Chapter 23 #2
The familiar beep of the alarm disarming freezes me in place.
The enclosed porch door whispers open as I grip the kitchen counter.
His footsteps echo on the tile before the soft thud of boots hitting the floor.
He never tries to hide his approach when I’m awake.
He wants me to know he’s coming. Wants my anticipation to build with each step.
The window catches his silhouette in its glass, the wolf mask molded to his face like it belongs there.
It’s as familiar to me now as my own face, its sleek lines revealing nothing but the glint of his eyes behind it.
And his mouth below it. He’s dressed all in black, as always, his broad shoulders filling the doorway.
“Luna.”
His growl ripples across my skin.
“You’re late.” I don’t turn around, aiming for casual, but the tremor in my voice is unmistakable. “I was starting to think you weren’t coming.”
He steps closer, so close the heat of his chest burns through the fabric of my nightgown.
“I always come, little doe. Look at me.”
I turn to face him. My body comes alive under his intense stare, nipples straining against the thin silk. My heart hammers in my throat.
“Dr. Ritchie cleared me.” The words tumble out too quickly. “I’m healed. Everything’s back to normal.”
He remains silent and motionless, his predatory gaze fixed on me.
“Did you hear me?” I ask, frustration creeping into my voice as I step toward him. “I said we can… you can…” Why am I shy? This man has seen me, touched me, and taken me in ways that negate any shyness. “You can fuck me again.”
“I heard you.”
His voice is low and controlled. Too controlled.
Why is he standing there like carved stone?
“Don’t you want me anymore?”
A growl rises from his chest, and my stomach flutters with relief. There’s my wolf. There’s the man I’ve been missing.
“Of course, I fucking want you. I’ve thought of nothing else.”
“Then do it. Take what’s yours.”
He moves one step, closing the final distance between us. His thumbs slide under the slip at my waist, tugging it up, inch by inch, until the bare curve of my ass is exposed. His touch is light, too gentle. This isn’t how he usually grabs me, with bruising force and desperate need.
“I won’t break.” I grip his hands, pressing them harder against my skin. He doesn’t shake them off. Thank God. “I’m not fragile.”
He tilts his head. “I know.”
But there’s still a hesitation in his grip.
“No.” Frustration bubbles up inside me. This isn’t what I want. This isn’t what I need. “What happened to the man who can’t wait to claim me?” I step back from his touch. “The one who rips my clothes off the second he gets here. The one who fucks me like he’ll die if he doesn’t?”
“He’s still here.” His voice is tight. “But things have changed, Luna.”
My head whips from side to side. “No, they haven’t. I’m still me. You’re still you. And I still want you exactly as you are.”
“Brutal? Selfish? Taking without thought?”
“Yes.” I step closer to him again. “That’s who you are with me. That’s who I want you to be.”
His hands clench at his sides. “And if I hurt you?”
“You won’t.” I reach for his jacket, hooking my fingers into the zipper and tugging it down, something I know better than to do. “Not in any way I don’t want.”
He grabs my wrists, stopping me. For a moment, I think he’s going to push me away. Instead, he spins me around, pinning my arms behind my back.
“Is this what you want?” His breath is hot against my ear, and his grip anchors me in place, holding me captive in this exposed position, a vulnerability so delicious it leaves me dizzy. “To be handled roughly? To be used?”
“Yes.” Desire floods through me. “God, yes.”
Fabric rustles behind me, then cold plastic brushes my skin.
The zip ties that I now love.
He tightens them around my wrists, binding my hands together at the small of my back. The position forces my chest forward, my breasts straining against the silk.
“Like this?” His voice is darker now, more like the man I know.
My heart pounds. “Yes. Just like this.”
His hand slides up my back, fisting in my hair, and pulling my head back. “And if I decide to bend you over that table and fuck you right now—ready or not—what then?”
“Do it.”
I push back against him, his hard cock pressing into the small of my back.
There’s a moment of stillness, then he pushes me forward until my hips meet the edge of the table. He spins me around and lifts me onto it, pushing me onto my back.
I gasp, my bound arms trapped beneath me, forcing my chest to arch upward as I try to adjust my position. The hard, unyielding table offers little comfort, and that’s part of the thrill.
“Spread your legs.” His voice drops to that dark, commanding pitch that raises goosebumps on my skin. He slides out of his jacket, the leather hitting the tile with a soft thud. “I need to taste you first.”
My thighs fall open for him. No hesitation. The cool draft of night air grazes my center.
He kneels beside the table, pulling me toward him until my ass is at the edge. He pushes the silk up, exposing my bare sex to his gaze.
“Eighteen days.” His hands grip my inner thighs, spreading them wider. “Eighteen fucking days without this.”
Then his mask presses against my mound—cold metal shocking against warm flesh—and he buries his tongue inside me. The first flick sends a lightning bolt up my spine. I gasp, arching my back until everything but my shoulders lift off the wood.
“God. I’ve missed your mouth.”
His hands clamp onto my hips, holding me still as his mouth and tongue move in perfect rhythm, long glides over my entrance, and sharp flicks around my clit until my knees tremble and my vision blurs. His mouth works me with the expertise of a man who knows exactly what drives me wild.
“So sweet.” The vibration of his words sends fresh waves of pleasure through me. “I’ll never live another day without you.”
“Please.” I don’t know what I’m begging for. Just that I need more.
He lifts his head to look at me, his eyes gleaming behind the mask. “Come for me, Luna. Now.”
His mouth returns to me with renewed intensity, his tongue relentless as one finger slides inside me, curving to find that devastating spot. Everything contracts to the sensation of his mouth, his finger, and the building pressure at my core that threatens to shatter me.
The orgasm rips through me, tearing a cry from my throat as my back arches off the table again.
Pleasure detonates in waves, each one crashing harder than the last. My thighs clamp around his head.
He growls, the vibration sending ripples of sensation through my core, as his tongue keeps working—licking, sucking, devouring—until my voice breaks on a plea.
“Please. Please, I can’t—”
He pulls back then, his breathing harsh in the darkness. The back of his hand drags across his mouth in one rough swipe before his fingers adjust the mask’s edge. His lips shine wet, and the sight of my release coating his mouth makes heat coil tight in my belly again, impossible and insistent.
My ribs expand and contract, lungs dragging in air that doesn’t seem like enough.
He reaches for the silk covering me and tears it open, the fabric giving way with a sharp rip.
Before I can process the sound, his hands clamp onto my hips.
He spins me onto my stomach, pressing on my back until my upper body is flat against the wood, the surface cold against my overheated skin, making me gasp.
“Yes.” The words fall from my lips like a prayer.
The metallic rasp of his zipper cuts through the silence. Then his palms slide down the backs of my thighs, rough and hot, and his fingers hook around my knees. He wrenches my legs apart, the motion pulling a gasp from my throat.
“Tell me you want this.”
“I want this. I want you. Please.”
A single finger drags through my folds, parting slick flesh. My hips lift, chasing the contact.
“Always so wet for me.” Satisfaction purrs in his voice.
“Always,” I push back, trying to increase the pressure, the friction, anything to ease the ache inside me. “Please, don’t make me wait anymore.”
The blunt head of his cock replaces his finger, pressing against my entrance—right there, so close—but he holds himself still. The pressure builds but doesn’t breach, and my fingers curl into fists at the base of my spine.
“If it hurts, if it’s too much, you tell me.”
“Yes.”
The lie falls from my lips without hesitation, and we both know that’s what it is. I won’t stop him. Not when he’s splitting me open. Not when the burn threatens to tear me apart. That razor’s edge between agony and ecstasy—that’s where he makes me feel alive.
He drives in with one long stroke that empties my lungs. The cry rips from my throat as he fills every inch of me, the fullness almost too much, but God, the way my body yields to him feels like waking up from a nightmare I didn’t know I was trapped in. My body has been waiting for exactly this.
A groan tears out of him, reverberating through his chest into my back.
“Fuck! So tight. So perfect.”
He doesn’t move, staying buried deep, giving me a moment to adjust. My inner walls flutter around him, trying to accommodate his size. Heat pools where we’re joined, radiating outward.
“Move.” The plea scrapes out of me. “Please move.”
His answering thrust punches the air from my lungs all over again. Then his hips pull back, dragging almost all the way out before sliding forward again. Each thrust is deliberate, slow, and measured, like he’s relearning my body.
Tears prick at the corners of my eyes—not from pain, but from the intensity of being completely filled, completely possessed. My inner muscles clench around him.
He hisses through his teeth. “Don’t do that unless you want this to end before it starts.”
I can’t help it. My body has a mind of its own, tightening around him again.
His hand comes down on my ass, sharp and stinging. “Behave.”