Page 79 of How to Lose a Pack in 10 Dates

My throat tightens. I shrug. “I can’t sleep.”

He blinks, eyes adjusting, and steps aside without question. “Come in.”

I cross the threshold, and the door clicks shut behind me. His room is warm and still, and as I step further inside, I wonder whether he can scent Wes on me.

“You wanna talk about it?”

I hover, then shake my head. He nods as if he understands, and then, I do something dangerous.

I step between his legs. Cam’s hands lift instinctively, but they hover. He doesn’t touch me, and doesn’t push.

That makes it worse. That makes it better.

He’s not trying to take, he’soffering. Instead of reaching for control, he’s giving me comfort; a place to rest, a body that isn’t asking for anything in return.

“Is this okay?” I whisper. The words scrape out of me, more fragile than I mean them to be.

“Yeah.” Cam’s voice is low; gentle but sure. “You don’t have to ask.”

Andthatis what undoes me.

Because he’s not Wes. He’s not angry or guarded, not all sharp teeth and biting tension and impossible pride. He’s steady and safe and soft in all the ways I forgot an alpha ever could be.

“I’m not gonna sleep tonight,” I tell him.

Cam searches my face. “You want a distraction?”

I nod.

“You sure?”

His hands rest gently at my hips, not urging me forward, but anchoring me there. The heat of his skin seeps through the cotton of my sleep shorts and into my bloodstream, and I nod my head again.

And then, he pulls me in and kisses me.

It’s warm and soft, open-mouthed and aching with restraint. I melt into it as his tongue brushes mine. One hand curls around my waist while the other drifts up my spine, and I push him back onto the bed and climb into his lap. He groans as his hands find my thighs, sliding up with maddening slowness.

“You’re not a distraction,” he murmurs against my neck. “But I’ll be anything you need right now.”

I don’t answer—I just kiss him harder. He guides me to straddle him properly, and my hands roam over his shoulders, down his chest, across the solid weight of him beneath me. His mouth is everywhere: my throat, my collarbone, the place just below my ear that makes me tremble, and his breath stutters out when I roll my hips, testing the heat between us.

“Aimee,” he rasps, fingers gripping my waist.

His amber eyes are heavy with instinct and restraint. There’s not an ounce of hesitation in them, though: just sheer and utter focus.

“Still okay?” he asks, voice hoarse.

“I want this,” I nod. “I wantyou.”

His whole body reacts—hips lifting slightly, jaw clenching, hands tightening—and then he flips us over so that he can settle between my thighs.

“I’ve got you,” he murmurs, lips brushing my temple. “You don’t have to hold anything back tonight.”

For what feels like weeks now, I’ve been holding: holding myself together, holding back my need, holding onto every excuse I’ve rehearsed about why this can’t happen, shouldn’t happen, won’t mean anything. But Cam is looking at me like itdoes, likeIdo, and it’s exactly what I need.

He settles fully between my thighs, his body warm and solid, one arm sliding beneath my back to hold me close, the other braced beside my head. His scent is threaded with the unmistakable charge of alpha arousal, and it curls through my gut in waves.

“Breathe,” he murmurs, mouth at my jaw, “just breathe.”

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