Free The Shadows of Night by Ellen Fisher

fear he felt for her people added a sharp edge to his lust.  
    She was the farthest thing from boring he could imagine.
    “Tell me,” he said softly, “do the men of your people take the time to touch you?   To make you ready?   Do they care for your pleasure as much as for your own?”
    Wordlessly, she shook her head.
    He continued to brush his fingers across her nipple until it puckered, growing rigid beneath his touch.   “How do your people make love?”
    Her eyes smoldered.   “Feline couplings are rough and quick,” she said in a hoarse voice.
    Rough and quick sounded good to him right now.   A hard, fast coupling, leading to a violent climax, in order to assuage the desperate need he felt.   But he couldn’t do that to such a lovely woman, a spirited woman, who deserved to be treated so much better.  
    She deserved to be made love to, to be touched and kissed until she ached as badly as he did.   She deserved as much pleasure as he could possibly give her.
    He was taken aback by his thoughts.   For the first time he realized he had begun to see her as a woman, and not just as a Claw.   To his surprise, his fear of her had subsided, almost lost beneath his need for her.
    He lifted his hands and ran them down her arms, feeling the texture of her skin beneath his fingers.   Her skin was soft, and almost as warm and silky as he imagined her pelt must be.
    “My people make love more slowly,” he said.   “But the men are always dominant, and perhaps we spend less time on the woman’s pleasure than we should.”
    She moved restlessly against him, bathing him in her slick heat. Her hands clutched his shoulders, the nails long and sharp, a reminder of her animal form. Yet her fingers touched him with surprising gentleness.
    She spoke in a hoarse voice.   “I think it would be pleasant to see what making love slowly is like.”
    “And I think it would be enjoyable to see what letting the woman take control is like.”   He flashed a grin.   “Perhaps there is something to be said for both our people’s methods of lovemaking.”
    “Perhaps.   Let us see.”   She lifted her hips, moved her hand between them, and captured his shaft, guiding it into the hot, moist entrance to her body.
    “Remember,” he said through gritted teeth.   “ Slowly .”
    She lowered herself onto him, letting just the tip slide into her wet flesh.   “Are you certain you want me to go slowly?”
    He wasn’t certain in the least.   In fact he was reasonably sure he was going to die if she didn’t move faster.   But he ground his jaw together and tried to speak as if he were in control of himself and his reactions, rather than on the verge of losing his self-control entirely.
    “Yes.   Go slowly.”
    She sank slowly onto him, taking in a bare inch of him at a time.   He could feel her body stretching around him as it encompassed him, could feel himself sinking deeper and deeper into her warmth, and he had to resist the impulse to thrust hard, to fill her totally.   A shudder of pleasure ran through his cock, and his balls drew up against his body, so taut they hurt.
    She paused when he was only about halfway inside her, letting him savor her heat, letting his ache grow to unbearable levels.
    “Slow enough?” she purred.
    He was about to explode.   He couldn’t decide if he wanted her to go even more slowly, to draw the pleasure out further, or faster, to bring him to a climax right now.   He’d never yearned for release so desperately in his life.   And yet he wanted to enjoy the moment, to revel in the feel of her hot body surrounding him, to feel the throbbing of her interior muscles and know that she, too, was fully aroused.
    Slowly, she slid downward again.   She was so wet that she slipped easily along his length, so aroused that she stretched to accommodate him easily.   At last he was fully embedded in her, right to the hilt.   She sat atop him, motionless, her mouth curved in a distinctly