Oceans Untamed Read online

  Oh, she wished she could see his face better, but when he spoke, she knew she’d hit the mark. “You’ll feel it,” he growled as he rolled on top of her. He was heavy, and for a moment she couldn’t breathe.

  His hands tightened around her wrists as his stone-hard thighs pressed under her knees, spreading her legs and leaving her utterly helpless.

  “Koenraad?” she whispered. The throatiness was gone, and her voice had gotten tight with worry. “I want to feel them both. Please.”

  “We’ll have to work up to that,” he said.

  “Why not get it over with? A moment of pain and then it’s all good.”

  He pulled away and sat up. “Now isn’t the time to talk about when you lost your virginity, but obviously the guy didn’t know what he was doing.”

  “But—”

  “Your ass is virgin territory, Monroe. And before you ask, I could tell by the way you tensed when I first put my thumb into you. Do you have any idea how much damage I could do if I just shoved myself in there? It wouldn’t be a passing moment of pain. It would hurt.”

  “But I’d heal.”

  “I don’t know why my blood is still potent in your veins, but we can’t count on it. In any event, I’m not going to hurt you just because it’ll heal later.”

  He leaned in close and moved her arms over her head. She loved the warmth of his arms on top of hers. “If and when I hurt you, it will be deliberate. It will be because it’s the right time for us both, and it won’t be something to suffer through. If I ever hurt you, you’ll love it. You’ll beg for it.”

  He rocked his hips and thrust, shoving his cock deep into her warmth and stretching her mercilessly.

  She moaned as pleasure crashed over her. She hadn’t been expecting it, hadn’t realized he could enter her so easily.

  His rhythm was slow, dragged out. Each thrust seemed designed to torment her, but with her arms pinned over her head and her legs pinned by his weight, there was nothing she could possibly do.

  And then his teeth were on her neck, nipping her sensitive skin.

  The beginnings of an orgasm swirled, hot and heavy in her core, gathering speed even though he stayed true to his maddeningly slow rhythm.

  He opened his mouth wider and took her throat between his teeth. She gasped, arched, offering her throat to him. “More,” she moaned. “Faster. Please, please, please—”

  “More?” He bit harder, and the unexpected and sharp edge of pain made her tremble. “Faster?” He picked up his pace, his hips slamming into her loud enough that she could hear it over the wind on the ocean and the crashing waves.

  “Yes!” Her body was alive with lustful energy. If he hadn’t been holding her down, she would have wrapped her legs around his waist and locked her arms around his neck.

  But he was holding her down, and as her orgasm waned, she was powerless to stop his hard, fast thrusting.

  Within seconds, she didn’t want to. He’d proven before that he could give her multiple orgasms, and now she was learning that it hadn’t happened by accident. He controlled her pleasure, meting it out according to some schedule she couldn’t begin to guess at.

  In his grip, her fingers struggled, wanting to grab him as the agonizing bliss of another orgasm exploded like fireworks.

  “Gorgeous when you come,” he said. “I’ll never get my fill of your curves, your ripe body.” He moved faster now, but it was less to make a point. He was going to come, and that set her off again. Her hands curled into helpless fists, and her feet pressed hard on the pier as she tried to arch under his heavy male weight.

  He bit the top of her shoulder, and she could tell he was holding back.

  The difference between this time and all the previous times was that now she knew what he was fighting. The spurs.

  She rolled her hips against his and clenched her muscles. “Let go,” she urged him. She didn’t care how much it hurt; she wanted to know. Wanted to feel it.

  But he didn’t. He probably never would, she realized. And despite all the pleasure he’d given her, by the time he’d pulled himself free from her soaked channel, she was disappointed.

  “Will you ever—”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Can I clarify something I said earlier?” he asked as he tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear. “When I said I didn’t want to disturb you while you slept, I didn’t mean by making noise, by turning on the television and watching documentaries about cute sharks. You were on your stomach, the sheet clinging to the curves of your perfect ass. It was putting dirty thoughts into my head.”

  She almost told him to go ahead and act out those thoughts the next time, but the amused, cocky look on his face told her he’d figured out how she felt. She was going to have to learn to control her reactions around him. Or not.

  She laughed. “There are other cute sharks besides you?”

  “You don’t think Spencer is cute?”

  She shrugged, but then she realized that even though she hadn’t had a sexual reaction to Koenraad’s best friend, she’d certainly been charmed by his good looks and carefree demeanor. Koenraad might have been able to tell. Or maybe he was honest enough to admit it when another man was attractive to women. She wasn’t going to ask. And she wasn’t going to answer his question, either.

  He was chuckling lightly, and she had that disconcerting feeling that he was reading her mind. Oh, he’d sworn up and down that he wasn’t psychic, but damn if it didn’t feel like it to her.

  He pulled away. To her surprise, he pulled off his shirt and shorts. That would have made so much more sense if he’d done it before they had sex.

  “It’s getting light out!” she said.

  “You saying you don’t like my body?”

  She twisted to scan the beach behind them. There wasn’t anyone in sight, but wasn’t dawn about when people went running—not that she’d know anything about that particular kind of insanity—or scoured the sand with metal detectors?

  A shudder passed through her. “For all you know, someone is standing on a hotel balcony staring at your dick.”

  “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

  If her ex happened to be watching, yeah, it was. But Koenraad didn’t know that Thomas had flown down from New York to get her back. She swallowed nervously and forced herself to think about something else before Koenraad asked what was bothering her. “What exactly are you doing, anyway?”

  He was peering intently at the water. “Going to find your sandals.”

  A shaft of moonlight cut through the clouds, illuminating the gazebo and the surrounding water. The bumps on his lower back were like a mountain range.

  “Koenraad…”

  He looked at her, his huge pupils reflecting silver. “Monroe…” he said, teasing her.

  “Those new scars… You got into a fight with the shark that attacked me, didn’t you? Did you kill it? I hope you did.”

  His face went blank in shock, like he’d been sucker-punched, and then his features turned hard.

  Instead of answering, he dropped into the water.

  Chapter 2

  Koenraad kept half his attention focused on the enormous truck in the rear-view mirror. His security gates were set to close quickly, and the man driving the truck was most definitely on island time, in no hurry at all.

  Even when they were safely through the second set of gates, Koenraad still didn’t relax. Something told him he wouldn’t be relaxing until he was back with Monroe. He brought the car to a stop in front of his mansion and got out.

  Now for the fun part.

  Forcing a smile, he walked back to the truck. The driver cranked down the window.

  “Give me a few minutes first,” Koenraad said. “I just want to get my dogs inside the house, then I’ll show you the trapped shark and we can figure out a humane way to get him… get it into the truck.”

  The driver nodded; he didn’t care. He was being paid quite a bit extra to handle this. Koenraad had set it up with the aquarium
’s owner, but no one except Spencer knew what he was really up to, that the trapped shark he needed removed wasn’t just a shark.

  Koenraad was halfway to the massive front door when he smelled her. Victoria. It was faint, very faint, but this time he knew he wasn’t imagining it.

  Time stopped as the realization sank in: despite all his precautions, Victoria had found him, and she’d somehow gotten past his security system.

  No doubt she’d been pissed that he wasn’t returning her calls. When he’d promised to search with her for Brady, he’d intended to show up. But then Monroe needed him, and he hadn’t bothered to give Victoria a reason for canceling. He didn’t want her knowing about Monroe.

  He inhaled deeply. Her scent wasn’t strong. With any luck, she’d quickly gotten tired of waiting and had gone away.

  But experience told him she wouldn’t give up so easily. She was an investigator for the Council, for her uncle, really. If she’d tracked him here, she’d snoop.

  The moment he stepped across the threshold, he smelled the awful truth. Victoria had gotten inside.

  Head slightly lowered, he ran down the long hallway that cut through the mansion. For a moment he lost her scent, but then he caught it again, stronger than ever.

  He slammed out of the main back door, his head turning left and right as he swept his gaze rhythmically and methodically over the private beach. She’d been out here, too. There was no doubt about that.

  Was she still here? It didn’t seem like it, but with the wind scattering scents, it was difficult to know for sure. Tracking was so much easier in the water.

  He carefully scrutinized the landscape again, but he was alone. Victoria wasn’t the type to hide.

  His phone buzzed in his pocket, but he ignored it as he surveyed the beach, trying to see it through fresh eyes, trying to imagine what she knew.

  She’d certainly noticed the blood in the pool. There was no doubt about that. He could smell it, which meant she’d smelled it, too, and she would have investigated.

  His jaw clenched so tightly that the curses welling in his throat came out in a long growl.

  Several long strides, and he was standing over the fouled water. Ghostly memories of that night swam through his mind, and he thought of Monroe. As wrong as things had gone, he’d been lucky.

  He unlocked the pool cover and let the motor drag it over the surface. Much better. It wouldn’t fool a shape shifter’s nose, but the men in the truck wouldn’t look at it twice.

  His phone buzzed again, and he yanked it out of his pocket. It took an act of will not to crush it in his fist. Two missed calls from Victoria. And a text.

  He tapped the icon. You’ve been a naughty, naughty boy. We need to talk about what you’ve been hiding behind your house. Today. Or else.

  Hiding behind his house? He swung his gaze toward the inlet where Brady had lived for the last six months. Everything went still… It felt like a thick glass dome had slammed over him like he was a mere insect, and the rest of the world was shut outside. Sounds, scents… even the breeze retreated. He blinked to clear his vision, but it didn’t do a thing for the fuzziness clouding his mind.

  The phone slid from his fingers and landed in the sand. He sprinted for the inlet.

  She’d been here. Those were her footprints baked into the sand.

  With a roar, he flung himself into the water, shifting shark, landing with a mighty splash. The remnants of his clothing ripped away as he arced below the surface.

  The inlet was cleansed of blood. The ocean had done that. But at the moment, he didn’t care about anything except Brady.

  He circled the inlet several times, his tail whipping, his heart pounding. The first pass showed him what his nose already knew. There were no sharks in the inlet. Brady was gone.

  Gone.

  And Victoria had him.

  And just like that, everything Koenraad had tried to protect crumbled like so much dry sand.

  Chapter 3

  Monroe set down the paperback she’d bought an hour earlier in the hotel gift shop. The day was turning breezy, and she wanted to get her sweater, but she didn’t feel like moving.

  She was sex-sore, satisfied, and feeling lazy.

  After Koenraad had jumped off the pier, he’d stayed away for twenty minutes. When he returned, he seemed like himself again and even made a joke about fighting a hermit crab to get her sandals back. Then he dressed—without turning his back to her—and held her close until the sun came up.

  As they brushed themselves off, he asked if she wanted to know the details of the attack. She shrugged because she didn’t want a repeat of him going cold. She couldn’t tell if he really wanted to tell her or if he felt obligated. Obligation was a relationship killer.

  Then he mentioned that he might have business in New York “after things here quiet down.” She’d been so relieved that she’d prattled on about all the places she could show him, and then they walked back to the hotel and she tried not to be jumpy about Thomas possibly seeing them.

  Koenraad had told her to order whatever she wanted from room service, and then he went out on the balcony and started making calls. He was gone before the white-gloved waiter wheeled in a cart with breakfast for two. She had to sit there alone while the waiter squeezed the orange juice into two glasses. She was so embarrassed that rather than meet his gaze and see pity there, she stared at his gloves like an idiot, pretending to be interested in how he managed to keep them clean.

  Most of the food had ended up in the hallway, untouched. She knew she was really too sensitive about being stood up, but it was definitely a recurring theme in her life.

  Though Koenraad always made it better, and heaven knew he had a really good reason for being so busy.

  But… he’d said he’d call in a few hours and that he’d be back for a late lunch. It was almost 1:00 and she hadn’t heard a peep.

  She stood, stretched the kinks out of her back—she really had to stop having sex on hard surfaces—and went inside to call herself on the hotel room’s phone.

  It came through just fine.

  Frowning, she chewed on the edge of her lip. If he was going to be much longer, she needed to know. She was hungry, and there wasn’t much on the room service menu that appealed to her. Or, rather, nothing that looked so delicious that she wouldn’t mind sitting in a hotel room and eating it on her own.

  She tapped out a message to Koenraad, then dug her sweater out of her bag. The weather on Tureygua was changeable to say the least. The nights were chilly, the days either blistering hot or chilly, depending on the hour. Her original trip was supposed to be two nights, and while she’d overpacked, she didn’t have a week’s worth of clothing for all the wild temperature swings. Koenraad kept buying her stuff, but she needed more.

  When he got back, she’d have to find out where the locals shopped. The boutiques near the resorts were expensive as hell, and for the most part, not her style. She didn’t need summer beach dresses. She lived in New York; the closest she ever got to a regular beach outing were rooftop pools. In the future, even those would be limited; Thomas was the one who had membership to the best one.

  Nope, she wouldn’t be going back there.

  Her phone buzzed with a response from Koenraad. I’m so sorry. Something has come up and I’ll be a couple more hours. If you can’t wait, order whatever you want (food or otherwise) and charge it to the room.

  “That’s just lovely,” she said, then caught herself. Koenraad was nothing like Thomas. He wouldn’t prioritize his job unless it was dire, so his forgetting to let her know that he’d be late was uncharacteristic. He was never callous or thoughtless. He wouldn’t cancel on her unless it was serious.

  None of that changed the fact that she was on her own. Her friends, who were staying in a more moderately priced resort across the street, were out on an all-day exploration of the island’s wildlife preserve. Monroe had mixed up the dates and had thought her friends’ vacation was done, otherwise she probably woul
d have tagged along.

  It was easy to lose track of time on Tureygua. She only had a few more days left, but it felt like she’d just gotten there. It also felt like she’d been there forever.

  There was nothing to do but read—might as well do it on the beach, so she ran herself a hot bath and dug her razor out of her bag.

  As nice as the hotel was, it had nothing on Koenraad’s mansion. When they’d checked in the night before, she’d been confused. He’d taken a room for the rest of her stay. “For your safety,” he’d said.

  That hadn’t quite made sense. Yes, she’d been attacked by a shark, but that wasn’t a good reason to abandon the mansion. She didn’t remember anything leading up to the attack, and she most definitely had no recollection of Koenraad giving her the transfusion. But just seeing the freshly healed skin was enough to keep her out of the water.

  It wasn’t like sharks could walk out of the ocean and grab her. She appreciated that he cared, but his reaction was overprotective. If it had been her house, she would have insisted on staying. But it wasn’t, and giving him a hard time seemed rude.

  She lathered up the thick guava body wash, spread it over her legs, and slowly scraped the razor up her calf.

  There wasn’t much to remove, but she finished shaving anyway, rinsed her legs, then inspected her knees and found she’d missed a spot. Looked like she’d missed it a few shaves in a row. Ten years she’d been shaving and she still couldn’t get it right.

  Koenraad had surely noticed.

  Irritated, she wet the razor and swiped it across her skin, nicking herself in the process.

  She reached for a washcloth and wiped the blood away. To her surprise, the wound had already stopped bleeding.

  Bending her knee, she brought it close to her face, but she couldn’t see any evidence of the cut.

  Her stomach growled, and she winced as she pulled herself to standing and reached for a fluffy towel that smelled of lilacs.