In that moment Livy realized that honey badgers truly were fearless, because Vic Barinov had bellowed the last half of that sentence only a few inches from her face and she hadn’t flinched. Although she could have sworn the windows behind the couch shook a little. Nah. Probably her imagination.
Livy thought about Vic’s question, and replied, “I never would have said that to Shen . . . he’s not half-cat.”
“See?” he yelled. “That is not an answer! At least not one I’m willing to—”
Livy went up on the coffee table behind her, slapped her hands hard against Vic’s face to hold him there, and kissed him. Again.
Vic again tried to pull her off. “Livy,” he growled against her mouth. “Just—”
“No,” she said, tightening her grip on his face and wrapping her legs around his waist so she now clung to him. “No talking. Just kiss me, Vic.” She pulled back a bit so she could look him in the eye, but she kept her grip tight. “Kiss me now and I promise we’ll talk tomorrow. We’ll talk all you want about anything you want. Tomorrow.”
Vic’s eyes narrowed on her, the gold lighter than usual. Lighter and brighter and untrusting. “You better not be lying to me,” he warned, his low voice nothing more at this point than an angry growl. “You know I hate it when you lie to me.”
Livy leaned in, placed a soft kiss on Vic’s mouth. A small one. Then another. And another. Moving from one spot to another. Teasing him. Sometimes nibbling his lip here, then there.
She had no idea how long she kept it up. Livy simply lost herself in it. Enjoying the feel of her mouth against Vic’s.
But suddenly, Vic made a chuffing sound, and he gripped Livy’s head between his hands, holding her in place. That’s when he took her mouth. His lips pressed hard against hers. Livy opened to him and Vic’s tongue was immediately there. Seeking, exploring. Taking over as felines like to do.
It felt . . . perfect.
Like the perfect picture. Maybe you didn’t know it was perfect when you shot it, but then you saw it on a print or on your screen and you knew. You knew. And this time, with Vic, it was the same thing. Weird . . . then perfect.
Vic pulled away, both of them gasping for air. He set her down, not gently, either.
“Get naked,” he barked at her. “And get upstairs.” Then he walked off.
Kind of confused about which she should do first—shouldn’t she go upstairs and then get naked? If she got naked down here, then she’d have to get dressed down here tomorrow—Livy just stood there.
A few seconds later, Vic stalked back into the living room.
“Too long,” he barked, picking her up around the waist, and securing her under his arm like so much laundry.
It would be humiliating if it was anyone else. Anyone else in the entire world. But it was Vic. Polite, sweetly charming, socially inept Vic.
Livy was just so entertained by this new side of him that she really didn’t give a shit where he carried her.
As long as he fucked her once he got there.
Vic took Livy to the master bedroom. His careful, practical bear side had gone into hibernation a good ten minutes ago. Now, all that was left was the cranky feline that had made Vic give up dating full-human girls when he was seventeen. They couldn’t handle the cranky feline when it came out. Few could.
And yet, when he threw Livy on the bed, she laughed. Hard.
Deciding that Livy’s laughter meant she was still taking too long to get naked, Vic reached down and yanked off her boots. He didn’t even bother to untie them. Couldn’t wait. Didn’t want to.
Once he’d done that, Livy had only managed to get her jeans unzipped, which, again . . . not fast enough!
Honestly, how hard was it for a woman not wearing many clothes in the first place to get said clothes off in a timely manner?
Vic caught hold of the waistband of Livy’s jeans and yanked them down. They were kind of tight, though, so he had to lift her legs up and drag them off. Livy’s legs flipped over her head and she ended up rolling backward until she rested on her knees. Now she only wore the T-shirt. He must have taken off her panties along with her jeans.
Startled black eyes blinked up at him, her hands resting on her bare knees.
“You all right?” Vic asked.
“Yep.”
Taking Livy at her word, he took a step toward her.
“Condoms?” Livy asked.
“What?”
“Con. Doms. Remember those?” She pointed at her crotch. “No one gets in here without one.”
Annoyed he hadn’t thought about that before now, Vic growled and looked around the room. He didn’t think Rita kept any in her houses unless you specified an “adult weekend” when the reservations were made. But the thought of leaving a nearly naked Livy to go hunt some down through Honeyville was bringing his fangs out.
“Get my backpack,” Livy suddenly ordered him.
“What?”
“My backpack. You brought it in the house, didn’t—”
Vic didn’t wait for her to finish. He just stalked out of the room and went to search out her backpack.
He found it in the kitchen, grabbed it, and returned to the bedroom.
Livy was still kneeling on the bed, appearing completely calm. “Open the back pocket and go into the zippered compartment.”
Vic did as ordered. Without looking, he located the zippered pocket with his fingers and opened it. He reached in and pulled out a long strip of condoms. Eyes narrowing, he focused on Livy.
“What?” she asked.
“You just carry around piles of condoms?”
“In case I feel like taking on the hockey team one night. You know, when I’m bored.”
“Can you ever give me a straight answer?”
“Maybe when you ask me a question that suggests one of the photographers I trained with told me exactly what to include in my backpack and travel bags so that I was always prepared for any situation rather than strongly suggesting I’m a whore.”
Vic blew out a breath. “You’re right.”
“I know.”
“Sorry.”
“Feeling a little possessive there, Barinov?”
“Kind of.”
“Don’t feel bad. One might suggest I’ve been feeling a little possessive about you lately.”
Shocked at that admission, Vic gawked at Livy. “Really?”
“Did you see me haul off and slap Melly outside the precinct?”
“Everyone saw you slap Melly.”
“Well, although there are many reasons I should slap the shit out of Melly Kowalski, in this particular instance I did it because she suggested that she wouldn’t mind ‘nailing that,’ when pointing you out to me. Her words. And I wanted to make it clear to her that I was not okay with her nailing anything. Especially you.”
“Really?” Vic asked again.
“Really.”
“I like that.”
“I can tell. Now come here.”
Vic dropped Livy’s backpack and walked toward her. As he did, she stood on the bed and walked to the edge. They met there, but Livy snorted.
“What?”
“I expected us to meet eye to eye. Instead, I’m looking at your throat. So tall.”
“Does that bother you?”
“No.” Livy nuzzled his neck. “Do you want it to bother me?” she murmured.
Vic briefly closed his eyes, worked to keep control. “Not at the moment.”
She looked up into his face. “Then shut up, Barinov. Shut up and kiss me.”
Vic did. His mouth moving over hers, his hands pulling her close until she was tight against his body.
Livy pulled her arms away from his grasp so she could wrap them around his neck, her tongue sliding between Vic’s lips and stroking.
Vic lowered her to the bed. He felt desperate, bordering on fully out of control. He knew he couldn’t risk that. Knew he wasn’t ready to reveal that side of himself yet. Hell, he might never be ready to reveal
everything about himself to anyone, much less Livy.
Vic pulled out of their kiss and began moving down Livy’s body, pushing up her T-shirt until he’d exposed her breasts. His tongue was rough as it dragged along the skin, teasing the nipple. Livy was sure such a rough tongue would have annoyed most women. But Livy’s skin was tough and not only easily tolerated the feel of it, but loved it.
But Livy had always been impatient. She couldn’t stand to wait for anything, but especially getting off. So she placed her hand on Vic’s head and pushed. Hard.
Thankfully, Vic laughed. Laughed and moved down her body until he was crouching by the bed. His hands gripped her thighs and yanked her down a bit until her pussy was right at the edge of the bed. He held her legs wide open and buried his face between her thighs. His rough tongue lapped at her, tickling and exciting her clit in the process. She didn’t know whether to giggle or scream. Then he slid that tongue deep inside her, tormenting her by using it like a slow-moving cock. Vic eased it in and out, taking his time.
Livy began to writhe on the bed, her hands gripping the comforter under her so that she didn’t unleash her claws and dig them into Vic’s scalp.
But then, with his tongue still inside her, Vic pressed his thumb to her clit and began to move it in small circles.
It was all Livy needed, her back arching off the bed, her claws ripping into the bedding. She cried out, her body nearly coming off the bed, but Vic held her down, kept her pinned. She liked that.
Hell, she liked everything. Until Vic was gone. Why was he gone? Where did he go?
Livy opened her eyes, but Vic hadn’t gone away. He hadn’t left the room. He’d just stepped away to push down his jeans and put the condom on.
Then he was gripping Livy’s legs again and yanking her lower half up, his cock pressing against her. He paused. Just long enough to make sure he had Livy’s attention. Then he pulled Livy closer and thrust hard. So hard, so mercilessly, that Livy started coming again. And at this rate, Livy wasn’t sure she’d ever stop.
Vic had only so much control, and he had to really concentrate not to lose himself in Livy. He wasn’t ready to let that happen. Wasn’t ready to forget that there were some things he had to keep to himself. But while trying to keep control of one part of himself, he was losing control in another way.
Vic was never this rude and demanding in bed. Never. He wasn’t Mr. Sensitive, but he wasn’t this . . . brutal.
But what didn’t help was that Livy really seemed to like it. She liked him just fucking her like they were two animals who’d met on the African plains or something.
Even worse . . . Vic liked it, too. Perhaps too much. It would be hard to go back to women expecting a more polite first ride. Because at the moment, his cock was as happy as it had ever been.
Only Livy’s shoulders were on the bed as she gasped and groaned. Her hands suddenly gripped her breasts, her fingers tugging at her nipples since Vic couldn’t with his own hands busy.
“Oh God!” she panted, her fingers tugging harder, gripping tighter, and Vic knew she was coming again. “Oh . . . oh . . . God!”
It was like her pussy had turned into a vise, all that wet heat gripping his cock hard and pulsating until Vic bit back a roar that might have destroyed every window in the damn rental house if he hadn’t stopped it.
Gasping, Vic pulled out of Livy and fell on the bed beside her.
Lying on their backs, they looked at each other, then back at the ceiling.
After a few minutes, Livy said, “Vic?”
“Yeah?”
“Now I’m starving.”
“Good,” he sighed, the feline in him sated and curling up for a little sleep, leaving his bear side awake. “I’m hungry, too.”
CHAPTER 16
The food was ice-cold but remarkably delicious.
They ate while naked on the living room floor. Vic tried to set some nice mood lighting, but the automatic fireplace didn’t work and he ended up covering one lamp with a linen napkin and turning on the TV, but muting the sound. It worked out surprisingly well.
Vic didn’t find out, though, until they were in the middle of their meal that Livy hadn’t eaten anything since hours before she’d gone into Whitlan’s apartment. How she’d lasted through two plane trips, that entire joust, and their amazing sex fascinated Vic. And watching her heal before his eyes, the bruises on her body and face all but gone, blew his mind. Shifters healed fast, there was no doubt about it. Yet it seemed honey badgers were even more resilient. Instead, the more food Livy put into her mouth, the stronger she became.
“This is a really nice place,” Livy remarked as she devoured more of the General Tso’s Honey Chicken. “A lot of times these rental vacation homes are . . .”
“Tacky,” Vic filled in for her.
“The pictures they have online never look the same as what you actually get. And sometimes they smell weird.”
“Rita’s smart. She keeps updating the homes she rents out so that they don’t just look like you’re renting out Grandma’s house while she’s in a nursing home.”
“So you’ve been coming out here for a while.”
“Since I was a kid. My parents brought me and my sister here at least once a year. They also took us to an all-bear town in Siberia every other year, and Moscow every Christmas to see the relatives.”
“Seems like you spent more time with bears than tigers growing up.”
“I did. My mother’s family pretty much cut her off when she married, then bred with a bear. They wouldn’t have been so hard on her if she’d had a couple of cubs with a tiger first, and then got married. The Cat Nation, in general, is pretty tolerant of that, but step outside that breeding plan of theirs, and you get the big family shunning.” He grabbed another egg roll. “What about your parents?”
“What about them?”
“I’m sorry. Was that out of line? Asking about your dad?”
“No,” she replied easily. “I just don’t understand the question.”
“Well, your dad’s white and your mom’s Chinese so . . .”
“Race, religion, politics . . . none of those mean a thing to honey badgers.” Using chopsticks, she popped another piece of chicken in her mouth, chewed, swallowed, and added, “Unless they’re in the mood to start a fight.”
“Pardon?”
“Badgers love starting fights, and we’ll use anything available to us to do it. Bigotry of any kind is fair game, whether we believe in the philosophy or not. Religion, no matter what you were raised as or believed in, is also a great fight starter. And then there’s politics, which is the best for when you really just want to see people beating the shit out of each other for a ridiculous reason. Badgers will go from one extreme opinion to another, whether they believe in it or not, as long as it gets that ugly fight rolling.”
“I always thought of foxes as the troublemakers.”
Livy snorted. “Foxes are lightweights. Cute little con artists and gold diggers. But honey badgers . . . we’ve been changing history since before a Roman honey badger told Julius Caesar that he doubted Pompey would have a problem with him crossing the Rubicon. And, of course, everyone knows about Rasputin—although he was kind of tall for one of us. But I think his mother was full-human.”
Vic had been about to put the last bit of egg roll in his mouth but he stopped and stared at Livy.
“And the rumor still holds that the Hundred Years’ War was started by badgers,” she went on. “And who can forget that the Borgias were all honey badgers?” Livy nodded. “Yep. My kind can start a knife fight at a sit-in peace rally using nothing more than overly expressive eyebrows. I’d call it a curse if we didn’t really, really enjoy starting shit for shit’s sake.”
“Even you?”
“Are you kidding? My parents sent me to private schools from preschool through high school for one simple reason. Private schools are a veritable shit-starting paradise. and they wanted me trained to be the best. But I met Toni when I was fo
urteen and she got me to focus on my photography instead of starting fights in the teachers’ lounge. She convinced me to make it the most important thing in my life. Once I did that, I stopped caring about making everyone else miserable. I don’t think my parents ever forgave Toni for that, either.”
“Why would they want you trained in shit starting?”
“If you don’t desensitize yourself to fucking with people’s lives, it’s impossible to rob them. It’s impossible to break into their homes and take things that are invaluable to them if you don’t enjoy tormenting rich people just a little bit. And the Kowalskis and Yangs do not steal from the poor. So it’s private school for all of us.”
“They don’t steal from the poor? Because stealing from the rich gives them a sense of higher moral ground??”
“That and they just don’t like rich people.”
“And sending you to private school had nothing to do with getting you a better education?”
“As far as my parents were concerned, I was getting my education from them. I knew the basics and multiple dialects of four languages by the time I was nine. But all the kids in the family went to private school because that’s where the wealthy are. The people we’re trained to size up from the first ‘hello.’ In fact, when I met Toni’s mother, she was carrying around her Stradivarius violin while she was trying to rein in her kids. And my first thought was, ‘I could get at least fourteen million for that on the open market.’ ” Livy shook her head. “It’s a beautiful instrument. My parents could never believe I didn’t bring it home with me.”
Finished eating, Vic folded his arms and rested his chin on them. “Why didn’t you?” Vic asked her. “Why didn’t you bring that violin home to your parents?”
Livy took a sip of her wine and replied, “Because I liked the Jean-Louis Parkers. A lot. They treated me like family from the very beginning. Still do. It never occurred to Jackie and Paul not to attend my father’s funeral. Even though they knew there would be fighting and snakes and supermodel mistresses.”
“They were there for you. That’s why it never occurred to them not to go.”