VISIONS OF HEAT

Careful, Faith. It was a soundless whisper. He won’t stop when you tell him to. Because he wasn’t Psy, wasn’t someone who’d follow her every command, wasn’t a man who’d follow any commands he didn’t want to. And still she wasn’t going to keep her distance.

What better proof was there of her accelerating decline?





Vaughn entered his lair deep in the forests to the east of Lucas’s aerie and padded up the natural stone steps that led, eventually, to the true entrance. His home was accessed through a warrenlike cave system that acted as his defensive perimeter. His living space was in the central core, brightly lit during the daytime by a clever use of several natural vents and low-tech mirrors.

From above, his lair looked to be nothing but a hill in danger of being taken over by the forest. To date, no one had stumbled upon it either by accident or design. His closest friends alone knew where he lived and how to negotiate the traps in the outer caves. Those who didn’t know . . . well, jaguars weren’t famous for their kindness.

Reaching the core, he padded through the living room to his bedroom, where he shifted back to human form. Naked, he stretched his arms above his head before walking into the shower, which seemed to be a waterfall cascading from the stone wall. He’d spent hours creating the illusion because his beast wasn’t happy in any place that looked too human, too civilized.

But both man and jaguar enjoyed sensation and pleasure. And water. So his home had a waterfall, as well as lush carpets he’d collected year by year on which his paws or feet made no sound. The walls were hung with handmade tapestries finer than those seen in many museums. Not only objects of beauty, they acted to contain the warmth in winter—when he used eco-generators to heat water in the fine tubes that ran throughout his home. That warmth became particularly useful during those times when he worked through the night on a piece that required a lot of contact with cold chisels and hard edges.

His armchairs were comfortable, his bed big enough to sprawl in, and more than big enough to entertain a lover no matter how energetic he was feeling. But he’d never once brought a woman here. However, today, he could imagine dark red hair against the pillows, creamy limbs against the thick blanket. Faith would look like an exotic jewel laid on a bed of the finest black velvet.

A growl rose up in his throat as arousal caught him in a vicious grip and shook him hard. He could’ve eased the physical ache himself, but he didn’t want to. He wanted the Psy he could still smell on his skin. The man advised caution, told him to wait to be certain she wasn’t playing with his mind, wasn’t a mole sent in by the Council to cripple DarkRiver from within, but the cat lived by instinct and it said Faith was his to take.

For many changelings, the human half would probably have won. But Vaughn’s animal half was stronger than that of most others. Stepping out of the waterfall, he took a deep breath. The air should’ve smelled of the earth and the forest, but instead held teasing hints of fire and woman.

Pushing his hair out of his eyes, he stood there and considered his next step. Faith had come a long way since their first meeting. She could bear small touches, hadn’t been made unconscious by his fleeting kiss, had reacted to his nakedness but in the same way any other woman would’ve reacted. He smiled at the memory. Faith wasn’t cold, no matter how much she might try to pretend otherwise.

But all that didn’t negate the fact that she was a long way from accepting the kind of touch the cat craved. He wanted to lick her from head to toe, with lingering stops in soft feminine places that drew him like a drug. However, the second he asked more of her than her mind was able to handle, he might lose her. And that was unacceptable. So, where did that leave him?

“Step by step,” he murmured under his breath, body taut with expectation. Faith NightStar was about to be hunted. He had no intention of harming her and every intention of breaking down the sensual walls that separated them. By the time he finished, Faith would be enslaved by her body’s hunger, the woman core of her screaming out for him.

It would take patience, but Vaughn was used to stalking prey without break for hours, days . . . weeks.





CHAPTER 10





Faith found herself doing something inexplicable the next day. Instead of spending her time reinforcing shields that were clearly malfunctioning, she kept going over what Vaughn’s skin had felt like under her fingertips, so hot, so different from her own. Caught in the memory, she ran her fingers over her upper arm. It was the first time she’d treated her body as a sensual object quite apart from its functionality.

A discreet alarm chimed.