Page 29 of Valentine's with the Cartel

"You're..." I choked out, unable to form a coherent thought through the haze of lust that fogged up my brain. "How did you know? I haven't told anyone yet!"

Rafael's eyes flashed with feral triumph at my revelation even as he pressed two long fingers knuckle-deep into my quivering channel in one swift, smooth thrust.

"I had my suspicions from the moment you ran to the bathroom and started retching like your life depended on it," he growled, scissoring his digits deep inside me in a deliberate stretch that stole the breath right out of my lungs. "But I didn't think it would be this soon. You are barely showing any signs yet. Other than the change in your scent, there's very little."

He was right, of course. My body had only begun to change subtly over the past few weeks—my stomach flatter than usual and my nipples more sensitive—but nothing that could be considered definitive proof of pregnancy... until now.

"Please," I whimpered as I rocked down onto his fingers, chasing more of that intense stretch he was so effortlessly inflicting on every upstroke. "I need you to fuck me now! I can't take the teasing anymore!"

Rafael's eyes flared with lust at my crude entreaty, a guttural groan tearing itself free from his chest as he surged upright and captured my mouth in another brutal kiss.

At the same time, his cock sprang free of its confines to slap heavily against my stomach, thick and throbbing with urgentdemand as it sought out my weeping hole like a missile locked on target.

And then he was sinking into me, his massive girth parting my flesh with ruthless precision until he was buried balls-deep in one powerful thrust that had us both crying out at the suddenness of the penetration.

I could feel every ridge and vein dragging against my sensitive inner walls as he began to move, stoking that spark of ecstasy higher and higher with each deep plunge of his hips.

"You are MINE," he snarled into my mouth as he gripped my thighs hard enough to bruise and hauled them wider apart. "And I will never let you forget it for the rest of your days, not even if I have to ruin your perfect little ass hole every hour on the hour until you are too sore to walk!"

He punctuated his words with a vicious grind of his pelvis that made me see stars and swear in multiple languages even as my fingers scrabbled against the sweat-slicked skin of his back, leaving angry red welts in their wake. Oh God, how I loved everything he was doing to me, and he was so relentless.

"I love you," I screamed at him even as he drove into me like a man possessed. "God help me, but I love you so much it's killing me!"

And then Rafael was kissing me again, his teeth and tongue clashing against mine in a battle for dominance that I could never hope to win... not when I had no desire to fight him on this, anyway.

"God, Anan," Rafael groaned as he slammed home inside of me. "The way you squeeze around me—it's like your body was made for mine, to take everything I give you."

His statement might not be too far from the truth, I thought. I was pretty sure we had always been destined to be together.

I could only whimper in response, my back arching off the bed as he hit some spot deep inside that made my visiongo white around the edges. He wasn't wrong—the connection between us felt so absolute, so right that it almost hurt to breathe sometimes.

"Please," I gasped out, writhing beneath him as he set a punishing rhythm, each thrust shoving me up the mattress with the force of his movements. "I need more—need you to make me forget everything but this feeling, this perfection."

There were a lot of things I wanted to forget in that moment, especially the fact that I lied to him and he had to find out the truth himself before I could fix my mistake.

Rafael let out a feral growl in response to my plea, one large hand fisting in my hair as he jerked my head back at an almost painful angle, exposing the delicate skin of my throat.

"My little slut," he rasped even as he latched onto the juncture between neck and shoulder, biting down hard enough to leave a mark. Him calling me 'slut' didn't feel inappropriate. I actually liked it every time he did it. "Always so desperate for me, always begging for more like it's your sole purpose in life."

And that might not be too far from the truth, and so I keened loudly at the sting of his teeth sinking into my flesh, the sharp pain blending so perfectly with the exquisite pleasure coiling in my gut that I could scarcely tell one from the other anymore.

Breathing grew more difficult by the second.

"Yes!" I cried out, my fingers scrabbling against Rafael's sweat-slicked back as he continued to pound into me with single-minded intent. "I was made for this, made to be your slut, your whore!"

The words tasted like a revelation even as they spilled from my lips, as if I had finally come to some fundamental understanding about the nature of our bond. And perhaps it was true—perhaps everything that had led us to this moment had been building towards this revelation all along.

Chapter 18

Rafael

I was lying curled around my omega as he drifted off to sleep following our intense lovemaking session, marveling at the way his body fit against mine so perfectly like two puzzle pieces clicking into place. There was nothing else I would rather be doing.

We had made love with an abandon and passion I had never experienced before, lost in a world of sensation that transcended the physical. And it happened because I knew he was pregnant. It had been different because of that.

As I listened to the steady thrum of Anan's heartbeat, my mind drifted back over the events of the evening. What a day it had been—full of revelations and new beginnings. Things were going to be different now, knowing he was pregnant.

There was that confrontation with Mara and her blatant attempts to sow discord between us by dragging up painful memories from Anan's past. What a bitch, I thought. She never had anything positive to share with us.

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