The Panther's Surrogate: A Paranormal Pregnancy Romance Read online

  She didn’t want to be scorched in the beginning and as his lips pressed against her shoulder and up her neck, she liked the slow burn. She liked the rise of passion. Her ass pressed against his crotch and she could feel how stiff and excited he already was. He was always eager for her and she loved that. She loved how much he wanted her and that she was undoubtedly his one and only.

  “How was the meeting?” She asked him, a smile solidified on her lips.

  “Boring,” he whispered into her ear with his thick accent. “All I could think about was how long your legs are and how desperately I need to kiss them.”

  “Yeah?” She whispered as his fingers slid around her hips and over her flat stomach, the tips digging into her and making her want to squirm. She pressed her ass against his cock and felt his fingers slipping under her shirt and pushing up.

  “They want your lips on them,” she told him, as she felt his fingers slowly drifting downward, drifting underneath her shorts, beneath her thong. She closed her eyes and sucked in her breath as the tips of his fingers brushed across her slit.

  God she wanted him. She always wanted him.

  “It’s been a while,” he whispered in her ear, kissing just behind her lobe, making her squirm and smile, resisting the urge to giggle with glee and delight at the sensation that he sent blossoming throughout her. God, she could tell she was wet already.

  “I’ve been pulling double shifts,” Josie told him, her fingers digging into the lip of the table as she felt his soft fingers tracing the line of her pussy’s lips, teasing her and tempting her. She needed him inside of her and she needed him to stay there forever.

  There was an intimacy that she wanted with him that she had never wanted with anyone else before. She felt his fingers slipping inside of her and the brush of his fingers against her clit sent a tremble through her body that made her groan. She wanted him to keep doing it and as she felt his chest pressing against her back, her ass rubbing his blazing cock, she knew he wanted more too.

  “Keep doing it,” she whispered, breathy and elusive.

  He kept rubbing her, knowing that when a woman said keep doing it, it meant to keep it up. He didn’t press harder and he didn’t rub faster. No, he kept it just right and the build was like a glacier cracking and falling free, plunging into an ocean of lust. She leaned her head back and felt his lips pressing against her neck, the warmth of his body filling her up as he continued to rub her.

  She flinched, her knees getting weak as he played with her, slowly slipping his fingers inside of her and she loved the feeling, wishing that there were more. She wanted him all the way inside of her. She wanted to take him there and now. “You’re so good to me,” she exhaled.

  “You deserve the best,” he whispered to her, his other hand running up her stomach, cupping her breast and squeezing it as she moaned, smiling at the feeling. She wanted more of it. His fingers found her excited nipples, feeling like they were charged with electric lust as they brushed over her nipple. He cupped her again and again, feeling her nipples and pinching them lightly between his fingers.

  She liked the soft jolt of pain that burst with each of the little pinches and she wanted more of it. She could feel the hunger rising inside of her. She wanted more of it and she wanted him to have her. Slipping two of his fingers inside of her, she moaned as he slid his fingers in and out, rubbing her clit with his thumb, working with such diligence and focus that she thought he was a wizard, working with multiple hands.

  She could feel his tongue on her neck and his lips kissing her over and over again, kissing along her jawline. She moaned as she could feel wetter and wetter with each passing second, not wanting any of it to end. “You’re naughty today,” he said with a sort of wicked lust in the back of his throat that she couldn’t avoid. She liked the sound of his voice. It was deep and foreign, exotic in all the ways that made her want to take him inside of her. She wanted to kiss his soft lips and breathe him in.

  It wasn’t long until she was leaning her head back over the nape of his neck and arching her back, grinding her hips against his strong arm and trying to take his fingers inside of her as deep as she could. His cock was pressed against her ass, pushing harder and harder as she kept pushing against him, wanting to take more and more of him inside of her.

  She was moaning as he kneaded her breast, squeezing her nipple and running his hand up along her neck, bracing her as his body gave into the lust and she could feel the orgasm billowing up inside of her, rising with a vengeance. She smiled and moaned, digging her fingernails into his jean clad legs, begging for that sweet release—begging for that bliss that only he could give her so lovingly.

  When it came, she felt her whole body go numb and as she sank into his arms, he caught her and held her against him, his cock still as hard and as blazing as it had been before her orgasm. She smiled and tried to catch her breath. Everywhere he touched her felt like bombs bursting across her skin and she snuggled up against him, trying to push against him as hard as she could.

  Kheem was her lover, but no one could know it.

  Kheem liked to stay in the shadows and she liked to slip into his dark world and having him explore all the sensuous places that only they could know about. She liked throwing him against the wall and going down on him or having him grab her like this in an abandoned room.

  They played this game for years now, ravaging each other like animals and keeping it only to themselves. She would find notes from him tucked inside of books she read or hidden in her desk. In the same fashion, she would leave him little origami figures that she made when she was bored at work and hid them in the kitchen where he worked. His dark eyes and his ebony skin were as black as the darkness that surrounded their secret affair.

  “God, you’re amazing,” Josie turned around and shoved him against the wall, placing her lips on his and loving how he always tasted of fruit.

  She took his lower lip between her teeth and chewed it passionately, slipping her hand under his waistline and feeling his bare cock, loving the heat that was radiating it. It was so hard. He never had a problem feeling so hard around her. It was amusing. She’d never known a man who was so eager to be excited around her. She grinned and wrapped her fingers around it.

  “I have to go back to work,” he lamented.

  Dropping to her knees, Josie unzipped his pants and unbuttoned it, looking at the outline of his cock behind his briefs and wanting so badly to take it between her lips and to lick it, to taste the heat and the warmth inside of her. God she wanted to make him feel as amazing as he made her feel. She rubbed it with her index finger, tracing the length of his cock and looking up at him.

  “Why are you so cruel?” She asked him with her large, doe eyes.

  He ran his fingers through her dark, crimson hair and she loved the strength of his hands. Kheem was the son of Raffu, an aged, tired man who was no longer interested in the politics of the Clans. He would sit in the meetings and just nod when someone asked for his agreement. Kheem would be the head of his clan one day, but until then, there was no way that he would ever be an alpha that she could submit to.

  She wanted him so badly, but as long as she was the head of her own clan, King Ronald would never let her have him. It was the worst feeling in the world to be refused the love and the companionship that you longed for.

  She looked up at him and stuck out her tongue, the tip of her tongue touching his cloth clad penis and tracing it as she slowly stood up. When she reached the tip of his cock, she started kissing his stomach, feeling the abs beneath his shirt with her lips and kissing him all the way up to his neck and until she was kissing his earlobe. He smiled with bright, beaming white teeth as he closed his eyes and leaned his head against the wall. His hands were clamped down on her arms and she liked feeling that strength pushing through her. She wanted him. She wanted all of him. She couldn’t wait for King Ronald to finally see he was worthy of her. He was tired of waiting for his aged father to abdicate his position. One day, they
were going to run away together if they had to endure this much longer.

  “I want you to be my surrogate,” Kheem said with his deep, low voice.

  Pulling away from him, Josie looked at him and stared at the tranquil features of his chiseled face. There was a peace in his face that made Josie feel nervous. The lust and the ecstasy that he’d just unleashed upon her dried up and she felt the sobering reality of what he just asked her.

  It was wrong on so many levels. He wasn’t an alpha, which meant that he couldn’t find a surrogate. He couldn’t demand that from her and that was something that would get him in serious trouble with Raffu. He could petition Raffu to take her as a surrogate, but that was the beginning of problems that no one wanted to deal with. Josie wasn’t willing to be Raffu’s surrogate and even if she were, how would she ever be able to face Kheem?

  But they would need King Ronald’s blessing and she knew that King Ronald still had a thing for her. He had constantly hinted at the desire for her to have his eighth child and heir, but Josie wasn’t interested in having his child. She wanted Kheem’s child and if King Ronald hadn’t been satisfied by her, then he was definitely not going to let an heir apparent to the clan leadership of the Panthers take her as a surrogate.

  No, that wasn’t going to happen. But even if for some reason King Ronald agreed with letting them conceive a child, then they would have to wait for the Hunters on Warco to get back to them and tell them whether or not they thought it was okay for another Shifter to come into the world.

  This was rarely offered and only after there had been a long period of peace and very few other Shifters born in the time period. Both of these boded ill for the two of them. In fact, there was nothing that made Josie think that this was a smart move. But, that wasn’t something she really cared about.

  She looked at Kheem and knew there was something inside of her that was hacking through all the logic, all the nagging doubt, begging her to listen. Josie didn’t like to think of herself as an emotional person. In fact, she liked to think of herself as a very stable and strong person who didn’t need to be scared of her emotions. They were in check all the time, but sometimes they popped up. Sometimes they demanded they be heard. Now was one of those times.

  “I don’t know,” she said, conflicted to her very core about the thought of being in trouble by everyone.

  She was beloved by most of the other clans and Kheem was seen as a good guy. The Jaguars hated him for the old war that they had been engaged in, but that was it. She was certain that if Ronald found out about the child, he would be furious in the moment, but he would come around. They might be able to do this. They might be able to get away with everything if they were smart enough.

  “It’s risky,” she said, knowing that her heart wasn’t set on anything, nor would it be for a while.

  “I want to have an heir,” Kheem said with an honest, transparent voice.

  It was a voice of a man who was genuinely opening up to her, wanting her to see the truth inside of him. She wanted to know all of his thoughts and feelings. He was a mystery to her, even though they knew everything about each other. They had spent enough quiet nights together or quick trysts to know each other better than anyone else in their lives, but he was still a wonderful enigma to her.

  She loved that about him and she was always going to love that about him. It was something that drove her wild beyond all the words she could think of. It was impossible to put her finger on it.

  “I want an heir with you and I know that the surrogacy process is long, but I want to try for it. I want to have you and a child with you.” Kheem said in a smoky voice that made her melt like butter in his presence.

  “They’ll never give it to us,” Josie said to him with all the truth and honesty she could muster. He knew it too. She could see it in his dark eyes; the darkness of the room couldn’t hide it. She ran her hand over his chest, standing close to him. “Give me some time to think about it,” Josie said after a moment.

  Chapter 2

  “You got big plans tonight?” Karen asked Josie with the kind of light, friendly personality that Josie envied from her.

  Karen was the kind of woman that Josie would kill to have at the Tiki, but she was over at the Luxario, working for Josie’s rival in the industry. Karen had the charm and the personality that everyone wanted in their staff at a bar. There was something magnetic about her and the way she effortlessly made people talk and feel comfortable was something to envy. But, the Luxario was her first hire and Karen was loyal. That was something that was both incredibly infuriating and respectable to Josie.

  “Nah,” Josie said, stirring her overly fruity drink and staring across the courtyard to the Tiki where she hoped she could get a glance of Kheem, but there wasn’t much hope. She was hopelessly smitten by him but it was important to the two of them that no one found out about it. So she looked back at her drink and stirred it methodically, staring at the fruit speared on the plastic sword. “How about you?” Josie asked Karen.

  Karen had been a culinary star in America where she’d been rising through the finest spirits establishments and gin joints only to end up at the Royal Palace after her husband died. She had since been dedicated to her craft and was constantly getting interviewed by foodies and journalists in the industry.

  They wanted to know why so many people were coming to the small island of Tarobi in the Caribbean to have a drink from her. The praise and the attention were definitely deserved and Josie wished she’d ended up at the Tiki. Having Karen around after a long night at the bar was a dream come true.

  “I’m here until closing,” Karen scrunched up her nose and gave a little shrug. “Beatrice has Chloe though, so no playing for the rest of the night. I’ll probably head home and open a carton of ice cream with her.”

  “She’ll still be awake?” Josie furrowed her brow.

  “Oh yeah,” Karen grinned, thinking about her daughter. “She wakes up the moment I come home. She can hear the door and boom, she’s up.”

  “That’s sweet,” Josie grinned at the thought of having a little, tiny person at home waiting for her.

  That wouldn’t be such a bad thing. That would be something she could actually get onboard with. What would it be like to have a child who was totally dependent and eager to see you? It was like you were both their slave and their god. She shook her head at the thought of it.

  “Karen, did you guys plan Chloe or was she a surprise?” Josie asked her.

  If Karen hadn’t been one of her closest friends on the island, there was no way she would ask such an upfront question. But they were close friends and it seemed like Karen was the best person to get an opinion from. Karen looked at her and then stared at the ceiling, diving into her memories and drudging up the thoughts that were escaping her.

  “You know, I think we both wanted to have a child,” Karen said with a nostalgic grin on her face. “But, I don’t think either of us were really expecting it seriously when I took the test and found out, you know? Like, it was real at that moment and we’d just been flirting with the idea up until then. It was really a powerful moment. So, honestly, I think it was a surprise for the both of us. Like a good surprise, you know? I hate it when people say they’re children were accidents.”

  “Yeah,” Josie could agree with that.

  No one accidentally gets pregnant. She’d been safe up until this moment, mostly because Shifters had a control over their pregnancies. She knew it was intense, fast, and brutal. Shifters had their children quickly and the sex was supposed to be immensely powerful and the sensitivity was supposedly unimaginable. She was actually nervous to give into it. She was nervous about the thought.

  Earlier today, she’d checked her schedule and saw that there was definitely a window of opportunity for her to take some time off. The pregnancies lasted around two to three months and she had more than enough vacation time and she could get someone to cover her job. She could just fake an illness or claim that she needed to go awa
y for a family matter.

  While King Ronald and some of the other clan leaders would find that suspicious, it wouldn’t be suspicious enough for them to question it. She looked at the starry sky and didn’t know where she was anymore. She was so conflicted and scared about this.

  “All right,” Karen said, coming back from helping a customer and looking at Josie. “What’s going on? You’ve got that lost and lovely look that I hate,” Karen pointed one of her manicured fingers at Josie’s face. Jose grinned and blushed at the sight and shook her head.

  “I don’t know,” Josie shrugged. “There’s a guy I really like and he wants to take the next step.”

  “Do you like this guy?” Karen asked her, making a drink without even having to look at it.

  “Yeah,” Josie said with a beaming smile instinctively spreading across her lips as she thought about the man that had swept into her life like a distant wind.

  He’d brought such passion and romance to her life that she didn’t know what to do with all of it. She knew they were in a state of change right now and things couldn’t stay this way forever. In fact, there was definitely going to be a point where they were going to have to settle down and figure out what it was that actually had transpired between the two of them. She didn’t feel scared about finding the answer to that particular mystery, but she was afraid of losing him. She wanted to keep him with her forever.

  “Do you love him?” Karen asked, her voice a little hushed for the dramatic effect that she was so good at capturing.

  Josie laughed at the sound of her voice and the look in her eyes. “I think so, actually,” Josie said.

  “Then stop playing around,” Karen said with a serious and somber voice. “Life is way too short for games and it’s way too short to play around with things that are important to you. You should get serious about this if you think he’s worth it. But if you don’t, stop wasting your time. He’s not worth it if you don’t think he is.”