Page 68 of Hunted By Wolves and Shadow
Sensing my turmoil, she tried to shift, but I couldn't release her. Not again.
Not yet.
I whispered my plea with my lips against her soft cheek. “Lie to me, witchling. Tell me you love me.”
It was too much to ask, but I craved the words more than my next breath. Even if she didn’t mean them, I just wanted to hold those words forever.
“Wolf?”
“I know, Emi, but please. Grant me this one wish. Lie to me this one time.”
“Wolf…I can’t.”
“I know I have no right to ask. But please, give me this one thing before you go.”
This time she pushed more insistently against my chest. Despite how badly I wanted to cling to her and never let her go, I did. I could barely meet her gaze, but then her hand was warm on my cheek and she forced my eyes to find hers. They werebrilliant green in the low sun, speckled with gold and full of more life and hope than I ever imagined one person could contain. Skies, but she was breathtaking. I wanted to look nowhere else for the rest of my days.
“One lie, sweetheart, and I’ll never ask for anything again. Tell me you love me.”
“I can’t, Wolf…”
My eyes burned and my heart throbbed. Of course she couldn’t. Turning away would have been the dignified thing to do. Instead, a hot tear overflowed to spill down my cheek, and Emi wiped it away with her thumb and held me tighter so I couldn’t look away. Then, she smiled at me, and my heart stuttered.
“No, Wolf. I can’t do both. I can’t lie and tell you I love you at the same time, because it’s no lie.” Her eyes shone and her lips tilted with inconceivable hope. “I know why you thought I’d go home, but that place isn’t home anymore. Maybe it never was. As soon as I got there, I knew it was wrong. I knew I had to come back. Had to find you.”
She kissed me, hard and fierce, just as determined as she did anything worth her attention. I wouldn't have her any other way.
“Why?” I whispered against her neck, unable to help myself from kissing the soft spot where her pulse raced over and over, all while salty tracks traced my cheeks.
“The only place I want to be is wherever you are, Wolf. My family may be blood, but that's the only thing we have in common. They never saw me the way you do. No one sees me like you. You looked at me and you didn't just see a witch or a girl to be ignored or a person whose only value is in the things she can do for you. You saw me. You saw all of me, and I never knew how much I was missing that until you.”
”You mean that, don't you?”
She responded by kissing me again, thoroughly. I loved it.
I was laughing as we broke apart. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
“It's aClouds, Yes. It's a yes to whatever comes next, as long as we're together. So, would you still like me to lie, or would you like me to tell you I love you with all the honesty of my heart?“
My smile was so big it hurt. Somehow, Emi was here, offering everything I didn’t deserve. And I knew I was a greedy man because I was grabbing it with both hands.
Whatever it took, I would to live up to what this magical creature deserved. I wanted to give her this whole bright, sunny world we found ourselves in. And I’d start by giving her all of me. I was hers, for as long as she’d have me. I had been for a long time already.
“Then, witchling, I guess it's a good time to tell you that I love you, too. I’ve wanted to tell you every day since you returned. I’ve loved you since you first held a knife to my throat. I loved you already even when I thought I hated you, and now, even though I know I could never deserve you, I love you selfishly, and scared, and with everything that I am.”
She blushed in my arms. Smiled. Healed me. “Thank the starry skies. That would have been terribly awkward if I’d misjudged how you really felt.”
We laughed, and I traced her jaw with my knuckles, still hardly daring to believe this was real.
“I love you, Wolf. As a man, as a wolf, it doesn't matter to me. If I had my one wish to do all over again, I would wish for you. Only you.”
I shook my head in amazement at her. “Then it's a good thing you wished for something far more useful, because you already have me. Always will.”
Her kiss was everything I needed.
When the kiss turned hot and needy, want surged through me, vivid and hard. It had been forever since I’d had her—a lifetime ago it seemed—but my body remembered every curve and everytender aching pleasure. The little moan she let out slotted into the last crack in my heart and made me whole again.
“I’ve missed you, kitten.”
