Phoenix Alight Read online

  This time he smeared it on both palms and massaged it in well, his eyes on hers. Then he covered her left breast with his left hand and her entire pussy with his right and squeezed both lightly. He bent forward at the same time and gave her another teasing kiss.

  Deep full-body happiness spread through her. She felt cherished and loved and utterly, totally safe. Was this the bear bond he was always on about? She lifted her hips for another kind of kiss.

  “Don’t distract me,” he chided.

  He began to massage her belly, working out in slow circles from her navel. Spreading the oil over her skin and rubbing it in well. He licked out her empty belly button and filled it again. Fire followed his gliding fingers. His tongue in her belly button made her passage clench and pulse. Her nipples furled into hard, aching peaks.

  “Hurry up,” she coaxed.

  “Hurrying is not romantic, dearest heart.”

  Maybe not. But fast and passionate was what she wanted right this minute. Cam however returned to those lazy sensual circles on her stomach. Pulling and kneading and making her body writhe beneath his knowing hands. The big warm hand on her pussy was a still weight that promised but did not deliver.

  “Relax,” he crooned. “Let go, Warrior Woman.” He blew on the skin he had oiled. Her pussy began to pulse harder.

  As if he could feel the blood rushing to her pussy, Cam’s big hand slipped lower to cover her open sex. Then he left her pussy forlorn to dip his finger in the oil in her navel. He dabbed the oil on her outer lips and traced the quivering edges with a delicate, barely-there stroke. He buried his nose in her folds and gave a great bearlike sniff.

  “Umm.” He dipped into her navel, sighed and dribbled in a little more oil. Returned with a slick finger to her pussy. “I love your smell.”

  “My smell!”

  “You smell like a sex goddess. Spicy. Powerful. Aphrodite and Ishtar and Hathor rolled into one.”

  “You think I smell better than the goddesses of love?”

  “Sure do.”

  She spread her legs wider, willing him to enter her vag. But he only chuckled. He found her stiff inner lips again and dabbled them with oil. With thumb and forefinger he pinched and tugged first on one side, and then the other, while she bucked and twitched.

  “Your lips are so swollen,” he murmured. “Stiff and dark. Red. Beautiful.” He pinched and pulled. Kissed her where he had so tenderly abused her sensitive flesh. Inhaled her scent again.

  Finally he dipped one finger inside her vag. Not far enough, just barely inside the entrance. She gripped him tightly. “Yes, yes,” she urged him.

  “I need more oil.” He rubbed thumb and fingers together and placed them under her nose.

  The scent of her arousal filled her nostrils. “Why are you tormenting me?”

  “Foreplay,” he said sternly. “You deserve foreplay, D’Angelo.”

  “It’s all sex, Cam.”

  “I know.” He smiled and brushed her lips with his. His stubble caressed her chin like the softest paintbrush. “Patience, Phoenix.”

  A single finger applied pressure just inside her entrance. Her passage grew softer and needier with every slow clockwise circle. She could feel her growing wetness. She practically levitated when he switched direction. She gasped when he withdrew his finger, lubed it. He returned to a spot a fraction of an inch over and ministered to it just as slowly. Her legs were beyond restless now.

  But there was no hurrying him. He deliberately worked his way around her entrance, and when that lap was completed, moved a little higher and continued his leisurely massage. “Trust me,” he begged. “Just relax and enjoy yourself.”

  It was relaxing. And arousing. And romantic. From time to time she could see or feel his erection. His cock was at attention, drops of semen dribbled from the dark purple cap. Its thick stony length brushed enticingly against her thigh as he bent over her. The scent of his arousal was thick in her nostrils. Rich, masculine, potent. Desperate. This tender teasing was costing him.

  He dripped another dribble of oil into her navel. Kissed her bush. Licked once at her clit. She began to pulse harder. “I’m going to come,” she warned him.

  “As often as you like, Frankie, my darling.”

  Oh. She consciously relaxed every muscle in her body as he eased his finger just a little deeper into her pussy and continued his lazy seduction. Relaxation didn’t work. Her vag spasmed and gentle waves of release rolled through her like lazy ripples on a pond. His finger stilled inside her, as she alternately gripped and released him in a pulsing rhythm.

  “Sing for me, Phoenix,” he begged.

  Her song of satisfaction and love could not be held back. She poured all her longing and joy into her melody. The music resonated with her climax and intensified her pleasure. And his big grin. That was one self-satisfied male.

  He sighed theatrically when the ripples stopped. “I forgot your G-spot,” he said apologetically.

  “No.”

  “Yeah, I really did.” He added more oil and dipped his forefinger in her navel again.

  She had meant, don’t rub me there – she was a spurter – but, Cam being Cam, kept going. As her song faded to humming, two fingers began to massage her G-spot at the same dawdling pace he had massaged her entrance. Her paroxysms started again. Her humming turned to a frantic chanting of his name. He bent his head and lapped up her wetness. She came again in a series of powerful convulsions.

  “Umm.” He covered her entire pussy with his hand as if he wanted to share her orgasm. But he waited until the aftershocks were barely there before he spoke. “Now?”

  “Now.”

  He knelt over her limp body and lifted her buttocks, thrust deep into her swollen passage. She was wet but her tissues were engorged. It was a tight fit. Her folds were tugged as he moved his thick length in, and pulled as he moved out. His oily thumb made brisk yet careful circles around the base of her oversensitized clit.

  Her song started up again. She came in waves of greater and greater intensity. He stiffened above her, pumped his pelvis one last time, gathered her close and came. His bellow and her shriek of satisfaction made victorious music.

  She must have drifted off. When she opened her eyes the welcome weight of his body was no longer on hers. He was sitting on the couch with her feet in his lap, rubbing the egg between thumb and forefinger. Of course he noticed the moment she looked at him.

  “Is this what I think it is?”

  “If you think it’s the Egg of Immortality.”

  “I’m a bear, Frankie. For better or worse. A bear.” He sounded unbelievably sad.

  “I love you, Cameron.”

  “Do you?”

  Wasn’t he going to tell her he loved her too? “Yeah. I thought the egg would heal you. And I figured if you were no longer able to shift, you might be more open to becoming a phoenix.”

  “Can’t you take me as I am?”

  There was no longer anything to think about. She had risked death for this man. They shared a bond that was soul deep. He was her fated mate and she would never find another. There was nothing to do but surrender with grace. “Sure.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “Will you marry me?” He looked gratifyingly unsure. But this was not a competition.

  “In a heartbeat.”

  “And have bear cubs?”

  “That might be harder.”

  “Why?”

  “Because phoenixes breed true. Our genes are dominant, or something.”

  “Huh.”

  “According to my Aunt Lois, when phoenixes marry other shifters, they still have phoenix babies. She knows of no exceptions.”

  “Huh.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Cameron~

  Who would have thought that Warrior Woman would give in without a murmur? Cam handed her back her egg and rubbed her feet tenderly, noticing the cuts and purple bruises on the soles. “Did you just say you would marry me?”
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br />   “Yup.”

  He lifted her leg and kissed her foot. “You won’t regret it.” He sniffed. Something impinged on his triumphant happiness. “You’re hungry.” That was an understatement.

  “Starving. I haven’t eaten since that tuna casserole.”

  “Nearly forty-eight hours. Doesn’t taking phoenix use up a ton of energy?” he asked as he stood up. Taking bear burned through fuel like nobody’s business.

  “It certainly does. I’m weak with hunger.”

  Now that he was thinking with his big head instead of his little one, he could tell she was exhausted. “Is that why you agreed to marry me?”

  “That’s just silly. I agreed to marry you because you are my soul mate.”

  “Okay.” That was settled. “Food or shower first?”

  “I need a shower, but I have to eat before I die of starvation.”

  “I’ll see what I can scrounge. There’s probably a block of cheese or something.” He strode off to the kitchen and peered into the fridge.

  There were three kinds of cheese in the deli drawer. He found a box of crackers in the cupboard. He would have just put the lot on a plate, added a knife and called it a meal. But women were fussier. He took the cheeses out of their wrappers, and arranged the crackers around them, remembered the grapes in the fridge and added those.

  He was proud of the tray he carried out to her. She sat up, as confident in her nudity as she was in her leathers. The sight of her lovely breasts nearly made him drop the cheese. Her big peach nipples were furled as tightly as rosebuds and had darkened to crimson. Was he drooling? Drool was not attractive.

  “Lovely,” he said. “Do you want a T-shirt or something?” Something to blot up the drool.

  “What I want is food.” She cut herself a wedge of cheese and began to nibble.

  Although he was once again consumed with lust, he could see that his mate was at her limit. She was holding herself together with sheer guts. No wonder he loved his Warrior Woman. He fed her a grape. She bit his finger.

  “None of that, Capt. You have to eat before you seduce me.”

  She laughed and cut herself another hunk of cheese. Balanced it on a cracker and took a healthy bite. He had never seen anything sexier than the way she enjoyed her food. He was far gone. But he had known that for years.

  “You’ll see,” he assured her. “A bear bond is a righteous thing.”

  She swallowed. “I know. I heard you this morning.”

  “This morning?” What on earth was she talking about? Had he done something else in his sleep?

  “Yup. I was a bit stunned when I woke up, but I heard you speaking to me as clearly as if you were in the tree with me.”

  What tree? He dimly remembered a cottonwood. “You did?”

  “I did. Giving orders, as per usual, Maj. Isn’t that the bear bond you’re always going on about?”

  “Not really. I mean, I love you, darling. I will always love you. Unto death. Beyond. But I never yet heard of bears sharing their thoughts. Are you sure you weren’t hallucinating?”

  “I’m sure.”

  That was spooky. “Huh. Maybe it’s because you’re a phoenix?”

  “Maybe. Got to tell you, Bear Boy, it was something of a shock to find you wandering around inside my head. On the other hand, this morning I certainly needed some direction.”

  “You know, I never heard of bears being telepathic. I mean, my mom and dad were bonded.” He held up his first two fingers entwined. “Tightly bonded. But neither one knew the other’s thoughts. Although they could finish each other’s sentences.”

  “That’s pretty normal for married people.”

  “Sure. Mom and Dad were soul mates. I’ve always assumed that they both went together because one of them was injured when the boat sank, and the other wouldn’t leave them to die alone.”

  His parents had drowned when the launch they were traveling in had sunk in the Antarctic. But bear shifters should have been able to swim away from such an accident. Instead, Adam and Marla Reynolds had died together.

  “Makes sense. But we phoenixes share a transcendent, telepathic bond,” she said thoughtfully, a loaded cracker halfway to her mouth. “But first there has to be the ritual of immortality.”

  “With the egg?”

  “With the egg.” She ate her cracker.

  “Were you in danger yesterday?”

  She nodded.

  He had better confess about his experiences. “I woke up, sure I was on fire. From inside.” Of course once he had cooled off, he had also been equally sure he was hallucinating again.

  She narrowed her eyes. “Really? I was attacked. Had to become fire and regenerate.”

  “You died?” Surely he would have felt that?

  “Almost.” Her voice was cheerful. “Are you going to eat that last piece of cheese?”

  His heart clenched. He lost his appetite. “Go ahead.”

  She did.

  “Aren’t you going to tell me what happened?” he asked.

  “It’s a long story. Maybe later. Right now I need to shower and sleep. In that order.” She rolled off the couch. “Coming, Bear Boy?”

  She had nearly died? No wonder he had been anxious yesterday and today. Still was, if it came to that.

  Frankie seemed to have gone past exhaustion. She stood passively while he helped her get clean. Submissively. Except that she wouldn’t let go of that damned egg.

  She kept transferring it from hand to hand. While she was rinsing suds out of her hair, she placed it in her mouth. She leaned against him while he soaped her breasts and washed her back and belly, still gripping it.

  “Lift,” he instructed when he knelt to wash her feet. Obediently she lifted her feet and let him scrub them. They weren’t just cut and bruised. The nails were broken and ragged. What the hell had happened in New Mexico?

  He left her leaning against the tiles while he washed himself as quickly as he could. He dried them both and carried her into the bedroom. Her eyes were closed but she still held tight to her egg. He wanted to put it safely on the nightstand but her fist clenched tighter.

  “No.”

  He shrugged. No point in arguing over trivialities. He covered her naked body with the sheet and glanced up at the fluttering curtains. The window he had leaped through in bear was still a mess of shattered glass and broken wood. Fortunately, mostly outside. Better take care of it while he could. Lord only knew when he would find himself stuck in bear again, unable to do the least little thing.

  Besides, he wasn’t sleepy. And his intuition was riding him hard. It might just be yesterday’s anxieties manifesting themselves today. Part of PTSD was being unable to shake off the bad stuff and reset to normal. Work ought to help distract him.

  He didn’t go far from Frankie, but he cleared away the broken glass and wood. He found a hammer in the mudroom and knocked out the remaining shards of glass and molding. He would have to replace the window, but it was warm enough this afternoon not to bother covering the opening. He would simply draw the blinds and curtains to shield Frankie from drafts and give them some privacy.

  When he had completed this chore, he lay down beside her and gathered her into his arms. Holding her strong and supple body felt right. Like coming home to perfect happiness. Frankie D’Angelo was going to marry him and have his babies. Life was good. Very good. In her sleep she was still singing, a tune that seemed part of her breathing. A lullaby.

  Auto-hypnosis? Because unlike the lullabies that had been sending him off to sleep, this one was relaxing but it didn’t make him sleepy. He had slept all night, all morning and all afternoon. Was there something to her claims that her songs just adjusted his body and mind so they could do what they needed to do? Because he wasn’t falling asleep. He was happy and relaxed and enjoying his mate’s presence.

  Except for that niggling intimation of danger. He felt as he did when he was preparing to go into battle. Alert. Vigilant. Every sense on high alert. Ready for action. Stoked.r />
  Well, suppose his intuition was telling him the truth. Suppose there was danger? Where would it be coming from? What could he guess about Frankie’s adventures in New Mexico?

  She had returned with living lava. So she had visited one of the many dormant volcanoes in that state. New Mexico had more volcanoes than any other state in the union. No eruptions in millennia. But lots of geothermal activity. One day, one or more would blow. In the interim, there were multiple magma flows below ground.

  So Frankie had gone underground. Who or what could she have encountered there more dangerous than an enormous blazing bird of prey? With his own eyes, he had seen Frankie in what she called greater phoenix. In that morph, she was the size of a small aircraft. In fact, he had flown smaller planes.

  Her wingspan was over twenty feet wide. Her tail feathers streamed behind her lengthening her body by yards. Her bronze colored beak was razor sharp and curved. And more than a foot long. The pruning shears from hell. Her talons were equally vicious. Beautiful, but also fiercely predatory. More than a match for most critters, paranormal or not.

  Frankie was hard to focus on when she was in phoenix which could only be an asset in a fight. She had informed him that he could only perceive her because he was also a shifter. He could believe it. The multi-colored splendor of her feathers was dazzling. Even when she appeared in her smaller morph, she seemed to be a blur of glorious color. And even in that morph, she was seriously dangerous.

  If she had been attacked and forced to regenerate, he could assume her assailant had also been paranormal. Another phoenix? That seemed deeply unlikely. But the crux of the matter was that she had been forced to regenerate. Whatever had fought her had been sufficiently formidable or sneaky to have come close to defeating his phoenix. An alarming thought.

  Frankie had told him that becoming fire was the pathway to renewal. A terrifying and excruciating process. If the flames that had burned him up last night were a taste of what she had gone through, no one would choose regeneration unless she had no option. Maybe she had actually lost that battle, even if she won the war.

  When a phoenix rose from the ashes, they had literally burned away their previous body, and emerged restored and perfect. Frankie might not look much different, but she was now entirely new. In which case, why was she so beat up and exhausted? Surely she ought to be in better shape, not worse?