Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77952 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 390(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77952 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 390(@200wpm)___ 312(@250wpm)___ 260(@300wpm)
So, I begin with a gentle kiss. I kneel, lowering myself to her level, and press my mouth to hers with purpose. I’m alpha, and she will know it. She responds like a woman who’s trying not to show how badly she wants to be touched. Her hands twist in my shirt, pulling me closer. Her mouth parts, lips yielding, tongue brushing mine, willing to taste what she didn’t expect to want. She breathes me in and releases the tightly wound parts of her that she arrived clutching so close.
When I pull back, she’s flushed and wide-eyed, her chest rising and falling. I watch her, cataloging every little shift: the tremble of her thighs, the heat blooming in her cheeks, the dazed hunger in her eyes.
I slide my hand to her knee, and she jumps slightly, gasping, her body reacting before her mind catches up. I look up, meeting her gaze, and ask, “Yes?”
She’s as still as a deer in the moonlight, sensing danger but convincing herself that she’s surrounded by nothing but the protection of the forest, ignoring her fear centers in the way that humans have convinced each other is a good thing.
I wait, inhaling her scent that makes my wolf arch under my skin. Human men prey on women like Scarlet, but not anymore.
When she gasps, “Yes,” I move slowly. My hand glides up the inside of her thigh, her legs parting in a silent, instinctive response. She invites me. Even through her clothes, I can scent her hunger, and it’s familiar in a bone-deep way that settles every longing I’ve ever had. I press the heel of my palm against her through the denim, and her hips roll.
She’s ready.
With deliberate care, I unbutton her jeans, still tasting her mouth in gentle sips. She lifts her hips with barely any encouragement. That’s trust. That’s surrender, in its first form. I slip my hand beneath the waistband, under the lace, into heat, leaning over her, crowding her.
She’s soaked, and I groan, pressing deep, coming home, knowing my brothers are watching it all. My fingers find a slow, even tempo, enough to keep her chasing. Enough to make her tremble. Her breath comes sharp, her thighs tense, and shake. Her hand clenches the cushion as her head tips back. I watch it all, like my brothers, my teeth itching to grip her nape and bite to make her ours. The first time I take her, I won’t watch her face as she comes, rutting into her from behind the way us wolves prefer, but I’ll feel it, though. She’s tight, and we’re big.
Then there’s the knot.
Scarlet tries to hold back, but of course, she fails.
When she comes, it’s with a soft, stunned cry, half-smothered by her hand. She shakes as waves of release crash through a foundation only just cracked open.
When she’s done trembling do I withdraw my fingers, sliding them over my tongue one after another while she watches.
Her taste is warm earth and summer sunshine, and I want to bury myself in it, mark me with her and her with me. Our eyes meet, and she blinks, stunned.
I lift her without asking, and without resistance. She folds into me, boneless and soft, the scent of her satisfaction clinging to everything.
I carry her to the bedroom and lay her gently on the bed.
I don’t undress her. I won’t stay. Not tonight. This is the beginning.
I tuck the blanket around her and smooth the hair from her temple. She blinks up at me, dazed, dreamy, and already drifting. I press one kiss to her forehead.
“You’re safe,” I murmur. “And this is the beginning.”
Then I walk out even though I don’t want to.
My wolf is a growling, ferocious beast who wants to claim what’s his. But I’m a man, too, and this is how you build a bond that doesn’t break.
The claiming will come.
But first, Scarlet has to crave it.
12
SCARLET
Morning arrives with a warm, decadent haze that softens my edges with the memory of Nixon’s mouth. I blink until my eyes become accustomed to the soft light filtering through unfamiliar curtains. My skin tingles with awareness and my thighs are heavy and tender with a sweetness I haven’t felt in far too long. I lie still, tucked under a thick blanket that smells like the forest, and replay the night in flashes.
Reed, Finn, and Nixon’s voices, low and commanding, teasing out my secrets and revealing theirs. The heat of Nixon’s mouth on mine and his hand sliding between my legs. The way they all watched me unravel, as if they’d planned it all along.
It doesn’t feel real. More like something I imagined in a wine-drunk and lust-dazed state. A fantasy I coaxed out of my deepest, most shameful longings.
But it happened. The orgasm that’s still blooming somewhere deep inside me, like a phantom echo pulsing in my core, and the way I opened myself, emotionally, confessing things I hadn’t even admitted to myself. Things about my past, my loneliness, my hunger for more. I told them truths I’ve held locked behind my ribs like fragile glass, and they didn’t laugh.