Defy the Dawn

His cock stood long and erect, a thick spear of hard flesh. The sight of him so fully aroused made her blood thrum heavily in her veins. It made her mouth water for the taste of him.

To her, Zael always looked something slightly more than human. No mere mortal genetics could produce his heartbreakingly sculpted features and cerulean blue eyes, or the copper-threaded, golden mane that crowned his handsome face. Human men could spend their lifetimes at the gym and never emerge with the flawlessly honed muscles that wrapped every inch of Zael’s powerful physique.

“You’re the beautiful one.” She couldn’t hide her awe. “You look like a fallen angel. That’s what I thought when I saw you that first morning.”

“Is that so?” He smirked as he moved onto the bed with her. “I promise there was nothing angelic about the things I thought about you then. Or now.”

Brynne’s quiet laugh dissolved into a sigh as he levered himself over her, brushing the head of his heavy cock against the sensitive skin of her inner thigh. “Mmm,” he groaned. “Definitely not now.”

She bit her lower lip, every nerve ending tingling with awareness as Zael stroked her wet clit with his fingers. She was still electric with desire for him, even though her orgasm had given her some relief. Her body undulated beneath his touch, aching for more.

“Tell me what you want, Brynne.” His rough whisper nearly undid her. Yes, he was golden and beautiful, but he was also strong and commanding, formidably male. He nudged at the slick entrance of her body, his erection feeling immense and hot as fire-forged steel. “You want this?”

“I want you.” She arched her hips in invitation… In surrender.

Zael claimed her in a slow, breath-stealing thrust that seemed to go on forever.

He was large and thick, stretching her as he seated himself to the hilt inside her. Brynne wrapped her legs around him, angling to accommodate more of him as he began to rock in and out of her.

Each stroke went deeper, every thrust held more ferocity, until the need and rhythm of their bodies was no longer either of theirs to control.

Brynne cried out as he pushed her to the limit—not only her body’s, but the limit of her sanity. Bliss and need twined together in a coil that twisted tighter, hotter…beyond anything she knew before.

She came violently, scoring Zael’s back with her fingernails as white-hot pleasure detonated inside her. And he kept moving, relentless in his tempo as he chased his own release now.

Brynne held on, her legs still wrapped around him, her hands gripping his shoulders as another hard orgasm began to build in the aftershocks of the one that still owned her. Behind her closed eyelids, her head thundered with the pound of blood rushing through her veins.

The drumming filled her ears, her mind—all of her senses.

It called to her…and when she dragged her lids open as Zael drove harder, deeper into her body, she realized that it wasn’t her pulse beating like a hammer in her blood.

It was his.

Mere inches from her mouth, the thick line of his carotid throbbed.

Her mouth watered, saliva surging as her fangs ripped even farther out of her gums. Hunger clenched her in a tight fist as she watched Zael powering above her. So strong. So alive.

So dangerously tempting.

She couldn’t pull her gaze away from his throat.

Nor from the pulsing beat of his blood, coursing so tantalizingly near her fangs.

The sound overwhelmed her, commanded all of her control….

Hunger raked her, and she cursed herself for how long she’d denied her body the nourishment it demanded. She licked her lips, trying not to imagine what it would be like to sink into that potent vein and take her fill.

“Zael,” she murmured, though whether in warning or apology, she wasn’t sure.

But in that next moment, he spared her from deciding. His big body tensed as he drove deep one last time, then on a low shout, he reared back as his release overtook him.

Safely out of her reach, at least for now.

And as she reveled in the feel of him lost to his desire for her, there was a part of her that knew no matter how good they felt together, it wasn’t meant to last.

It couldn’t.

Nor could she wish for it to last—not longer than this moment, if she were being honest with herself. Not if she was ever brave enough to be honest with Zael.

Forcing her gaze away from him, Brynne stared at the window across the room where dusk was still hours away. The darkness inside of her was much closer, and it beckoned.

Soon she would have to answer her hunger’s call, and face the monster clawing to get out.

CHAPTER 13

The smell of spilled blood was overwhelming.

Lucan’s heightened Gen One senses had locked on to the coppery scent of human red cells as soon as he and his team of warriors had exited the Order’s ultraviolet-shielded SUV at the front entrance of the GNC building.

Now, nearly an hour later, with the last ambulance having carried off the wounded and the dead, Lucan stood in the middle of a blood-soaked office in a state of barely restrained fury. Outside the building, sirens wailed. Inside, there was only silence.

And death.

Fifteen people killed in a hellish spray of gunfire, more than twice that number injured by three guards sworn to protect them.

“You know, I might be able to understand this better if these three assholes were new recruits,” Chase said, his fangs extended in the midst of so much blood.

Lucan grunted. “They weren’t new. They’d all been on the security detail for years with highest clearance levels. Two of them were family men, for crissake.”

When Dante glanced up, his fangs were bared too. “Which means no one can be trusted. Not when we have no idea how far Opus’s reach extends.”

“Or who’s the one calling the shots,” Tegan added gravely.

Lucan nodded, well aware that everything his comrades said was true. “Opus has had their pieces in place for a very long time, waiting for their chance to make a move. Now they’re starting to play us like fucking pawns. They’re setting us up for something big. I feel it in my bones.”

And he could see from the sober expressions of his comrades that they also dreaded what might be coming next.

Heavy boot falls in the hallway drew the team’s attention. Brock walked in, his UV helmet clipped to a tab on his weapons belt. He and Kade had been tasked with guarding access to the building after the dead and injured had been taken away.