Stygian's Honor by Lora Leigh Page B

her breath.
    And that her hands were gripping the hard width of his shoulders.
    “What?” he growled. “What are you questioning, Liza? My hunger—or yours?”
    Her stomach tightened, rippling in response to the hunger in his voice as a growl rumbled beneath the word.
    “Let me go.” The demand was undermined by the whimpering need in her body.
    Hell, she may as well be begging him to continue for all the denial that wasn’t in her voice.
    “Let you go?” He pressed tighter into the cradle of her thighs as his hands parted them further. “Are you sure that’s what you want?”
    The black in his eyes flickered with blue, fascinating her with the sparkle of color.
    Her breasts trembled against the hard width of his chest as her breathing accelerated. Heat flushed her face, spreading through her body as she fought to keep her lashes from drifting closed.
    As she stared up at him, she felt one hand move from her hips a second before his palm slapped against the elevator control panel. The cubicle came to a stop, lights flashing before they dimmed and remained steady. The electronic voice warned: “Please be patient, we are working to reset operation.”
    Liza’s eyes widened.
    “Don’t leave the hotel.” He lowered his head and the rasp of the day-old beard against the sensitive shell of her ear had her eyes closing in desperate need.
    “I can’t stay here. Why would I want to?”
    “To stay with me?” he suggested, his lips touching just beneath her ear, sending tingles of incredible sensation rushing along her nerve endings.
    To stay with him?
    God, she wanted to stay with him.
    She didn’t know him, she only knew of him. She’d watched him for weeks as he moved about the periphery of her life, always surprised when she saw him though always expecting his presence.
    “This won’t work.”
    “Won’t it?” As he nuzzled against her ear, heat and searing need flashed through her senses. “Then why are you holding on to me as though you’ll never let go?”
    Her nails were biting into the fabric of his shirt as though desperate to reach his flesh.
    The sensual side of her was desperate to get to bare skin, to feel him against her, the warmth of him, the pleasure of him stroking her.
    “Why did you manhandle me against the wall?” she accused back, but once again there was no anger to her tone, nothing to really impress him with the fact that she meant it.
    If she did mean it.
    “I want you, Liza,” he rasped at her ear then. “From the moment I saw you the night your friend approached Malachi, I’ve wanted you. I’ve wanted you bad.”
    The words affected her more for the sheer simplicity of the statement than the roughness of his tone.
    “You want to draw me in.” That was her fear, her certainty. “Whatever Wyatt thinks he can use me for, you want to convince me to allow.”
    The knowledge of that hurt.
    It ached deep inside her but did nothing to change the power of the arousal building between her thighs.
    “Is that what you really think?” Anger colored his tone as his head lifted, the blue in his eyes brighter, nearly overtaking the black as he glared down at her.
    The anger couldn’t overshadow the hunger in his gaze. It was there: clear, bright and unapologetic.
    “Don’t do this to me, Stygian,” she whispered rather than answering the question. “Don’t destroy my life.”
    “I could complete it.”
    But something warned her that completing it could also destroy it, and that destruction terrified a dark, hidden core of her that she rarely allowed herself to dwell upon.
    She was certain she would have had an argument, that she could have come up with one if the elevator hadn’t given a small jerk and resumed its journey downward.
    Her feet were settling on the floor and Stygian stepping back from her as the doors slid open to the hotel lobby. A half dozen Breeds were waiting to step inside.
    They moved back, their expressions inscrutable, gazes shuttered as they flicked