Chapter 30 #2
He drove into her harder. Faster. His thumb found the space between them, pressing against her clit in tight circles that matched the rhythm of his hips.
She cried out, her body bowing, and he felt the orgasm hit her all at once, a full-body seizure that clenched around him so hard his vision whited at the edges.
Her nails dug into his shoulders, her legs locked around his waist, and the sound she made was his name, repeated, breaking apart on each wave.
He followed her over. The climax tore through him with a force that started at the base and detonated outward, and at the peak of it, with her body convulsing around his and her throat bared as her pulse hammered under the skin where her neck met her shoulder, he bit down.
Not savage. Nor careless. His teeth broke skin with the precision of something practiced over centuries by instinct he'd never used before, and the taste of her blood was copper and the green, botanical scent.
The bite carried everything he was, his tiger, his magic, his essence, through the wound and into her bloodstream, and the bond locked into place with a sensation that defied every word he'd ever learned.
It was like the world developed a second pulse.
Hers. He could feel her heartbeat alongside his own, synced and steady.
Her pleasure still rippling through her body registered in his chest as warmth, as rightness.
The exhaustion in her muscles echoed in his.
Every emotion she carried, the fierce satisfaction, the lingering grief from the chamber, the stubborn, brilliant love she'd fought so hard to deny, flowed through the new channel between them with a clarity that stole his breath.
She gasped against his neck. Her hand flew to the bite mark, fingers pressing against the broken skin, and he felt her feel it. The bond. His heartbeat in her blood. His presence settling into her awareness like a frequency she'd always been tuned to but never had a name for.
"Oh," she whispered. Just that. The researcher reduced to a single syllable by something no textbook could have prepared her for.
He carried her to the bed because her legs had given out and his weren't far behind.
They collapsed onto the mattress in a tangle of damp skin and heavy breathing, her face pressed against his chest, his arms wrapped around her, the bond thrumming between them with a warmth that felt like sunlight through closed eyes.
"That's what a claiming feels like," she said after a long silence, her voice muffled against his skin.
"Yeah."
"The Ashworth text significantly undersold it."
He laughed. It shook both of them, her body vibrating against his, and she lifted her head to look at him with eyes that were different now.
Not just the gold-flecked hazel he'd been drowning in for weeks.
There was something behind them that he recognized because he could feel it through the bond.
The particular glow of a woman who'd made a choice she was at peace with.
"I can feel you," she said, pressing her palm flat against his chest. "Your heartbeat. Not just through my hand. Inside me."
"It goes both ways." He covered her hand with his. "I can feel everything. Your exhaustion. Your satisfaction." He paused. "Your hunger. When did you last eat?"
"That's your first question as my bonded mate? When did I last eat?"
"Partnership means making sure you don't pass out from low blood sugar after an emotionally significant day."
"I had a granola bar at the council meeting."
"That's not food, Steph."
"It had chocolate chips."
He pulled her closer, tucked her against his side, her head in the curve of his shoulder.
Through the bond he could feel her settling, the fierce energy of the day finally giving way to something quieter and deeper.
Contentment. She'd deny it if he named it.
That was okay. He could feel it, and she could feel him feeling it, and the loop of awareness between them was strange and new and exactly right.
She traced idle patterns on his chest, her fingers drawing invisible symbols on his skin. Spirals and crescents and boundary lines, the language of her work written onto his body.
"Criss."
"Hmm."
"I'm going to want to do that again. Soon."
He turned his head and kissed her hair. "How soon?"
"Very." She lifted herself onto one elbow and looked down at him, dark curls falling around her face, the bite mark on her neck already beginning to close into the thin, permanent scar that would carry his signature for the rest of her life.
Her eyes held his, steady and warm and full of a hunger.
"But first, tell me about the bond. Everything the books didn't cover.
I want to know what you feel when I do this. "
She kissed the hollow of his throat. Slowly. Deliberately. And through the bond, he knew that she could feel his entire body light up, because he felt her feel it, and the feedback loop of shared sensation was something neither of them had been ready for.
"That," he managed. "I feel that."
"Good." She kissed lower. "What about this?"