Animal Instincts

By Jaci Burton

A sexy, standalone novel from the New York Times & USA Today bestselling author of the Play-by-Play series and Hope series.

Moonlight Madison's life is way too full for a relationship. Attending veterinary school and volunteering at a vet clinic by day while working as a dominatrix by night leaves no room for men. A submissive at heart, she hates her job, but it pays the expensive tuition bills. If only she had the time to find a dominant man to cater to her every fantasy.

Blake Hunter knows exactly what Moonlight needs. A strong man to bring out the animal in her. Because he knows a secret about her—a secret she isn't even aware of. He's going to reach right into her heart and soul to unleash the beast that only he knows lives hidden deep within.

One animal can always spot another. It's instinct.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jaci Burton, Inc
• Release date: Apr 6, 2005
• ISBN: 9798201061432

Book preview

Other Titles by Jaci Burton

PLAY-BY-PLAY NOVELS

The Perfect Play

Changing the Game

Taking a Shot

Playing to Win

Thrown by a Curve

One Sweet Ride

Melting the Ice

Straddling the Line

Quarterback Draw

All Wound Up

Hot Holiday Nights – A Novella

Holiday Games – A Novella

Holiday on Ice – A Novella

Unexpected Rush

Rules of Contact

The Final Score

HOPE NOVELS

Hope Smolders

Hope Flames

Hope Ignites

Hope Burns

Love After All

Make Me Stay

Don’t Let Go

Love Me Again

WILD RIDER NOVELS

Riding Wild

Riding Temptation

Riding on Instinct

Riding the Night

ANTHOLOGIES

Unlaced

Exclusive

Laced with Desire

Nauti and Wild

Nautier and Wilder

Hot Summer Nights

SPECIALS

The Ties That Bind

No Strings Attached

Wild Nights

Rescue Me

Nothing Personal

Unwrapped

Dare to Love

Unraveled

SINGLE TITLES

Wild, Wicked, & Wanton

Bound, Branded, & Brazen

Animal Instincts

Bite Me

Dolphin’s Playground

Dream On

Garden of Eden

Hands On

Lycan’s Surrender

Magnolia Summer

Midnight Velvet

True Lies

Animal Instincts

By

Jaci Burton

Animal Instincts

All Rights Reserved ©2005 by Jaci Burton

ISBN: 978-1-946535-21-4

Cover by Designs By Dana

eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Published by Jaci Burton

Praise for Jaci Burton

A STALWART IN THE ROMANCE GENRE. —USA Today

A wild ride. —#1 New York Times bestselling author Lora Leigh

Jaci Burton delivers. —Cherry Adair, New York Times bestselling author

As always, Jaci Burton delivers a hot read. —Fresh Fiction

Burton is a master at sexual tension! —RT Book Reviews

One to pick up and savor. —Publishers Weekly

Contents

Other Titles by Jaci Burton

Copyright

Title Page

Praise for Jaci Burton

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

About Jaci Burton

Chapter One

Moonlight Madison looked out the window of the Whipped Cream BDSM Club’s changing room, her gaze captured by the cheerfully bright orb in the sky.

A full moon. The fog rolled in from the ocean, slinking its way under the Golden Gate Bridge to blanket the city. San Francisco, a full moon and a thick fog on a Friday night could only mean one thing—all the weirdoes would be in here tonight, looking for her to beat, whip and otherwise subjugate them to her whim.

Oh, joy.

After dressing in her uniform, she shoved her street clothes into her locker and pushed the metal door shut, trying to mentally prepare for the night ahead of her.

It was just a job, she kept reminding herself. It wasn’t who she really was. Not even close.

The room was blissfully quiet, giving her a few minutes to ready the switch from average girl mode to bitch-dominatrix. Which was damned hard to do considering she didn’t have a sexually dominant bone in her body.

Wasn’t there one goddamn alpha male left in this town? Just once she’d like to meet a man who’d take charge and have his way with her no matter how much she objected.

If she didn’t need the money so damn bad, she’d get out of this profession. Being a dominatrix by trade and a submissive in reality wasn’t fulfilling in the least. Her bank account, definitely. Her sex life…

…Yeah, right. What sex life? She worked every night at the club, raking in more money than she could ever imagine. Money she needed, too. During the day she worked at the veterinary clinic and attended veterinary school part-time.

If she could afford it, she’d go to school full-time. But being on her own and having no financial support meant she had to continue working at the club, the only place she could earn enough money to pay for school.

It’d be worth it in the long run. She didn’t even mind attending the summer session at school. It was a way to catch up and it wasn’t like she was missing a social life or anything. She never vacationed so she might as well be in school while everyone else took the summer off to travel. Besides, as long as she stayed around for school, she could work here at the club. Eventually she could quit this job and do what she really wanted to do. And maybe, just maybe, find time to have sex with someone who wasn’t a submissive wimp begging her to flog him because he’d been a bad boy today.

The thought of having to spank an endless round of pasty, flabby asses repelled her. She stuck her tongue out at the full-length mirror, shaking her head at the getup she wore for this job. Admittedly, black was her color. Good thing, since it was the uniform of the day here. Her silvery blonde hair was pulled high on top of her head in a ponytail, secured by a black leather band. Her face was painted with deep purple eye shadow and false eyelashes so long they brushed her brows. A little over the top, but her customers liked it that way. And the vibrant colors of the shadow did make her eyes seem a very vivid blue. Couple that with almost black lipstick and she was all set for the full moon.

Hell, she should go outside and howl. That might bring in a few extra customers tonight. She sure felt like howling. Maybe that would release some of the pent-up anxiety she’d felt lately.

She snickered at the thought of walking outside in her thigh-high leather boots with four-inch heels. The black PVC corset and way too tight matching panties revealed way more of her ass-sets than she would ever think of showing outside the masquerade of the club. Then again, in this part of town nobody’d bat an eyelash. Besides, she did what the club paid her for. This was her road to finishing up her studies and she’d do whatever she had to.

Truthfully, it wasn’t so bad. None of the customers were allowed to ask for sex. It was against club rules and her rules. She wanted to choose her own bed partners, and they sure as hell would never be the kind of men she catered to here.

No, she wanted a real man. An animal. Someone to dominate her.

She’d about given up on finding one. Besides not having time to date much, men were so…considerate these days. So afraid to even touch, let alone ravage. And dammit, she didn’t want a man to ask permission to fuck her, she wanted to be taken.

Mistress Moon, your first customer is here. Would you come to the front desk please?

She sighed at Susan’s voice on the paging system and opened the door of her private chamber, heading for the lobby to pick up wussy customer number one for the night.

Your dominatrix for the evening, Mistress Moon, will be with you shortly.

Uh-huh. Thanks. Blake Hunter paced the small, low-lit reception area of the Whipped Cream and waited for her, not quite able to believe that this was the place Moonlight Madison worked at night. The ambience was dark, with cherry wood furniture, wall sconces that emitted subtle lightning and soft, sensual music. Quite a change from the brightly lit, always loud vet clinic where he normally saw her. What was she doing at a BDSM palace?

His answer came in the form of a luscious, silver-haired goddess swaggering down the hall, looking nothing like she did at the clinic. There, she wore casual clothes, her hair pulled back and very little makeup. The bombshell walking down the hall was a completely different person.

Dressed entirely in black PVC leather, she strutted every inch of her goddess-like body in stiletto thigh-high boots, her silvery-blonde ponytail swinging from side to side as she approached. Full breasts swelled and threatened to spill over the top of the corset.

The closer she got, the more pronounced her frown became. Did she recognize him? Did she sense the same thing he did? Or was she really as clueless about what was inside her as he thought? If she knew, she’d have sought him out, he was sure of it.

The only reason he came here was because he didn’t want to approach her at the clinic, and didn’t want to scare the shit out of her by showing up at her apartment. He’d been watching her for a long time now. Since the first time he walked into the clinic all those years ago, he’d picked up her scent and realized there was more to Moonlight Madison than he’d ever guessed. And every time he saw her, he became more convinced she didn’t have a clue about him, or about herself.

She stopped in front of him, her head tilted slightly as she scanned his body from head to toe.

The movement exposed her neck, one of his favorite parts on a woman. So tender, so sensitive, it aroused him just thinking about possessing that slender column of flesh, burying his teeth in her nape and holding onto her as he fucked her. The creamy expanse of her throat would look nice with a collar around it, too. As long as he held the leash.

He inhaled her sweet scent, thankful she hadn’t tried to mask it with one of those cloying perfumes women sometimes wore.

You’re Blake Hunter. From the clinic.

He wasn’t sure she’d acknowledge that she knew him. Yeah.

Figures, she mumbled low enough that the average person wouldn’t hear. Then again, he wasn’t an average person. He also wondered what she meant. She looked disappointed. As many times as he’d been to the clinic to pick up medicine for the refuge, he’d never spoken directly to her. She was always in the background doing something and his dealings had usually been with the receptionist or the doc. But he’d seen her. Knew she volunteered there and went to vet school part-time.

He still couldn’t get over the transformation. Her typical worn blue jeans and an oversized T-shirt were night and day different from the sex bombshell getup she wore now.

Not that he minded her current attire. Either way, she excited him. A helluva lot