16. SIXTEEN
SIXTEEN
Bastien
Between us, we manage to get my shirt off without getting any of the vomit on my face.
I have to tear the shirt, but that seems like a small sacrifice.
The stench clings to my skin and makes my belly churn, but I manage to hold down my nausea.
Mostly because a slab of guilt settles on top like a stone slab over a coffin.
I can’t believe I charged in there like that without even calling Vera first, without checking if she wanted me here.
I wouldn’t blame her if she never talked to me again.
Guy got what he fucking deserved for spiking Vera’s drink, but she didn’t need me to charge in and save her. She had him handled.
Of course she did.
Right now she’s being kind and not chewing my ear off, even though I deserve it. I’m feeling strangely rational again now that she’s right beside me, even if we’re not talking.
I avoid her gaze on the drive to her dorm room, and the only thing that compels me to get out of the car and follow her inside is how badly I want to shower and wash the stink from me.
“Come on. Showers are through here.” She leads me to the communal shower room, and another surge of guilt forms a thick band in my guts at the fact that she’s having to look after me. I’m causing her even more trouble. “Listen, maybe I should go.”
“Bas, just get in the shower, OK? You can have your existential crisis afterward.”
That drags a tiny laugh from some reserve I didn’t know was there. “Yeah. OK.”
“My room is number fifteen when you’re done.”
I shower quickly, relieved to be rid of the smell. Then I pull my underwear and pants back on, leaving my chest bare. I spot clean my jacket, leaving little wet patches on the front, and then I find room fifteen and knock softly on the door.
When she opens it I have to curl my fingers into fists at my side to keep from grabbing her up into my arms. All at once I’m hit with her scent and the sight of her legs, which are bare beneath an oversized sweater—at least I think they’re bare. Gods help me.
Maybe she has on a tiny pair of shorts. Either way my mouth waters, and it takes me a moment to gather my wits enough to talk. “Hi.”
“Hi.” Her smile curves up at one corner of her lips more than the other, and I want to kiss the other corner until it stretches all the way across her mouth.
“You smell a lot better.”
I take a step forward, not knowing if she’s going to let me in or send me home. I know what I deserve, but I still hope…
Her orange-and-lemon scent curls around my senses until my reason gets foggy and I have to drop my nose toward her neck and breathe her in. My next words are unsteady. “You smell amazing. You always smell amazing when you’re not wearing perfume.”
Her hands drift up, hovering over my chest like she wants to touch me but she’s not sure.
I want to tell her to touch me however she wants, wherever she wants, to use me like she did in the cave. I clamp my mouth shut tight around those thoughts, though, and wait for her to decide what she wants. I wouldn’t blame her if she shoved me out the door and told me to drive back to Mosswood.
I don’t expect what she actually says next.
“Did you really mean all that stuff you said back at the bar?”
She still has doubts. I guess that’s fair, given how I was the one who rejected her four years ago. It’s just that, since January, my whole world has shifted, and it’s hard to even remember what the hell I was thinking back then. “Yeah. Every word.”
There’s a little pause which feels like a hundred thousand years.
She looks like she wants to cry, and the only thing that stops me dropping to my knees right here in the doorway to her dorm room is the fact that her scent isn’t sad.
There’s no trace of the bitter smell of sadness.
Instead her scent blooms with rich sweetness, like a flower opening up in the sunshine.
I have about half a heartbeat’s warning before she takes a running jump into my arms. Jacket forgotten, I catch her up, groaning at the feel of her small body against mine.
She throws her arms around my shoulders and her legs wrap around my waist, and she clings to me, rubbing her nose through the patch of hair below my collarbone.
I stagger forward. The door swings closed behind us, and I kick it for good measure, letting out a satisfied grunt as the latch clicks and she’s all mine.
That’s all I have time for before she lifts her chin and my mouth is on hers, crushing our lips together.
I find a place where I can press her against a bare section of wall and try in vain to get my fill of her.
It’s hopeless. I’ll never get enough of her soft lips against mine.
Of her flavor. The way she clings to me so fiercely.
She breaks away gasping, and I bury my face in her neck, lapping at her skin, kissing and hunting for the place that bears my mark.
Mine.
“My mate.”
She moans as I drag my teeth along the spot. “I didn’t know how much I needed to hear you say that.”
“Did I say that out loud?”
Her laughter turns into a gasp when I let her slide lower until my solid erection is pressed firmly up against the seam of her thighs. The only thing that separates us is her panties and my trousers, and even that is not enough to stop her feeling the whole length of me as I rock my hips.
“N-no. I don’t think so. I don’t know. Feels like you wouldn’t need to. I can’t explain. I love that you missed me. That you want me.”
I lean down to press my forehead against hers, breathing hard.
“Ver, I’m sorry. I fucked this up at every chance you gave me.
I wish I could have put into words what that night in the cave meant to me.
What you mean to me. I was too scared of what it meant and of scaring you away.
It was like for once my bear took over and once I’d bitten you and I could see my mark on you and see you full of me I realized you were mine all along, or you were meant to be. ”
A sob lifts her chest, and she trembles in my arms. It’s like a goddamn knife to my guts. “Don’t cry, Ver. I’m sorry.” I don’t care if they are probably happy tears. It still rubs up wrong against every instinct in me.
I brush her tears away with my thumb and find her looking at me. Her expression is one I’ve never seen on her face before—shock, awe. If I was a braver bear I might name it love.
“I didn’t want to let myself hope,” she whispers.
I frown.
She’s not finished. “I’ve spent half my childhood hoping and squashing it down, knowing you’d never pick me.”
“Of course I w—”
“Would you hush and listen?” She cuts me off, and I can’t help laughing at my fierce little mate. If anyone ever doubted she has the heart of a shifter they’d only need to see her now.
“I lathered myself in perfume at Christmas so you wouldn’t smell how much I want you.
How that never went away. Because I didn’t want you to stop being in my life.
I can’t shift. I don’t know what that means for my children or the mate bond or any of that stuff, and I hate the idea of you compromising.
I just wanted you around in whatever form I could have. ”
I can’t stay quiet any longer. “Vera, I’m not compromising. I meant what I said before; you’re perfect. You’re perfect for me. Shift or no shift, magic or no magic—though I promise you there’s magic. I feel it. It wouldn’t matter. I want you. I belong to you.”
The sigh that leaves her sounds like her soul just left her body.
It reverberates through her entire body, drawing a purr from me that blows out her pupils and makes her lips drop open.
“Bas, I feel the same. I’m sorry I rejected you before.
I should have listened—really listened. Can we make up for lost time now? ”
“If you let me, I’ll spend the rest of my life making up for it.”
She trembles, her small body shaking in my arms and her scent flooding the room. “Fuck me.”
I shake my head.
Her brows draw down, and then I see realization dawn on her face. “Make love to me?”
“With pleasure,” I growl, walking in two large strides to the tiny bed to lay her down.
Immediately she’s writhing in my arms, reaching for contact on every part of her body.
Somehow I drag myself away long enough to pull the sweater up and over her head.
She sits to help me do it, revealing the thin white tank top which is all she has on underneath.
Her nipples strain through the fabric, and my mouth waters too much to wait.
I lower my head and suck on them, wetting the material with my mouth, turning it translucent until it barely hides the pink, taut peaks.
I’m on my knees by the single bed, leaning over Vera. My cock throbs inside my trousers, but I don’t dare take him out yet in case it’s over too quickly.
Her back bows as I drag my hands over her waist and down toward her hips. But she still has panties on, and right now that feels absolutely unbearable.
Nudging my beast to the surface, I let my face shift until sharp teeth and claws replace my blunt human teeth and nails. Then I tear the panties right off her body, baring her perfect pussy to me so I can draw in a deep breath and savor the scent.
“Gods, look at you. Look at that hairy little cunt.”
She laughs, but it quickly turns into a moan when I spread her legs and lave my tongue through her slit like I’ll die if I go another minute without her slick coating me.
I might.
Sure feels like it with my cock throbbing against my fly and my beast fighting for control every second I’m not buried deep inside her. Not going there yet, though.
Not until my mate is done cumming on my face.
Vera lets out a keening cry as I spread her wider and tease both sides up and down, never lingering long on her clit. I know she wants it. I can scent her need getting closer to desperation every second.
When her fingers card through my hair and grip me tight, I nearly lose it. My cock jerks in my pants. I grunt as she tugs me up to plant my mouth over her little bud, and there’s no more denying her.