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  I was different from other women. Quiet. Solitary in nature. Aggressive when irritated. I’ve always put that down to my being adopted by older parents with whom I had nothing in common. My only close friend was Pinky. Unless I went out on a date, it wasn’t unusual for me to walk the craggy headlands or spend the night alone in my apartment reading, but tonight I couldn’t settle, couldn’t even sit. My blood seemed to be on fire and my bitten finger throbbed even though it no longer had puncture marks. My skin felt too tight for my body and I noticed it seemed to be peeling on my back and arms where I’d caught too much sun. A deep unsatisfied lust curled inside me and I cursed Michael. I knew it would be impossible to sleep so I pulled on my matching lacy bra and thong, my crop top and my wraparound skirt, left my apartment and headed toward Bondi Beach. The sound of the sea always soothed me and I so needed it right now. I walked down Curlewis Street, the main road toward Bondi Beach. The occasional car passed and I could hear the sound of my sandals slapping the pavement. I also heard a slithering sound. I stopped and looked behind me. Nothing.

  Shrugging, I moved on. Sometimes, when it’s a moonless night I take all my clothes off and bathe in the rolling waves. I needed to tonight; had to find a way to get Michael out of my system.

  I still had the feeling that someone was watching me and it hadn’t abated since I had astral-traveled. Sometimes I felt like screaming out, “Come on, show yourself.” Of course, even as I glanced again behind me, surveying the dimly lit street, there was no one there. I froze.

  Not anything human.

  On the footpath, a snake wove its way toward me. It was enormous, far bigger than a red-belly black snake or a brown snake, our Australian poisonous snakes. From its yellow, diamond patterns on a black body I knew it was a nonvenomous diamond python, the most glorious snake, the snake I’d kept as a pet when I was young and had no friends.

  I watched this snake in wonder as it moved toward me, yet I knew no snake would willingly slither its way down a street far from bush land. Though they strike with a swiftness and power I admire, snakes are shy creatures and don’t seek out humans. Even my own baby python had attacked me when it was new until it learned to weave its way around my body in a way that I found sensuous and exotic.

  My heart started to race and fear hammered my brain. It was coming for me, but before I could turn and run, it raised itself off the ground. Its head turned sideways and it looked at me through one eye then morphed into the shape of a man. A big, solid tanned man. Michael! He strode toward me, all six foot plus of perfectly honed and tattooed naked man.

  He held out his hand. “I’ve come for you, Gabby.”

  “Like hell you have.” I lashed out, striking and kicking, but Michael blocked my moves until I could punch no more.

  “Stop. Gabby. We need to talk.”

  “No, we don’t. We never need to talk.” I tried to run past him but he grabbed my arm. This time I bit him hard enough to draw blood.

  “I feel pain, Gabby, but for you I’ll take it. Are you finished?” he asked, his voice soft.

  I released my bite. “Wh-what happened back there.” I couldn’t—wouldn’t—believe what I’d just seen.

  “I’m a shifter and so are you.” Michael caught me in his arms. “Your change is coming and I won’t let you go through it alone.”

  “I’m not like you. I’m not,” I cried, determined to escape.

  “You like being alone except when you mate. You never fit into a group but you don’t know why. You’re tough. Strong. Unemotional.”

  “Let me go,” I cried, twisting and turning as terror consumed me. It couldn’t be true.

  He wrapped one huge arm around me, forced me back and pinned me against a shop wall with his body and took my chin between the thumb and forefingers of his free hand. “Already your skin is peeling. Soon you’ll develop a fever and your skin will shed from your body, leaving you in your other form. Do you really want to be alone when that happens?”

  I looked into his eyes and saw truth. Some passersby made kissing noises as they walked past toward the beach. The way Michael held me, they probably thought we were lovers.

  “It’s not possible,” I said in a small voice.

  “Watch this,” he said, peeling a sheet of skin from my shoulder down to my elbow. It didn’t hurt. Instead, under the skin was another membrane with a greenish-colored hue. Scales! I saw scales.

  I gasped.

  “Don’t be frightened. I’ve watched you for a long time but when you astral-traveled I knew you were ready for the change. I’ve come to guide you through it.”

  “It was you watching me.”

  Michael nodded. “Let me soothe you. Let me make your first change easier to bear.” The moment his lips touched mine, the sense of him, his very sexuality, ran like honey through my blood, calming the restlessness. I tried to focus, to find my anger, but it seemed to have dissipated with his kisses. His lips demanded a response and I kissed him back, my tongue playing with his. Michael pushed his hand inside my top to move aside my white, lacy bra and cup my breast, but when his mouth followed and his tongue found my nipple I groaned out loud.

  While he lathed my nipple, his fingers slipped down my body, under my skirt and into my underwear. I could smell the spicy smell of male sweat and dominance. I had a sense of slipping—of my mind holding clouds. His fingers slid inside me and moved along my slit until a fire started to build in the pit of my stomach. A groan started in the base of my throat as I rocked under his touch, my need urgent, yet he kept my orgasm just out of reach by lightening his touch.

  “All in good time, Gabby.”

  Disappointed, I had a vicious urge to bite him so I took his bottom lip in mine and bit down hard.

  He hissed.

  “Don’t think you can dominate me. It can’t be done.” My hands balled into fists and I lashed out, punching him on the jaw.

  Michael just laughed. He wrapped his arms tighter around me to stop my flailing fists, binding me with his body. He gripped my face, forcing me to look into his eyes. The pupils were slits. His gaze hypnotic.

  I tried to twist my face away. I could feel his rock-hard erection pressing against me and I wanted it. Needed him to satisfy my wild urge to mate. He was all around me, molding his body to his, and soon he would be inside me. I rubbed my aching breasts rubbed against his chest. Eyes heavy-lidded, I stared out into the night as he pleasured me with his lips, his tongue and his fingers.

  People walked past. I’d thought of having sex in public many times but had never had the guts to do it. A couple—a man and a woman—stopped on the footpath. The man stared blatantly while Michael licked the tip of my nipple and fingered me. I thought my legs would buckle from the pleasure of his touch.

  The man pulled his partner closer to watch us. Under heavy eyelids, I could see the lust on his face until she spoiled it for him by pulling her cell phone out of her bag and dragging him away. Was she ringing the police? The thought of getting caught thrilled me and horrified me at the same time.

  Michael’s finger’s centered on my clitoris, building my orgasm with experienced fingers, and I forgot about the woman.

  “Oh, that’s good.”

  Another passerby, a man, stopped and stared, his gaze fixed on Michael’s hand. The passerby’s own hand moved toward his crotch and he started to rub himself. I loved it that he stared at me with real longing.

  “You want this,” Michael whispered in my ear. “You
want men to see you wet and open. I am your mate. I can see into your mind. Every desire. Every fantasy is now mine to explore with you. I teach you to change and to change back into your human form. We’ll have so many adventures.”

  “Don’t think you can own me,” I said. I trusted no one and I valued my independence.

  “You are mine,” he growled. He continued to slide his finger over my clitoris so that I rocked with the movement of it, enjoying seeing my lust mirrored in the face of the watching male who was unzipping himself.

  “Please,” I gasped, wanting Michael, yet not wanting his threatening ownership. I groaned with delight as he slipped two fingers deep inside me and strummed my clit with his thumb.

  He turned around to see what I had been staring at. Several men walking on the pavement toward the beach had stopped and gathered to watch us. “Let them want you. I want to spread you wide and let them desire you as I take you. Every man will want to follow after me, but if they dare move forward I will crush them with my bare hands.”

  I believed he would and I admired him for his willingness to fight for me. He was that strong.

  He knelt at my knees and parted my legs. The tip of his tongue flickered at the apex of my sex through my underwear and my head flicked back, bumping against the shop door, but even the dull pain in my skull didn’t stop me arching toward his questing tongue. I realized that he intended to remove my underwear and lick me in full sight of the men. As he pulled my lacy briefs off, he threw them at the gathering men. The man who caught them buried his face in them and pulled at his cock. Another man snatched my briefs and brought them up to his face. Soon a fight broke out and I reveled in it.

  The tingling sensation of Michael’s tongue set every fine hair on my arms erect, until the sheer sensuality of it made me part my legs farther. Michael licked me, devoured my juices and shoved his tongue deep inside of me. I moved to his touch, straining to come as my orgasm gathered force. Finally when his tongue teased over the tip of my clitoris, I knew my orgasm was moments away.

  “Please,” I gasped.

  Michael had found the trigger to my total submission. His hot tongue began little circular motions around my clitoris until I whimpered with pleasure.

  My hands grasped his broad shoulders and I sank my nails in, knowing he was strong enough to take any pain I delivered. With him, I no longer felt cruel, but was a match for the power of his eroticism. Using his hands, he parted my thighs so that I was totally exposed to the now gathering crowd.

  I could hear their hoots and hollers as the men edged closer.

  Michael ate me as if he wanted to consume every part of me. When his hands moved to cup my bottom to bring me forward so his whole mouth covered my clitoris, I began to quiver with every stroke of his tongue. My hands moved to grasp his hair, my fingers pulsed with every lick until I came, screaming and crying. I could hear the men groaning their own release and it was the sexiest thing I’d ever heard as I came.

  Michael rose, all six foot four of him, and pressed me against the wall. With the other hand, he took the large head of his cock. Michael stared down at me, his expression hard. “You are my mate.” With that said, he pushed himself deep inside of me.

  For the first time, a man taking control of me thrilled and excited me so much that I raised my hips to meet his thrusts. Each thrust drove him deeper. He took me by the wrists and pinioned them above my head. It was the final signal of his heartless control, except when he leaned forward he nuzzled his cheek against mine. “All mine,” he repeated, until the words resonated in my mind and there seemed to be nothing left except him.

  Michael withdrew from me, turned me around, put his arm around my stomach, pushed me forward and slid back into me with long deep repetitive thrusts. Even to my own ears my breathing was loud as I felt my climax build again. He knew just where to aim, how deep to penetrate. He reached around and under me, taking my breasts in his hands. His whole consumption of me, his being in me, covering me: he was a hungry dominating creature.

  I pushed myself back, needing his full penetration, when I came and he gave me every solid inch. This time my orgasm was so intense it seemed to blot out my mind. I screamed and writhed. I felt I was splitting out of my body, but instead of pain, the pleasure was intense.

  As my orgasm died away I could hear sirens. The police were close.

  A strange tightening feeling consumed me as if I was about to burst out of my skin. I turned and realized that Michael was changing shape back into a python. His facial features seemed to dissolve and his arms shrank into his torso until finally he was in snake form on the ground in front of me.

  I looked around me. The group of men on the pavement had moved back, their faces masks of horror as they stared at Michael. I, too, wanted to run but the snake slithered around my legs and worked its way up my body before I could move. Terror gripped me. Whatever Michael had told me before didn’t make sense as my mind refused to accept I was a shifter. I wanted to scream but when I opened my mouth my tongue flicked out, long and forked. No sound emanated. My bones seemed to be dissolving as the large snake squeezed and molded me. I could feel my body changing, my arms and legs shrinking, and I sank to the ground, thrashing around. I couldn’t breathe. Panic consumed me, but just when I thought the air was crushed from my body the snake released me and I slid on the ground, my head and tail thrashing as I tried to work out how to propel myself forward without arms and legs.

  I looked around me and saw the crowd of men fall back, their faces masks of revulsion. I arched my back and rose up hissing. One man screamed. Another wet his pants. I would have laughed if I could have. I loved having power over men. Their fear was exhilarating. I experimented with moving my new body, loving its agility and strength. I finally understood why I was different to other women. So aloof.

  I was a shifter.

  “Come, Gabby. It’s time to leave. The police are nearly here.”

  I heard Michael’s voice in my head. He slithered ahead of me and I followed, moving my torso from side to side to gain traction as the men jumped on car hoods, anything to get away from us.

  No one stopped us. No one got in my way. Awe showed in the faces of the men on the pavement, but I no longer cared how men responded to me. Instead, I followed Michael, keen to be close and to feel his powerful body wrap around mine again. I’d never thought I was capable of having a mate.

  Until I’d met my match.

  * * * * *

  If you enjoyed this story, don’t miss Gabby’s first sensual adventure in Psychic Sex, available now from Spice Briefs…

  She loves the sense of power being a personal trainer gives her—not to mention the access to a seemingly endless stream of sexy men. But when her latest object of desire doesn’t rise to the bait, she’s forced to spend the night with a good book—all about astral projection. As she drifts off to sleep, she’s shocked to suddenly find herself having the wildest, most satisfying sex of her life—and it all seems so real…

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  ISBN: 978-14592-3560-1

  Shift Into Pleasure

  Copyright © 2012 by Carla Molino

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  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.