NINE
There was a wariness between them, days later, that Natalie couldn’t figure out how to overcome. She didn’t know if she even wanted to overcome it at this point.
The mating heat had her off balance; her emotions, her independence, and the fear Mike had instilled in her through their marriage of being controlled again all battled within her head and within her heart.
A part of her wanted to reach out and take everything Saban seemed to be offering her, yet the other part held back, watched and waited. Nothing could be as easy as this. The mating heat, the sense of everything coming together when his body moved within hers.
The new school season was coming closer by the day. Classes were on a year-round basis, but the six-week break between the final semester and the beginning of new classes gave students and teachers a much-needed vacation before classes began. And it was during that time that the Breed Cabinet had given Natalie a chance to get used to the town and to review the files she had been given on the students assigned to her.
The classroom she had been given was one of the finest she had seen. The computers were state-of-the-art, the room was bright and airy, the tinted windows that lined one wall looked out on the green, well-manicured grounds that surrounded the school.
She knew the glass to those windows was specially made to ensure an assassin’s bullet couldn’t find its way through. Just as she knew that the Board of Education had approved a variety of security measures that would place Breeds in close proximity in and around the school to ensure the protection of the Breed children who would be attending classes.
It was a chance of a lifetime. She would always be known as the first non-Breed teacher to be a part of the education of the exceptional children rumored to have been born of the unions between Breeds and non-Breeds.
That had been part of the excitement of having been chosen for the job, until she met Saban.
Natalie paused in inputting the class schedules she was making up into her personal PC at that thought. Yeah, Saban had changed things. From the day he had arrived at her home, she had known he would change things within her, and because of it, she admitted, she had fought the attraction rising between them.
She had fought him, snapped at him, acted like a shrew and a spoiled brat, searching for ways to irritate him past the wickedly sexy looks he had given her.
A part of her had wanted nothing but to run from him, while another part of her had held on to every look, every word, every second of attraction sizzling between them.
Until she found herself here, staring sightlessly at the half-finished class schedules and the room prepared for incoming students as Saban rechecked the security control room that the Breed children’s bodyguards would use during class.
She looked to the open door, aware of the murmur of his voice, too low to make out what he was saying, but comforting nonetheless. Comforting just because she knew he was there, close, protective.
God she was totally losing her perspective here. The same protectiveness that terrified her when he was defending her against Mike was now comforting.
She shook her head at the thought, just as she mentally kicked herself for not having anticipated what Mike would do. He had been fine with the divorce and the mistress he’d had on the side the last year of their marriage until he thought she might have someone else in her life.
Then it was all over but the screaming, the fighting, and the accusations. She was well acquainted with all of them.
The surprising part had been that he had actually stayed away from her since the confrontation at the house. She had been terrified he would try to get in again, that he would bring his insanity back to where Saban could choke it out of him.
As she dragged a hand wearily through her hair, her gaze still on the doorway, Saban stepped through it. Tall and rugged, dressed in jeans, a T-shirt, and boots, a black Breed Enforcer badge clipped to his belt on one side, his weapon worn comfortably in a shoulder holster.
He looked like what he was, a badass Breed ready to fight if the situation warranted it. Ready to love if she would give him half a chance.
He strode across the room, powerful legs eating up the short distance, his brilliant green eyes eating her alive despite the forbidding line of his mouth.
The flat, severe expression was a warning, and one she knew she wasn’t going to like.
“What’s happened?” She rose slowly from her chair, all manner of nightmare visions flashing through her head. Heading it was the fear that Callan Lyons, pride leader of the Ruling Cabinet, had changed his mind about allowing the children to attend the public classes.
He moved to the front of her desk, his brooding gaze flickering over her face before he propped his hands on his hips and scowled. The irritated, aggravated look took her aback.
“I’ve just been informed that your ex has attempted to order Callan Lyons to have me removed from your home based on his suspicions that you have been unduly influenced by me and therefore not in possession of your full mental faculties. He’s threatening to sue me, the Ruling Cabinet, and the Board of Education for being conspirators in my evil designs upon your very luscious body and demanding that you be released from your contract and escorted immediately to his location where he will then return you to your home and get you medical care.”
As he spoke, Natalie felt her lips parting in shocked amazement.
“He wouldn’t dare,” she breathed.
“Oh, he’s dared,” Saban snapped. “Now, tell me again why I shouldn’t kill the son of bitch and put us all out of our misery.”
She only wished he was joking.
“Because it would piss me off?” She flattened her hands against the desk and glared back at him. “Do you think I want bloodshed over someone’s insane jealousy? For God’s sake Saban, why the hell do you think I divorced him?”
“I’m wondering what possessed you to marry him to begin with,” he snorted irritably before running a hand along the back of his neck. “He’s out of control, Natalie. I’m warning you now, the Breed Ruling Cabinet is considering a measure to have him arrested and barred from the area. If he ignores the injunction, he’ll be jailed.”
“Saban—”
“Don’t Saban me,” he growled. “Do you have any idea the threat he poses to the very tenuous agreement the Ruling Cabinet and the Board of Education came to here? Or the threat he poses to you, personally? I’ve warned you, he’s not sane, and this merely proves it.”
“Mike is a little intense sometimes.” She grimaced. “He’ll get tired of this and go away.” She hoped.
He leaned forward. This time he was the one that flattened his hands on the desk as his nose came within inches of hers. “You are fooling yourself.”
Perhaps she was. Shaking her head, Natalie moved away from the desk and walked to the windows. She stared out onto the lush grounds, the tall, thick trees that bordered it, and wondered what she would do if Mike managed to destroy this chance for all of them.
“You should let me talk to him.” She turned to Saban, knowing, even before she did, what she would see.
His eyes narrowed on her, denial reflecting on the hard, savage lines of his face.
“Not gonna happen,” he informed her with a menacing purr. “Do you remember the last encounter? Did he look as though he would listen to you then?”
No, he hadn’t. She breathed out roughly.
“He’s not a bad man,” she finally said softly. “He just wasn’t a good husband.”
“He’s insane. Stop trying to defend him. He’d cart you out of here physically no matter your wishes, if you gave him only half a chance. I don’t intend to give him that chance.”
No, she didn’t either. But Mike had never been dangerous, not really. He was suspicious, paranoid, and sometimes a little over the top, but she couldn’t believe he would hurt anyone.
“When are you going to stop defending him, Natalie?” He crossed his arms over his chest and glowered back at her.
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“I’m not defending him.” She hunched her shoulders against the accusation. “I just don’t want you killing him.”
“And if I promise not to kill him?” he rasped coldly. “What then? Will you accept that he’s fucking crazy and at least allow me the satisfaction of throwing him over the county line?”
Her lips almost twitched. He might be a Breed, but at the moment he was pure arrogant, irritated male.
“You should let me talk to him,” she said again, shaking her head. “You have to know how to reason with him, that’s all.”
“Well evidently you don’t know how to do it either, or you wouldn’t have ended up divorced, now would you?”
“Yes, I would have.” She met his gaze without flinching. “Reason or not, Mike couldn’t accept my need to be myself, and I couldn’t accept his need to control me. It was that simple, Saban. Everything else aside, that was what destroyed our marriage.”
“You loved him.” And he hated it. She could see it for the barest second, flashing in his eyes, the knowledge that she had felt something for another man.
Natalie nodded slowly. “When I married him, I loved the illusion he gave me. I loved the man I thought he was.”
His nostrils flared; if it was in anger or in an attempt to scent the truth of her statement, she wasn’t certain.
His arms dropped from his chest as he shook his head then, turning from her and running his hand along the back of his neck as though to rub away the tension there.
“I had a life before you, Saban. Just as you had one before me,” she reminded him.
“I never loved until you.” He turned back to her, that arrogance stronger, tightening his features, brightening his eyes. “But I don’t blame you for the emotions you had for him. Sucks, but there it is. My problem with this is your refusal to admit how dangerous he is.”
“A danger to himself.” That was the sad part, and what Natalie had admitted to herself before taking that final step to divorce him. “He’s not a danger to me, Saban. If he hurt me, he couldn’t continue to be the martyr he sees himself as. The world is against him.” She spread her hands helplessly. “That’s how he sees it. Use force or violence against him, and it’s only going to make him worse.”
She moved then, not certain why the memory of that had her moving to him, walking into the arms that opened for her. Why did she even need to be held? Mike was out of her life, at least for the most part. She didn’t need comforting, and she knew Saban sure as hell didn’t need it. He was arrogant enough for a dozen men.
But there she was, folded against his chest, his hands rubbing against her back, his warmth enfolding her.
The arousal that had remained a low throb inside her all day wasn’t building; the hormonal adjustments the doctor had made the day before had made it safe for her and Saban to actually leave the house for longer than five minutes. So it wasn’t overwhelming hunger driving her.
She felt his lips press to the top of her head, though, and couldn’t stop the smile that tugged at her lips.
For two days they had avoided the subject of Mike, as though he were a grenade in danger of exploding between them.
“Something will have to be done about him, Natalie,” he said softly, one hand curling beneath her chin to lift her face to allow his eyes to meet hers. “This won’t continue.”
She nodded slowly, regretfully. Yes, something would have to be done, and she knew she would have to do it. She couldn’t allow Mike to be hurt. He wasn’t a bad man, as she had told Saban. He was just a very needy man, a man who refused to accept that things couldn’t always go his way. Once he accepted he had lost, though, he would give up, lick his wounds, and torture some other poor woman who didn’t have the sense to see through the sad stories he wove.
She had seen through them a long time ago, and now, as she stood in Saban’s arms, she was willing to admit that she didn’t want Mike’s accusations and his paranoia to damage what she was finally admitting to being between them.
She had a chance here for the love she had dreamed of, for the life she wanted. She couldn’t let Mike destroy that. She couldn’t let herself destroy it, because she was learning that Saban just might be a man she could depend on. A man she could be free with.
TEN
She was up to something. As the day went by, Saban could watch the gears working in her mind. It was fascinating, watching her, sensing her turning the problem of her ex-husband over in her mind until he wanted to snarl in jealous fury at the knowledge that she was thinking about him.
He didn’t want her thinking about another man. He wanted to wipe Mike Claxton with his smarmy smile and avaricious gaze completely out of her memory.
Knowing he couldn’t grated at his temper. Knowing she was trying to figure out how to do his job and get rid of the bastard only made things worse.
He watched the process, though, and cataloged each shift of expression, each changing scent of emotion as she worked in the schoolroom, and later as they ate dinner at one of Buffalo Gap’s better restaurants.
The hormonal adjustment Ely had given her the day before, as well as the adjusted capsule she took that morning had eased the heat enough to allow Natalie to think rather than to fuck with instinctive abandon. He would have preferred the abandon, he had to admit, because there was no hormonal treatment for the males.
The effects were different, the agonizing heat not nearly as uncomfortable. Or perhaps it wasn’t as noticeable as pain. Saban had known pain. Pain so agonizing, so brutal that the need to fuck, no matter how vicious, was more pleasure than agony.
But it was bordering on intensely irritating as he checked out the house. He went over the security diagnostics and then ran the secondary sensors for electronic listening devices, explosives, and a variety of threats.
His dick was spike hard and threatening to rip his zipper from his jeans, but if he was going to fuck in peace, then he had to make damned sure the house was safe first.
Moving back to the living room, his gaze moved instinctively to his mate. She was curled in the corner of the couch, watching him, molasses eyes dark and hot, her body vibrating with arousal.
She was perfection to him. It didn’t matter that another had taken her, that she had loved another, he told himself. But did she still love him? Were there emotions that had carried over from her marriage that now hampered her ability to see her ex-husband as he was?
“You’re watching me with that predatory look in your eyes again,” she announced, her voice husky, edging into passion.
God, he loved the sound of her voice when she desired him. When the heat was building and her pussy was creaming.
“Perhaps I’m considering dessert.” He moved closer to her, his teeth clenching at the needs suddenly rocking through him.
The heat building in her wrapped around his senses, intoxicated him, made his blood boil. It had been like that the moment he had laid eyes on her, watching her from afar. She had been an assignment when he landed in Nashville, where she had worked in a small public school as a teacher. Within hours she had become the most important thing in his life. In the weeks since, she had become even more. She had become his soul.
That knowledge made his need for her harder, sharper. It made him all too aware that his position in her life was precarious, despite the mating heat. As much as he hated it—and he did hate it—there had been another male in her life at one time, and that male was encroaching on his territory.
Saban had been created and trained to deal with such irritations with maximum force. He had been raised by an old man he called Broussard to know compassion and to follow something far greater than death.
As he stood there, staring at his mate, he wondered which would win. The training or the upbringing, because at this moment he wanted nothing more than to shed blood and to protect his mate. Because something inside him—that primal, primitive part of him—warned him that his mate needed protecting against Mike Claxton.
“You don’t look
like a man considering dessert.” She unfolded herself from the couch, a sinuous, sexy move that had his nostrils flaring to both draw the scent of her into his head and to maintain control. The scent tested the control, but he resisted for the moment.
“I’m a man considering many things.” Foremost, he was considering the best way to maneuver his very intelligent, very confrontational little mate.
Her low laugh was knowing, sexy. The scent of her was like sunrise, like spring and innocence, and like a woman moving slowly, confidently into her place in her mate’s life.
He liked that scent. He liked all the feels and the textures of watching her claim what was hers alone.
Perhaps Claxton wouldn’t be such an issue. Not that he would ever let her confront the man herself, but perhaps he could not shed blood. And maybe he didn’t have to worry about securing her heart. She was coming to him, the scent of her was mixing with his, his scent was mixing with hers.
Her fingers slid under his belt.
Saban’s head jerked down. His gaze slashed to those graceful fingers, curled as they were between his jeans and the shirt tucked into them.
The heat of her fingers branded his flesh through the shirt and flashed to his balls, drawing them tight.
It was a first for them. The first time she had come to him. He lifted his head back to her, saw the flash of vulnerability in her eyes, and took a firm hold on the hunger tearing through him.
“I’m yours,” he told her. “Do as you will, mate.”
“Mate,” she whispered the word almost questioningly.
“Much more than a wife.” He kept his arms still at his sides rather than touch her as he wanted to. “The most important part of who I am.”
Her expression softened, though her gaze gleamed with nervousness and with a twinge of uncertainty. It didn’t stop her need, though, and it didn’t stop that small step into awareness of her power over him.
And she had a great amount of power over him. He would do more than kill for her—he would die for her. But even more, he would fight to the very limits of his training to live for her.
“I want you.” She said it simply, and with that she stole any remaining part of him that he may have held separately from her.
The breath literally stalled in his throat as she worked at the buckle of his belt. Slow, sure movements, her slender fingers easing the belt loose then slipping the metal button free to slide the zipper down, over the heavy ridge of flesh throbbing beneath.
He growled involuntarily, the muscles of his abdomen flexing violently as her fingers gripped the hem of his shirt and pulled it up his torso.
Saban lifted his arms, bent enough to allow her to pull the shirt free, then nearly roared out his pleasure as her head bent and her sharp little teeth raked his chest.
“Mercy, my cher,” he growled, forcing his hands to merely skim along her back.
She was fully dressed. He wanted her naked, and he wanted her naked now.
He gripped the hem of her shirt and drew it off when he wanted to rip it off. He forced back a hungry snarl as he felt her satiny flesh, and then a roar as her hot lips moved down his chest to his abdomen, then to the straining length of his cock.
He stared down at her in amazement as she went to her knees. Her breasts were framed in black lace, pale and swollen and pretty as hell. Nothing could be as pretty as those pale pink, luscious lips surrounding and consuming the head of his cock though.
Damn. Nothing could be as good.
His fingers slid into her hair. The warm strands tangled around his fingers like living silk. She sucked the head of his cock deep inside her mouth. She sent his senses exploding.
Saban felt his head fall back on his shoulders then forced himself steady to stare down at her. He felt the rumbling growls that came from his chest, and he growled her name. He snarled his need for her, and he fought for control. He prayed for control, because he wanted this to last. He wanted this touch, the way her eyes blazed up at him, the sight of his flesh held intimately in her mouth seared into his memory.
A shattered groan ripped from his chest as her tongue swirled around the head, caressing the swollen crest with wicked licks. And there, just beneath the crest, her curious little tongue probed at the flesh that covered the barb. The extension wasn’t erect, but it throbbed beneath the flesh, ached with the need for release.
“I’ll not stand much more,” he groaned as she sucked the head back into her mouth and whispered a moan over the thick crest.
“Natalie, cher.” His thighs tightened against the need to come, his balls drew up in agony.
With one last, slow lick, she pulled back slowly.
“I want to take you.”
Saban stared down, dazed, sweat forming on his forehead as she rose to her feet, her slender fingers stroking over his erection.
“I want to take you right here.” She toed off her shoes as she unsnapped her jeans.
“Here?” He swallowed tightly, watching as she wiggled from the snug denim like a fantasy present, unwrapped one slow inch at a time.
“Here.” Her smile was pure sex, pure need. “Do you have a problem with here?” She kicked her jeans free before reaching behind her and unclipping the bra.
The cups fell away from the firm, sweet flesh of her breasts, and control was suddenly the last thing on his mind. Sweet, succulent nipples topped the flushed mounds, and he was lost.
“Here works.”
Hell, he didn’t care where it was, as long as he was inside her, holding her, her holding him, a part of each other.
Saban sat back on the couch, watched in wonder and pleasure as she straddled his thighs and came to him.
His hands shackled her hips as he reclined into the back of the couch.
She flowed over him like hot honey. Soft, saturated, slick flesh enclosed his cock head, then by slow, agonizing inches took the shaft of his erection. Tiny, whimpering cries left her lips. Her sharp nails bit into his shoulders, and her dark eyes were nearly black in her pleasure.
“I’ll not last long. I’ll make up for it.” He was fighting to breathe.
He could feel the sweat beading on his flesh, feel the wildness invading both of them.
“You can make it up all night.” She leaned into his chest, her hips lifting, dragging the tight, clenching flesh of her pussy over his cock, and he lost it.