“So,” he says, his voice low. “We have this whole place to ourselves. What do you want to do with our evening?”
My body makes the decision before my brain gets a vote. An inferno surges through me, flooding my chest, my throat, my face, and between my thighs a pulse of warmth so intense my hips shift involuntarily. His scent is concentrated this close, rolling over me, and I’m staring at his mouth. My lips part, and every rational thought I’ve had today evaporates.
“If you want to kiss me,” he whispers, “just do it, Claire. I can see it on your face. In your eyes.” His nostrils flare. “Smell it in your scent.”
The slick that’s been building up, every touch, every stolen glance, every accidental brush of skin adding to the tsunami my body’s been unleashing without my permission. He knows, and that makes it worse.
“That’s not what I’m thinking,” I manage.
“You sure?”
No. I’m the opposite of sure. I’m drowning. I duck under his arm and cross to my backpack, snatching it off the floor with trembling hands. “What I’d love is chocolate. A drink. And to crash on this couch. Long day.”
“Sounds great. I’ll join you.” He turns to the pantry, relaxed, easy, as if he didn’t just almost dissolve me against his kitchen counter.
Another wave crashes through me. My knees buckle, just for a second, and I catch myself on the back of the couch. The ache is deep, heavy, centered low in my belly, and the slick is worse, thick and insistent, soaking through my underwear. This is something deeper, hormonal, that feels dangerously close to?—
No. Not my heat. It can’t be. Heats build over days. This has been hours.
“Gonna have a shower first,” I say, too bright, too fast. I grab my bag and rush for the bathroom.
“Sure. I’ll be waiting, sunshine.”
The wordsunshinein his low voice unravels the last thread of my composure. I shut the bathroom door, press my back against it, and shove my hand down my pants because if I don’t find relief in the next thirty seconds, I’m going to scream loud enough to wake every wolf on this mountain.
I’m drenched. My fingers slide through heat and slick, and I rub my clit in tight, frantic circles. I come in under a minute, biting down the muffled cry that teases my throat. My legs give out and I slide down the door, trembling, pulsing, gasping.
The relief is brief because the ache retreats but doesn’t leave. It’s still there, coiled and patient, waiting.
This can’t be happening. Not here. Not now. Not in a one-bedroom cabin on a mountain with an Alpha whose scent calls to me.
Up on my feet, I strip and turn on the shower. Twist the dial to cold. Step under the spray. The shock of ice water punches the air from my lungs, and I yelp, pressing both palms against the tile, letting the cold hammer my shoulders and chest.
A knock at the door.
“You okay in there?” Corey’s voice, careful, controlled.
“Yep! Totally fine! Just enjoying the water pressure!”
Silence. “Yeah. Cold water can be refreshing. Hot drink will be ready whenever you’re done.”
His footsteps retreat.
Bastard pays too close attention to everything I do. His Alpha nose picked up every spike in my scent and wave of slick, the arousal I’ve been failing to contain since the picnic blanket.
Okay. New plan: stay in this shower and let whatever is happening pass. Cold water will drive it away. Mind over biology. I’m a grown woman, and I have willpower and control.
The ache surges again, and slick runs down my inner thighs, all while my mind floods with Corey’s hands gripping the counter, his chest under the ripped T-shirt, the way he pinned me against the tree and whispered into my ear what he wanted to do to me.
I press my forehead to the cold tile and close my eyes.
I’m not surviving this trip. Not even close.
19
COREY
“Claire. It’s been twenty minutes since the water stopped.”
