She looked back and stopped walking with the group. Her golden eyes flicked down to my mouth, then back up to mine. “You’re struggling,” she whispered, too quiet for the others to hear as they moved on ahead of us.
She wasn’t wrong.
I sucked in a ragged breath, staggering a few steps forward until I wasrightin front of her—drowning in her scent.
“You’re usually better than this, overachiever,” she teased.
I didn’t answer.
Icouldn’t.
My throat was too fucking tight. Not with just hunger, either.
She looked over her shoulder briefly, and the vein in her neck called to me.
My restraint snapped.
I moved.
It wasn’t an active thought. It was instinctual.
Need.
I pushed her back against the ravine’s rock wall before I knew I’d decided that I would. My hand had her wrists pinned above her head as I caged her in.
Our foreheads pressed together. We were close enough that I could feel the pulse in her jaw.
“Don’t move,” I growled, not caring if any of our squad had noticed us or not.
“You’re starving,” she said calmly. Like sheunderstood.
“You smell like midnight orchid and sweet blood,” I rasped. “And you keep walking around like you don’t know what you do to me.”
Venom beaded on her fangs, bright green. “I do,” she whispered. “But you haven’t lost control yet. So don’t now.”
“What the fuck, Dimitri?” Zuko’s voice snapped from somewhere left of us.
“Hold off,” Rune said softly. “He’s fine.”
“Rune can handle this,” Slater murmured. “I have a suspicion he’ll be a brother-mate.”
“Who won’t be?” Aura snorted. “You two think quite a few men will be.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” Zuko growled in warning. “Most supernaturals have multiple mates.”
“Oh, that’s right, they do,” she mumbled to herself.
I thought the wording was odd, but I didn’t care about that.
My fangs burned.
My hands shook.
My breath ghosted over her lips as I stared at the pulse of the vein in her neck.
“Let me taste you,” I begged, trying to compel her, but she wouldn’t maintain eye contact with me.I was desperate.“Just once. To ground myself. I can’t think straight.”
She tipped her chin, not baring her throat. “Give me my hands back.”
