Page 84 of Into Darkness (Night Prowler 6)
He waited, not answering. The silence was deafening. Her heartbeat went jagged, and she knew he could sense that, as well as he could sense her longing and her wretchedness, the hole that had always been inside of her that nothing seemed to fill, except him. Lu swallowed the words she wanted to say, a litany of I need you I want you I think I’ve loved you my whole life, and said other, less perilous, words instead.
“What you said before, about what the Ikati really are. Our true form. Will you . . . will you show me?”
A quiet inhalation. “Now?”
His voice was gentle, a little unsure, and his hesitation worked on her like a reverse spell, releasing her own doubt so she sat up in bed with sudden, ravenous confidence. She looked down at him. He looked back at her, his eyes shining mercury bright in the darkness.
“Yes. Now.”
Slowly, he sat up from the floor. Then he stood, holding her gaze, those silvery cat’s eyes flashing. He removed his jacket, then dragged his shirt over his head and let it fall, so that finally he stood before her bare-chested and magnificent, in spite of the snarl of scar tissue that marked all the skin on his right side. Or maybe even because of it.
His hands went to the top button of his trousers, and Lu couldn’t look away. Even if she’d wanted to, she couldn’t.
She needn’t have worried, however, because before Magnus’s fingers had undone a single button, his hands and arms and chest had begun to glow softly, and the room was bathed in light.
It only took a few moments. He went from solid to beautifully amorphous, a man-sized shape of curling gray mist and tiny pinpricks of dancing lights, until the Magnus that had just stood before her had entirely transformed into a ruffling, shimmering cloud of vapor. His trousers slid empty to the floor and lay there, leaking air.
Lu jumped from the bed, clapping and squealing, bobbing up and down on her toes. “Yes! That’s amazing! I used to vanish when I sneezed before I learned how to control it, but this is—”
She fell still and silent because the beautiful cloud of vapor began to swirl around her in a sinuous coil, drifting over and around her whole body, slipping like living silk against her skin.
“Oh,” she breathed, lowering her arms as they were gently surrounded by mist. The mist trailed down her legs and Lu became acutely aware that she wore only her panties and a camisole. A tremor passed through her body, and the soft cloud contracted slightly around her, as if in an embrace.
Lu closed her eyes. She said his name, the barest whisper of sound between her lips. Feeling him like this was intimate and intensely sexual, so much so that a surge of heat passed over her, heat and desire, hardening her nipples and sending a spike of pleasure straight down between her legs.
The cloud of mist withdrew. She was left bereft, trembling, undone.
Then the mist changed
again, drawing in on itself to coalesce into another form, not man or mist, or anything she would have ever imagined in all her wildest dreams.
A huge, powerful body, rippling with muscles. Four legs and sharp fangs and a long, sinuous tail, almond eyes glowing phosphorescent green against a wedge-shaped head covered in glossy black fur. As was the rest of him.
A panther. The most incredible, impossible thing Lu had ever seen. Shock leached the strength from her legs, and she sank to the mattress.
The animal stalked slowly toward her, a low rumbling purr vibrating through its chest. In disbelief, Lu began softly to laugh. He stopped a foot away, watching her with those preternatural eyes. He was feral and unnaturally large, towering over her and looking as if he was about to devour her whole with that set of impressive teeth.
“Well,” whispered Lu when her laughter had faded. “Aren’t you a pretty kitty.”
His snout wrinkled, curling back to reveal razor-sharp canines. Lu sensed how dangerous he was in this form, far more dangerous and perhaps less rational than in human form. But she wasn’t afraid of him; she was fascinated. She reached out and tentatively brushed her fingers against his cheek, and oh, what exquisite plush softness, like the finest mink.
His whiskers twitched. The rumble deep in his chest grew louder. His eyes closed, just longer than a blink.
“Is this okay?” Lu slid her fingers along his jaw, rubbing softly, then scratched him behind the ear. He tilted his big head into her hand, allowing it, but slanted her a look she interpreted to mean he wasn’t a household pet, and if she called him kitty again he might be inclined to spray urine on her pillow in retaliation.
She bit her lip to stifle another laugh. “Does the sourpuss need some catnip to improve his mood? A little fresh cream, maybe? How ’bout a nice ball of twine to bat around?”
Magnus leaned forward, then licked her face with his enormous, pink, scratchy tongue.
“Ew! Bad kitty!” she laughed, pushing on his furred chest, but with a flash of light and a ripple of power, the animal was gone and the man was in its place, staring down at her with a look of barely leashed hunger in his eyes, his whole body taut as a bowstring.
Naked, and taut as a bowstring.
In a rasp of a voice, he growled, “You don’t like my tongue?”
Lu thought she’d never heard anything so erotic in her entire life.
She froze. Her hands were flat on his chest, her legs open around his hips. He was breathing hard and so was she, and as they stared into each other’s eyes the moment stretched out and she lost all sense of time or place, up or down, wrong or right. All she knew was that she wanted him. She burned for him. He was everything she’d ever wanted or could ever want, and it no longer mattered what happened in all their tomorrows: She needed to tell him how she felt before it was too late.
