Page 145 of Bane of the Wild Hunt

“Summer, I’m unwilling to risk any misunderstanding, and we don’t always think about intimacy the same way, so you will need to communicate clearly andout loudwhat you want.”

She rolled her eyes, and it would have been easy for me to become extremely upset when she reverted to this dismissive attitude during such an important conversation. But I knew it was her self-consciousness and self-doubt making her defensive.

But that didn’t mean I was budging on my boundaries.

“Just last night you made it clear you were happy not to be involved with anyone—” I began to remind her.

“Butyouare not just anyone, Sage! You are myanam. You are my friend and my sanctuary. You—”

She stopped, and her eyes widened as if she was afraid she had said too much, and then she began to drift back from me. “Gods, I’m sorry! This was a mistake, I knew that I should not have—”

I reacted immediately and caught hold of her arm to pull her back toward me.

“Iachefor you, Summer. You have consumed every part of me. Is that what you need to hear?” I asked her a little roughly, having lost my hard-won composure.

“Yes,” she admitted softly, looking abruptly emotional as she nodded. “Yes, that is what I needed to know.”

My heart was hammering so hard in my chest that it hurt my ribs, but I waited for her because I could tell there was more she had to say.

“I’m sorry, Sage,” she whispered finally. “I have never had this conversation before. I’ve always just known how it would go because males were happy to take what they wanted from me without question. I didn’t know how to ask or if it would be offensive for me to ask. You have not given an indication of how you—”

“Because I wanted you to be safe,” I broke in despite my intentions to let her speak, but my heart still felt like it was trying to ram its way out of my chest. “Your sense of safety with me is paramount. I would sooner suffer the consequences of forever wanting what I cannot have than have you feel again, for even a second, that your safety is secondary to the desires of someone else.”

Her eyes widened, her lips parting as tears began to gather in her eyes.

“So be clear with me,” I invited her softly as I drifted closer to her. “Tell me what you want.”

Her nostrils flared as she inhaled hard, but she came closer to me as her eyes lowered to my mouth.

“Kiss me,” she breathed. “Please, Sage, just—”

My fingers knotted in her hair as I closed the distance between us quickly. I wanted to slam her up against me and conquer every inch of her. I wanted to unleash all my suppressed desires upon her in a storm of passion.

But I was determined to restrain myself.

And then the first taste of her almost obliterated every intention to take my time with her.

The heat behind her lips, soft as petals, was as urgent and hungry as flame; her sharp inhale and soul-wrenching groan conveyed the depths of relief and want. Her clever tongue met and danced with mine in a perfect symphony. Her honeysuckle and rain scent intensified and seemed to flow straight into my veins. Every inhale was drawn sharp in desperation becausewe forgot to breathe, and every groan that wrenched free was swallowed and consumed between us.

That first yielding had my inner beast roaring so loud in my head that it shook my composure to the core.

Her hands moved down from my hair to my shoulders and around my back to my ass which she squeezed with a groan of appreciation. Her breasts were crushed against my chest, but I pressed a hand up between us to finally relish their heavy weight overflowing in my large palm. Summer uttered a breathy moan of encouragement that deepened into a growl of gratification when I shifted my hand so my thumb circled her pert nipple. She nipped at my bottom lip then sucked it hard enough to hurt.

And I abruptly needed to cover her gorgeous body in possessive bruises and teeth marks.

Summer felt similarly because she used her grip on my ass to undulate suggestively against me, teasing my cock that was already painfully hard and trapped between us.

With a rough groan, I gripped her hair and pulled her away from our frantic kiss before it escalated any more. And the sight of her with swollen lips, messy hair, and passion-sparked eyes almost became my undoing again.

“Don’t stop,” she growled, her voice guttural, and it made me grin cockily at her.

“We need to establish what this means, Summer.”

“Moretalking?” she groaned, and then squeezed my ass harder to increase the pressure on my cock.

My composure snapped, my inner beast seizing the reins just long enough to reach up and grip her throat in authoritative command before I could catch myself.

“Allow me to clarify. If you do not set boundaries with me right now, then I am going to take you up against that wall as hard as I want,” I asserted firmly.

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