Shadow Fall

was about to leave her. He tried to push her away, but ended up grasping her hips to bring her closer.

…oh, please, yes…

When she nipped him with her teeth, his control cracked. He skimmed his hand up again to cup her breast, stroking his thumb over the peaking nipple. Mouth dry, he barely managed to be lucid. “We leave in an hour, and I have to meet with Adam.”

That was probably the most heroic statement he’d ever made. If it wasn’t worthy of some wings, nothing was.

“Too soon,” she pleaded. “Let’s shut the world out for a while.”

“I…oh hell, don’t do that…Bella, please…” But her hand was already down his sweatpants. No blood was left in his brain at all. His last coherent thought: Screw it. He was going to Hell for sure this time anyway.

With an abrupt shift, he had her on her back. The burn in his side barely registered. It was hardly important considering the much more insistent ache in her grip. Her damn T-shirt got twisted around her chest. She released him so that he could kiss his way up her belly. He pried the cloth from her body and went facedown in the dip between her breasts, growling with dark satisfaction.

Annabella laughed out loud and seized his head by the roots of his hair. “If you don’t kiss me soon…”

His mouth destroyed the last of her sentence, capturing her soft lips with his. Tasting her. He found her thigh and urged it up around his waist. Didn’t take more than a tug and she had her legs around him, her exquisitely honed muscles pulling his hips down to hers. He resisted; any more friction in that area would probably disappoint them both.

The kiss started soft, but with an ugh of impatience at the back of her throat, she bit his lower lip to take the action deeper.

Custo pulled back, paused, forehead against her cheek while he strained for air. Wrestling with Annabella was well worth the ticket to Hell, but he didn’t want to rush it. Levering from his elbows to his hands, he ground out, “Anna, slow down or this won’t be good for you.”

She scowled like a spoiled brat, her legs tightening around him to lift her hips off the bed. “You’re the one who said we had to hurry,” she snapped back, color high on her face and her breasts. “I’ve wanted you since you freakin’ hijacked my cab. Now hurry.”

He’d wanted her since he saw her dancing in the Shadowlands. All sleek and ethereal. She was a carnal, earthy woman now, and the devil in him liked her better for it.

“That’s it,” she said, fed up…have to do everything myself…

Her hands went back to the waist of his pants, trying to simultaneously push them and his boxers down his hips from her ridiculous angle. Impatient, demanding woman. She wasn’t making much progress; something was in the way.

He touched her mind, though it was obvious what she wanted. He caught an image of her straddling him, speared by him, arching like a glistening bow, every strand of trained muscle taut, her hands braced on her splayed knees.

Okay, he was flexible…they’d do it her way.

He shifted to give her better access to his pants. The pain in his gut stabbed him and he tumbled to the side, but he clamped down on his reaction before she could change her mind. He had to be on his back anyway, so it was all good.

“Shirt,” she commanded, tugging the cloth up at his waist. He didn’t mind the sharp jab when he sat up to pull it over his head. Not with that wicked, purposeful gleam in her eyes. He jerked the last of his sweats off himself.

No going back now. The only thing that mattered was this moment. Touching her, he was alive again, one last time. No, alive for the first time ever.

Her gaze darted to his and then held, her body wavering as she saw him, really saw him. This wasn’t just sex. Couldn’t be. Not when he traded the last of his honor to be with her before facing the angels.

Her expression sobered and Custo touched her mind. He had to know what she was thinking.

…in too deep…in way too deep…

So on some level she understood. Her thoughts went silent as tension hardened the long, supple contours of her body.

Why discover Annabella now, when he was past any hope of a life with her? Why now? He could think of only one answer: For all the order of the Heavens, there was no reason, just madness. It shouldn’t be this way.

Annabella’s breasts rose and fell with her labored breath. Her eyes were shiny, worry slowly darkening the blue of her irises.

Custo shuttered the thoughts that had revealed his ragged soul to her. She shouldn’t have to see that. Not her. He was no good, but she didn’t have to know it, at least not for another hour.

Besides, his blood was greedy. If there could be no reason, then they would be all feeling, all heat and sensation, and banish the rest. He was about to grab her waist and pull her down on top of him, to stroke and coax and tempt her demanding, delicious mood back to dominance, when the darkness of her eyes transmuted to raw lust, overtaking his own thoughts.

Damn, he liked her so, so much.

She extended one smooth leg, sliding onto him. She submerged him in her tight heat, her glorious body sheening with effort, arching with the satisfaction of deep contact. His hands gripped her hips to control their rhythm. He meant to go slow, really he did, but the sight of her above him and the mindless, rising drumbeat of sex drove him to rock her faster. To stroke her to high pleasure, then electric white ecstasy.

A charged bolt of shattering intensity shook them both, cracking, wrecking, sundering. His soul was in pieces, but as long as it was Annabella’s doing, he really didn’t care.

Heaven help him.

Wolf skulked in the deep, fallow shadows of the apartment. They were in the bedroom. In the bed. Together. Melded.

Wild yearning bristled his pelt and had him panting with harsh, bitter need. Yeasty scents had his Shadow- magicked body shuddering with the human emotion. It tainted his animal mind, filled his breath with new sharp words as his thoughts advanced to a darker, covetous violence.

The woman was his. She belonged to him. Hadn’t he just shown her what they could be together? Hadn’t he fulfilled her brightest dream?

Wolf drew his lips back over wet teeth, a growl rolling in his chest. That bed should be soaking with red. Annabella’s soft body on her knees, back arching for him.

But he could not enter. The angel-light banished him. He was not strong enough yet. Not nearly strong enough to break their carnal communion. Mortality was diminishing him, darkness slower to amass his form, Twilight’s Shadow less ready to feed his re-creation. His rebirth required time, the bane of human existence.

If not for his name, Wolf, the process would have been interminable. A name. Wolf. Power.

And she had given it to him. She had to know that she belonged with him. That together they could do great things, that he could exceed her every fantasy. She had to know.

And if she didn’t, he would show her.

Oh, hell. What had he done?

Custo didn’t have to reach in her direction to perceive the thoughts tumbling around her head. She kept telling herself to relax, stay calm, to chill—so her emotions had to be all over the place. He really should explain things now, tell her that he was leaving. Face her hurt and give her the opportunity to curse him to his face.

Custo patted Annabella’s hip. “Better get up and get ready. I’ll check in with Adam.”

She frowned up at him, her bare skin rosy beautiful. “You’re not telling me something.”

That he was leaving her at her most vulnerable? That he was turning her scary wolf problem over to