Leon didn’t seem to notice.
Except… perhaps he did. Every now and then, he pushed his hair behind his ear. The move appeared casual, but Karl had noticed the way Leon did it when he was on edge about something.
Karl breathed in slowly, Leon’s warm, sweet scent hitting him like spring after snow. He stared hard into the steam rising from his mug.
This wasn’t smart. He hadn’t let himself touch anyone in years, except his pack. He hadn’t let himselfwantto. And now his skin was buzzing just from the nearness of another body. That didn’t feel safe.
The worst part? He didn’t know if he wanted to get away from it, or turn into it. To lean, fraction by fraction, until he could feel the press of warm skin against his.
He stayed very still instead. If he didn’t move, didn’t breathe too deeply, it would pass.
And then Leon shifted even closer. Just a hair, but deliberate.
Karl stopped breathing. The only sound was the rain hammering on the tarp and the soft, slow breaths from Leon beside him.
Leon said, low and calm, “Seems as if we’ve both got the same problem.”
Karl turned his head, warily.
Leon looked sideways at him, a smile ghosting at the corner of his mouth. “Perhaps we should do something about it.”
Chapter Thirteen
LEON
He hadn’t meant to say anything. He really hadn’t. Maybe it was the fact Karl smelled incredible. Or maybe Leon was just tired and dangerously horny from being around the sheer hotness that was Karl.
Whichever. The result was the same.
A muscle ticced in Karl’s jaw in response to Leon’s statement, and he looked at Leon as if weighing the situation like a tactical decision. But he didn’t move away. So Leon moved—careful, slow—until the side of his thigh pressed flush to Karl’s, and his hand brushed Karl’s arm.
Fuck. It was like being dropped into the middle of a storm, winds tearing him apart, lightning burning him up. The world narrowed to heat, pulse, sensation—his gut pulled and something strange and catastrophic swelled in his chest, like his heart didn’t know whether to break or detonate.
Karl jolted, like he’d felt it too. Their eyes locked. “What thefuckwas that?” Karl asked, voice rough.
Leon laughed breathlessly, trying to regain control over the situation. “Are cats and wolves like magnets or something—slam together and try to blow apart at the same time?”
For all he knew, that could be right, which would make sex with Karl a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and maybe not in a good way. More likely, though, it was tension finally snapping after days of stress and forced proximity.
Karl didn’t answer. His gaze dragged over Leon’s mouth, dark and intent, his breathing ragged. Whatever had just hit them, he wasn’t pretending it hadn’t. He just didn’t want to be distracted by it anymore.
Want surged through Leon, sharp and consuming, so fast it drowned everything else under raw, blinding hunger. He forced himself to move slow, deliberate, like stretching out after a punishing run, letting the heat settle into something he could control instead of being devoured by it. He set his mug aside with careful precision, and Karl did the same, though his hands didn’t look entirely steady.
Leon reached for him, tugging at the poncho he was wearing. “Want to take this off?”
He’d have preferred to undress Karl himself, a slow, tantalizing reveal of Karl’s body, but the fact Karl hadn’t replied to his suggestion made Leon want to be sure they were on the same page. He knew Karl’s body was ready—he could tell how primed he was—but Karl’s mind might disagree. Hell, for all Leon knew, he might have a mate. The thought was like a bucket of cold water being dumped over him, but then Karl gathered the yards of material in his hands and lifted it over his head.
Oh, Bastet.
Leon didn’t have to pretend not to look this time, to hide the jolt of hunger or the drag of his gaze. He just drank it in, the breadth of Karl’s chest, the long lines of muscle down his thighs. And the lazy curve of his cock, already half-hard. He was so goddamn beautiful, it was almost rude.
Leon’s removal of his own poncho was so desperate it was practically ungraceful. He flung it away from him, careless where it landed because he could see the hunger in Karl’s face as his gaze roamed Leon’s body. And then they were squirming to find a way of lying down that didn’t take either of them off the dry blanket under them. For an instant, they lay face to face, looking at one another. Leon was relieved to see Karl breathing as swiftly as he was.
Karl trailed his hand along Leon’s side. Not greedy, not grabbing, simply trailing lightly and leaving sensation in its wake, as if his skin were on fire. He’d thought Karl would be the type to go straight for the kill, but maybe he should stop stereotyping wolves because Karl’s fingers were just drifting maddeningly up and down until Leon was shivering with the need for something more.
They were still watching one another, Karl’s gaze intent as if he were cataloging Leon’s every reaction. Leon ran his hand over Karl’s chest, stroked down the warm skin of Karl’s stomach, tensing under his touch, until he wrapped his hand around Karl’s cock. Hot, heavy, andperfect.
Karl’s eyelids fluttered, and he let out a soft, broken sound, like a gasp that hadn’t quite made it all the way out. Leon swallowed hard.
