“Goddamnit,” Oliver muttered and lurched down to crush their mouths together.

Luna groaned. Her hands knotted in his hair, urging him closer. She tasted like bond nectar and herbs and the hot chocolate she drank earlier. Oliver licked deeper into her mouth until it was pure Luna, nothing else.

“Gotta be fast,” Oliver slurred against her lips. “Fiancé’s waiting.”

She nodded frantically, scrabbling at his clothes.Their hands kept tripping over each other, clumsy in their eagerness. Oliver couldn’t believe how much he wanted her. He couldn’t feel what she was feeling, but the want was just as bad as it’d been when the bond was yanking them together. The only difference was that now it was all his.

“I keep expecting—” Luna cut off with a moan as he bit gently at her neck. “I keep expecting it to kick in. You know? Like, to feel?—”

“Please don’t,” Oliver said. He didn’t want to hear her talk about the times they’d had together in this very bedroom, the shared sensations blurring until they couldn’t tell which ecstasy belonged to who.

She was still wearing her bra and he still had his boxers when he pushed her onto the bed and dropped to his knees. But before he could bury his face between her legs, Luna forced his chin up.

“Not this time,” she said. “Get up here. I want you inside me.”

The words set a fire in Oliver’s stomach. He shot up onto the bed, grabbing a condom from the bedside drawer and tearing it open so hard the condom ripped with it.

Luna grabbed the next one off him. She rolled it onto his cock and then climbed on, both of them moaning as she bottomed out. He caught her hips, trying to see if she was taking it too fast. But there was nothing but pleasure in her expression as she worked herself on him.

“Come on,” she moaned. “Fuck me like youmean it.”

She meant like the first time. Hard and primal, holding her bruisingly tight. He even considered it: pushing her into the mattress face-first, holding her there while he fucked her. The idea of it made his stomach twist. If this was the last time, he wanted it to be slower. Wanted to make it last.

He pressed her back into the sheets, twining their fingers together above her head. Something like surprise flickered over her face, but it was quickly lost as he started to thrust in earnest. She bit her lip, and Oliver waited to feel the echo in his own lip. It never came, and he buried his face in her neck so she wouldn’t see whatever shitshow expression was happening on his face right now.

He missed her. He was inside of her, and he wanted to be closer. Wanted to feel what she was feeling, wanted to hear the tail-ends of her thoughts. He wanted deeper, wantedmore, wanted everything they’d agreed they wouldn’t have. Screw blocking each other out, screw not pushing deeper, he wanted all of Luna. And now he’d never get it.

Luna squeezed his fingers with a whimper. “Knot me. Fuck, Oliver,pleaseknot me.”

Oliver gritted his teeth. “Can’t. No time.”

“Please,” she said, voice choked with tears. “I love it so much, please, Iloveit…”

For a moment, Oliver considered it: thrusting as deep as he could, locking them together. Teasing the knot gently back and forth, never quite pulling out, the way she liked. Sending her out to herfiancé forty minutes later than she promised, her hair a wreck, drenched in his scent.

“I love,” she repeated. Then she cut off, her mouth falling open in a silent gasp as she came.

Maybe it was an echo. A phantom sensation from the bond. Maybe it was his own brain making things up. But a familiar warmth panged in his chest, his own orgasm chasing hers. He pulled out at the last moment, jerking himself around the condom. Watching the base of his cock swell around his fist.

Luna whimpered. He dropped his head on her shoulder in a silent apology. Then, against his own better judgment, he kissed the bandage on her thumb.

Neither of them spoke. Finally, Oliver sat up, wincing as he pulled the condom off his swollen knot.

“You should get going,” he said as he tied it off. “Five minutes are up.”

Luna nodded. She wiped her cheeks.

“Intense,” she whispered. She gave him a brisk smile, as she always did when he was worried he’d hurt her. Then she pushed herself up, adjusting the bra strap they’d never gotten around to taking off.

He watched her get dressed. Watched her apply deodorant and finger-comb her hair until she looked totally normal. Even her smell was normal, the deodorant drowning him out.

She paused at the door. “Thank you. Not just for the sex. For… letting me stay, I guess? At the inn, obviously. But also, you know, with…” Her eyes were glossy, but onlyuntil she blinked. Then she was picture-perfect, ready to go back to her real life.

“I had such afuntime with you,” she finished. She gave him one last smile, then flounced out.

Oliver lay there with his knot aching and his boxers around his ankles. He’d never felt emptier. He feltcold. It was so much worse like this. Holding her close, knowing he’d never do it again. He never should’ve let her back into his room.

Twenty-Six