then it was a test to see if they
could be the ones to crack the ice.”
    He pressed against her, letting her feel his
hardness. Holding her gaze, Kori trailed a finger down the smooth skin of her
cheek.
    “There’s nothing wrong with you, mo ghrá .
Nothing at all.” Up and down, his fingertip moved.
    “There has to be,” she said with a whimper that
tore through him. “I always froze up and hated them for touching me.”
    “You’re not frozen now, Valera. Do you hate me
for touching you like this?” he asked, continuing to stare at her. Refusing to
release those pools she called eyes.
    Lera shook her head. “It’s different with you,
Kori. That’s why I have to keep away. As hard as it is for me to not know what
they talk about, it would be worse to experience it with you and then be thrust
back into the cold world I’m in now.”
    Of course it’s different with me, Lera. You
belong with me. “Who says you’d go back to a cold world, Lera?”
    “The day you found your mate would make you off
limits to me. I’m better off not knowing.”
    I have found my mate. You, Valera. And I’m never
letting you go. “I don’t think so, Lera.”
    “You make my insides feel funny. Make all the
walls I’ve erected crumble.”
    “And?” He delved his hand into the hair at the
back of her skull and nuzzled her neck. Her fresh