Read NocC 007 - Stephanie Draven - Mythica 6 - The Fever and the Fury - Harlequin 2012-01 for Free Online Page A

can.”

Chapter Four
    Stop him , she thought. Stop him!
    But as his mouth inched its way along her jawline and found her lips, his honeyed kiss filled her mouth with sweetness. If her existence depended on it—and it may have—she couldn’t have stopped him. Instead, her lips parted and she offered no resistance to the tongue that touched her own.
    The intimacy of being kissed by Luke was a revelation. The unanticipated joy of it rocked her to the soles of her feet. How was it that mortals could experience this and ever want to do anything else? She didn’t return his kiss, but let him plunder her mouth. And she wished that he would go on doing it forever.
    The only cry of protest to escape her lips was when he drew away. “I’m going to touch you,” Luke said, very, very seriously.
    He’d touched her before: they’d been locked in deadly combat more times than she could count. She’d scraped him, raked him, bloodied his face and hands. He’d thrown her, choked her, burned her…flashes of violent memories came rushing back and a jolt of tension ripped through her. But when his hands slipped gently over the curves of her breasts, a delightful flood of warmth cascaded to her belly to the throbbing place between her thighs.
    Oh, how she wanted to run her hands down his chest, but didn’t dare. She could only let him touch her wherever he pleased, hypocrite that she was. It was the barest technicality by which she remained obedient to Athena and she’d always hated technicalities. She couldn’t give herself to a man, but she hadn’t given Luke her consent. He was simply taking her.
    And she couldn’t stop him. Wouldn’t stop him. Because she was profoundly grateful. And she had to know. She had to know if a man could possibly find comfort in a creature like her, if it were possible that there could be anything at all about her that might give some small degree of pleasure to another person.
    Luke’s strong hands were everywhere, igniting a fierce yearning inside her body. He was pulling her shirt off, thumbing her nipples, caressing her belly, cupping her ass, drawing her tight against him where his swollen shaft throbbed against her thigh.
    It was all so terrifying, wicked and delicious.
    “Stop me,” he said, hips grinding against her, but her hands floated uselessly at her sides. In an instant, he picked her up and she felt wonderfully weightless. Then he dropped her on the bed where, sinking into the pillows and linens, her thoughts flew away. He kissed her neck and her shoulders and her breasts.
    Phaedra was a rag doll, joyously limp in surrender, head lolling to the side in rapture. That’s when she caught a glimpse of her own face in the standing mirror. It was a face she’d never seen before. Eyes soft with wonder. Cheeks flushed with arousal. Round breasts, trembling belly, soft, satiny hips. She looked beautiful all tangled up with his body and she mewled when his fingers reached down and circled in her wetness.
    Entranced by her own reaction in the mirror, she wanted to thrust against his hand for more. Wanted to clutch him closer, but she struggled to stay still.
    Luke lifted his head and met her eyes in the mirror. “So you do like to watch.”
    “Yes.” Even though she was experiencing his sensual hands as they kneaded her hips, it was watching it that stole her breath away. As a fury, watching had been the only indulgence allowed to her. But now she saw her own naked body as she’d never seen it before. Laid out and soft, covered in a thin sheen of sweat, trembling and beckoning.
    Pleasure coiled inside her at the sight of the sexy young woman splayed on the bed. She could scarcely believe it was her. But it was her. This unbearably intimate, unbearably beautiful thing was happening to her . Could it be real? And how long did she dare to allow it go on?
    Luke was working at the fastenings of his pants.
    “Wait,” she murmured, knowing that she must stop him. “Maybe we could just