Passion's Prey: The Shadow Shifters by A.C. Arthur Read Free Book Online Page B

top lip. He extended his tongue to lick the pad of her finger, and she smiled.
    “You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into here, Caprise. I’m not who you think I am.”
    Her response was to toss her head back and chuckle. He watched long sheets of hair dripping to the floor, flowing behind her. Just as she’d said, he was unable to resist, so X lowered his head and kissed along the exposed line of her neck. When her hands slapped against his shoulders, her long nails scraped along his skin, she whispered in a husky aroused voice, “And you have no idea who I am. That makes us even.”
    No, X thought as he pushed her down to the floor so that she was on her knees in front of him, they were not even. She was a well-bred, beautiful woman even if she had denial issues. And he was more dangerous than she knew.
    He leaned over her, put his palm to the base of her back, let his fingers trickle down between the crevice of her bottom. He stopped at her anus, felt the tight bud and the persistent jutting of his dick. On a coarse oath, he squelched that thought, figuring she was nowhere near ready for him that way. Using both hands to spread her wider, X thrust his dick inside her ready opening.
    Caprise screamed with the stretching of her skin and simultaneously arched her back, pushing back to take even more. This was how she liked it. She wondered how X knew. Soft and slow didn’t work for her, hadn’t in a very long time. Now she craved fast and hard, long deep strokes that she felt throughout her entire body, vicious climaxes that took her breath away. This was what she needed. Especially tonight.
    Through the shower door she’d seen him stripping, watching as every inch of his deep brown skin was exposed. That skin was covered with beautiful artwork that she suspected he took time and consideration to select. Every tat would mean something to a man like X, would symbolize some part of his life, some part of the man. After she’d stepped out of the shower the front of his body was even more alluringly visible. Across his chest was a tribal-type tat with its swirling lines coming to a sharp sword-like peak. Lower, on the left side of his abs, was a jaguar, long and sleek, majestic. His biceps sported more tribal insignias that wrapped completely around the width. She’d noticed them specifically because she was into tat work as well. What she hadn’t seen was the emblem of the Topètenia, but she knew it was there; somewhere on his body would be that icon, the human marking that her brother and his two friends had gotten as a symbol of their loyalty to the tribe. A symbol of the animalistic part of themselves—the part Caprise continued to deny.
    His body was as gorgeous as she’d imagined each time she saw him. Thick, toned muscles, oozing masculinity and power. He was exactly what she thought he was, despite what he said; she knew this man, had known him for years. He was the one of the three who was least expected to be smart and cunning. While Nick and Rome had achieved good grades and headed straight to college, Xavier had graduated with minimal honors and immediately dedicated his time to the US Marines. Upon his completion of those four grueling years of training—as she remembered him explaining to Nick one night—he’d applied to the FBI. Three years in the field and X was elevated to special agent status. That wasn’t the norm, but then again, neither was X. And it was no mistake that Caprise had paid close attention to him, even then.
    As he lowered her all the way to the floor, covering her from behind, something primal was unleashed in her, something as natural as breathing as she arched her back and accepted him inside her. She reared back, her head lifting, mouth opening wide as she screamed his name. Against her bottom lip, sharp incisors pricked and her body sizzled with desire.
    On the surface it might seem strange that she was here, in this position, with this man she hadn’t seen in