Page 41 of Her Rabid Beasts

I narrow my eyes, and when he opens his, that grin turns into something a little more uncertain.

“Didyou,” I demand, “or did younot,threaten to blow up the anima dorm?”

“Not threaten,” he corrects earnestly, stepping forward. “I had the explosives in place and everyth?—”

The dark look on my face makes him decide against finishing that sentence. I thought perhaps he’d turn sheepish at my words, but once again I’ve underestimated his audacity.

He takes a step forward and the space between us heats at the intensity simmering in his eyes. “Blowing up a building is the veryleastI would do to get to you.”

Shit. My afternoon get-off session didn’t take the edge off anything. A tingle shoots straight between my legs, but I ignore it and keep the venom in my voice. “And how about the girls in it? You didn’t care for them?”

He rubs the back of his neck, exhaling heavily, as if the concept is a great nuisance. It’s then that I see my black hair tie is still around his wrist. He’s kept it after all this time. “I got them out in the end, regina.”

I glare at him. At this insane wolf who tried to blow up an actual building to get to me. A shiver wracks my body andarousal holds me in its hot, heavy grasp. Those beautiful lips of his curve into a smile.

“I’ve come to cuddle. Move over.”

“No you haven’t,” I say quickly, leaning back.

“We used to cuddle all the time down in the cavern!”

I shake my head.

His face falls and I almost feel bad. I want to be the type of girl who has her mates in her bed every night, but?—

I take a deep breath. “You need to ask permission.”

Savage gapes at me. “What does that mean?”

“Oh, come on. You went to the same manners classes I went to. Consent and all that.”

“Consent has to be freely given, enthusiastic and ongoing.” He sings it like it’s a jingle from a commercial.

“Yes. So you can’t say, ‘I’m cuddling with you.’ You say, ‘CanI cuddle with you?’”

“Oh, right.” He scratches the back of his head. “Can I cuddle with you?”

“No.”

“See!” He gestures wildly. “It didn’t work! That’s why I didn’t ask.”

I glare at him in exasperation, and he grins at me. “I’m only joking, regina.” He kneels down next to my bed and clasps his hands together like he’s a child praying at bedtime. “My beautiful, stunning, gorgeous regina, with eyes like a warm summer’s night. May I, pretty please with five cherries on top, eat your pussy and fuck you senseless?”

Pressing my lips together to stop the laugh that’s threatening me, I say dryly, “Well, that was lovely, I suppose.”

“I know.”

I tear my eyes away from that perfect, masculine face and stare at my hands. The backs of my eyes burn as I wonder whatthe fuck I should do. The force of my desire for him is almost choking me. But with everything that’s happened?—

“Regina?”

He keeps calling me that and I don’t understand why I feel different about him now. Whyhefeels different about me. I’m confused and tired and thirsty?—

“Hey.”

The gentleness in his voice catches me by surprise and I suddenly don’t know what to do. How to move, how to speak.

And then he’s there, climbing onto my bed and pulling me into his muscled body. My face sits against his warm, bare chest and I’m getting his skin wet with tears, but under that is his scent. Ancient forests and deep fertile earth. A smell I’ve known for weeks and even longer than that. A flash of a memory comes to me again, of me lying down next to Savage, both of us in our beast forms. Just breathing. Just lying quietly together. It’s familiar to me now. His wild, heady energy, wrapping around me on a near constant basis. I might not have known it, but in all that time, I got used to him being by my side.

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