He smiled against her flat stomach. "I am courting you." His teeth nipped along the curve of her hip, found the strange birthmark, and scraped at it with small bites. "Persuading you." His tongue eased the ache. His hands opened her thighs wider, stroking, caressing. His finger found the hot core of her, wet with liquid fire, scorching and tight as he slowly inserted his finger deeper and deeper into her body. "I want my body buried in your body. Is that what you want, querida? Do you want me the same way I want you?" Her delicate muscles clenched around him. Hot. Fiery. Moist with need. Watching her face, he withdrew his finger, carefully inserted two, stretching her a little more, inch by inch. "Tell me you want me, Colby. I need to hear you say it." He needed to hear her say it because he had to be with her, share her body, share her skin and blood and bones.

Colby shook her head, tormented beyond all reasoning. Yes, she wanted him, every cell in her body needed him. Her body was wound so tight, the pressure unbearable so that she didn't think she'd survive without him. But he was demanding everything from her. Not a part of her, everything.

And you will give me everything. It was a growl. A command.

"No." She said the word even as he pressed his fingers deeper, even as her body tightened and threatened to shatter into a million fragments, she struggled to keep who and what she was intact.

Rafael could feel her body's response. She wanted him. She moved restlessly, her head turning from side to side on the pillow, a soft sound escaping from her throat. She tried to protest again. He felt it welling up in her as she struggled away from the rising need. He withdrew his fingers and replaced them with his mouth, his tongue probing deep. She cried out, startled, her body rippling with life, fragmenting, imploding, so that she was shocked at the intensity of the waves of pleasure rocking her. She tried to wrench away, the pleasure shattering her, but he clamped his arm over her hips and held her still, drinking her in. He refused to stop, pushing her further, wanting her need to rise in direct proportion to his own voracious hunger.

Colby struggled against the pulse after pulse of sensation tormenting her body, carrying her away when she needed to be anchored. She thrashed beneath him, unable to tamp down the fire racing through her body enough to breathe. She couldn't catch her breath, couldn't think clearly. Fear clutched at her. The sheet knotted in her fists and she tried to pull away from the assault his mouth was making, his tongue flicking and teasing until her nerves were screaming for release.

"You have to stop," she gasped. Colby was completely losing herself in the firestorm of pleasure rushing through her. He was taking her over. She couldn't get away from his mouth and tongue. Her body just kept winding tighter and tighter, burning hotter and hotter until she knew she would explode. Worse, lust was rising, sharp and deadly, the need so strong it terrified her.

She couldn't hold a single thought, not even to save herself. The pleasure was bordering on pain, the pressure building and building. She never wanted him to stop, she wanted to shatter into a million pieces. She wanted to be whatever he needed, go wherever he led. A low cry of terror escaped her as his tongue picked up the rhythm and pulsed deeper into her body. He was ravenous, driving her over the edge ruthlessly as her body twisted and bucked beneath him. Not once, but twice, three times, until one orgasm ran into the other and her mind dissolved and her body blew apart.

He rose above her, shoving her thighs apart to accommodate him, opening her fully to him. His erection was thick and heavy and intimidating, his eyes like flint as he pressed into her slick entrance. She could feel him there, stretching her, just waiting, when her entire body tensed, frustrated, pulsing and throbbing with need. She had the mad desire to impale herself on him, but he held her hips still with hard hands. His expression was raw hunger, his mouth a merciless slash. "Are you going to say no to me again, Colby? Are you going to deny me what is truly mine?" His voice was rough, harsh, his temper swirling over both of them.

She gave a small tormented cry. Was he giving her one last chance to save herself? How could she say no when she needed him now, when everything in her had to have him deep inside her body?

"Are you?" he insisted.

Colby shook her head. She couldn't speak, couldn't breathe, her body on fire, fear flowing like lava through her veins at the thought of what was to come. He was shattering her and reconstructing her, so that she would always crave him, always need him. A part of her recognized it, but she couldn't stop the dark hunger he was arousing in her.

Never again. It was a decree, bit out between his clenched teeth.

Rafael thrust hard, driving deep into her in one hard stroke, knowing she was too innocent for what he was doing, but unable to stop himself. He had centuries of hunger in him, a dark, ravenous hunger that spilled out of him, erupting into a fever of frenzied pounding. She was hot and tight and gripped him with a fire that nearly drove him mad.

"It's too much. It's too much," Colby cried out, desperately trying to push him off of her. He was going to kill her, driving her body so high, the sensations so electric she was losing herself completely.

He caught her wrists in a vise, pinned them to the bed on either side of her head, his mouth taking hers, tongue driving deep as his hips thrust harder, deeper, wanting more, taking more.

The call was on him now, wild and primitive, a need as old as time to seal them together for all eternity. His lifemate. His other half. The words beat at him, rising from his soul as he buried himself deeply into her hot fiery sheath with the world going up in flames and spinning out of control. She was making little gasping sounds and he could feel her muscles tightening, clenching as he switched into a pounding tempo that only fed his voracious hunger.

The need to taste her grew stronger and stronger, more demanding until his mouth left hers, moved down to the warmth of her neck, traced an erotic path lower to scrape his teeth over the tempting beat of her heart. His body clenched, drenched in sweat and his heart thundered and pounded. The demon roared for release, urging him on. He was trembling with such need he thought his entire body might explode in spontaneous combustion. With a groan, Rafael gave in, sinking his teeth deep.

Colby moaned aloud as white-hot whips of lightning seemed to dance through her body. He calmed her, his mind now firmly in hers. Rafael held her still, possessively, while he indulged his appetite, and his body plunged deeply, wildly into hers. She tasted like hot spice and warm honey. He never wanted to stop; the terrible hunger that had haunted him for centuries was, for the first time, satiated by her. Colby. The blood in his veins. His life. His world.

The demon roared for more, for all of it, insisting he stake his claim. For a heartbeat of time the ritual words welled up, desperate to spill out. It was instinct, something deep within him urging him onward, instructing him in the ritual. At once tiny sparks leapt around him, colors of deep blue and silver, little stars rising from the comforter to leap around him in glittering reprimand. The words beat at him needing to be said, demanding he claim her, but Rafael hesitated, the little stars dazzling his eyes. He would be below ground and she would be running the ranch in the daylight, unable to touch him when her heart and soul, her mind, urged her to do so. She would be in hell, driven to the point of insanity while he slept deep beneath the ground.

Rafael immediately swept his tongue across the pinpricks on her breast and lifted his head, breathing heavily, his teeth clenched as he fought for control. He uttered his command softly to her, holding the enthrallment now. He lowered his body until her mouth was nearly against his chest, wanting her to take enough blood for a true exchange. He slashed a wound across his chest and pressed her mouth to the gash to replenish what he had taken, holding the back of her head so she couldn't escape, his body pinning hers beneath him. The moment her lips moved against his skin, he shuddered and her body tightened, an endless spiral gripping her, gripping him. Little jackhammers seemed to be tripping in his head. Fire consumed his blood. He drove into her harder and faster, his body slick with sweat, with pleasure.