Only 04 - Only Love

dripped from cuts on his left hand.
    He looked as dangerous as he was.
    Shannon’s heartbeat doubled, but she didn’t back up one step. She couldn’t. She didn’t trust her legs to hold her.
    “Prettyface,” Whip said softly, coldly, “is a spoiled, savage mongrel that weighs more than most men. He has too much wolf in him to understandanything from a man but force. So I beat him at his own game. Force. Now he’ll accept me.”
    Shannon’s chin came up defiantly, but she was smart enough not to say a word. Whip was right and both of them knew it. She just didn’t like hearing it put so bluntly.
    “As for the rest of your tirade,” Whip said, “when you give yourself to me— and you will —it won’t be because I choked you into submission. If that was all I wanted, I would have killed Prettyface the first time I walked into the cabin. Then I would have thrown you down on the floor and raped you.”
    A small sound came from the back of Shannon’s throat as she understood the raw truth of Whip’s statement. Deep inside, she had always assumed it was Prettyface’s snarling presence that had kept Whip from touching her in any way at all.
    Now Shannon knew how badly she had misread the situation. Whip was as smart and quick as he was strong.
    And he was frighteningly strong.
    “But that isn’t what I want from you,” Whip said, his voice lethally calm.
    “Wh—” Shannon’s voice broke.
    She licked her dry lips, took a quick breath, and tried again.
    “What d-do you want from me?” she asked.
    At first Shannon didn’t think Whip would answer. Then he took one last, gliding stride toward her. When he stopped, he was so close to Shannon that she couldn’t take a breath without her breasts touching his hard chest.
    Slowly, giving Shannon every chance to flinch away, Whip lifted his hands to her face.
    She didn’t move. She simply watched him with eyes that were both wary and defiant.
    The bullwhip he still carried in his left hand caressed Shannon’s cheek so lightly it felt more like a breath than a touch. The supple leather coils traced her eyebrows, the straight line of her nose, her high cheekbones.
    It was the last thing Shannon had expected from Whip. The touches were so gentle she barely felt them. They shouted of Whip’s restraint.
    And they teased her even as they reassured her.
    She closed her eyes, wanting to concentrate on the elusive, shimmering sensations that shivered through her body. She took in a quick breath and smelled the wood smoke and evergreen on Whip, as well as the primal, disturbing scent of blood.
    “Whip?” Shannon whispered through trembling lips.
    His wrist flicked and the leather coils vanished. A vague thump told Shannon that the bullwhip had landed on the floor.
    Whip took the shotgun from her hands and uncocked it with a few swift, easy motions. When he replaced the weapon on its pegs over the door, Shannon numbly noted that there was blood on both of his hands.
    Whip saw the look on her face when he turned back to her.
    “It’s all right, honey girl,” he said. “You don’t need the shotgun. I won’t hurt you. I’m just trying to answer your question about what I want from you. But I don’t have any words to tell you…”
    Callused fingertips lightly traced Shannon’s hairline, the rims of her ears, the dense mahogany eyelashes quivering against her cheek, the tremblingline of her lips, the pulse beating frantically in her throat.
    “Are you truly afraid of me?” Whip asked huskily.
    Shannon shook her head. “N-no.”
    “You ought to be.”
    “Why?”
    “I want what I first saw in your walk,” he said simply.
    “I—I don’t understand.”
    “Neither do I. I’ve never wanted a woman the way I want you, all at once, no thought, no caution, no right or wrong, nothing but a hard need riding me all day, every day. And the nights…Jesus. The nights are pure, undiluted hell.”
    Shannon tried to speak. No words came out of her dry throat.
    Whip’s thumbs traced her mouth, caressing it as intimately as a kiss. Her softness lured him, and her heat, and the ragged sigh she finally gave, a sigh that was also his name.
    “You have a walk like honey,” Whip said huskily, bending down to her. “Kiss me, Shannon. I want to find out if your mouth is half as arousing as your walk.”
    Shannon made a soft, startled sound when Whip’s teeth nibbled at her lips and his tongue probed the corners of her mouth. Tingling sensations rippled through her,