Two metal goals with energy magic making up the net were at each side of the field, and I could feel the electrical charge buzzing between them just standing in the middle of the field. A gust of wind swept through, making the blades of grass lean to the side, and a comfortable shiver rushed through me.
“Okay.” I slid my hands under the ball, and he let go. The heaviness of the solid sphere weighed down in my palms. I pulled it to my chest to help me support it with a small groan. “Oh, it’s really heavy.”
He chuckled, sweeping his hand through his long curls, and my chest tightened at the motion. “It’s made of marble.”
“Of course it is.” A brown blur caught my eye toward Bestial Forest. “Hey, Lachlan?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you see that?” I kept my gaze trained on the forest line as the squirrel ran across the edge.
“See what?” He turned back to look, but I burst into a sprint toward the right goal he had said was mine.
My shoes smacked against the grass as the wind pushed my hair behind me. The wind was working against me, messing with my momentum. Thankfully it seemed to be messing with him too.
As a shifter, I was fast, but as a fox shifter, I had more cunning when I ran.
Lachlan’s footsteps hit the ground behind me, and he was gaining on me quickly. Werewolves were innately faster, but he wasn’t light on his feet like I was.
I pushed my foot into the ground and propelled myself to the right before switching back and forth in an untraceable zigzag so he wouldn’t know which way I would switch. A burning seared through my thighs.
He let out a frustrated growl, and his fingertips barely brushed my hair.
I pushed myself faster, sucking in a lungful of air. “You’re not going to catch me!”
“Wanna bet?”
I was about ten feet from the goal when he caught up to me. My muscles cried out as I threw the ball toward the goal just in time.
Lachlan’s hands wrapped around my waist, and he drove us forward into the ground. He’d flipped us so I landed right on top of him, smacking our foreheads together.
Pain radiated through my skull as I sat up, my knees barely touching the grass below as I straddled him. Rubbing my forehead, I looked up to see that the heavy black ball had landed in the goal. “I made it!”
“You cheated,” he huffed under me.
I tilted my chin down and steadied myself by pressing my palms against his hard chest. “Hey, therewasa squirrel.”
He snorted and let his head fall back against the ground.
Leaning down, I let my fingertips glide up his hard chest and pushed them through his soft brown locks. “You have beautiful hair.”
He grinned, staring back up at me before reaching up and running his fingers through the length of mine. “So do you.”
Heat pooled between my legs as something hard poked against my thigh, and a rush of hotness spread up my neck. “I should get up.”
“You could.” He swallowed hard, and the desire in his brown eyes doubled the rising desire in me.
“I’ll help you with that, little bird,” Damien’s husky voice whispered before his shadows curled around my waist and chest snugly, lifting me off Lachlan. Another gust of wind blasted my hair wildly around as the shadows placed me on my feet next to Damien.
The shadows glided over my skin in a slow, teasing way, before slipping back around Damien. My skin tingled where his shadows had been, and my body heated.
Lachlan jumped to his feet and frowned at Damien. “You really had to ruin the moment?”
“What moment?” Damien tilted his head, smirking.
“You know what moment.” Lachlan pouted, crossing his arms. “There was a moment, right?”
I nodded, pressing my palms against my cheeks. “There was a moment.”
