Race went absolutely still.
“Give it to me,” Ash said, straightening her spine.
“Heart-fire.” Race’s hoarse voice descended to something dangerous and wild. “If you take that, there’s no going back. I won’t be able to stop?—”
She held his darkened gaze, popped the bottle, and swallowed the bitter liquid.
With a growl, he came for her like a predator breaking its chains. Ash barely had time to snatch up her pack before his arms locked around her, heat pouring through every layer between them.
The world shifted, and the room warped, darkness completely engulfing her as he dematerialized them.
Chapter
Thirty-Five
They reformedinside Kraevyr Peak’s cave, the air faint with woodsmoke and cool stone.
The moment Ash’s backpack hit the ground, Race had her against the cave wall, his control snapping like a wire pulled too tight. His mouth crashed onto hers in a kiss that was nothing but primal need—hot, demanding, desperate.
Cold granite pushed into her back, but Ash barely registered anything except the tearing of fabric before her clothes were ripped away, shredded like paper. He left her utterly bare, his clothed body like a furnace surrounding her.
“Hungry, are you?” she rasped against his mouth, trying for sarcasm, even as her breath hitched when his hand slid between them, fumbling with the zipper of his jeans.
The only answer was a deep, animalistic sound vibrating from his chest. Through their bond, his need hit her like a tidal wave. His pupils had slitted, with a thin crimson ring around black—a predator’s gaze. They fixed solely on her.
Breathing hard, she grabbed the bottom of his t-shirt. He ripped it right down the middle and flung it aside. His mouth closed over her mate mark, sucking hard enough that desireroared through her veins like unchecked flames, turning her blood molten.
God!Ash moaned, clutching his back. Beneath her palms, scales rippled across his skin, his talons scraping her hips as he lifted her off her feet like she weighed nothing. “Race, claws?—”
He growled, grabbed her wrists, and lifted her hands until they met the cold, heat-blackened metal bar jutting from the stone wall. The one she’d noticed her first time in the cave—once used by dragonkin for their daily lives, now repurposed in the most seductively primal way.
“Hold—” His voice was guttural, the command rough, dangerous.
Her heart hammered as her fingers curled around the bar. With his lower body, he pinned her against the granite surface, worn smooth by dragonfire, his eyes burning a perilous burgundy.
“Bossy bastard,” she gasped, even as her thighs clamped tighter around his hips, his scorching, jeans-covered length grinding against her folds. “Bloody hell, you’re burning up?—”
A snarl ripped free from him, cutting her off. He yanked his cock out of his unzipped pants, and then he thrust into her in a single stroke. She cried out, her head snapping back against the wall, the bar groaning under her weight as he filled her—too big, stretching her.
“Christ!” A groan broke from her throat as he withdrew and slammed into her again, harder, faster, the rut fever driving him past all semblance of his usual finesse.
He kissed her again, and it wasn’t soft. It was teeth and tongue and sheer possession. His fingers dug into the flesh of her thighs as his hips moved, plundering into her, fucking her against the wall.
Pleasure surged, amplified by the bond between them, turning everything sharper, rawer. Every thrust poured hisneed into her veins, feeding back into him, the loop growing unbearable.
“Race,” she whimpered, not even sure if it was a plea or a curse. He angled his hips, his cock dragging against her clit with ruthless precision.
“Yes!” she cried, moving with him. His slit eyes were almost fully dragon now, and scales cut across his jaw and chest—smooth and heated against her skin. Her body quivered around him, her orgasm ripping so hard through her she nearly lost her grip on the bar.
But Race didn’t stop. His thrusts only grew rougher, hungrier, as if her climax had only sharpened his own frenzy.
Desperation clawed him, a dark, burning need searing into the marrow of him. She was so hot, so wet, so damned tight. Her body squeezed his cock as if it would drag him deeper, and he wanted more—fucking needed it.
Caught in the blazing fever, he was beyond words, functioning only on pure instinct as he drove into her with frantic urgency. His hands gripped her lush ass, his gaze locked on where they were joined. Each savage thrust shoved her up the wall, her nether lips stretching around his thick shaft as he buried himself to the hilt again and again.
She whimpered, her eyes glazed, her breasts jiggling with each slam, sweat slicking her skin. Then she was moving with him, desperate, chasing her climax once more. Instinct snarled through him, and he thumbed her clit, once, twice?—
Her cry ripped through the cave as another orgasm erupted, and she shattered, her core gripping him, milking him mercilessly.
