Tugging Adri’s shirt up to bare his ripped abs, Rafe sat back on his thighs to keep him pinned as he pulled the waistband of Adri’s sweats down to reveal his steel-hard, leaking length to the room.
“Doc, hurry the fuck up!” Adri snarled when he stared too long.
Rafe’s lips twitched in a smirk as he let his fingers shift to claws and traced one sharp tip down his length. “I won’t leave you like this at work this time. Not with so much at stake. But I told you if you wanted to touch me, you had to earn it, and you’re still being rude, kitten. So, no touch for you. You know what you need to do if you want that to change.”
Violence shone in Adri’s eyes. “What? You said you’d?—”
Before Adri could finish the thought, Rafe leaned down to pin his wrists to the floor and reached for his power, using it to flood pleasure into Adri’s balls. A sharp cry left Adri’s mouth as his back bowed and his cock jerked into empty air before shooting stripes of cum up his chest, untouched, with none of the build-up it would normally take to orgasm. It was instantand intense, but Rafe knew from experience it would also be ultimately unsatisfying because of that. It would leave him needy and wanting.
A whine left Adri’s mouth as his hips continued to try and jerk up against Rafe’s weight holding him down.
“Shhh, kitten. You were so good for me, coming like that.”
“Rafe,” Adri complained, voice soft. “I need.”
It was the first time he’d used Rafe’s name while they were intimate, and the aching desire in his chest became overwhelming as he looked down at his mate, but they didn’t have time for anything more. This had punished him as much as Adri. He’d just have to hope his ornery mate let them have what they both wanted once the night was through.
Pressing a kiss to Adri’s jaw, Rafe whispered he’d be right back before racing to grab a towel from the bathroom. Adri was still sprawled out on the floor, knees splayed and eyes closed when he returned. Gently wiping the cum from his skin, Rafe pressed a trail of kisses up his chest as he tugged Adri’s clothes back into place. His own cock was so hard he was starting to feel light-headed, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was taking care of his mate. Helping Adri to sit up, he reached for the glass of water on the nearby table and supported Adri’s neck as he helped him drink it.
He could see the moment the jaguar came back to himself because every muscle in his body tensed and his head jerked away.
“What’s wrong, kitten?” Rafe asked.
Adri glared at him.
“I’ll let you come properly next time,” Rafe promised, testing whether his mate was ready to admit this thing between them wasn’t going away.
“I don’t give a fuck about that.Youstill haven’t come. Are you just fucking playing with me? Do you even want me at all?”
Who knew his kitten had such sweetness in him? “Does this feel like I’m playing?” Rafe asked, grabbing Adri’s hand and pressing it to his zipper where the fabric was damp from how much pre-cum he’d been leaking.
“Then why do you never take your own pleasure when we’re together?”
“Because I need you to have zero doubt you want to give it to me, kitten.”
Adri huffed and pushed himself to his feet, heading to the bathroom. “I need to wash the smell of sex off me, and then we need to leave.”
Rafe wished he could follow suit, but he didn’t have anything to change into, and the smell of sex wasn’t coming out of these clothes without more time than they had to clean them. He wished he had Rocco’s ability to hide scents with his magic, but his power didn’t work that way. He’d just have to deal with every shifter around them knowing exactly what Adri was doing to him. At least everyone would know who he belonged to.
As soon as Adri stepped out of the bathroom clean and dressed, Rafe stepped in close, gripping his nape and rubbing his stubble up and down his sensitive neck while he slid his hands up the muscles of Adri’s back and generally did everything he could to make sure the jaguar was bathed in his scent.
“Fucking hell. Why don’t you just piss on me while you’re at it?”
“Is that an option?”
Adri slammed him against the nearest wall, gripping his throat hard as he snarled in his face, and Rafe held his hands up in surrender. “That was a joke. For real. Water sports aren’t my thing.”
Adri huffed in annoyance and stepped away, heading to the entryway without bothering to check that Rafe was following. Smiling to himself, Rafe followed after his mate. Adri was totally warming to him. Otherwise, he would’ve been sporting claw marks and a concussion after a comment like that.
The location of the fighting ring that night was a closed-down nightclub partway into Cruor Coven territory. While the Lunettis had taken over running the fights over a decade ago, they hadn’t tried to contain them to their own territory. There was more profit to be made by continuing to circulate the locations throughout the city.
They tended to make sure the vampire fighters were on the roster when they were in coven territory. That night’s fight was Adri’s six-foot-five vampire friend Jay versus a cougar shifter Rafe was unfamiliar with. It was rare to find a cougar in New Trinity, let alone the ring. They weren’t an aggressive shifter type as a rule, which made the fighting circuit in the city known for its violent inhabitants an unusual choice. This one was female and sticking to the shadows behind the bar as she waited for their match to be called. Her face revealed nothing as she focussed herattention anywhere but at the gathered crowd of bloodthirsty viewers.
“Who is she? I haven’t seen her before,” Rafe said when Adri checked in with him for the third time as he leaned against a wall, sipping at a shifter-strength whiskey.
The way Adri had continually looked to him and checked in on him as he went about his responsibilities as unofficial assistant manager and coach had left Rafe a combination of hopeful and horny.
“Indigo. She goes by Inferno in the ring. She’s another new one—a recruit rather than a debtor—but Viviana said she had solid references.”
