Free Amber Fire by Lisa Renée Jones Page B

shoulder before he restrained the urge. He licked away the blood, kissed the sensitive skin. She moaned as if pleasured by the act, and he sunk his cock deep into her warmth with final release. He clung to her, trying to calm the beast in him. Trying to catch a breath. Forcing air in and then out.
    With Herculean effort, he pulled away from her. He turned her around and lifted her to sit on the bed. She stared at him with sated, confused eyes. Beautiful green eyes. His cock reacted, thickened again. Jareth backed away, pulled his pants into place. He ran a hand over his head. “Get dressed, Amber. Get dressed now.”
    He paced the room, trying to calm the cat in him, the wild primal urge to bend her back over and take her. Several seconds passed before Amber’s voice shimmered down his spine and damn near undid him.
    â€œWhat just happened?” she whispered.
    He turned to thankfully find her standing beside the bed, her pant leg and boot back in place. Her fingers went to her shoulder, under the T-shirt. “You bit me, I think.” She swallowed hard. “And God. I think I liked it. I’m not sure it’s normal that I liked it.”
    Hearing she liked his nip of her shoulder was not helping him calm the hunger running rabid within him for her. He leaned against the door, next to the chair lodged there. None of this made sense. “What do you know of your mother, Amber?”
    â€œMy mother?”
    â€œYes, your mother. I need to know about your mother.”
    â€œShe was an archaeologist, like my father. She died in childbirth. I don’t understand. You know this. What does that have to do with any of this? With whatever just happened between us?”
    â€œI cannot mate with anyone who is not Yaguara, Amber,” he said. “Not in the biological sense. We can have sex with humans. We can have relationships. But true mating—the lifelong, eternal bond—that’s not possible. But just now . . .” He balled his fists by his sides. “I almost—the bite . . .” He scrubbed the good inch of stubble that had formed on his jaw. “I shouldn’t have had that urge. Not if you’re truly human.”
    Her eyes went wide. “If? There is no if . I am human.”
    He ran a slow hand over his brow. Damn. He was shaking. “We have one mate in our lifetime,” he explained. “The male bites the female on the shoulder and the blood creates the bond. Never in my three hundred years of living have I wanted to mark anyone.” Her mother had to be Yaguara. “Your mother died in childbirth. The women in our race have a bad habit of dying during childbirth, Amber.”
    Her hand went to her neck. “What are you saying? That my mother was Yaguara?” She paled further, the dark circles under her eyes more pronounced. “That’s not possible. You just said you can only mate with your own race. My father was human. We know that for certain. That means he could not have mated with a Yaguara female.”
    He ran his hands down his jeans, nervous energy ripping through him. “I said we cannot mate outside our kind, to join eternally, soul to soul. That does not mean some have not tried to create a bond with a human, but it was long ago forbidden as childbirth is always, without exception, fatal to the mother.”
    â€œNo,” she said, denial in her voice. “This can’t be. It can’t. My mother was human. I’m human.”
    Noting the panic in her voice, he softened his. “I know this is hard to digest.” He hesitated, thought back to their prior conversations. “You mentioned you have your father’s journals. Maybe we can find answers there. You didn’t know what you were looking for before now.” He inhaled and prepared for the firestorm to come, but he might as well deal with it all now. “There is something else you need to know.”
    â€œI’m somehow certain I am