"Neither can I," he grunted, wincing as she pressed the alcohol pad she held to the abrasion on his cheek. "It was wasted effort. You, Lyra, are a troublemaker. I've seen this tonight."

"Me?" She drew back, her eyes innocently wide as she stared back at him in surprise. "What did I do?"

"You antagonize your brothers." He caught her hips as she attempted to move from the bed where he sat. "You deliberately challenge their authority and continually keep them in a state of combat-readiness. That fight was your fault. Had you been a bit more forthcoming, as I encouraged you to be on the phone, they would not have charged in, determined to protect your honor." Her lips twitched. The little hellion.

"If you had stayed out of it, there wouldn't have been a fight." She braced her hands on his shoulders to hold him back from licking once again at the scratch she had somehow gained from the night's adventures.

The red mark extended from her shoulder, past her

collarbone, and although the sting was irritating, it was nothing compared to the fires burning in the rest of her body.

"No man gives you orders but me," he grunted at being denied access to her sweet flesh. He deserved something in reward for the aches and pains echoing beneath his flesh.

"You don't give me orders, either," she informed him imperiously. "What is it with you guys that you think you can?" He sighed wearily, seeing his life stretching out ahead of him, constantly amazed or exasperated at one small woman. Not that he wasn't looking forward to it. But Lyra had a habit of antagonizing her brothers where perhaps she should be less confrontational.

He was definitely going to have to talk to them alone in regards to this. She seemed to enjoy keeping them upset.

"The fact that you can so easily get into trouble?" He arched his brow mockingly. "Lyra, sweetheart, after discussing this with your brothers, I'm certain you are a trouble magnet." The fight had been a damned good one. Clean, brutal, fists flying, and curses raging as he and Grant, her oldest brother, proceeded to destroy the kitchen.

When they finished, Lyra had stomped to the bedroom to pout while they agreed to a beer and a heated argument on whether or not Lyra would stay with him.

Not that there was a question of it as far as he was concerned, but in the eyes of her family, he had seen their love for her, and their fears. He wasn't exactly the boy next door. He was a Breed, and he had just nearly gotten her killed. It would be enough to terrify a brother who had accepted responsibility for his headstrong sibling.

And they seemed to accept him and his ability to protect her. Most men would have been hesitant. Thankfully, the

prejudices against the Breeds were absent in the Mason family, due to the fact that her three brothers had been instrumental in the rescues of many of the Breed captives.

He pulled her to him then, his chest tightening at the memory of Creighton's gun caressing her temple, the bullet much too close to extinguishing the fire that warmed everyone she touched. How could he endure life without her now?

"You didn't have to fight them." She leaned against him, her slender body flowing easily against him as he lifted her to straddle his lap, his arms wrapping tight around her back as his lips lowered to the mark he had left on her shoulder. "I had them under control."

"You had them in cardiac arrest," he sighed. "Your poor father will never be the same."

Lyle Mason, the father in question, had been most

determined to take his daughter home, to wrap her in the protection he felt only he could provide. He had been a man tormented with thoughts of losing the daughter he so obviously adored.

Not that Tarek understood the family dynamics, but he understood the need to protect, the need to love the tiny woman he held in his arms. She was his light. His world. She could be nothing less to anyone who loved her.

He pressed her tighter against him, feeling her rock against the erection straining beneath his soft pants, dampening the material with the damp heat of her pussy.

She wasn't wearing panties beneath her gown. His hands smoothed down the material until he caught the hem and lifted it, his hands gripping her smooth, bare ass.

A moan locked in his throat at the feel of her sliding against him, her breathing deepening, the scent of her heat filling the room.

"Don't leave me, Lyra." He couldn't stop the words from slipping past his lips as he held on to her, lifting her, laying her back to the bed as he rose above her.

"I have no intention of leaving you, Tarek." Her eyes were glowing with emotion, with hunger. "I told you, I love you. And I don't say that lightly. Not to anyone."

He touched her cheek, his throat tightening as he fought past the confusion, the disbelief that this woman could love him. That God, in all his bountiful mercy, had finally adopted him and given him this gift he never thought he could have. Something, someone, to always call his own.

"The next time you start a fight with your brothers, I will spank you, though," he growled as her head raised, her lips finding the hardened nub of his nipple as she nipped at it playfully.

"Sounds like fun. How many fights are we talking about before I get my just desserts?"

He moaned as her fingernails raked down his abdomen before her fingers hooked in the waistband of his sweatpants and began to lower them slowly.

"You are a hellion," he breathed out roughly as he moved from the bed and stripped quickly.

Her gown went flying past him as he shucked his pants. When he straightened, there she was, on her hands and knees, her tongue reaching out to lick the bulging head of his cock. Her black hair fanned around her face, her blue eyes glowing with emotion and hunger. They were as brilliant as the brightest, purest sapphire, and more precious than gold to him. Her pink little tongue flickered over the crest of his erection again, leaving a trail of fire around the sensitive hood as he tensed at the pleasure shooting from his cock to every other nerve ending in his body. He didn't think pleasure could get any better—until her lips parted, her heated mouth opening to accept the head of his cock into the damp depths.

Tarek watched as the flushed, straining crest of his erection disappeared between her lips, her tongue stroking the underside with such incredible pleasure he wondered if he could bear it.

His hands tangled in her hair, clenching tight as a strangled growl filled his chest, escaping his lips as she began to suck him with hungry abandon.

Her movements were hesitant, innocent.

She was killing him.

She stared up at him, laughter and arousal gleaming in her gaze as her tongue stroked, her mouth drawing on him, her wicked hand moving slowly up his thigh until she cupped his balls with silken fingers and destructive pleasure.

"Brat," he groaned, fighting for breath. For control. His tongue was throbbing like a toothache, the need to spill the excess hormone into her mouth making him wild. He could taste the spice, feel its effect on him, feel his cock tightening further, the need to release becoming a near-agonizing pleasure.

And still her mouth moved on him. Slow, delicate licks, deep, drawing caresses until a purely animalistic growl erupted from him.

Tarek tightened his hands in her hair, pulling her back as he felt the pulse of the barb just beneath the hood of his cock.

"Enough."

"Hmm. I'm hungry." She licked her lips sensually, full, swollen lips. "Maybe I want more."

She laughed, a low, sweet sound, as he pushed her back to the bed, spreading her thighs as he lowered his shoulders between them.

There was no time for preliminaries. He had to taste her. Sample the delicate liquid silk of her pussy before he went insane. Or kissed her.

If he kissed her, there would be no waiting. He was riding too close to the edge, her own hunger rising so quickly the scent of it was going to his head.

"I'm going to eat you up," he groaned a second before licking through the bare, syrup-laden silk of her intimate folds. "Every inch of you, Lyra. Until the taste of you permeates every fiber of my senses."

She breathed in roughly, the flesh of her tummy convulsing as he watched it with narrowed eyes. He could see so much there. Each ripple of creamy flesh corresponding with the level of her arousal.

His tongue circled her clit before he drew it between his lips, watching as her stomach seemed to convulse. As he suckled at her, he moved his fingers to the drenched folds of her pussy, opening her farther until he could work a finger inside the hot depths.

She jerked against him, her hips writhing, pressing closer to the penetration as her creamy juices began to flow.

"Oh God, Tarek, you're making me crazy," she cried out desperately, her vagina rippling around his finger. "Stop torturing me like this."

He hummed his pleasure of her taste. Sweet. Addictive. He pushed her closer to the edge of her release, his finger thrusting deeply inside her, caressing the responsive depths as she lifted to him.

"Tease." Her rough accusation was thick with her pleasure.

"Fuck me, Tarek. Don't make me have to kill you." He would have smiled if he weren't so consumed by the hunger for her.

"Tarek…" Her half-scream was followed by the tightening of her pussy around his finger, her tummy tightening. "You'll pay for this." Her knees bent, her feet pressing into the mattress as she lifted closer. "I swear I'll make you pay…" He gave her what she needed. Adding another finger to the snug depths of her cunt, he began to pump them inside her using his lips, his tongue, the suction of his mouth to drive her higher, to send her into fragmented explosions of ecstasy. She arched to him, crying out his name as he quickly rose above her, lifting her, pressing his cock into the convulsing tissue of her pussy as he gritted his teeth against the pleasure. She was so tight. So hot.

Liquid silk. Lava-hot cream.

He gripped her hip with one hand, lowering his weight to the elbow of his opposite arm as he felt her legs wrap around him.

Her pussy flexed around him, tiny flutters of sensation, tight, rippling caresses washing over his erection as he worked it into her, first short, desperate thrusts and then hard lunges as he began to fuck her with all the strength and desperation of the hunger surging inside him.

His lips lowered to hers, his tongue spearing into her mouth as she moved beneath him, opening for him, taking him with strangled screams and ever-tightening ripples of her responsive pussy.

She was ecstasy. She was life.

The tempo of his thrusts increased as the hormone surged from his' tongue to her system, heating them both further, sending them rushing headlong into orgasm.

As he felt his release tightening his balls, the extension beneath the hood of his cock began to engorge, becoming firmly, heatedly erect and locking him tight inside. Violent shudders shook her as her arms tightened around his neck, her head turning as his lips unerringly found the mark that branded her as his mate as he began to flood her with his semen.

Shocking, violent pleasure. A bonding unlike anything he could have known. And Lyra. Always Lyra. The center of his life.

"Oh God. Tell me that barb thing does not go away with the heat," she gasped when they found the sanity to breathe. "I wouldn't be pleased."

"I guess you'd have to hurt me?" He chuckled weakly as he rolled to his side, pulling her against his chest as he sighed in contentment.

"I'd have to hurt you bad." She sighed.

"But you'd still love me." She'd better.

"I'll always love you." She nipped at his chest before leaning her head back to smile up at him mistily. "Always, Tarek. You might not be the boy next door, but the Breed next door works much better."

Their laughter was soft, content. His soul was fulfilled. He wasn't completely human. But neither was he an animal. He was a Breed, a Breed who had found his mate, and his life.