Burn, Baby, Burn Read online

  If she means what I think she means, then hell yes, he thought as she slid off the barstool. Grinning as anticipation raced through his veins, he hopped off his own barstool, leaving behind his half-finished Guinness to follow her out the door, and said a silent thank you to the Gods for sending him the hot piece of ass that he’d wished for.

  Chapter Two

  Two hours, three bottles of wine, and a pizza pie later, most of Adalyn’s frustrations and worries had melted away, along with most of her self-consciousness and inhibitions. Normally the last thing on earth that she would do is shack up with a human stranger in his bachelor pad, sitting on his worn leather couch and watching cheesy comedies with him, but after the night she’d had, and the couple shots of whiskey she’d had at the bar, it seemed like the perfect thing to do.

  And try as she might, she just couldn’t bring herself to regret it.

  It didn’t hurt that the human in question sitting next to her, with his arm slung over her shoulder and his gorgeous green eyes twinkling mischievously as he made some wise-crack, was very, very good looking. With wavy dark hair, a strong jaw and high cheekbones, and full, sensual lips that were capable of making her stomach flip flop with their sexy grins, she was hard pressed to resist him. Though he’d remained fully clothed the entire time, only stripping off his jacket to reveal his Ed Hardy t-shirt, she could tell that beneath his clothes and tanned skin, lay rock hard, rippling muscle, and her fingers twitched, wanting to run her hands over it and see if he felt as good as he looked.

  Oh wow, girl, you’re really wasted, she told herself. Sleeping with strangers was not something that she did, Like ever. But something about Christian, even past his good looks and the fact that he’d been charming and attentive and funny, seemed to pull him toward her, and apparently whatever it may be, it was pulling him toward her too, because the humorous glint in his eyes changed, and he drew her a little closer to him.

  “You know,” he said, tracing the outline of her jaw with his thumb. “I’ve really enjoyed spending time with you tonight.”

  “Oh yeah?” she smiled up at him, amused at the slight slur in his voice. Other than that, though, he seemed remarkably good at holding his liquor. “Are you sure that’s not just the alcohol talking?”

  “Nah,” he said, shifting so that he could wrap both of his arms around her. “I’m still somewhere in here, sharing the space inside my body with a vat full of pinot noir maybe, but still.” His eyes twinkled down at her as she laughed. “You’ve been pretty fun. And, umm, you’re also pretty hot, so that doesn’t hurt either.”

  She blushed at that. “You’re not so bad yourself,” she said, reaching up to brush a stray piece of hair away from his handsome face. Normally she would feel inadequate with a man like him – though she had a pretty face, she was hardly model material with a size twenty-four waist, a fact that drove her crazy since as a dragon she was strong and sleek and beautiful. But he didn’t seem to even notice as he looked down at her with a hunger in his eyes that made her breath catch, and her heart rate spike.

  He lowered his head to press his lips against hers, and she closed her eyes as she kissed him back, enjoying the feel of his full mouth against hers, stroking against her lips softly. He nipped at her lower lip once, twice, three times, then slid his tongue between the seam of her lips. She groaned, as she tasted him, spicy male mixed with tomato and mozzarella and a hint of wine, and wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders. He shifted her weight so that she straddled him, sliding his hands around so that he could squeeze her ass.

  “Man, I’ve been wanting to do that since you walked through the door,” he groaned against her lips. “You’ve got one fine booty there.”

  She giggled. “You’re a real smooth talker,” she said, nipping his nose gently with her teeth. “Is that what you say to all the girls who come back to your pad with you?”

  “No,” he groaned as she leaned in to flick her tongue across his earlobe. “You’re one of a kind.”

  “Mmm.” She suckled on his earlobe, liking the sound he made and wanting to hear more of it. Sure enough, she was rewarded with another groan, and he shifted beneath her, poking her pelvic bone with his hard-on. She began moving her mouth downward, across his jawbone and along the column of his throat, then flicked her tongue against his Adam’s apple.

  “Man, you’re a tease,” he growled, his hands sliding around her shoulder so that he could pull her away from his neck. His lips came down on hers now, more passionate and intense than they had last time, and her pulse spiked in anticipation as she felt his hands slide up her shirt. He popped the front clasp on her bra without removing her top, and she moaned when his big hands covered her breasts, his rough palms rasping against her nipples.

  “Let me see you,” he panted, pushing her back far enough so that he could remove her top. His blue eyes gleamed with appreciation, and her chest filled with feminine pride. “God damn,” he growled, taking her breasts into his hands again. “You’re so fucking hot.”

  She moaned when he took a nipple into his mouth, swirling his tongue around the sensitive bud, and then sucking on it. Her hands instinctively braced themselves on his shoulders, and she rocked herself against the hard on pressing against her crotch as he teased her. The ache between her legs, which had started off as a slow burn, begun to intensify until it became a raging inferno that spread throughout her entire body.

  “Hot,” she panted, tugging at the zipper of her jeans. She popped them open, then shimmied out of them along with her panties. “Too hot. Clothes, off.”

  “I see we’re down to Neanderthal speech,” he muttered as she reached for his shirt, but he didn’t seem displeased – on the contrary he grinned as he leaned back, his eyes roaming over her naked body as she undressed him. “Now this is the kind of service I could get used to.”

  “Shut up and help me,” she growled, tugging him forward so that she could pull his shirt off the rest of the way. Chuckling, he did as she asked, unbuttoning his jeans and lifting his hips so that he could push them down his waist. His cock sprang free, long and thick and just as gorgeous as the rest of him, and she took him in her hand, not even bothering to push his pants the rest of the way down his legs.

  “Oh yeah,” he groaned as she squeezed his length. “You can do that all night if you want, baby.”

  “I have something a little more interactive in mind,” she said, straddling him once again. She guided his cock slowly inside her, her breath catching as his thick shaft penetrated her inch by inch. He felt so good inside her, so big, stretching and filling her. She’d never thought sex with a human could be so good, but as she impaled herself fully on him and looked down at him, at the way his eyes burned as he drank her in, she had to admit this was the best sex she’d had in a long time, perhaps even in living memory.

  “Ride me,” he said hoarsely, his fingers gripping her hips. He began to move her up and down his shaft, and she rocked her hips in time to his thrusts, riding him slow and easy, grinding against him, rubbing her clit against his pubic hair. Pleasure began to build inside her as he slid in and out of her, pressing against her clit over and over again. She gasped each time he hit her sweet spot, pushing her closer and closer to the edge, until she fell right over, the orgasm flowing over her like a wave breaking against the shore.

  “Yeah, that’s it,” he said roughly, thrusting harder as she came. He didn’t stop, didn’t even slow down, just kept pistoning inside her, his face tight and his body straining. She came again, and then a third time, her body shuddering above his. Her cries echoed off the walls, possibly disturbing the neighbors, but she didn’t care, didn’t give a damn about anything except the way he was looking at her and the feelings of rapture he created inside her, with his smoking hot body, his hands, and his cock.

  Finally, as the fourth orgasm crested over her, he came, his pupils dilating as his body shuddered. He let out a long, deep groan as he let himself go, and she felt his hot seed spurting inside her as he
came. They both went limp at the same time, and she collapsed against him as his body sank back into the leather couch.

  “Damn, that was good,” he muttered into her hair as she began to sink into unconsciousness, and if she’d been coherent enough to speak, she would have agreed wholeheartedly.

  * * *

  When Adalyn woke up next, it was with a pounding headache and a dry mouth – the hallmark signs of a hangover. Trying to figure out just what she was doing in a strange bed, in a room that was filled with Marvel Comics posters and smelled like spray-cheese and Ritz crackers, she cracked open an eye and rolled over to see a man with dark hair and a gorgeous face lying next to her.

  Dead asleep. With a tiny river of drool, leading from his sculpted lips, to the puddle of saliva pooling on his mattress.

  Oh God. Suddenly she remembered. Flying over New York City and crashing into a dumpster. Walking into a bar and trying to make a phone call, but then realizing that she didn’t remember any of the damned numbers she wanted to call. And hell, why would she? All of her numbers were stored in her cell phone so that she didn’t have to remember them.

  Yeah, well look how that turned out, she said sourly. For not taking five minutes to memorize Raymus’s number, you end up with a hangover in a strange human’s bed, and you still don’t have a clue in the world what to do.

  She supposed that she could take a train or a bus back down to Virginia, or rent a car- she still had her wallet, after all. But none of that was going to help her get her flying ability back, and even through the pounding headache, her instincts told her that whatever the reason, the answer to her inability to fly was to be found in New York and trying to run away wasn’t going to solve anything.

  However, just because she couldn’t run away from New York didn’t mean that she couldn’t run away from this stranger’s bed. And the more awake she became, the better that idea started to sound.

  Jesus Christ, she thought to herself, staggering from the bed. She looked around on the floor of the bedroom for her clothes, but though she saw plenty of his – apparently Christian didn’t believe in using the laundry basket that sat in the corner of the room – there were none of hers, not even underwear. She remembered, then, that they’d had sex in the living room, and after taking a quick peek in the hallway to make sure no one else was out there, she tiptoed out to collect her clothes and her wallet.

  An hour later, she was checked into a Holliday Inn, ten blocks from Christian’s apartment. And even though she felt relieved as she sat herself down on the double bed, she also couldn’t help but feel guilty that she hadn’t bothered to even leave a note.

  Oh, come on. He probably won’t even remember your name when he wakes up. He was pretty wasted too.

  Well yeah, but we did have amazing sex, she argued with herself. Doesn’t that merit leaving a note?

  It was drunk sex, she reminded herself. Which means it probably wasn’t actually as amazing as you thought it was. So, no, you don’t owe him anything.

  Sighing, she stripped off her clothes again – she really was going to need to go buy a spare set so she didn’t spent the next twenty four hours smelling like a distillery – and took a long hot shower. By the time she was done she was feeling pleasantly tired, and she didn’t even bother to get dressed again, just sank beneath the covers and fell into a deep, dark sleep.

  Chapter Three

  The sound of someone pounding at the door woke Adalyn from a sound sleep. Groaning, she rolled over and cracked her eyelids open, then spent several seconds staring up at the unfamiliar ceiling and trying to remember where she was. Eventually she gathered enough strength in her muscles to sit up and look around, and remembered that she’d checked into a Holliday Inn in the middle of the night, after crash landing in the middle of New York City and having drunken sex with a total stranger.

  And now, apparently, someone was banging on the door of her hotel room. Suspicion filtered its way through the pounding headache behind her skull as she listened to the fist banging on the door. Who the hell was looking for her, and why? Nobody knew Adalyn was in New York, let alone in this hotel room. And the only person she knew who was in New York was the guy she’d fucked last night.

  Panic washed through Adalyn, clearing some of the fog in her head, and she hopped out of bed and scurried to the peephole. Had he somehow tracked her down here after waking up and finding out she was gone? If so, how? And what did he want with her now?

  The person Adalyn saw through the fish-eye lens wasn’t Christian, however. It was a tall, thin woman with straight black hair dressed in a dark skirt suit. Her green cat’s eyes marked her as a shifter, and Adalyn’s stomach twisted itself in knots as she tried to figure out who the hell she was, and how she knew her. Adalyn didn’t know anyone in New York. Not a single soul, aside from Christian.

  “I know you’re in there, dragon shifter!” She called, baring her fangs. “You should really let me in if you want to get your wings back!”

  That last statement galvanized Adalyn into action. She unlocked the door, then grabbed the woman by the arm and yanked her inside before she had so much as a chance to say hello. Her green eyes widened as Adalyn locked the door and pressed her back against it so that there was no chance the stranger would escape. After all, if this woman really meant what she said, she was Adalyn’s only chance to get her dragon form back. No way was Adalyn letting her go.

  “Who are you?” Adalyn demanded as the feline shifter stumbled back into the bed – apparently the high heels she wore didn’t allow her to cope with backwards momentum very well. “And what do you know about my wings?”

  The woman arched an eyebrow. “My name is Delilah Black, and I’m with the Order of Protection, New York City branch department.”

  Adalyn groaned. Great, that was just what she needed. A run-in with the Order. “Please, ma’am,” she said, holding up my hands as unease began to unfold in her chest. “I didn’t mean to yank on your arm like that. I don’t want any trouble.”

  The woman snorted. “Relax. I’m not going to arrest you for that.” Her lips curved into a wide smile. “I imagine you’re going through enough trouble as it is.”

  Adalyn narrowed her eyes. “What would you know about it?” she asked, crossing her arms beneath her chest. Her very bare, very naked chest.

  “Oh my God!” Her cheeks flamed, and she immediately rushed for the bed to wrap a sheet around her. As a rule, dragon shifters weren’t incredibly modest, but this woman wasn’t just a stranger, but an authority figure as well. “Shit, I am so sorry,” she muttered, wrapping the sheet around her.

  “No need to apologize. I enjoyed the view.” The feline grin widened, and Adalyn took a step back. She so did not swing that way. “In any case, you’re clearly quite frazzled, being in a strange town without your ability to shift.”

  “Right.” Adalyn huffed out a breath, then plopped down onto the edge of the mattress and glared up at her visitor. “So, would you mind telling me just how you know about that? And why this is happening to me?”

  “Of course. That is what I came for, after all.” Delilah arched a brow, then sat in a nearby chair. She crossed and uncrossed her long, shapely legs, then flipped her hair over her shoulder before continuing to speak. “Due to recent issues with a certain dragon shifter in the City, we’ve had to cast a spell over the entire area in order to disable dragon flight without approval from the Order. There have been too many accidents, and close calls from dragons who can’t control themselves and keep themselves hidden, so it’s a necessary precaution. Any dragon without clearance who flies into our airspace is immediately taken captive by the spell, and the spell will continue to hold until we release you from it.”

  Anger burned a path through Adalyn’s chest like wildfire. “How dare you!” she shouted, clenching her fists as she rose from the bed. The sheet slipped halfway down her body but she was too angry to care. “That’s a ridiculous violation of my rights as a shifter!”

  Delilah snorted.
“Clearly you haven’t had to deal with any major dragon-related catastrophes, such as the Empire State Building catching on fire because a drunken dragon couldn’t control himself on New Years Eve,” she said. “I assure you the city mayor was most displeased, and if we hadn’t put this law into place, he would have routed all of the dragon shifters from this town permanently. It was the only alternative.”

  “Hmph.” Crossing her arms, Adalyn sat back down on the bed again. “Well clearly the dragon shifters in this town are idiots,” she said crossly. “I’ve never had to deal with anything like that back in Virginia, where my clan is from.”

  Delilah gave a mocking sigh. “Ah, if only every clan was like yours,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Unfortunately, that is neither here nor there. The fact is, you’re stuck in human form until I clear you for flight.”

  “Okay,” Adalyn said, yanking the sheet up to her neck as Delilah’s green eyes lingered a little too long on her breasts. “So what kind of papers do I have to sign? Surely you can call my clan up and get my background. I’m not a flight risk in any sense of the word, and before last night I’ve never had an accident. You can check with Raymus, my clan leader. Tell him you’re with Adalyn Shaw.”

  “Ah, Adalyn Shaw. Good to know your name.” Delilah inclined her head, then rose from the chair. “I will certainly attempt to contact the Greyfeather clan this afternoon and verify your identity and whereabouts. However, it usually takes a few days to process new dragon shifters, so I’m afraid you’re going to be grounded for a little while.”

  “A few days?” Adalyn cried, jumping to her feet once again as Delilah headed for the door. “I can’t be stuck here for a few days. I need to get home. I don’t know anyone here!”

  Delilah turned back, a sly smile on her face. “Well, I suppose I might be able to expedite the process if you’re willing to help me out with something.”