Page 42 of Rivers and Roads

Those were the words I needed to hear. I pulled my hand out, then drizzled the oil over my cock before shuffling closer. He still had his knees drawn up, and I took him by the ankle, spreading him wider. I wanted to see it, to watch myself sink inside this Alpha who wanted me, who was falling for me.

The Alpha I had been fantasizing about for too damn long.

My head caught on his rim, sliding up toward his balls, and he gasped as I grabbed myself and steadied my cock. I moved my gaze up to his face, watching as his eyes squeezed shut, and then I gave a short thrust forward. He let out a whine, almost sub-vocal, deep in his chest, and his claws extended as he grasped at the sheets. They started to shred under his hands, and I pushed a little harder.

“You can take it,” I murmured.

He shook his head from side to side, but it wasn’t a no. His hips moved toward me. “More,” he breathed out. “Fill me.”

I didn’t need him to ask twice. Bracing myself on his hips, I gave a sharp thrust, and after a second, I slid home. His body would never welcome me the way an Omega’s would welcome another Alpha. I would never have a knot for him, and I didn’t know if my body would ever take his again.

But in that moment, it didn’t matter, because this was perfection. I watched myself slide in until my hips were pressed against his, and we were joined. There was no way to be closer unless there was a bond between us, and I swore for a second, I could see one shining. It was weak, flickering, but wrapped around us, and it petrified me and left me aching for more.

“Fuck me,” Zane ordered, and that snapped me out of my daze.

I gave him a feral grin, holding still for only a second, and when I saw him reach the peak of his tolerance, I obeyed. Drawing almost all the way out, I slammed back in, sending the bed crashing into the wall. Zane pushed up in his elbows, eyes wide, lips parted. He looked wild with desire—every bit of him the beast I had rescued, and every bit of him the strong Alpha who was nothing short of absolute.

He was mine.

He was utterly and completely mine.

That was the rhythm I fucked him with—possession and love and want and need. I pulled him close, letting his legs wrap around me, and he pushed halfway up, trying to ride my cock. His own rubbed between us, and in his punched-out groans, I heard him getting closer.

“I’m going to come,” I told him, pushing my hand between us so I could get to his dick. My hand curled around it, and it only took two strokes for him to spill.

His head fell back on a cry, and I felt his come shoot over my stomach. That was all it took for my orgasm to crash over me, almost as powerful as it had been the night before during the peak of my heat. I wasn’t filled with a knot, but it didn’t matter. I was still with Zane, and that was enough to send my head into a spin.

I came to lying on his body, his hands in my hair. He was making a deep, sub-vocal rumble in his chest that moved across my sensitive skin, and I turned my face, rubbing my nose along his thick chest hair. I heard him chuckle as he stroked his fingers along my scalp, and when I lifted my head with the little energy I had left, he took me by the chin and kissed me.

It was soft and kind. It was absolutely nothing like the kisses he’d given me before. It was a mirror of all the layers that made up the person he was, and it settled deep inside me, even if that empty ache was still there.

“Why do I feel this way?” I asked. I felt young, suddenly, even with the weight of the First War heavy on my shoulders. I had lived so much life, but I had never felt a connection like this to anyone before.

His hand moved to my cheek, and he rubbed his thumb under my eye. “Do you want the truth?”

My brows rose. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I know exactly why, but I don’t want to send your ass running for the hills,” he confessed. His voice sounded hoarse and a little raw, and I realized he was vulnerable in this moment. Alpha or not, powerful or not, if I wanted to shut him out, he wouldn’t be able to stop me.

“I’m not going anywhere,” I told him. I shoved one hand under his back, holding him tight against me. I was probably too large to be pinning him to the bed like that, but he didn’t seem in a hurry to push me away. “I never thought I could have this. Why the hell do you think I’d give it up now?”

He swallowed thickly, and his eyes were shuttered as they met mine. “We’re bonding.”

I almost laughed because I knew we hadn’t. I’d stopped him at the goddamn eleventh hour, in spite of what everything in me wanted. “We haven’t…”

“No, we haven’t,” he agreed, not letting me finish. “I haven’t bitten you, but it’s still there. I could feel it during your heat. I could see it,” he added, sounding a little breathless.

I knew what he was talking about now. That fantasy when I sank inside him, when I carried him to the edge of pleasure. It wasn’t a hallucination. But it was also something we could still walk away from, and it would eventually fade into nothing.

I closed my eyes and pressed my cheek over the thrumming beat of his heart. I swallowed back a desperate plea for him to sink his teeth in and mark me as his because it wasn’t right. Not here. Not like this. Not when I couldn’t be sure it wasn’t his trauma that made him want more.

“I can’t,” I told him.

He twitched beneath me, then held me tighter. “I know.”

I lifted my head again and made him hold my gaze. “No, you don’t know. I want this more than anything. More than I have ever wanted anything. But you just got out of the worst situation, Zane. Your head’s a fucking mess right now, and I just had a heat. I care about you too damn much to go forward without some time first.”

His jaw tightened, and his cheek sank in like he was biting it. Then, after a beat, he let out a breath and nodded. “When we get back home, we’ll talk.”

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