Page 55 of A Lion's Heart
She knew what sex was and how it played out between a man and a woman. But Decan wasn’t just a man, and luckily for her, she wasn’t just a woman. Nothing about this mission was turning out the way she’d expected. Not the things she’d been uncovering or the people who were now key players. Her father was worried about her. He’d expressed that throughout their lunch and then again when she’d gone to the main dining hall for dinner. He’d wanted her beside him and had repeatedly told her how much she meant to him and her mother. So much so that Nisa began to worry.
As for her mother, she’d watched Nisa quietly. Or what she thought was quietly but Nisa had felt Kalina’s gaze lingering on her more than once. She hadn’t been able to explain it, but then she hadn’t really tried. Her mind had been someplace else.
On someone else.
She removed her shorts and the flat shoes she’d slipped on before coming to Decan’s room. He pulled off his shirt, revealing ripped abs, sculpted pectorals and biceps so perfect she wanted to leap over the bed and grab hold of them at this second. The army of healed slashes over his chest horrified and held her still. They were a dark pink color in a violent pattern that wrapped around his sides. Her fingertips warmed as she recalled the feel of the raised and bumpy skin on his back.
She’d asked about that last night and he’d brushed her off. Nisa wasn’t going to take that route again. This time she walked slowly around to the other side of the bed as he’d sat on its edge to remove his boots. She waited while he also removed his shorts and boxers. Then she was touching him.
Standing in front of him she rested her palms on his shoulders and gently pushed him so that he was once again sitting on the edge of the bed. His head came up and those intense blue eyes held her gaze. Strength, loyalty, power, were all the things she could see in his eyes and feel from being this close to him. There was no doubt that Decan Canter was a powerful Shadow Shifter. The muscled body and deadly quick maneuvers she’d witnessed last night cemented that fact in her mind. So how had he obtained these scars?
Shifters did not contract human ailments, and they had the ability to heal from most wounds. Additionally, there were now—thanks to Ary Delgado, the Lead Curandero—Shadows that had been previously trained as human doctors, with the added training to specifically treat shifters. So these scars should not be here.
Yet they were, and hurt suffused her when she touched them.
She gasped and Decan reached up to grab her wrists.
But Nisa was not to be deterred, not this time.
She continued to move her fingers over his chest. Some parts of the scar were still puffy, other parts had thinned. There were so many that when she went lower to just above his navel she could no longer remain silent.
“I don’t understand,” she said her voice so quiet she wondered if he’d even heard her.
He released her wrists and used his hands to cup her face, bringing her gaze back up to meet his.
“You don’t have to,” he said. “It’s over.”
But it wasn’t. At least not for her.
Her chest heaved with the heaviness of the pain that pressed upon her as she looked down at his blemished skin once more. She placed her hands on his shoulders and leaned over to look at his back. Tears immediately sprang to her eyes and then the anger ripped free.
“Who did this?” she asked him. “And why?”
He moved his hands to her waist, lifting her from the floor and standing to turn them around. Decan lay her back on the bed and came over her.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said.
When she opened her mouth to tell him he was wrong, that it definitely did matter because whoever had done that to him needed to pay—possibly with their life, she hadn’t quite decided between that and torture just yet—he lowered his face closer to hers.
“All that matters is this.”
His words whispered over her lips just before his tongue touched them. Nisa parted her lips, but she did not close her eyes. He was staring down at her and she wanted to see him. All of him.
“I want you,” he said and brushed his lips over hers.
“I want you,” she replied.
“Do you?” he asked. “Do you know everything that goes with wanting me? Can you handle it, Nisa?”
She didn’t know that, wouldn’t know until she’d tried. What she did know without any doubt, was that this was happening. Again. And she had no intention of stopping it.
In answer to his question—or was it a challenge, she didn’t know—but she tilted her head and wrapped her arms around his neck to pull him down for a kiss. She adored the feel of his tongue against hers. He tasted wild and defiant and the more she arched into him, stroking her tongue over his, the more aroused she became.
His hands went beneath her then, grasping her ass and squeezing tightly. So tight for a moment she wanted to scream out. Then the pain lessened and his palms smoothed over the agitated skin. She sighed in response because the two sensations were so different, yet so tantalizing. She felt his fingers moving lower, down the back of her thighs as his mouth continued to work over hers. When he lifted her legs, pulling them up so she could wrap them around his waist Nisa thrust her hips upward. Anxious did not quite describe the need clawing through her at this moment.
Nothing mattered. No sound. No event. No scent…wait a minute. He pulled his mouth from hers and she realized in that moment that the scent was thick and wafted through the air as if it were coming in through the vents. It was a sultry aroma that reminded her of the incense Baxter had brought back from The Gungi. A rich and woodsy smell settled over them and stroked against Nisa’s cat until she could do nothing but let loose the growl that rumbled deep in her chest. Decan’s head shot up, his eyes widened.
“Get ready,” he mumbled, as if in reply, and lowered his head to her neck.
