“Are you okay?” I reach up, fingers tangling in his fur. “What happened to you?”
“Ves’thrahk—” he stumbles slightly, corrects himself, and keeps running. “Need you—can’t wait?—”
Oh
He’s not okay. He’s barely holding on. I think whatever I was making. Whatever made he tasted on his finger is what caused this.
The heat in my belly coils tighter. My hips shift against him, and I feel how hard he is.
A whimper escapes before I can stop it.
“How much further?” I manage. He doesn’t answer, just growls and runs faster. The movement jostles me against him, friction and pressure in all the wrong,or right, places. My breath hitches.
“Andrik, slow down?—”
“Nai’thahk.” (Can’t stop.) His voice breaks. “Kai’lunaeth” (Your heat.)
I blink.Heat? Moon?
Why can I understand his words sometimes, and not others?
He’s trying so hard not to stop and take me right here in the snow. And maybe I’m a terrible person,because I kind of want him to.
“You’re not going to make it, are you?” I whisper against his throat.
He shudders hard.
“You’re drunk,” I continue testing him. “Whatever you tasted… is in your blood now, isn’t it?”
A sound rips from him, half-growl, half-moan.
“I can feel how hard you are,” I breathe. My hand slides down his chest, over the ridges of muscle. “Are you going to take me right here? Pin me to a tree and?—”
“Lumi!” My name is a warning, a plea.
“I want you so bad it hurts,” I whisper, and it’s true, every word I say. “Can you feel it? How much I need you?”
His steps falter for a second, but he just picks up speed. Snow kicks up around us. His heart is pounding so hard I can feel it against my chest.
“Almost,” he grits out in English, finally. “Almost there?—”
“What happens if you don’t make it in time?” I ask wickedly. “What happens if you lose control before we get there?”
“Thrahk. Ves lunaeth.”Fuck. Your heat.
“Tell me,” I breathe against his ear. “What will you do to me, Andrik?”
He makes a sound I’ve never heard before, broken and inhuman.
Light pulls my focus away. Blue flames erupt in a circle ahead of us, illuminating the forest floor.
He doesn’t slow down, just barrels straight through the fire; it doesn’t burn, just parts around us like water. He drops to his knees the second we’re inside.
I’m in his lap, straddling him. His hands are on my hips, claws prickling through the thin fabric of my shirt.
His eyes are wild. Pupils blown so wide they’re almost black. And his fur, pulsing with light, is so beautiful it steals my breath.
“Saelûn,” he rasps, forehead pressed to mine, panting and shaking. “I need—you have to?—”
