Page 56 of Wolf of the Storm
"I trust the storm," she says softly. "I trust you. The bond gave me your blood—it has to be enough."
Her faith in me breaks something open in my chest. Something I locked away when my father died and left me alpha at twenty-three. Caring too much meant losing too hard. I learned that lesson young.
I pull her close, wrapping my arms around her until there's no space left between us. She fits against me perfectly, her head tucked under my chin, her heartbeat syncing with mine. For a long moment, we just stand there in the hallway, holding each other while the world threatens to tear itself apart around us.
"The bond demands it," I breathe against her hair. "But this is more—I need you, Eliza. You make me better than I am alone. Stronger. More human. And the thought of losing that, of losing you—it terrifies me more than any enemy ever has."
She pulls back just enough to look up at me. Tears shimmer in her eyes, but her expression is fierce. "You trust me with your life. Trust me with my own."
Partners. Not alpha and mate. Not protector and protected. Partners. Equals. Two people choosing to face danger together because together is stronger than alone.
I kiss her.
Not gentle. Not careful. I pour everything into it—the fear and the love and the desperate need to prove through touch what I can't articulate with words. That she's everything. That losing her would destroy me more completely than any Fomori ever could.
She kisses me back just as fiercely, her fingers fisting in my shirt, pulling me closer. Her need matches mine—desire mixed with something deeper. We're reaffirming what we are after the argument threatened to tear us apart.
I back her toward the bedroom door, never breaking the kiss. My hand fumbles for the handle, pushes it open, and we stumble through together. She's pulling at my shirt before the door closes behind us, and I help her, yanking it over my head and tossing it aside.
"Declan," she breathes, and my name on her lips undoes me.
I lift her. Her legs lock around my waist, thighs gripping tight enough to bruise. Three steps—my bare feet silent on hardwood, her weight solid and real in my arms. The bed. I lay her down, and she pulls me with her, refusing to let go. My hands sink into the sheets on either side of her head, taking my weight, keeping myself from crushing her even as every instinct demands I press her into the mattress and never let her up.
My fingers find the hem of her shirt. Drag it up slowly, exposing her stomach inch by inch—the soft skin, the way her muscles jump under my touch, the shallow rise and fall of herbreathing. She lifts her arms and I pull the fabric over her head, toss it somewhere behind me. Don't care where it lands.
Her hands work at my belt, fingers clumsy with urgency. The buckle gives. Button pops free. Zipper hisses down. I shove the denim down my hips, kick it away. Her jeans follow—I peel them down her legs, taking her underwear with them, and then there's nothing between us. Just her flushed skin against mine, everywhere we touch generating heat.
I start at her throat. My mouth traces the line of her pulse—too fast, frantic, alive. She tilts her head back, offering more, and I take it. Teeth scrape down to her collarbone. She gasps, her nails suddenly digging into my shoulders hard enough that I smell copper. The pain lances through me, sharp and perfect, and a growl rumbles up from my chest.
Lower. The swell of her breast fits perfectly in my palm, and I close my lips around her nipple. Her back arches off the bed. The sound she makes—half moan, half plea—vibrates through the bond, echoing in my bones.
The claiming mark sits just above her collarbone, raised and silver-white against her throat. My mark. Proof that she's mine, that I'm hers. I trace it with my tongue, following the crescent of my teeth, and she shudders beneath me. Her whole body trembles, thighs tightening around my hips.
"Declan." My name fractures on her lips, desperate and demanding.
When I settle between her thighs, her hands immediately fist in my hair. I meet her eyes one more time before I lower my head. Let her see the wolf looking back. Let her see exactly what she does to me.
Then I put my mouth on her.
Her thighs start trembling first—small tremors that spread up through her hips, her stomach, until her whole body is taut as a bowstring. The taste of her floods my senses, salt and heat andsomething uniquely her. I feel the exact moment she tips over the edge—her spine arches clear off the bed, her fingers twist in my hair with bruising force, and my name tears from her throat, raw and broken.
The bond explodes with sensation. Her pleasure slams into me—white-hot and overwhelming, feedback looping between us until my vision blurs at the edges. My hands grip her hips hard enough to leave marks, holding her in place as she tries to twist away from the intensity.
I don't let up. I work her through it, tongue and lips relentless, drawing out every aftershock until she's gasping for air, until her thighs quiver against my shoulders, until her hands in my hair go from pulling to pushing weakly at my head.
"Can't...” she chokes out. "Too much—Declan...”
Only then do I ease back, press a final kiss to her inner thigh where her pulse still races.
When I move back up her body, she pulls me down into a kiss that tastes like desperation and forever. "I need you," she gasps against my mouth. "Now. Please."
I position myself at her entrance. The head of my cock presses against her, hot and slick, and I freeze. Just one heartbeat. One suspended moment where neither of us breathes.
Her legs tighten around my hips, pulling me closer but not forcing. Her hands frame my face, thumbs brushing my cheekbones. Her eyes—pupils blown so wide the brown is just a thin ring—lock on mine and don't waver. Don't blink. I see everything in that gaze: the rapid flutter of her pulse at her throat, the slight tremble in her lower lip, the set of her jaw that's pure stubborn determination despite the sweat dampening her hairline.
The bond hums between us, taut as a wire. Her heart hammers against mine—beat for frantic beat. Her breath comesshallow, quick. Mine mirrors it. We're trembling—both of us—on the edge of something that feels bigger than just bodies joining.
She pulls my forehead down to hers. Our noses brush. Her exhale becomes my inhale.
