Page 51 of Cruel Mate

“It certainly is,” he said as he held her and kissed her firmly. She kissed him back with a pressure that told him exactly what she wanted.

With the emotions of the day all coming to a head, Zander couldn’t resist.

Even as his hands snaked under her dress, he whispered, “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” she breathed against his lips, kissing him again. “I need you, Zander. I need you to wash away everything else.”

Zander was all too happy to oblige. He would do it as many times as it took to make her feel whatever she needed. Whether she wanted to be numb, sated or merely loved, he would give it all to her.

Delicately, he pulled off her dress and dropped it on the floor by the bed, trailing kisses all over her body as he pulled off her panties.

Her fingertips tickled his lower abdomen as she pulled at the hem of his t-shirt, helping him to tug it off with one hand hooked in the back of the collar. He shivered at the simplest of her touches and yanked off his belt quickly. He needed to feel more.

When she cupped his face in her hands and pulled him down on top of her, lying on her back, Zander struggled to slip out of his jeans and lie atop her.

Holding himself up on his elbows, he cupped her face in his own hands and kissed her, feeling the warmth and feminine fragility of her body beneath his own.

Her hands trailed from his head, over his shoulders and down his back, her fingertips tickling him all the while until he was so sensitive, his cock so hard, that it was painful.

He needed to be inside her. And when she wrapped her legs around his waist, her hands coming to cup his buttocks to pull him into her, he knew she felt the very same way.

He entered her slowly, filling her up in a way that made her breathe out a long and pleasurable sigh.

Again, her hands came to his face, and she kissed him, her lips still brushing his as she looked him in the eye and whispered, “Make love to me.”

Zander’s body quivered with need as he began to do just that. His thrusts were slow and deep, sensual and needy. He offered her everything he had, their lips twined just as the rest of their body parts were.

Soon, it was impossible to tell where he ended and she began. Lost in a haze of intimacy and pleasure, Zander realized nothing had ever felt like this before. And he wasn’t ready to lose the sensation. He slowed even more, his fingers hooked in Layla’s hair, holding her head in place as he kissed her lips, her throat, her breasts.

She arched her back like a cat, angling her pelvis back and forth, thrusting to him as much as he was to her. Their panting became one. Their bodies became one. Their wolves became one.

Everything around them simply melted away as Zander lost himself in his mate, hoping she felt everything that he was feeling.

Angry sex in the forest had been wonderful. Surprise sex in the bathroom had been glorious. But this, this was utterly breathtaking, a reconciliation like none before it. And Zander felt as if he truly were washing away everything that had come before, because nothing could ever compare to being with his mate.

The way her body responded to his, how she moaned and writhed beneath him in pleasure, the way her sex squeezed around his cock when she climaxed, it was something he would hold dear forever.

“That’s it, baby,” he whispered in her ear. “I’ve got you.”

They made such sweet love that Zander couldn’t blame her when he saw a tear roll down Layla’s cheek. His own eyes welled up so violently that it was hard to hold back tears. Nothing had ever felt as powerful as this, and as he came, he couldn’t help but growl, “Fuck, Layla, I love you.”

Chapter 20 - Layla

He loves me.

It was the first thing that Layla thought about when sleep lifted from her the next morning. Their lovemaking had lasted well into the night, and exhausted, they had collapsed in each other’s arms.

But as she rolled over in bed now, she realized she was alone. She stiffened, sensing Zander standing by the end of the bed. His body was so stiff she could feel the tension through the air.

“Zander, what’s the matter?” she asked, but he didn’t respond. She sensed he was listening to something and reached out with her own ears to listen too.

That’s when she heard it. The sounds of fighting coming from outside the house were blood-curdling.

“What is that?” Layla gasped, grabbing the bedsheets to cover herself. A million answers rushed through her mind, but all of them ended with Christian. She should have known he wasn’t just going to up and leave.

“Stay here,” Zander ordered, darting for the door. “Lock the door.”

Layla was about to protest, but then he looked back at her from the doorway and growled, “Think of our baby.”

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