Chapter 16
Anya
My boyfriend is a freaking polar bear. Well, he isn’t a polar bear, but he can be.
For a moment I considered yelling, telling him to get his head examined, and stomping out, but something deep within me told me he was telling the truth. Likely the same thing that seems to pull me toward him like a magnet and makes my skin tingle when we touch.
He called it our bond. Because I’m his soul mate.
But why? What about me is good enough for some kind of .
. . he said Goddess . . . to decide I was worthy of this?
But at the same time, I can’t deny it feels right.
I hate that it doesn’t make sense and yet my brain has decided to make peace with the whole situation.
Like I haven’t spent my entire life needing things to be logical and organized.
Then I look at his stupid-handsome face, with that annoyingly adorable lopsided grin, and I can’t help but acknowledge the warm, glowing feeling in my chest.
“Fuck it,” I whisper aloud to myself moments before flinging myself into his arms.
He catches me without hesitation, and I wrap my legs around his waist, kissing him hard. He growls into the kiss, which only makes me want him more as our skin tingles everywhere we touch. Which is everywhere since he’s still only wearing his shorts.
“So, I take it . . . you’re okay with . . . my polar bear?” he pants between kisses.
Instead of answering him, I kiss him harder, holding his face where I want him, grinding my hips on his very attentive length below me which causes him to throw his head back and groan, opening his neck to me so I kiss and nip at his skin there.
I don’t know what’s come over me but it’s amazing to suddenly feel so free from the rigidity of my mind.
Something about Kodi chases it all away.
Just as I consider pulling his shorts back off, there’s a jiggle on one of the doors. Gasping and flinging myself off of him, I snatch his shirt, throw it at him, and grab his hand to sprint out of the rink.
My brain initially wants to chide me for doing something so rash and completely not myself, but I think I’m learning to like this new side of me that puts the rules away to live a little.
Once we’re safely back in the parking lot and climbing into his truck, I’m laughing so hard I can’t breathe.
After swinging by my apartment for a few things, I go back to Kodi’s condo with him. The second we make it through the door and he locks it behind us, he’s all over me in the best way. His lips and hands are everywhere.
He takes my bag from me and must set it down gently because I don’t even hear it plop. We awkwardly maneuver our way down the hallway into his room.
My mind is a messy swirl of need for this amazing man—who’s also a polar bear—and how I could have fallen for him so quickly. The warm, glowing feeling in my chest is spreading through my entire body, the tingles everywhere we touch adding to those sensations.
Fueled by a lot of lust and a little love, I ask, “So, your knot?”
He briefly tenses before he continues touching me, moving his hand under my shirt, trailing tingles along my abdomen with his touch. “I didn’t get to finish explaining a few things.”
Grinding against him as I wait for the rest of his explanation, he finally continues.
“Goddess, I want you so fucking bad, but you have to be sure.”
Nodding and kissing him harder, I pant, “Of course. I’m sure. I want you.”
He groans into our kiss saying, “Not only this . . . If we do this . . . I’ll claim you as my mate .
. . I’ll mark you . . . Bite you . . . You’ll be mine .
. . Forever.” He tries to explain this between kisses and the information trickles into my mind, his words registering and taking me by surprise.
“Bite me?” I ask as I stare into his eyes, chest heaving in an attempt to get more oxygen to my brain so I can think properly.
He nods, nipping at the skin between my neck and shoulder.
“When we find our soul mate, when we . . . consummate the bond,” he wriggles his eyebrows at me, “I’ll knot you and bite you here,” he drags his feather light touch across my neck, “claiming you. You’ll have a mark of our bond.
Forever.” The humor fades from his eyes, conveying the importance of what he’s telling me.
I expect panic. My chest to seize. For flight mode to consume me.
But none of those things happen. Tilting my head, I take him in.
Sure, he’s a football player, but he’s so much more.
He’s been nothing but kind and caring towards me.
He settles something within me that I’ve never been able to settle myself.
He’s filled a space within me that feels as though it was always waiting for him.
“Yes.” I breathe into the space between us.
His eyes widen and shine with unshed tears. “Really?” he chokes out.
Nodding, I try not to cry myself at the level of passion on his face that looks to match the emotions rising within me.
His fun and completely unserious smile returns. “Technically, shifters don’t have divorce,” he says, his smile falls once more, “but if you’re ever truly unhappy, there are options. But I promise to do everything I can to make you happy for the rest of our lives.”
My mind already made up, I respond without hesitation, “Yes.”
He doesn’t waste another second, his lips crash into mine in an all-consuming kiss, stoking the fire within me higher as he finally moves us to his bed.
He lays me down with a heartbreaking gentleness you wouldn’t expect from a brutish football player, let alone one that can transform into a giant wild animal, but now I know that those things aren’t what make him amazing.
He just is. We’re soul mates. Made only for each other.
He stands to his full height as his eyes devour me, and I wriggle beneath the weight of his stare. He pulls his shirt off in that over the head move that men do. I always found it annoying before but am definitely enjoying it now as I watch his muscles move with the action. “Like what you see?”
Biting the corner of my bottom lip, I nod. “I absolutely do.”
He makes the same torturously slow show of removing his shorts, his briefs having been shredded by him turning into a freaking polar bear . . . because that really happened.
When he’s bared to me, his length bobbing in front of him, I nearly drool at the sight. But also, that thing is huge. Not like crazy romance novel long, but the girth is girthing.
“Your turn,” he purrs as he moves in, relieving me of my clothes like he’s unwrapping something precious.
It takes a conscious effort not to squeeze my thighs together in an attempt to curb the throbbing need in my core as I lie in only my bra and underwear on the bed. Kodi leans over me, licking and kissing my muscles, making me feel more beautiful than I ever have.
When he reaches my apex, he inhales a deep breath, his eyes rolling back in his head. Embarrassment rises within me and I can feel my cheeks burning.
“You smell a-fucking-mazing. That is absolutely nothing to be embarrassed about. If I could bottle your scent and carry it with me all the time, I would.”
He’s serious, but a surprised laugh bubbles out of me, “Please don’t. That’s gross.”
He ignores my request, and I begin to worry he really would do something like that, but all thought leaves my mind when he slides my bra off one breast and sucks it into his mouth, his tongue swirling languidly around my nipple.
Every sensation is heightened by our bond sparking between us.
I can’t stop the sensual sounds escaping me.
He pays the same attention to my other breast while his fingers continue to lazily trail across my body. “Kodi,” I whine, causing him to chuckle against me. He nibbles my nipple before letting it go with a pop.
I rise up, removing my bra completely and shimmy out of my underwear, leveling the playing field, hoping it makes him lose control a little.
He seems content to draw this out, but I want him now.
Taking matters into my own hands, I latch onto his thick forearm, pulling him to me and shoving him down on the bed before rolling to straddle him.
His eyes widen, still hazy and lust drunk. On me.
“I need you.” My voice is thick and gravely in a way I’ve never heard it before.
He pouts. “But I wanted to taste all of you first.”
Nuzzling into him in a way that feels natural, even though he’s an animal, not me, I make a conscious decision to wear my heart on my sleeve.
“If we have forever, there will be plenty of time for all of the touching and tasting.” His features soften and I can see his love for me shining in his eyes. “Make me yours, Kodiak.”
His eyes flash and in an incredibly sexy maneuver, he flips us so that he’s on top of me.
He leans down quickly, sliding his tongue through my folds once, making my eyes cross.
“Needed a taste. Fuck, you’re good,” he says as he notches the head of his length against my opening. “Last chance.” He warns.
Rocking myself down onto the tip of him, my breath catches and it’s his turn for his eyes to roll as he continues his slow descent into my core. “You feel . . . fucking perfect . . . like . . . home.” He praises between kisses, groans, and harsh breaths.
When he’s fully seated inside me, his knot resting against my entrance, I am in complete agreement with his home statement. I’m full as all hell but have never felt more complete, the bond no longer tingling but full-on vibrating between us, our bodies connected in every way.
Waves of pleasure are rising and rushing through my veins, throbbing around his thick shaft as he finally begins to work himself in and out of me. For a long time, the only sounds in the room are our cries of pleasure and that of our bodies coming together in my new favorite symphony.
When the desire collecting within me burns bright, swelling at my spine and down my thighs, I try to tell him. “Kodi,” I cry. It’s all I can say. He reads my body like no one ever has, gently massaging my clit as his hips keep a steady rhythm pistoning into me.
“Oh god . . . I’m gonna—” my words are broken off by a scream as I’m shattered into a sparkling euphoria, black spots dotting my vision. He continues through every wave of my orgasm, leaving me twitching and thrashing in an unparallelled, alternate universe where all I know is this zenith.
His movements become erratic moments before he roars, slamming his knot inside of me. I was not prepared. My mouth opens on a silent scream as white-hot ecstasy engrosses every fiber of my being, another climax firing off so hard and fast that the world goes silent for a moment.
Kodi’s loving eyes meet mine as he moves my wild mass of hair away from my neck. My brain can’t even immediately register what he’s doing. When Kodi licks the spot on my neck it dawns on me. He begins to swell within me, and I cry out as an almost uncomfortable stimulation steals my focus.
I watch as he moves his jaw and his bear’s fangs emerge from his mouth. If I wasn’t losing my mind from arousal, I might have had time to be terrified, but I can feel both of our heartbeats in my core, like our bodies know what’s coming.
When he bites my neck, the first thing I feel is the piercing of his fangs in my flesh.
To keep from screaming as a third orgasm detonates within me, I decide that if he’s biting me, I’m biting him.
So, I do. I lean in and bite down on him in the same place—hard—and he releases me on a roar.
He’s growing even harder and more swollen within me.
He still looks at me lasciviously, but with a hint of confusion, then surprise overtakes his gaze.
Surprise that must be mirrored on my own face because . . . something is happening.
I look at my body, expecting to see a cheesy cartoon glimmering string of light to be surrounding us based on the sensations coursing through my body and across my skin.
When it rolls up and over my head, I release a heavy breath I didn’t realize I was holding.
When my eyes meet his, there’s a solidifying kind of twang feeling between us .
. . within me? I can’t explain what’s happening, but if I had to guess, that’s what he was referring to as our bond.