Mona Lisa Blossoming m-2 Read online

  I gripped Chami's hand urgently. "Help me stop them."

  "Do you wish me to kill Dontaine?"

  I blinked. "No, I don't want anyone dead. I want to stop them before someone dies."

  Chami hesitated. "If you are going to break a rule, it should be done cleanly, completely."

  "I don't want you to kill Dontaine, Chami."

  He looked at me, his narrow face tight and troubled. "Milady, I do not know how to stop him without killing him."

  I blinked my eyes and it was as if I suddenly saw clearly what was before me, like a blind man regaining his vision. Wiry, slender Chami stood before me, a fragile looking creature compared to the monster I was asking him to face. Chami's strength lay in his stealth, in his ability to creep upon his victim undetected. His strength was in killing his prey unseen, not in fighting.

  I backed away from Chami as I realized that he would not be able to help me either. Whirling, I turned and ran into the clearing, toward the combatants.

  Behind me I heard Gryphon yell, "Mona Lisa, no!"

  "Stop!" I shouted as I ran to the grappling opponents, a struggling mass of fur and flesh twisting on the ground. "I command you both to stop!"

  Writhing and thrashing, the two locked combatants twisted and rolled over me, knocking me to the ground. I felt the heavy crushing weight of them briefly, endlessly, then they were off me and I was gasping. Turning my head, I looked up into Dontaine's eyes. Disoriented, I noticed his eyes were still the same shape, like a human's. But what looked out from within them was not human. His jade green eyes had melted to the color of glittering honey, with that odd clarity that animal's have, as if you could see clear through them. Wolf eyes. Amber lay pinned beneath him, both of them an arm's-length away from me.

  "Stop it! Both of you!" I cried in a harsh breathless whisper. It was desperately lacking in forcefulness as a command, but I was trying to regain the air that had just been squished out of me.

  "I will be acknowledged Master of Arms?" Dontaine growled. His voice was deeper, rougher, like it took great effort to force a human voice through that harsh animal snout.

  "Yes," I instantly agreed.

  "That is not all I desire," Dontaine rumbled, his voice painfully deep. This close, the brush of his power was different, odd, more electric. His beast's power washed over me and made me gasp, made me writhe. It beat upon me and was almost pleasurable, but it contained that edge of pain that threatened, that made it sweet. It called to something within me. Something that wanted to rise up and meet it.

  It took all of my effort to concentrate on Dontaine's words, his meaning. He was saying that he wished to be my lover. And I understood then why Gryphon had left me to go to Mona Louisa's bed. What did sleeping with another matter? As long as the one you loved still lived and breathed.

  "I will take you to my bed once," I said to that half-human, half-animal face.

  "No!" Amber roared, and that one word tore through him like a cougar's scream. He gave a sudden, powerful shove and the two of them rolled away from me, wrestling, grappling once more, illustrating the sad truth that it takes two people in agreement to maintain peace, and only one to start a fight or continue it.

  Hands snatched me up in an almost painful grip, dragging me back safely to the crowd of onlookers. I turned to see Gryphon, his eyes blazing down at me. "What are you doing?" he demanded harshly, no longer calm, far from detached.

  "I'm trying to stop them," I replied shortly. "Almost did."

  Gryphon's eyes swirled with fear and anger but the rough screams, the piercing cries, the growls and grunts of rage—animal, human; no difference—drew our attention back to the center. Amber and Dontaine had separated. Both had sprung to their feet. Both were bleeding and battered. And both were fiercely determined to win. They came together in a blinding rush and Dontaine's claws swiped down in a tight slashing arc, ripping with ease through Amber's chest and shoulders.

  Amber stood there, unguarded, and let Dontaine rip into him for an unbelievable moment. Then reaching up with an almost casual grace, Amber grabbed Dontaine's unprotected neck with his right hand, dug in assuredly, and ripped Dontaine's throat out. A thick chunk of meat and cartilage spilled from Amber's hand onto the ground as if in slow motion. There was a moment of sheared silence, of stillness. And then came a slow gushing of blood, a dark spurting of fluids. Dontaine fell onto this back, writhing, twisting, his chest heaving, struggling to take in air and unable to do so. He gurgled, emitting wet guttural sounds as if he were drowning in the wash of his own blood and fluids, lying there on the ground helpless.

  "Oh, my God!" I broke from Gryphon and threw myself down beside Dontaine. His odd brown eyes, like clear honey, looked frantically up at me. I reached a tentative hand out toward the raw gaping maw of his throat, but stopped short of touching it. The glistening bones of his white spine gleamed visibly. I turned helplessly to look up at Amber. He stood over his fallen opponent's head, gazing impassively down.

  "Is he dying?" I asked. It was hard to believe otherwise, looking at Dontaine desperately gasping like a landed fish for air. I knew that to kill a Monère you had to take his head or heart or poison him with silver or the sun. But surely this much strategic damage would kill him, too.

  "No. This will not kill him," Amber said. "He will be uncomfortable until he heals and is able to breathe once more, but he will not die." The calmness of his deepened voice contrasted wildly with his eyes. Eyes that had turned feral yellow. Eyes that were screaming inside with the aggression of his beast, triggered from the recent battle.

  My hand lowered hesitantly like a fluttering butterfly undecided where to land. I finally touched Dontaine's shoulder, reeling thick fur brush coarsely against the smoothness of my palm. The creature reached up as if to grip my hand. Then remembering his own claws, he dug his hands into the ground instead, sinking the long sharp nails deep into the dirt, forcing that part of him, at least, to lie still while the rest of him spasmed and shook. His chest bucked and heaved, trying to draw in breath. But how could you breathe when your windpipe was torn out?

  I felt Dontaine quiver under my hand. As I touched him, his power zinged into me and my palm started to tingle. Nothing unusual with that. I was a healer and I wanted to heal him. But then my whole body started to tingle, to pulse, and that was not usual. The smell of blood and the scent of raw meat filled my senses, blinding me until it was all I could see, smell, taste. I could almost roll the coppery sweet tang of blood on the back of my tongue and taste the salty sweetness of warm tender meat in my mouth. My skin began to itch, to burn, to heat. And the cloth rubbing against my skin suddenly seemed unnatural, unwanted.

  "Her eyes," I heard a woman gasp.

  "She's changing," Amber said. "Dontaine's beast is triggering her own."

  It took a moment before I understood what he had said. I was starting to lose myself. "No," I growled. My voice was rougher, deeper, as if I had swallowed gravel and it was rubbing against my throat. I lifted my eyes up to Amber and shook my head, fighting it. "No."

  Gryphon spoke quietly to Amber, gazing down at me. "Take her, watch over her."

  "No," I gasped, fighting desperately not to rip my clothes off and free my itchy, prickly skin.

  Amber scooped me into his arms like a little child and ran from the clearing, away from ail the people, the curious watching eyes. He loped into the woods, away from all that raw pungent meat. But the smell of blood still rode thick in the air, right beside me, up against me.

  I turned my head and like a magnet, my eyes were drawn to the blood seeping down Amber's chest, his slashing wounds looking like dark lines of melted chocolate in the night. But chocolate could never taste this good, this rich, this alluring. Like an irresistible summons, it drew me. And I answered its call, lowering my mouth, letting my tongue press deep inside, digging into the fresh wound as I lapped up the sweet liquid elixir of his life. Amber groaned in painful pleasure, his breath coming heavily, his slow heart thudding loudly. We were deep
in the forest now.

  "What will it be, Mona Lisa? Sex or meat? We can change and hunt. Or we can fuck."

  Dimly, I realized those were the only two ways to channel my beast's energy. It was there just below the skin, a waiting tension, like water ready to spill over the brim, just barely contained. And fresh from battle, with bloodlust singing in his veins, Amber needed the release, too. He was giving me the choice. And he was warning me. He'd said fuck instead of make love. That was what it would be if I chose that option in both of our heightened aggressive states.

  But it wasn't really a choice. Changing into my beast scared me spitless, because the beast, once loosened, took me over completely. I lost all sense of self and just became the animal with its need to kill and eat blood and meat, to tear into flesh and sate its hunger. They told me it would get better. That as I changed more, I would gradually be able to control my beast better. That I would be able to retain my sense of self. Control it. But I had run from it my entire life, suppressed it, scared of losing my precious necessary control. I couldn't face it yet. Not yet.

  "Sex. I choose sex." His eyes gleamed brightly as I drew his head down to me and pressed my mouth hard against his. He let me slide down from his arms onto my feet as his tongue swept inside, tasting his own blood on my lips. He growled and lifted me up, pressing my hips hard against the solid thick ridge of him that had risen up. I made a hungry mewling sound and rocked my pelvis against him in hard pleasure-seeking surges. He pushed me away before I could wrap my legs around him, and unbuckled my belt with two rough pulls. It clanged to the ground with the weight of my daggers.

  "Lift your arms," he commanded. I did so and he swept my gown from me. All that covered me now was ivory lace panties, a fragile barrier. Amber cupped a big hand there between my legs, his thick fingers pressing against my moist lips.

  "You're wet," he said.

  My breath caught as with a rough twist, a sharp pull, he ripped the cloth away. And then I was completely naked. Amber pushed down his pants, stepped out of them, eyes blazing, and I let my eyes feast upon him.

  How magnificent he was. My vision was sharper, clearer somehow and I saw things in the minutest detail. His yellow eyes glowed in the dark, a bright feral gleam. I could see every separate striation in his irises; they were liquid pools of swirling amber. His brown hair flowed in thick waves, wild and untamed, each strand clear and distinct to my eye. Ribbons of blood decorated him like trophies from his battle. He stood before me like a giant monolith, his shoulders so wide that they would block out the moon when he lifted himself over me and covered me. His arms bulged with a thickness that was greater than my thighs. The flat plane of his stomach narrowed down to slender hips, and his abdomen rippled with living ridges and valleys, dipping and flowing. His legs were like two strong columns, beautifully carved, bulky sinew and muscle. And between them rose his sex, heavy and proud. A rampant rod that was in perfect balance to the whole size of him in thickness and in length. He was a big man, all over, his strength great. And I suddenly couldn't swallow. We'd made love before, never fucked. But it wasn't fear that dried my mouth. It was hunger.

  I moved to flow against him, but Amber stopped me. With his broad hands against my shoulders, he spun me around. But instead of drawing me back against him, I felt his teeth press against the back of my neck. He nipped me. Hard enough, pleasurable enough to have it actually hurt. He'd always treated me with the gentlest of care before. Startled, I looked back at him and met those gleaming yellow eyes. His cougar eyes. They glowed eerily in the dark; alien, other. He was bent down, crouched over me, and I became sharply aware of the sheer size of him, of how much bigger he was than I. The solid mass of him, the heavier weight, his greater overpowering strength. He was a natural predator and the sharp blade of fear prickled my skin, pleasant and not, raising goose bumps upon my shivering flesh. My nipples tightened and drew to pebble hardness. His pupils expanded, widened, almost swallowing up his irises and his nostrils flared wide, as if he had smelled the tang of fear mixed with my arousal, and found it intoxicating.

  A low rumble started deep in his chest and my heart fluttered in the cage of my chest like a captive bird.

  "Run," he growled.

  I stared back up at him with wide eyes, fear and desire twin captives within me, merged and inseparable.

  "Run!" he repeated, his voice gravel rough, barely recognizable.

  I turned and ran, my senses quivering with that odd heightened alertness, my strength boundless. He gave me a few seconds head start then came after me. I didn't hear anything, just felt the heavy waves of his power pounding behind me, closing in. Just before it touched me, I veered sharply to the right. I laughed tauntingly as he overshot me, then laughed again, a teasing invitation as I looked over my shoulder.

  "Catch me if you can," I challenged in a low husky voice.

  He turned abruptly and came after me again, a silent shadow, white teeth gleaming in a wicked grin, his feral eyes dancing with the joy of the hunt. I screamed as he pounced and darted to my left. He was big but I was quicker. I feinted and darted, his hands gliding over me, missing me, and grasping air. Touch then go. Pounce and evade. Fleeing, chasing. Dangerous foreplay that somehow felt natural to the cat within me, a wild courtship that heated me to liquid softness so that my musky scent wafted behind me, an invisible trail to tease his nostrils, driving him even more aggressively forward.

  I feinted to the right. He grabbed my arm and I turned and raked him with my nails. I snarled, teeth snapping at his hand and he released me and I was free once more, laughter trailing tantalizingly behind me. I faked left, darted right, and glanced back to see him right behind me, eyes intent, a great silent stalking shadow.

  He leaped and tackled me. His massive weight hit me hard, rolling us both to the ground. I scrambled to my knees and tried to crawl out from underneath him, my heart pounding, my eyes gleaming with excitement, but he captured me, one hand clamping my waist with an iron grip. One twist and my hair was wrapped tightly around his right hand, trapping me, holding me still with rough firmness. His teeth sank into the back of my neck, not breaking skin, but almost. The delicious promise was there in the edge of his sharp teeth, the threatening pressure, the warning growl, the forceful shake. All of it came together like proper ingredients thrown serendipitously together.

  Submission clicked in me like a switch thrown and I stilled, shuddering, no longer wanting to run from him. Purring, I arched up and pressed back against those delicious teeth, my hands braced on the ground. His restraining hand relaxed, opened, and left my waist. A flat palm smoothed down my buttocks. I pushed my eager bottom back against him with an inviting wriggle. Gasped as his fingers slipped down my back crevice, lightly passing over a hole he shouldn't have touched and continued forward, seeking and finding and sinking into my wetness with two big fingers. I groaned, panting, as I was stretched and opened. I felt his chest rumble against my back, a trembling vibration that passed through me and caused me to tighten around his thick fingers. Then they were gone, those stretching invaders, pulled out from me despite my body's greedy, grasping clutch.

  "No!" I cried.

  His teeth released me and he shifted, aligning his body behind me, both hands gripping my hips.

  "Brace yourself," Amber grated. Then with one wild plunge, he crammed himself into me, pushing ruthlessly through my folds, forcing me to accept him. All of him. It was too much.

  I screamed, bucking. His teeth clamped down on my shoulder, a sharp stinging bite, and again it was like a magic switch being thrown. I subsided beneath him, quivering, and he released my shoulder and pulled out of me at the same time.

  "Take me," he muttered and plunged back in, sinking deep, cramming me full once more, making me cry out. Stunning me with a brilliant rainbow wash of sensation that was almost too much, so that I couldn't tell if it was pleasure or pain. Or both.

  I moaned as he pulled nearly out all the way, a sucking, sliding sensation that washed another rough wave
of incredible pleasure through me. I felt every last vein and ridge of his full shaft brush across my screamingly sensitive, quivering nerve endings on the way out. I felt like an accordion. But instead of air, I was being pumped and filled with pleasure. Explosive pleasure coming in. Hot devastating pleasure pulling back out.

  Gathering himself, Amber speared into me again with a heavy grunt, with the full force of his hips and back behind the thrust, forcing a sharp stabbing pleasure on me that was almost beyond bearing.

  "All of me," he grated hoarsely.

  God, I was full. So full. So unbearably full.

  "Take me, take me," he chanted, sliding out, surging back in. A fast desperate rhythm. Full force. No holding back. Pounding into me, making me cry out with twisting delight, making me writhe with exquisite agony. Light exploded from me, shining from within me. Shooting from us both. We glowed from deep within where the light of our mother moon dwelled within us. We were but vessels holding the shafting radiance sent down from the moon until its release. And it came spilling from us, flooding the dark night with dazzling brilliance, with incandescent joy.

  Amber pulled back and plunged into me with pounding force, again and again, as fast as he could go, as if he would force himself out the other side of me. It was a steady, unthinking, forceful drive to the finish, naked of all restraint. An unvarnished taking.

  One final ramming thrust that drove deep, deep inside of me, farther than I knew it was possible to go, farther than I thought it possible that I could take or accommodate, and then I was screaming, coming in a violent, convulsive, seizing release that felt as if it would rip me apart as I pulsed and pulsed in blinding, agonizing ecstasy.

  I felt Amber clench his teeth and groan harshly, gutturally, as he came, too, ejaculating in a series of great shuddering spurts that seemed to go on and on, flooding his hot seed within me as I clenched and quivered and shook about him. I sucked air into my lungs, shaking, still shimmering though the light was fading, giving a final sweet moan as I felt him pull his heavy length out of me. My arms gave out completely and I collapsed to the ground, unable to move, the cool earth pressed against my cheek.