Chapter 19 #2
I eat the wrap because it’s extraordinary. I tell him so between bites, and he seems quietly pleased with himself.
North grabs us cold cans of pop out of the cooler. He hands me mine, and I take a long sip, then lean back against the cushions. Without fully deciding to, I find myself resting against him, just a little, shoulder to shoulder.
He doesn’t move but settles into it.
Some amount of time passes, and it’s peaceful.
His arm goes along the back of the bench behind me, and eventually the tips of his fingers start tracing the outside of my upper arm slowly.
It is beautiful and sends wonderful goose bumps down my arm.
Then the sensation goes through me in a way that is not subtle.
My body has been building toward this for days. The trace of his fingertips feels like it’s being broadcast on every frequency in my body, and the warm, low, insistent pull between my legs that I have been pretending isn’t there has decided to stop being polite about it.
My heat is close. I can feel it in every nerve, and here I am, surrounding myself with the most attractive Alphas in the world.
I stand up abruptly, stepping out from under his arm, needing space to breathe, worried I might just lose myself to my heat. “Look at that,” I say, gesturing vaguely toward the water, pretending something in it has caught my attention.
“Mm,” he says and doesn’t move for a second. Then I hear him stand.
I walk to the far side of the boat, rest my hands on the rail, and pretend to look at something on the horizon that doesn’t exist, because being against that bench with him was about to be a problem I couldn’t talk my way out of.
I turn around, and he’s right there.
There’s no air between us. My back is against the rail, and he’s braced one hand on the edge beside me, the other hanging loose at his side. He’s close enough that I can see the pulse in his throat, close enough that his scent is all I can smell.
We stare into each other’s eyes for a long moment. His knuckles come up to brush my cheek, and the trail of sensation burns me up from the inside out. “I’m not going to ask you for anything you don’t want. I know you’ve been with Ace and Luca, and I’ve been patient.”
“I know.”
“You don’t.” His thumb traces the line of my cheekbone, slow enough to make my knees feel unreliable.
“It’s been wrecking me. I’ve wanted you since the second you swam out to us, and every day since has cost me.
Walking past you and not touching you. Watching you smile at us and not taking more.
Sleeping under the same roof and hearing your door close at night and making myself stay on my side of it.
” His eyes hold mine, far too full. “And the worst part is it’s not just want.
It’s that I already care about you more than I should. ”
I can’t swallow properly or find my voice. My hands lift of their own accord and settle flat on his chest, where bare, damp skin meets my palms, and his heart is steady against them.
My hands stay on his chest, and the strength of him under my palms is incredible. The heat of his skin and the rise and fall of his breath captivate me.
“North,” I whisper, and his name comes out like a confession. Because impossible isn’t the word for this after what he just gave me.
His gaze settles on mine. “Don’t fight your own body on my account.”
His other hand slides to the back of my neck, firm and sure. My eyes close for one second, then open again, and the ache in me is so deep now that it feels almost like grief turned into want.
“Your body’s been honest with me for a while,” he says, close enough that every word brushes my skin. “I want the rest of you to be honest too.”
I break a little at that because I’m so tired of holding myself back. So tired of pretending I don’t want this, don’t want him, don’t want the kind of taking he’s promising me with every look and every touch and every quiet, devastating word.
His mouth lowers to my ear, and the heat of his breath sends a sharp, trembling throb through my body. “Let me ruin you, Adelaide.”
The moan that leaves me is helpless and soft and humiliatingly needy, and his fingers tighten once at the back of my neck like he felt every inch of it.
I turn fully toward him until there’s almost nothing left between our mouths.
“You have no idea,” I whisper, voice shaking, “how long I’ve been trying not to beg for you.”
His eyes darken. “Then stop trying.”
My breath catches.
He stays there, waiting, giving me the choice even now, even with both of us burning.
“Tell me yes,” he says.
“Yes,” I breathe. “Please, yes.”
He kisses me.
Not tentative. Not gentle in the way men are when they’re still deciding. North kisses me like he’s done waiting, the decision was made a long time ago, and this is just the moment he’s finally allowing himself to act on it.
The hand at the back of my neck tightens just enough to hold me exactly where he wants me.
His other arm wraps around my waist and drags me flush against him, and the full, hard line of his erection finds me all at once.
Every inch of that controlled patience he’s been wearing for days is still there, but now it’s turned dangerous.
A purr peals past my lips, sounding embarrassingly needy, and he answers with a low, approving hum that I feel through his chest under my hands.
His mouth works mine open slowly, thoroughly, like he intends to leave no part of me untouched.
When his tongue slides against mine, my whole body burns and chills in the same breath.
My fingers dig into his skin, and I stop knowing where the boat ends and I begin.
He breaks the kiss just enough for me to draw in air.
“I will never get enough of you,” he says, voice rougher now.
“Me neither,” I whisper, barely getting those words out.
His mouth brushes mine again, not a kiss, just a smirk. “I know.”
The arrogance of that should annoy me. Instead, it ignites a fire inside me. “You’re smug right now,” I answer.
“Very.”
“Well—”
“Come here,” he commands, quickly taking my mouth again before I can answer, deeper this time, one hand still firm at my neck, the other sliding up my spine until I arch into him exactly the way he wants.
His kiss is all control, carnal hunger, and the quiet threat of how much worse he could make this if he let himself.
My head goes light at the thought of what he could do to me.
The boat rocks gently under us as the sun burns warm across my shoulders.
North’s mouth leaves mine only long enough for him to study my face, and whatever he sees there seems to settle and bring out his smile.
His hand slides from the back of my neck to my waist, firm and possessive, and then he starts guiding me backward.
That’s what makes him so dangerous. He moves like a man who already knows I’m his focus, his only one, and has all the time in the world to prove it.
I go where he leads until the backs of my legs brush the space between the two helm chairs and the front dashboard presses cool against me. He steps in close, filling every inch of space, one hand braced beside me, the other closing around my wrists and drawing them up above my head.
“Give me your yes, Adelaide. I want it clear.”
Heat crashes through me. “Yes,” I breathe with excitement.
His mouth brushes my cheek, my jaw, beneath my ear with slow, devastating control. “Good,” he murmurs. “Now stay exactly where I put you.”
The words leave me shaking with arousal.
He keeps one hand around my wrists while the other traces the line of my throat, my shoulder, the edge of my bikini strap with maddening slowness.
“You’re trembling,” he says, voice low against my skin. “And I haven’t even started taking what I want.”
My breath stutters.
His mouth finds mine again, deeper this time, stealing the air from my lungs. When he finally pulls back, his forehead rests briefly against mine.
“I’ve wanted this for too long,” he says. “Wanted you pinned here, looking at me while trying to be brave, yet your whole body gives you away.”
I shiver.
His thumb drags once over my lower lip before he steps back just enough to look at me, still holding my wrists high, still keeping me exactly where he wants me.
“You can still stop this,” he says. “But if you don’t, don’t expect me to keep pretending I’m unaffected.”
“Don’t stop.”
The grin that answers me is slow and dark enough to make my knees weaken all over again. “I was hoping you’d say that.”
His hand leaves my wrists just long enough to trace the line of my shoulder, then the edge of my top, and around my back, where he unlatches my bikini top. I lower my arms to let it slide down them and tumble to my feet.
“There,” he says softly. “Now you’re being honest.” He stands there for a second, staring.
His gaze travels over my breasts, taking in every inch with the kind of attention that makes me feel both exposed and wanted in the same breath.
“You were made to ruin men,” he says, voice low. “Do you know that?”
Heat rushes through me so hard it feels like it might burn straight through my skin.
North’s mouth finds my throat, then my shoulder, each kiss sliding lower, reaching my breasts.
He has a hand under each one, lifting them as if they’re jewels, squeezing them, his mouth and tongue lashing at my nipples, sucking, tugging.
I’m moaning, trying to not fall over from his possessive attention.
“You have no idea,” he murmurs against my skin, “how beautiful you are when you stop pretending you don’t want this.”
I shiver and lean into him despite myself, wanting him to take me harder, to make it hurt… and that time, that’s exactly what his mouth does. I cry out, my hands on his shoulders, grasping, never wanting to be released.
His hands slide down my hips to find the ties of my bikini bottoms and pause there, waiting.
Checking.
Giving me every possible chance to stop this.