This time his lips twitch. I’m sure of it. Almost.
“No sarcasm?” he asks.
I slide my fingers into his smooth, dark, still-wet hair. “You’re learning, Beta Sinta.”
He growls deep in his throat at the name I used to call him, when I was a conflicted prisoner and he was a stranger I didn’t understand. “That’sAlphaSinta to you, Princess.”
I laugh, shamelessly in love. “What about Husband?”
Griffin stops. Actually, I think he trips. He tenses, and his breathing turns fast and shallow, scaring me a little.
I grab his face and turn it toward mine. “Are you all right?”
He stares at me. His jaw hardens into marble under my hands, and his gray eyes flicker with hints of something explosive and unnerving. “Are you serious?”
“What?” I frown. “Um… Yes?”
His nostrils flare, and his stare turns blistering. “You say that now? You agree to marry menow, when I’m so bloodyangrywith you that I can barely hold on to my temper, and I don’t know whether to make love to you until I finally can’t see you lying there broken and bloody every time I blink, or to spank you senseless!”
My stomach had been spiraling viciously downward, but at “spank” I feel my eyes light up.
“And not in a good way!” Griffin practically shouts.
“You wouldn’t.”
“My hand is itching for your reckless little arse.”
“You were fine two seconds ago!”
“Iwasn’t!” Cursing, he sets me down behind a large rock. In no time, I’m completely naked, most of my clothes simply ripped right off. They were ruined anyway, but I still blink in shock. Griffin strips out of his own wet and bloody clothing as well. He looks like a God—hard, chiseled, powerful,livid—and I shiver with slightly wary excitement as I step into the almost-too-warm lake. Steam curls up my body, turning my skin damp and pink. Griffin prowls in after me.
Silt squishes between my toes as I move back. “If you try to spank me, Titos might eat you.”
He stalks me. Griffin’s arms hang loose at his sides, but his expression is shuttered and stiff. There isn’t an inch of him that’s relaxed.
I back up until I’m trapped by boulders and the water reaches my knees. When Griffin stops in front of me, his naked body, even vibrating with barely leashed anger, is too tempting to resist. I reach out and slide both hands down his sculpted torso, stopping only when my fingers dip into the indents near his hips.
The taut skin on Griffin’s lower abdomen twitches. He sucks in a breath. I sweep my hands toward his growing arousal, but before I can wrap my fingers around it, he grabs my wrists and forces them behind my back.
I look up. He looks down at me with such fierce intensity that my breath catches, and my heart starts to pound. In his severe expression, I see aggression that won’t hurt me, and love that will always heal.
Groaning like he’s in pain, Griffin drops to his knees in front of me and then cages me in an almost violent embrace. His beard rasps my stomach, and his harsh breathing sends a rush of sensation across my ribs. He stays there, his face buried below my breasts. I want to hold him, touch him, comfort him, but when I try to move, his grip tightens on my wrists. And so I stand there, my heart so full it hurts, staring at the tense line of his broad shoulders and the top of his dark head.
Griffin’s entire upper body eventually lifts on a deep breath. He tilts his face up and kisses the hollow between my breasts. The kiss is gentle and lingering, almost reverent, and something inside me heats and then melts. He turns his head and trails his lips over the inner swell of my breast. When his mouth closes over my nipple, a little earthquake trembles beneath my skin.
I restlessly shift my legs when Griffin sucks hard enough for me to feel the pull all the way to my core. Pleasure spikes, soaring through me, and I arch into him, already hopelessly aroused.
Slowly, Griffin drops back onto his heels. Still holding my wrists, he kisses a fiery path down my belly, stopping just above the apex of my thighs. Everything under his mouth tightens, throbbing with want.
“Cat?” His voice is rough. He doesn’t look up.
I’m still helpless and caged, and Iache, expectation leaving me coiled tight, needy, and panting. “Griffin?”
He pulls on my wrists. My back arches, and my pelvis tips forward to meet his lips. “Marry me.” He kisses me lightly and then more deeply, his tongue parting my folds for a long, slow caress. “Marry me soon.”
“Yes,” I answer, breathless.
Griffin makes love to me with his mouth until tremors shake me, and my legs quiver. “Is that ‘yes’ more of this, or ‘yes’ you’ll marry me as soon as humanly possible?”
