Free Of Love and Darkness by Tami Lund

dress that clung to her in all the right places. Her thick dark hair draped over her shoulder and curled down her back.
    “Hey, neighbor. I thought I saw your car in the parking garage. I just sold a design to Chia Pet. Want to help me celebrate?” She didn’t wait for his answer, but simply strolled into the apartment.
    Gavin’s mouth went dry. Harmony was perfect: a beautiful, willing human woman who was exactly his type, and who expected nothing from him but sex. A lot of sex. A lot of varied sex. Harmony liked a little kink.
    I’m mated , he reminded himself. Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney .
    Sydney was a blond. Willowy. And dressed way too conservatively. Plus, he still had his doubts about her prowess in the bedroom, even after two sizzling kisses.
    But she’s my mate . Sydney . He chanted her name in his head, as if this would somehow offer him the self-restraint he needed to tell Harmony to leave.
    But why ? Sydney was still in denial, and she insisted she had no interest in sleeping with him. Harmony obviously wanted to sleep with him. She walked into the pool of light cast by the lamp next to the couch and he saw clearly that she wore nothing at all under the thin knit dress. His libido did a little cheer.
    I need this . Why should he remain celibate until Sydney decided to come to her senses and realize they really were mates?
    Harmony’s hands were in his pants and her dress was bunched at her waist when his phone rang. She urged him to ignore it, but he ignored her instead and pushed the button to connect the call.
    “Gavin? Are you okay? I had the strangest sensation that something was wrong, but I’ve been busy and this was my first chance to be able to call.”
    “Shit,” Gavin cursed as he leaned back against the couch and tugged Harmony’s hand out of his pants.
    “Who is that?” Harmony asked.
    “My, ah, girlfriend.”
    “Who are you with?” Sydney demanded. “And did you just call me your girlfriend? I’m not your girlfriend, Gavin, and the sooner you realize this, the better off we both will be. Are you even listening to me?”
    With a sigh, Gavin disconnected the call. Harmony gave him a sympathetic look. “This isn’t happening, is it?”
    Gavin sighed again. “Nope.”
    Harmony slid off the couch and tugged her dress over her hips. Then she reached down and patted Gavin’s cheek. “If it doesn’t work out, call me, okay?”
    “Yeah,” Gavin said as he watched her saunter to the door. “Right.”
    Gavin didn’t consider himself an overly sexual male, under normal circumstances. Usually, he was exhausted enough after a night of chasing down Rakshasa that he simply passed out when he got home, and didn’t wake until it was time to start the routine all over again. But when he did want a piece of ass, he rarely had a difficult time finding it, and then closing the deal.
    In the last twenty-four hours, he found himself turned on and then without the means to close the deal more times than he probably had in his entire three hundred and eighty-seven-year life. It was damned frustrating.
    In an effort to burn off some excess frustration, Gavin went out and patrolled his usual areas, searching for Rakshasa on whom he intended to take out his aggression. But the streets were quiet, for once, probably because the temperature had taken a dive into the negative numbers, and while shifters had an elevated body temperature, even they preferred to hole up inside on these kinds of nights. Finally, Gavin threw in the towel, returned to his apartment to retrieve his overnight bag, climbed into his car, and headed north, toward the burbs. With any luck, Sydney would be in a randy mood tonight and would turn to him for some good old-fashioned sexual tension relief. His chances were slim, he knew, but everyone had to have hope, right?
    When he entered her house, he discovered the Light Ones had multiplied in the few hours he had been gone. Four of them sat in the living room, chatting amicably