Free Kathi S Barton - [Aaron's Kiss 04] by Karen Fuller Page A

high cheek bones, and dark, smooth brows over eyes a starling shade of dark blue. His nose had been broken before.
    She could see where it had healed incorrectly, leaving a small knot in the middle of the long slope that added to his looks rather than took away from them. His jaw was jutted and strong-looking. She found herself wanting to bite it, just a nibble or two. Tucker’s shoulders were wide and well defined, biceps that measured at least twenty-two inches, she guessed. He had a tall, lean figure, six-foot-four at the very least. His chest was wide and Sam would bet were muscled along with abs that were washboard rippled and hard as rock. Sam doubted the man had an ounce of fat on him.
    ~~~
    “Why? Don’t you want me to touch you, Sam? I can smell you, your heat, and your need. I don’t want to stop. I don’t think you do either, do you?” He touched her cheek, and watched with fascination as her eyes deepened to a deeper violet. Tucker slowly raised his other hand to her hip and pulled her body to his. He lowered his head to hers. “Sam…”
    “Daddy said to come down now. That it’s time to pay the piper.” Mac’s high-pitched voice cut through them as if he had used a rapier.
    Tucker backed up immediately, dropping his hands from her. But not before he saw her flare of disappointment. Sam turned away from him. Closing his eyes, Tucker tried to get his body under control before he turned to the boy in the doorway.
    “I need to go down now. I need to talk with the master as he’s commanded. You must stay here and wait for me.”
    Tucker wanted to pull her back into his arms, just to hold her, to pick her up and cradle her. He was surprised by this need. He wasn’t much of a touchy person. He felt her shame and embarrassment, and he wanted to soothe her, but didn’t have any idea how to do that to someone.

    “Go. Just leave me alone.” Tucker watched as Sam walked into the bathroom and quietly closed the door behind her. When he started toward the bathroom, he stopped when he heard the lock turn.
    “Are you coming? Dad said to come on down when you’re ready, but not to take too long,” Mac said and turned and left. With another look toward the bathroom door, Tucker left. He would talk to her when he returned—if he returned.
    “Master, mistress. I beg entrance please?” Tucker had been taught, and none too gently, to never go anywhere or into any room he was not specifically invited to. The repercussions of a mistake like that would stay with him for days, if not weeks. And once learned, he didn’t soon forget.
    Tucker had once, in the very beginning of his life as a vampire, walked into the room he had been assigned. He had been a vampire maybe about fifteen years. It hadn’t occurred to him that the room wasn’t his to do with as he pleased. He had simply walked into a bedroom he had been sleeping in forever and always without asking for permission. And calling it a bedroom was really giving much more credit for the room than it deserved, as it was no more than a rag on the dirt floor of a four-by-four foot cell.
    Mistress was there waiting for him, just to catch him making a mistake, he was sure.
    She had ordered him on his knees first and when the first slice of the whip bit into his skin, he nearly cried out from it. The whip had been specially made for her, she had told him once. There were at least a dozen long strips of leather, each one with several barbs of silver wrapped around them. He had taken only thirty lashes that night, more than he had ever received to that point, but not the most he would feel against his back in his long servitude with her. Pain riddled his body and he knew when she finished with the whip, she wasn’t finished with him yet.
    When she had ordered him to stand, he knew, just knew, he had to leave her. He had to get away before it was too late.
    Moving slowly, pain rippling through his back, he stood with his hand behind him and his head bowed. Mistress