She reminded herself once more that she could do very many things. Take time. Say no. She’d already gone through it all. But there was only one thing shewantedto do, and to hell with everything else. Her heart was loud in her ears, there was aweight on her chest that felt oddly like joy, and she moved onto her hands and knees and came to kneel in front of him.
She cupped his face in her hands. His eyes were a wild mix of man and wolf, the brown of them lit from somewhere ancient, his body tensed to the point of trembling, a bowstring pulled all the way back, holding. Holding.
She leaned in—
And stopped when he pulled back. Just an inch. Just enough.
Her heart dropped. Her face went hot. She sat back on her heels on a strangled sigh, hands falling to her lap, suddenly weak. “I’m sorry, I—”
He moved so fast she barely tracked it. One moment, there was distance between them; the next, he was on her, his hands coming up to frame her face for a second, then he pulled away before any contact. “No,” he said. Low and rough and very certain. “No. It’s just—” He exhaled, something pained moving through his face. “If we start this, I will always be able to stop, Moonbeam. Always, anything, and at any point. I need you to know that.” His thumbs brushed her cheekbones, the lightest possible touch, like he was worried that any more would put him under a current too strong. “But tonight the moon is—” He stopped. Started again. “If you need more time. If you’re not sure. That is fine. That is more than fine. But tonight, if we—” His jaw worked. “I just needed you to understand what tonight means.”
She felt his struggle. Could feel it, actually, in that pull between them, taut and enormous and asking. The moon and the wolf, all of it held back by sheer, stubborn will. For her.
It was sweet, a little unhinged, and exactly right. “We’re not stopping anything, Rex.”
“Are you sure?” His voice was rough, a growl running underneath it that skittered across her skin and settled somewhere down low. So, so low.
“As I’ve never been.”
She moved into him then, not a crash and not in a rush. She came into the circle of him and felt his hands settle on her waist, the lightest possible touch, almost a question, and it made her smile against his neck. She pressed her lips there, where he was warm, where the scent of him was wild and hot and something she didn’t have a word for yet, but thought she might call home. She breathed him in. And there, with his skin under her lips, his pulse against her mouth, the overwhelming, slightly terrifying sense that she was completely lost, she shuddered. Something lit up in her, or simply woke up, answering. That the pull she’d been feeling for weeks had found its other end.
She felt rather than heard his exhale, where relief, want, and something bigger than them and barely leashed, mixed together.
Then he moved, just so, and his mouth was on hers.
Soft at first. Almost tentative.
That wouldn’t do.
She pulled him closer, opened for him, deepened the kiss until the world narrowed down to just this, just him, just the two of them in the clearing with the moon pouring down around them and nothing else mattering at all.
His nose brushed the corner of her jaw, her neck. She arched into him. “Touch me, Rex. I feel like I’m going to explode if you don’t.”
And touch her he did. On a growl, he pushed up her t-shirt, took her breast in his palm. Then the other. But... “Off,” she demanded, and she was the one growling this time. “Everything comes off now.”
“Damn it, Zoe...”
“No. We’re going to burn through this. And when we’re done and possibly a little more sane, then we’ll do the nice and slow. But if you don’t get naked and inside of me right this minute, I swear to you–”
That did it.
She all but heard the snap of his control. She did hear a lot of tearing as he simply grabbed the front of his t-shirt and tore. Right off. Same fate awaited his pants and whatever else he had on. Within a minute, he was gloriously naked in front of her, his massive hairy chest heaving, his abs that belonged to Photoshop. She looked down then.
Her mouth watered. Her pussy watered. Her brain drowned in all of the watering.
She pressed a palm on him, flat, right where his heart hammered.
“Yours,” he growled, fierce and terrifying, his nostrils flaring and his eyes savage. “My heart. My body. My soul. My wolf. We’re yours, Zoe.”
She nodded. It was pretty much all she could muster under the emotional onslaught of his words and her need. Trembling, because this was more and deeper and defining, she pulled her t-shirt up and away, her bra following suit. Then her pants, underwear. If it was chilly, she didn’t feel it—the look in his eyes warmed her through. If there was danger somewhere close, she didn’t register—he was safety.
She took a step forward, her hands linked behind his head, making sure there wasn’t an inch of her that was not pressed against him. She felt him, big and rock-hard against her belly, and couldn’t help stroking a little. In answer, he pulled her up in his arms, her legs wrapped around him. He dropped to his knees and laid her down, gently, before everything started to spin under his charge. His mouth on hers, then down on her breasts, her sternum, her ribs, as if he was following a trail. Gentler on her belly. He paused on her mound, taking in a long, deep breath. Her pussy felt his low growl; he was clearly well aware of that, because next thing, those big, scarred fingers of his parted, so gently, her lips.
And he licked.
A flat, slow sweep of his tongue that made her roll her eyes back and made her forget how to breathe. Another lap followed, and another, until she was nothing but the pleasure between her legs. He opened his mouth and consumed her, all of her at once, sucking as if he could eat her. Really eat her. His tongue moved in and out of her, his thumb on her clit, over and over, until the orgasm crashed over her and took her under. He didn’t move an inch. No, he stayed there, taking every drop of her until the waves of pleasure subsided and she came back down to earth. Only then did he leave her with a savage growl, his tongue swiping another path upward until his mouth was on hers, her taste on his lips.
And it didn’t matter that she’d just had a mind-blowing, out-of-body experience. When he nudged her with the head of his cock, need gripped her all over again. She opened for him.
