I become aware of him slowly. The warmth of his chest under my cheek. The steady rise and fall of his breathing. The way his hand rests at my back, not moving, just present. His scent has softened, the sharpness of his anger gone, just linen and woodsmoke and something warmer underneath that I don'thave a name for yet. My body registers all of it before my brain catches up. Heat building slow and low. The awareness of how solid he is, how close. My pulse ticks up for a different reason than grief and I notice it happening and I don't pull away.
“Aubrey.” My name in his mouth, soft and reverent.
Thomas used to touch me like I was worth something. Liam brushed my hair back just to see my face. Matteo kissed my forehead when I was half asleep, like it was the most natural thing. I know what this is supposed to feel like. My body remembers even when my head tries to forget.
I lift my head and find Ezra's eyes. Steady. No demand in them, nothing calculating, just him watching me.
“Kiss me,” I say.
He stares at me like I've said something in a language he's still translating. Like he's checking he heard right, like he can't quite believe his luck.
“Me?” he says.
I almost smile. “I don't see any other alpha in here.”
Something moves through his expression. Wonder, maybe. He swallows once. “It would be my honor.” His voice has gone low and careful, like the words mean more than they sound. “My honor, Aubrey.”
And then he leans in and takes my mouth with his. I kiss him back because I want to, because I'm choosing to, because my body has been building toward this since he wrapped his arms around me and didn't let go when I fell apart. Ezra makes a low sound against my lips, surprise bleeding into something hungrier, and his hand slides into my hair, palm cradling the back of my skull, holding me like I'm something to be careful with.
I open my mouth. He's there, his tongue sliding slow against mine, tasting me like he's got nowhere else to be. His lips are warm and slightly chapped and real, and the scratch of hisstubble rasps against my chin and jaw, and he tastes like coffee and a little like honey, and I can't think past it.
His chest is heaving against mine, the rise and fall gone uneven, his purr rumbling louder, and when I pull back just enough to look at him his mouth is slick and his eyes are dark and his cheeks are flushed. He looks ruined and he's barely touched me. Something low in my belly bunches at that. Something that is not dread.
I fist my hands in the front of his Henley and pull him back to me. The kiss goes deeper. I chase the taste of him, wanting more, wanting all of it, and a sound comes out of me that I don't plan. Low. Hungry.
Ezra curls his hand around my hip. Pulls me in until there's no gap left, chest to chest, his heartbeat hard and fast against mine, his thigh pressing between mine. I go willingly. More than willingly. I climb into his lap, straddling him, and he lets me, his hands steadying my hips as I settle.
I'm bare from the waist up. He's still fully dressed, the soft cotton of his Henley warm under my palms, and the difference registers everywhere our skin meets and doesn't. His hands slide under the waistband at my lower back, palms flat against bare skin, and I arch into it. His fingers spread wide. Trace my spine. Count my ribs like he's learning me.
Slick gathers between my thighs, and the shame comes with it, automatic, six years of conditioning that says my body opening means something bad is coming. I feel it rise. I breathe through it. Push past it. Because this is mine. This wanting is mine. I chose this man and he asked before he touched me and his hands have not taken a single thing I didn't offer.
The shame doesn't disappear. But it doesn't win either. The grief of that sits right next to the want, the two of them tangled together, and I don't try to separate them. I just let them both be there.
I’m hard. Throbbing and leaking slick. My scent plumes around us, mixing with his. It’s delicious. Intoxicating.
Ezra kisses my jaw. My throat. The soft skin below my ear. I tip my head back and give him access because I want to give it. His teeth scrape where my neck meets my shoulder.
My hips rock, seeking friction, seeking pressure. My cock glides against his chinos, the ridge of him pressing up where I need it.
“Touch me.” My voice cracks on it. “I want you to touch me, alpha.”
His hand slides from my hip. Traces down my stomach, stopping at the waistband of my sweats.
“Here?”
“Yes.” It comes out rough. Desperate. “Please, alpha. Your hand. Please.”
Ezra smiles against my throat. “I've got you.”
He slips his hand under the fabric, wrapping his fingers around my cock. My whole body jerks, a full-body jolt, hips stuttering forward into his grip. He strokes his thumb slow over the head and spreads the slick there and I whine into his shoulder.
“That's it.” His voice is low and reverent. “That’s it.”
He moves his hand. Slow at first, learning me, figuring out what makes my breath catch and my hips stutter, what makes me grip his Henley and hold on. His thumb circles the head on each upstroke and my thighs are trembling, my whole body shaking, the pleasure building past anywhere I can hold it.
“You're so good.” His mouth brushes my ear. “Choosing this. Letting me have this.”
Thomas said things like that. Quiet things. Things that meant you matter, you're worth something, I see you. I didn't know how much I'd missed being seen until right now with Ezra'shand on me and his mouth at my ear and his scent wrapped all the way around me.
