Page 108 of Tharn's Hunt
“Yours.” Her voice meets mine in the mindspace, clear as the sky across the dust.
And I know?—
I will never let her go.
Chapter 30
NAKED AND (NOT) AFRAID
JACQUI
Iwake the way a planet might wake to its first sunrise. Slow, dazed, irrevocably changed.
My body feels different. Not just the pleasant ache between my thighs, the ghost of his teeth on my neck, the places where his claws left possessive marks. Something deeper. Like my bones have been reforged. Like my blood sings.
Tharn is wrapped around me—a furnace of muscle and heat, his arm slung heavy over my waist, his chest pressed flush against my back. His breath stirs my hair with each exhale, and for one reckless moment, I consider pretending to sleep forever.
But the light shifting through the cave is too bright, the air too thick with the scent of us. Salt and musk and something electric that makes me inhale even deeper. I turn carefully, my movement barely a whisper, but his arm tightens instinctively.
“Mine.”
My gaze flies to his, but he’s still resting. A soft huff of a chuckle brushes through my nose, my cheeks warming even aseverything else within me warms. Even unconscious, he won’t let me go.
Good.
His face is softer in sleep, the usual intensity smoothed into something softer, almost vulnerable.
I lift my arm, tracing with my finger, following the curve down his shoulder.
He’s beautiful.
Alien.
Mine.
A month ago, that thought would’ve sent me into a panic. Now? After the way he ruined me, after the way our minds collided at the peak of pleasure—after feeling his soul knit to mine—it’s the only truth left.
This is why Justine will never leave. This is whyIwill never leave…
Tharn's eyes open suddenly, catching me mid-trace. His lips slowly curve into a smile.
That same damn smile that sent me scrambling backward the first time he tried it. Back when his unfamiliar facial muscles had twisted the expression into something feral, when I'd mistaken bared teeth for threat instead of tentative affection.
Now, heat crawls up my neck for entirely different reasons.
"You look," his mental voice slides into my mind, a low rumble that vibrates through the bone. I blink. We're not touching. The connection is just… open. "Your thoughts are loud."
Oh, this is new.
And terrible. Because Tharn with a direct line to my brain is apparently Tharn with no damn filter. "And you're smug," I shoot back.
His grin widens, all fangs. "Your pleasure made me so."
The bluntness makes my face flame. I press my palm against his chest to shove him—or maybe climb him. "You're imagining things."
He catches my wrist easily, his thumb brushing my racing pulse. His eyes darken. "I am not imagining this," he projects, the thought a low thrum against my skin. He brings my knuckles to his mouth, his fangs grazing them lightly. "You taste of me. I want to taste me on you again."
A low growl rumbles in his chest. He rolls, covering my body with his. His mouth finds mine, not asking but taking, a deep, slow kiss that tastes of possession. His hands are heavy on my sides, his thumbs finding the soft swell of my breasts, pressing in, learning my shape. I shudder.
