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I swallowed a lump that rose straight from my heart to my throat. I wanted to tell him that I'd be his. I wanted to make the promises that I knew he wanted to hear. But I couldn't. And I wouldn't lie to him or to myself. So I did the next best thing. I took his hand and led him up to my bedroom.
* * *
CHAPTER 14
As I closed the bedroom door, Chase gave me a long, smoldering look. My stomach lurched, and suddenly, the only thing I could think about was screwing our brains out. He usually took the lead, but this time, I wanted to be in charge.
I took two quick steps and, before he could speak, pushed him back onto my big four-poster bed. His eyes widened with surprise as I straddled him, and he gave me a wicked grin that told me he didn't mind being on the bottom one bit.
I unfastened his shirt, one button at a time, leaning over to trail kisses down his chest as I pulled away the material. I let my tongue linger on his salty skin, then kiss by kiss, inched my way down. As I unbuckled his belt, I was gratified to see the impression I'd made. He moaned gently as I slid his pants down.
"Delilah—" he started to say, but I shushed him, slowly licking the length of his cock, using only the tip of my tongue as I worked my way from the root to the head. I couldn't take him fully in my mouth—we'd tried that and lost the battle to my fangs—but I tickled him, fluttering lightly up and down his rigid length. The scent of his lust was heady as he gently reached down to run his fingers through my hair.
Leaning back, I pulled off my turtleneck. Chase stared at me with naked lust, his gaze taking in every movement I made, every jiggle and bounce of my breasts as I unhooked my bra. I pushed myself off the bed, quickly unzipping my jeans and stepping out of them. Chase folded his hands under his head, silently watching as I slid my panties down my hips.
Somehow understanding that I needed to call the shots, he waited. I knelt by his feet and took off his shoes, then helped him out of his pants. As he sat up, I climbed astride his lap, and he wrapped his arms around my lower back, his lips closing around my nipple. The warmth of his tongue on my skin echoed through my body, and I let out a little sigh as he slid one of his hands between my legs, fingering me gently at first. The tension began to build, rippling through my body until it cascaded into a tidal wave.
The sight of him, all sweaty with breath coming hard, pushed me over the edge, and I squirmed, lowering myself onto his hips, sliding down his length with silken ease, nestling him as deep inside me as he could get. Pushing him back on the bed, I leaned down to kiss him.
Chase wrapped his arms around my waist, holding me tight. As our rhythms flowed into synch, I forgot about the Autumn Lord, forgot about the war, forgot about everything except the rocking of our bodies.
As we were lying in bed afterward, Chase changed his nicotine patch, slapping a new one on his shoulder, while I sipped a bottle of root beer. Reluctantly, I brought myself back to the present and our problems.
"Chase, remember I mentioned what the Autumn Lord said about the Hunters Moon Clan?" I dug into my nightstand, looking for a candy bar. Success! A Snickers was hiding right below the notepad that I kept at the ready for any odd ideas that might surface while I was sleeping.
Chase adjusted the comforter—a thick, blue patchwork quilt—so that it covered his chest. "Damn it's cold. Has the snow let up yet?"
"Dunno, but I'll check." I padded over to the window, shivering in the chill of the room. Outside, the snow had picked up, and I estimated there was a good three inches on the roof right now. "Nope, and it doesn't look like it's going to. I think we're in for quite a storm. So, do you?"
"Do I what? Oh, you mean the werespiders. No, not really. I kind of lost track of things when the whole Death Maiden business came up." He finished applying the new patch and dropped the old one in the garbage. "Hey, I'm going down a step tomorrow. I may actually kick this habit because of you, babe."
I gave him one of my happy smiles. Cigarette smoke bothered me so much that I went to great lengths to avoid it. And he'd be healthier when he quit.
"Good for you! I'm proud of you," I said, unwrapping the candy, ready to scarf the entire thing down. He looked at the chocolate bar with those puppy-dog eyes of his, and I relented, handing him half of it. "Why I was asking was this: the waterfall that the Autumn Lord mentioned is supposed to be in a city east of Seattle. Do you know anything about any waterfalls around here?"
I swallowed the last bite of chocolate and jumped out of bed to slip into my pajamas. Contrary to popular belief, the heat in our house sure didn't rise to the top. It just seeped out the cracks. My floor was always the coldest.
Chase thought for a moment. "Yeah, actually, I think I know what he was talking about. The town of Snoqualmie is just east of Issaquah, and Snoqualmie Falls are there. They're beautiful—they were featured in the show Twin Peaks some years back. Weird-ass show, though now it seems tame compared to what life's become with you guys around. Anyway, there's a lodge there, very pretty place. And once you hit Snoqualmie, you're heading into the foothills of the Cascades. A lot of undeveloped country out there."
"Foothills… that fits. The Autumn Lord said we'd find their nest in the foothills near this waterfall. It's perfect. Close enough to the city that it wouldn't take them long to drive in, yet out where they won't be noticed." I thought about it for a moment. "Chase, we have to hunt them down. Zachary's going to keep an eye on Tyler. If he's mixed up with this, then he's probably going back to the nest every now and then, especially if he doesn't think anybody's onto him."
Chase flinched at Zach's name but let it pass without comment. "I'm tempted to sneak onto the Puma Pride's land and tail this guy the minute he leaves the compound."
I gave him a sideways glance. "I could do that. Or Morio. Or both of us. If I was in my tabby form, or Morio in his fox form, it would be easy enough to hide without attracting attention."
"They know you're a werecat, though, don't they?" Chase shook his head. "It might be better to send Morio in. I don't like the thought of you trying to fend off a racing puma. Morio can run a lot faster than you in his superhero form, can't he?"
I snorted. "Superhero? That's a good one. I'm going to have to tell him what you said. But yeah, you're right. Morio's greased lightning when he's in fox form. We can send him in, and he can let us know when Tyler's getting ready to leave the compound."
Chase yawned and leaned back against the headboard, playing with the necklace of worry stones I'd bought for him. He used them to keep his hands busy and keep his mind off what it would be like to be holding a cigarette.
"I've been meaning to ask you. What do you think the connections between the murder victims are? I know they're all members of the Puma Pride Clan, so don't even start with that, but what else? Why them? Why were they killed and not anybody else?" He frowned. "It seems so random to me."
I pulled my knees up to my chest and gave a little purp. Chase was always good at thinking of the questions that eluded me. Of course, being a detective was his job, while being an agent for the OIA was more of a hobby for me. It's true that I'd been learning the ropes of the PI business, but at home my assignments had mainly been being sent in to rescue someone, or to hunt down criminals and take them out. The OIA wasn't known for its apprehension ratio so much as for its extermination record.
"I'm not sure. Several of them were off the books, if you'll remember. They didn't even try to pass in society and kept to their own kind."
Chase let out a little sigh. "Seems like a lonely life to me. It must have been hard to be an Earthside Supe before you guys opened the portals. They had to hide or pass. I feel sorry for them."
