I gasp at the contact. He swallows the sound.
The kiss deepens. His tongue traces the seam of my lips and I open for him, letting him in, letting him take what he needs.
His hand slides lower. Past my hip. Over the curve of my ass. His fingers hook into the waistband of my yoga pants andpull.
I break the kiss with a gasp, catching his wrist before he can go any further.
“Mason. Wait.”
He makes a frustrated sound, yanking his hand out of my grip. “I don’t want to wait.”
“You’re not in your right mind.” The words come out breathless, ragged. My body is screaming at me to shut up and let him do whatever he wants, but some tiny rational part of my brain is still functioning. More than his, at least. “Your heat is affecting your judgment. I don’t want you to do something you’ll regret.”
Mason laughs. Actually laughs, the sound rough and incredulous.
“Have you ever—in your life— desperately wanted someone during heat that you didn’t also want at literally every other time?”
I open my mouth to argue.
Close it again.
Because nope. I haven’t. Heat hormones might mess with your head, but don’t create desire from nothing, just amplify what’s already there.
“I’ve wanted you for a long time,” he says quietly. “The only thing that stopped me was that you didn’t know the truth.”
But even as my heart races, even as every nerve ending screams at me to give in, I can’t shake the nagging feeling that this isn’t just about me. That I’m a convenient outlet for whatever complicated emotions are churning through Mason right now.
I don’t want to be a distraction or a convenience. I don’t want to be the person he turns to because I’m the only available option he’ll allow himself.
But I also can’t leave him alone. Not like this. Not when he’s trembling and feverish and looking at me like I’m the only solid thing in his entire world.
Fuck it.
I kiss him again. Slower and more deliberate this time. My hands smooth down his stomach, fingers lingering where the muscles jump at my touch.
Without breaking the kiss, I guide Mason onto his back. It’s easy to take control, like he’s been waiting for me to do just that. He sinks back into the bedding like he never wants to leave.
My fingers trace the planes of his chest, learning the topography of his body through touch alone. The ridges of his ribs. The hollow of his throat. The raised silver scar of Judah’s claiming bite.
Mason shivers beneath me. His eyes have gone glassy, unfocused, lost in sensation.
When my hand finally slides lower, past the waistband of his pants, finding him hard and aching, he arches up with a broken moan that makes heat pool in my belly.
I work him slowly. Deliberately. None of the frantic urgency of heat-driven coupling, just steady pressure and careful attention to every sound he makes, every hitch of his breath, every flex of his fingers against the sheets.
He comes apart beautifully.
His whole body goes taut, head thrown back, a sound tearing from his throat that’s half my name and half something wordless. I kiss him through it, swallowing his moans, feeling him pulse against my palm as the orgasm crests and breaks.
Afterward, he lies boneless in the nest, breathing ragged, eyes closed. Some of the desperate edge has softened.
I press a kiss to the crown of his head.
He barely huffs a response, already almost asleep.
For a few minutes I just lie there in the quiet room, listening to the rhythm of his heartbeat.
But my mind won’t stop spinning because I can’t stop thinking about the mess Judah and Mason have made of their lives.
