Excerpt of Let Sleeping Demons Lie by Maree Anderson

Brennan inhaled, testing the breeze. He was a Lion Prime, that most alpha of alphas, and his humanoid body reacted instantly to the scent. He shifted into his Beast form, shed the ragged remains of his clothing, and was racing toward the tree-line before his brain even finished processing what he'd scented. Female. Lioness. Of impeccable lineage. In heat...

His blood sang with the need to claim her.

Her scent filled his nostrils, soaked through his skin, poured through his veins in a heady rush more potent than any drug humans could concoct. Her unique essence coated his tongue, and he savored her--bitter-sweet and richly seductive as the Dutch chocolate that was his secret vice. The taste of her exploded in his mouth, and he swallowed her down, took her inside him, absorbed her very being.

Pakhet's paws! If her scent was anything to go by, she would be an outstanding creature.

She'd thrown herself to the Lions, and it would be a race to get to her first. A race he intended to make sure he won.

He roared a challenge to other leonine Primes who were even now tracking her and closing in on her position. But instead of a higher-pitched roar from the female in answer to the claim he'd staked, there was nothing. Silence.

Brennan slowed his headlong rush to a lope. Whiskers twitching, all senses on hyper- alert, he followed his nose, his powerful body wending through the underbrush. He paused to scent the air, confirming what he already knew.

He was first to arrive.

He padded toward the clearing, supremely confident of his welcome despite the fact that the female hadn't answered his call. He was a Lycan Prime. No matter what form he chose, Beast, Were-Beast or humanoid, he was a magnificent specimen. Irresistible. Any female would be privileged to mate with him.

And here was the privileged female. She'd opted for her vulnerable humanoid form and, like a trusting child, curled up beneath a tree--asleep, apparently.

But not for much longer.

Brennan scented five males closing in. He shook his heavy mane, began with a low rumble which segued to a full-throated deafening roar as he staked his claim to all comers.

The female was his.

For as long as he wanted her.

He waited, still and alert, forelegs planted wide, shoulders hunched high, hoping one of the approaching Primes might be terminally stupid enough to interfere. A good battle would do even more for his mating drive. But the males knew from experience exactly what Brennan was capable of. They backed off and left him with the prize.

Brennan switched his full focus back to the female. Given the strength and duration of his roar, he expected her to have already shifted to her Beast form. She should be wide awake and waiting, lying on her belly with her butt in the air, flaunting her sex. Willing. Wet. Quivering with the need to take him within her body.

She hadn't stirred.

This was more than mere sleep. Had she been drugged and deposited here for who knew what twisted reason?

Brennan was Prime enough that he could dampen the sexual haze of the mating imperative and refuse to succumb to it. He wasn't that far gone. Not yet.

He analyzed her scent again. It was so tantalizingly similar to a true Lycan Lioness that it would fool most. But not him. He stroked her mind with his, probed deeper and assessed her aura.

She was Other but just what flavor, he had no idea.

Not Angel--pure or fallen. He'd had the misfortune to encounter both in the past, and he'd been limp-dicked as a Demon male the rest of the day!

There was no trace of animal blending with her aura, not the slightest hint of a primary form. So nor was she Demon. Not that he would bother to toy with one of their females. He might have a powerful sex drive, but he wasn't that desperate.

Could she be human?

He discarded that startling notion instantly. Not even a Damned human female, who'd been indoctrinated to the Dark Arts from the cradle, possessed the ability to replicate this scent. And although humans might intentionally visit the Demon Realm from time to time, none had ever dared breech the Lycan Realm.

Her scent mantled him, seeping into his pores, fizzing through his veins, and all thought of taking the female to his mother and dumping the entire mystery in her royal lap was smothered by more pressing concerns. Like the heavy tightness in his scrotum and the almost unbearable stiffness of his cock. Like the desire to plant his seed in her, fuck her until she quickened and ripened with his young.

Whoa there! The pheromones she was giving off were seriously messing with his head. No way would he intentionally impregnate an unknown quantity. But fucking her? That was a whole 'nother issue.

First, he would find out if she had drugs in her system.

Her limbs twitched. She shivered, curled up in an even tighter ball, the vulnerable knobs of her spine curving as she burrowed her head deeper in the crook of her arm, her face completely obscured by the thick, ebony mass of her hair. Her buttocks reminded him of a ripe peach. Her pouting nether-lips, rosy and glistening, invited him to lick and suck and lap.

He prowled toward her, sniffed her sex, swiped his rough tongue over her slit, tasted her.

Her taste exploded on his tongue. Sweet Pakhet! He took a deep breath, inhaled her unique aroma. Ahhh. Delicious.

And although she was ovulating, it hadn't been mating-induced, for he could detect no other male's scent mingling with hers. Nor could he detect any sign of drugs. The only taint he identified was one of extreme physical exhaustion.

She might not be what he expected, but she'd sure put him in the mood. Given the way she smelled, unconscious or not, she was in the mood, too. And Brennan was just the Lycan to give her what she wanted.

He shifted to his humanoid form and crouched behind her, ran a hand over her hip and down the length of her thigh, her skin--so pale, so smooth. Silky soft.

Gently, he uncurled her limbs and rolled her over on her back to admire her. He supposed her face was what humans called classically beautiful. But with her eyes closed and no emotion animating her features, she reminded him of a porcelain doll. A rather tragic porcelain doll, if one considered the bluish bruises beneath her eyes.

The rest of her was a sweet little package. She was more rounded than the tightly muscled, athletic females of his kind--not plump, merely sleekly curved. Her breasts were more than a handful, even given the size of his hands. Voluptuous, with dusky, jutting nipples just begging him to suckle. But enticing as her tits were, he knew what he wanted.

And he would take it. She was female, in heat, unmarked. The laws of the Realm decreed that Brennan had every right to mate with her.

He growled deep in his throat, anticipating the pleasure of seducing her to wakefulness and then sheathing his aching cock in her feminine flesh. And as he devoured her with his predatory gaze, he knew that no law yet written would stop him from fucking her.

Her body unconsciously responded to his need, and her sex wept for him, a creamy coating begging him to taste. He spread her thighs, buried his nose in her folds and inhaled.

She was the best thing he'd ever smelled.

Slipping his hands beneath her ass, he tilted her hips to open her more fully. He lapped and laved, suckled. Feasted.

Her stomach muscles rippled, and her thighs clenched about his head. She moaned.

He grinned and nipped her clit, hands tightening on her hips when she bucked. “You're awake. Good.”

Her eyelids fluttered, flew open, her gaze bemused and dazed. With a noticeable effort she focused on him, and her body stiffened. Her eyes narrowed, flashing searing emerald-green fire. “Get. Your. Hands. Off. Me.”

He sat up, still idly stroking her clit as he watched and analyzed the expressions flitting across her features.

Awareness. Desire...

Fury.

He read her intentions in the tensing of her muscles. He allowed her to launch herself at him, delighting in her sass even though his hands were abruptly full of spitting, clawing, altogether far-too-desirable female. He caught her hands before she could blood him with her sharp nails, hauled her to her feet and backed her against the trunk of the nearest tree.

She loosed a shriek worthy of a Banshee and tried to knee him in the balls.

Unsuccessfully, of course. She was a rank amateur when it came to combat and telegraphed her every move. Before she could even squeak, he had her right where he wanted her, arms stretched above her head with her wrists shackled by his hand, thighs spread wide to accommodate his big body. “Mmmmm. Feisty. I do like my females lively. They taste so much better that way.” He pressed his groin to the juncture of her thighs.

She froze.

“Go on,” he purred, leaning in to sniff her neck and lick the delicate skin beneath her ear.

“Fight me some more.”

Her eyes widened as the truth of her situation smacked her. Her body was pinned by his, her feet dangling off the ground. He'd imprisoned her hands with one of his, but the other cupped her ass. If she so much as twitched her hips, he would be inside her.

She struggled to control her breathing, shivering as his lips moved lower to trace her collarbones before dipping to her breasts...

Her scent flared, intensifying as he licked her nipple.

His own scent poured from him in waves, mingling with hers, goosing their naked skin with the fierce command to slake their desires.

And he knew she desired him. He smelled it, tasted it beading on her skin. He heard it in the abrupt hitch of her panting breaths as he drew her nipple fully into his mouth, rolling it around his tongue, teasing it until it swelled and engorged like a ripe cherry. He noted it in the sweetly pink blush of arousal painting her pale skin as he turned his attention to her other breast. He felt it in the heat of her cleft, in the creamy wetness of her feminine flesh against his skin. He grinned, knowing he was Prime, knowing no female in her right mind could resist him.

He left off suckling to gaze at her, expecting to see her features glazed with desire and lust.

She huffed a breath through her nostrils. “Hurry up then. Fuck me already! I've got important things to be getting on with.”

He blinked at this unlikely response. “Like what?”

“Like figuring out how I got here and where the hell I am.”

Somehow, Brennan reversed the blood flow from his cock and re-circulated it round his brain cells. “You don't know where you are or how you got here?”

She impaled him with a glare his mother would be proud to call her own. “Duh. Isn't that what I just said? Add to that, I haven't a clue where my clothes are or why you think you have the right to pounce on me. Where I come from we...” She caught her lower lip in her teeth. “Where I come from-- oh, hell! I can't seem to remember where I come from.” She laughed, but it was a forced, uneasy sound. “Wherever, we don't pounce on each other without an invitation. Okay?” She tried a fierce frown on for size and thrust out her lower lip, reminding him so much of a young cub trying to make like a big bad cat that he had to bite his tongue to keep from laughing.

“Okay.” Yeah. Riiight. Didn't matter where she came from. So long as there were horny males and sexy little feminine packages like her, there would be pouncing going on. It was the nature of the male beast. “And just so you know, you're in the Lycan Realm.”

“Oh.”

She barely reacted at all, like mention of the Lycan Realm didn't mean anything to her. He would pretty much bet his tail she hadn't a clue what Lycans were either. Lucky she hadn't come to when he'd tasted her in Beast- form, or she would have freaked!

“So what's with the whole running round naked thing?” she asked. “You guys get off on flaunting your bits, huh?”

“Yep. See anything you like in particular? I'm more than happy to let you get up close and personal.”

A crimson flush bloomed on her neck, creeping up to paint her cheekbones. But given the mixed signals she gave off, whether the blush was embarrassment or lust was hard to tell.

“What's your name?” he asked, genuinely intrigued.

“It's--” Her brows kit in a perplexed frown. “I can't seem to remember that rather pertinent fact, either. Guess I must have knocked myself silly or something.”

Oh yeah? Like that explained anything. “My name's Brennan,” he said.

“Oh. Thanks... I guess.” She ducked her head, but not before he'd seen that lickable lower lip wobble and detected the tiny sniff of a female obviously trying not to cry.

And just like that, all Brennan's protective male instincts grabbed him by the balls and started yammering in his ear.

Shit. With a heartfelt sigh, he eased away from her so that he could set her on her feet. He was Prime. No way could he fuck a female in trouble--a vulnerable female who couldn't even remember her own name. His painfully hard cock-stand was gonna have to take a temporary vacation until he got this sorted. “Don't cry, Kitten. We'll figure out who you are and where you came from, and then I'll get you back where you belong. I promise.”

Her chin lifted. Her green eyes, luminous with tears, peered up at him through the curtain of her hair. “You're not going to fuck me?”

He grinned. “I wouldn't say that. I'm just not going to fuck you right now.”