2

Chapter One

He touched her gently. Too gently. Carmella strained beneath Torren’s tender strokes, forcing back the aggression rising inside her as her desire rose. His long, dark brown hair caressed her arms, creating a curtain of rough silk around his head while his tongue laved her hard nipple and his mouth suckled the eager point gently.

His hands, work-calloused and large, moved over her body with sensual knowledge, but with restraint. He was holding back, just as he always did. Her head tossed on the pillow as she bit her lip to keep from crying out in frustration.

“Adrenaline overload,” he whispered against her breast, moving lower, his lips like a stroking flame over her skin. “Relax, Carmella.”

His voice was thick and husky with lust as he nipped at the flesh of her abdomen, travelling closer to the center of the heat spreading through her body. But there was something more. A vein of knowledge she couldn’t quite grasp…almost amusement. As though he knew the needs tormenting her and refused to ease them.

Her fingers clenched in the blankets of the bed beneath her as she fought for control. She could handle it, she assured herself, she always had before.

“Carmella.” She opened her eyes, staring down at him as he paused over the pulsing mound of her cunt.

God, he was so rugged, so handsome. The angles of his face were an artist’s dream. High cheekbones, the sharp slash of his nose, the stubborn chin. The male sensuality in the curve of his lips combined with the sun-darkened tone of his flesh gave him a brooding, intense look.

“Are you going to fuck me or talk to me all night?” She restrained the urge to bite him. Why did she always want to bite, to claw? The desperate throb of an almost violent lust surged through her veins.

Torren’s lips quirked into a small smile. Too knowing. What knowledge did he possess that she didn’t? And why couldn’t she sift through the myriad psychic impulses to make sense of it?

“Eventually, I’ll fuck you.” His hand slid up her thigh, parting her legs further as the long strands of hair caressed her flesh.

Carmella shivered. She loved the feel of the silken strands on her skin.

“What do you mean, eventually?” She panted as she tried to tamp down the heated urges flowing through her.

She wanted to fight. Wanted to force him to restrain her, to plow inside her with every hard, throbbing inch of his thick cock. She trembled at the thought, allowing the image to flow through her mind as she whimpered in growing hunger.

“Damn, you’re hot enough to burn me alive.” His fingers skimmed the saturated curls between her thighs.

Her vagina pulsed, spilling the thick juices of her need from its gripping tunnel.

“Torren, stop teasing me.” She wanted to scream, to demand that he give her the agonizing pleasure/pain her body was craving.

God, what was wrong with her? She needed him, loved him as she had never loved anyone. Torren fulfilled her. Soothed her. But nothing seemed to touch that dark core of lust growing steadily in her body.

Torren moved between her thighs, his eyes narrowed as he watched her. Hard, muscular legs spread hers; the broad head of his cock kissed the swollen lips of her pussy. Carmella shuddered, her hands fisting in the blankets as flames nearly erupted over her body. No. No. She couldn’t let that happen.

She bit her lip, feeling the wide head of Torren’s erection part the wet curves of her cunt. Her body was taut. She fought the flames and the agonizing pleasure as he began to stretch the delicate tissue of her vagina.

“Torren.” Her strangled gasp was a plea. God, she couldn’t be begging for something she knew she could never control. And she would never be able to stop her response to what she needed so desperately.

“It’s okay, love.” He sheltered her, coming over her as his hips worked his cock deeper insider her in smooth, shallow thrusts. “Hold onto me, Carmella,” he whispered at her ear. “It’s okay.”

But it wasn’t okay. The scream trapped in her throat was one of frustration and fury. The heat building through her body was too dangerous to ever relinquish control of.

“Hold onto me,” he whispered again a second before his cock surged inside her, hard and deep.

She couldn’t stop the keening cry that escaped. Couldn’t halt the desperate spasm of her vagina around the thick, hot shaft impaling her. It was so good. Not what she needed, but so damned good.

His hair flowed around them, smelling of man and cleaning soap, damp and cool against her hot skin as he began to fuck her with a steady driving rhythm. Carmella arched her neck, her fingers tightening around the blankets gripped between them as dark lust surged through her body. Oh God. Her skin was heating, her blood flaming. Torren’s cock stroked, caressed, tormenting sensitive, aching, nerve endings to a point of pleasure she could barely stand. She had to come soon. She had to.

“Now,” she begged desperately as she fought the erupting power threatening to release. “Please, Torren. Please, now.”

He slammed home. His arms tightened beneath her shoulders, his knees digging into the mattress as he began to fuck her hard and fast, pushing her close to the edge, so close…

Carmella couldn’t contain her cry as the orgasm, lighter than she would have preferred, swept through her body, tightening it with pleasure. The desperate edge of hunger dulled as she heard Torren growl out his own release, the hot pulse of his semen emptying into her vagina as he tightened in her arms.

Breathing rough, her skin still prickling as heat raced beneath it, she tried to relax in his arms. She didn’t want him to know how close to the edge she was coming. Couldn’t face his realization of the perversions that tormented her.

“Okay now?” His lips caressed her cheek. A loving, gentle touch that brought tears to her eyes.

“Fine,” she lied. She hated lying to him. Hated the needs that tormented her.

Torren moved to her side lazily, pulling her into his arms as he cuddled her close.

“Sleep, baby,” he whispered. “Tomorrow’s another day.”

The reflective tone of his voice bothered her, but the fight to hold back the violence rising inside her took all her concentration now. She nodded against his chest, but she knew sleep would be a long time coming.

* * * * *

We can’t wait much longer. Torren sent his thought to the man who waited miles from their location, pacing his rooms furiously.

Dammit, Torren. I’m moving as fast as I can. He could hear Ryder’s lust pulsing in his voice. The connection he allowed the other man as he made love to Carmella had been strong. Ryder had sensed in every pore of his body the nearly uncontrolled needs sweeping through her.

Move faster, Torren suggested darkly. She nearly lost control tonight, Ryder. We can’t afford to allow her to do that until you are with her.

A bleak pause followed his words.

Head to the beach house tomorrow. I’ll have the Hummer waiting outside the east end of New Cincinnati. I’ll cover her from here.

It was a risky plan. Torren stared down at Carmella, knowing she didn’t sleep as she pretended to. Her muscles were taut, small goose bumps raised along her flesh as she fought the power coursing through her. He had to save her. He had to protect her. He kissed her head softly, enjoying the feel of her silken, fiery-colored hair against his lips.

She was a Fyrebrand. But even more than that, she was a blood link to the greatest psychic monster ever created. Her power was deep, strong. The psychic ability to spark and generate fire from thin air; to destroy, if need be, with flames hotter than any man could create, pulsed within her small body. And she was slowly losing control.

I love her, Ryder. But he knew and accepted that she would never be his alone. There was no jealousy, no anger in that thought. He had known for years that she belonged not just to him, but to Ryder as well.

I’ll take care of her, Torren. The unspoken emotion lingered in Ryder’s thought, as did the surge of dark, intense lust. He would complete the circle Carmella needed. He would complete them all.

Torren tightened his grip on her, holding her close, regretting the coming separation, but looking forward to the reunion. Carmella wasn’t the only one restraining her lust, her darker desires. Torren was as well.

A smile crossed his lips. One he was glad Carmella couldn’t see. Anticipation rolled through his body, thickening his cock, heating his blood. His hands smoothed over her back.

“You aren’t asleep,” he growled at her ear as he lifted her thigh over his, pushing his erection against the wet curves of her cunt.

Heat awaited him. A gripping, milking pleasure he needed one last time before he left her to Ryder’s care. He rolled to his back, pulling her with him as she gasped in pleasure.

She impaled herself on the thick shaft, her back arching as she cried out at the pleasure he brought her. She surrounded him with fire, a lava-hot intensity he was more than willing to lose himself in.

“Ride me, Carmella.” He gripped her hips as her small hands braced on his chest and she began to rise and fall along the hard length of flesh spearing into her. He gritted his teeth, his hips meeting her downward glide as he fought to take her easy, gently.

She cried out above him, her hips moving faster, harder, her pussy gripping him like a silken, slick fist. Torren gritted his teeth. His cock throbbed, ached to spew its hot release into the tight depths of her vagina.

His hands tightened on her hips, pushing her to ride him, to stroke the tight clasp of her pussy over his cock repeatedly. She was crying above him, her nails biting at the flesh of his chest, stroking his lust higher.

“Fuck me,” he ordered her, his voice tight, nearly desperate. “All of me, Carmella.”

He arched his hips, driving every hard inch inside her as she began to shudder convulsively, her cunt rippling along his shaft as her orgasm tightened her body. He thrust inside her again, hard, heavy, and then once more before he erupted inside her, groaning in pleasure, holding back the regret. It was much less than he wanted, but he knew soon—very soon—it would be everything the three of them needed.