The wolf pushed forward before I could stop him.
I cupped the back of her neck and pulled her mouth to mine.
Not gentle.Not questioning.Hard and demanding, taking what I’d been thinking about all day whether I wanted to admit it or not.She gasped against my lips, and I swallowed the sound, tasting chamomile and honey and something sweeter underneath.
For a moment she went rigid.Then her hands fisted in my shirt and she kissed me back with a fury that matched my own.
This wasn’t tenderness.This was war.Her teeth caught my bottom lip, sharp enough to sting, and I growled into her mouth as I pulled her closer.The wolf howled triumph.Mine.Finally.MINE.
I deepened the kiss, my tongue stroking against hers, and she made a sound in her throat that went straight to my cock.Her body arched into mine, her breasts crushed against my chest, her hips pressing forward until she could feel exactly what she was doing to me.Her heartbeat raced under my hands, blood rushing hot beneath her skin.
More.The wolf demanded more.Push her down on the bench.Claim what belongs to us.Make her scream our name.
I broke the kiss before I could lose control completely.
We stood there, both breathing hard.Her lips were swollen, her cheeks flushed, her eyes bright with something between anger and arousal.Her hands were still fisted in my shirt.
“What the hell was that?”Her voice came out rough.
I didn’t have an answer.That wasn’t supposed to happen.The contract gave me her body on my terms, under my control.This hadn’t been controlled.This had been the wolf taking what he wanted, and I’d let him.
I stepped back.Put distance between us.
“Tonight,” I started, but the word felt wrong.Tonight was supposed to be about strip inspections and denied pleasure.About maintaining the power dynamic that kept this arrangement manageable.Not about kissing her like I was drowning and she was air.
The wolf snarled at my retreat.Go back.She’s OURS.
But I’d lost control.For one moment, the wolf had been driving and I’d been a passenger, and that couldn’t happen again.That was how people got hurt.That was how things fell apart.
“I should go.”My voice came out rough.
“You’re leaving?”Anger flashed in her eyes.“You come in here, you kiss me like that, and now you’re leaving?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Because I didn’t plan that.Because the wolf pushed too hard.Because for thirty seconds I wasn’t in control of my own body, and that scares me more than you ever could.
“Tomorrow,” I said instead.Then I left before she could demand answers I didn’t have.
In the hallway I pressed my palm to the wall and fought to steady my breathing.My heart was still pounding.My cock was still hard, aching with a need that had nothing to do with strategy and everything to do with the taste of her still lingering on my tongue.And underneath it all, a cold thread of unease was coiling through my gut.
I’d lost control.
The thought sat like ice in my chest.Control was everything.Control was how I’d survived the boarding school, the years of rebuilding, the climb from nothing to everything.Control was what separated men from monsters, strategy from chaos, power from weakness.
One kiss, and the careful distance I’d been maintaining had cracked.The wolf had pushed through, taken what he wanted, and I’d let him.Worse, I’d wanted to let him.Had wanted to push her down and claim her right there on the piano bench, consequences be damned.
That wasn’t the plan.She was a means to an end, a possession, a pawn in a game that had nothing to do with soft lips and defiant eyes and the way she’d kissed me back like she was trying to devour me.
I couldn’t afford to lose control.Not with her.Not with anyone.
I’d be colder in the morning.I’d remember why she was here, what she was for, what I needed her to be.The wolf would stay leashed where he belonged.
But tonight, alone in the dark hallway with her taste still on my lips, I wasn’t sure I believed it.
14
