And then his claws are on the fabric of the tunic and it’s gone, torn away, and I’m fully naked under him in the green light.
Oh, but I’m not done. The rules are still in me, somewhere under the fever, and the wild thing he woke in me wants to run again, wants this male to earn the right to have me.
So I continue to fight.
I buck under him and get a hand free and punch him, hard, across that beautiful fevered face. I scream at him, wordless and furious, trying to get away. Maybe I can get on my knees and run again. Dammit, he’s so strong. I claw, kick and wrench myself out from under his weight and scramble up onto my knees in the dirt.
I’m super proud of my accomplishment.
Then he lunges. But I’m faster than he expects. I really do get onto my feet and get two strides away and then he’s on me again, an arm hooking around my middle. We go down together and roll, a tangle of his huge body and my flailing one, over and over through the wet grass. I’m shrieking and hitting at the wall of his chest and he’s growling, taking it, loving it, his eyes blazing like I’ve handed him a gift.
Uh oh. We roll right into the stream.
The cold shocks the breath out of me. For a second I’m under, churning, hair in my face. Then his fist closes around my ankle and he hauls me back, dragging me up the bank on my belly through the mud.
I’m naked, soaked and filthy but still fighting him, twisting onto my back to kick at him. He catches one foot. Then the other. And he is so much bigger than me, so much stronger, that when he finally decides he’s done playing it’s like a door swinging shut. He pins both my wrists over my head in one enormous hand, drops his weight down between my thighs, and holds me to the earth.
He is so sexy I’m going to die from the want. My chest heaves and my whole body screams with how badly I need him pounding inside of me.
“Mine,” he growls, low and final, feral fangs bared, water dripping off him onto my skin.
And I stop fighting.
Because I’m done. I’m so turned on I can’t see straight, every nerve in my body lit from the chase, the cold water and the weight of him holding me down in the mud.
My thighs fall open.
I tip my chin up.
And when his mouth comes down on mine this time I kiss him back with everything I have, biting at his lip, arching up into him, past pride, past strategy, past every wall I ever built.
“Maxon.” It comes out of me ragged, begging, nothing left to guard. “Please. Please, now, I need you, I can’t?—”
He doesn’t make me ask twice.
He positions the crown of his leaking erection at my entrance. I feel it notched there, where I’m sopping wet and ready. He surges into me in one long stroke and I cry out…not pain, I’m not new to this, but the sheer overwhelming size andheat of him. He’s certainly the biggest and thickest I’ve ever had. And wow, it really does make a difference.
I feel him everywhere.
He fucks me hard, not stopping to check on me, fully in the throes of a primal need he cannot fight. And I’m there for all of it. I hold on tight and experience the best moment of my life. A huge, scary orgasm is building and he hasn’t even touched my clit. What magic is this?
“Hallie.” He literally roars my name. “My Hallie,” he cries out. “My Queen. I love you.”
“I love you too,” I sob, arching up to meet him, holding nothing back, no wall, no math, no corner to retreat to. “I love you.”
And that’s when the I feel the orgasm starting. “I’m going to…don’t stop.” Then it rushes through me, so intense I scream out as it moves along my thighs and across my stomach, clamping down in my pussy.
Maxon stills above me and throws his head back, letting out another thunderous roar. I watch the majesty of this male coming undone above me. I can literally feel the pulse of his large cock as it throbs inside of me as he comes. I can feel the heat of his seed as it jets inside of me again and again. There’s so much I swear it must be leaking along the inside of my thighs.
Oh wow.
We both come down slowly.
The forest hums around us, the stream still rushing, the two false moons still hanging in the green-lit dark. He’s collapsed half beside me and half over me, taking his weight on one massive forearm so he doesn’t crush me, his breath sawing against my hair.
I have never in my life felt so thoroughly, completely undone. Or so safe.
Here I am, at the end of the longest day of my life, with a male who took a blast to the chest for me and a found family that programmed me a forest, I am not alone, and I am never going to be alone again.
