Page 60 of Heat Clickbait
"That night during my heat, when I begged you to mark me." Her voice dropped, becoming something more vulnerable. "You all said no to protect me. But what did you want? Not as my protector, just as Nova?"
The question cut through every defense I'd built. "I wanted to claim you so thoroughly that everyone would know you were mine. Ours. I wanted to sink my teeth into your neck and never let go. I wanted—" I stopped, jaw clenching against the admission.
"Tell me." Her hands came up to frame my face, forcing me to meet her eyes. "What did you want?"
"Everything." The word emerged broken. "I wanted everything. Your submission, yes, but more than that. Your trust. Your brilliant mind challenging my assumptions. Your savage independence existing alongside our bond, not despite it. I wanted to deserve you, and I knew I didn't. Not yet."
"And now?"
I pulled her closer, until she stood between my thighs, my hands spanning her waist through my borrowed shirt. "Now I know that deserving you isn't about being perfect. It's about being present. Being real. Being the man who makes spreadsheets for dates because that's how I show love, not the Alpha who takes what he wants because he can."
"Show me," she said, echoing what she'd said to Milo. But where that had been about passion, this carried different weight. "Show me how Nova Masters loves. Not the Alpha, not the business manager. You."
I stood slowly, using my height advantage to back her against my desk. Not aggressively, but deliberately, each movement calculated for effect. "You want to see how I love? I plan every detail. I consider every angle. I optimize every experience." My hands moved to the buttons of the shirt she wore, my shirt, undoing them with methodical precision. "I take my time."
"Nova—"
"I'm still talking." The command in my voice made her eyes dilate, but there was no fear there. Only anticipation. "When I love, I categorize every response. File away every gasp, everyshiver, every tell that shows me what you need." The shirt fell open, revealing skin still flushed from her encounter with Milo. I should have waited, something inside me demanded that propriety told me that she should at least wait until she was done leaking his cum before I fucked her senseless, but I couldn't bring myself to care. In that moment all I wanted was her. "I create systems to ensure your pleasure. Protocols for your safety. Contingency plans for every scenario."
"That sounds very—" She gasped as my mouth found her pulse point. "—clinical."
"Does this feel clinical?" I lifted her onto my desk, contracts crinkling beneath her, my laptop pushed aside. "The way I've memorized that you arch your back at exactly sixty-three degrees when you're close to climax? That your scent spikes with vanilla precisely four seconds before you come? That you bite your lower lip when you want something but won't ask for it?"
She was biting her lip now, and I traced it with my thumb. "Ask for it."
"You know what I want."
"I know what you wanted during heat. This is different. This is choice, with clear minds and full awareness." I pulled back enough to meet her eyes fully. "So I'll ask you properly, with all the gravitas this deserves. Callie Odette Cross, will you allow me the honor of forming a permanent bond with you?"
Her laugh was breathless. "Did you just formally propose a mating bite?"
"Would you prefer I added a slideshow? I have one prepared."
"Of course you do." She pulled me down for a kiss that tasted like cinnamon and possibilities. "Yes, Nova James Masters. Yes to your formal proposal. Yes to your spreadsheets and systems and ridiculous need to optimize everything. Yes to you."
The moment that followed wasn’t the desperate, fevered joining of our heat. No, this was something far more deliberate, far moreintentional.
Every brush of my fingers against her skin was measured, every hitch in her breath noted and filed away for future reference. I stripped her down with methodical precision, my hands mapping the curves of her body as if committing them to memory, though, of course, I already had. The way her ribs flared just beneath her breasts, the softness of her stomach that she always tried to hide, the way her thighs trembled when I traced the inside of them with my fingertips. I learned her all over again, this time without the haze of instinct driving me.
When I finally settled between her legs, I didn’t rush. Instead, I took my time, my mouth trailing down her body with the same meticulous attention I’d give to a high-stakes negotiation. Her breath hitched when I reached the juncture of her thighs, her fingers tightening in my hair, not to guide me, but to anchor herself. I couldtasteher arousal, sweet and sharp like caramelized sugar with that telltale hint of chili, and I savored it, my tongue mapping every sensitive inch of her. She was already trembling by the time I focused on that precise spot just inside her left thigh, the one that made her hips jerk involuntarily. I filed that away too.
Her first orgasm was drawn out, deliberate, built from nothing but the careful application of pressure and rhythm. She came with a broken cry, her back arching off the desk,sixty-three degrees, just as I’d noted, her scent flooding the room with vanilla and something richer, somethingmine. I didn’t let her recover. Instead, I kissed my way back up her body, my lips brushing over the flush spreading across her chest, my teeth grazing the pulse point at her throat.
"Please," she gasped, her voice rough, her fingers still tangled in my hair. "Nova, Ineed?—"
"I knowexactlywhat you need." I rose just enough to meet her gaze, my hands working the fastenings of my trousers with practiced efficiency. "I’ve run approximately thirty-seven mental simulations of this moment."
She let out a breathless laugh, her dimples flashing. "Only thirty-seven?"
"I’m rounding down for modesty’s sake." The truth was closer to hundreds, but admitting that would’ve required explaining the spreadsheet I’d made comparing variables and that seemed like overkill for the moment.
When I finally entered her, we both froze. There was no heat to dull the edges, no biological imperative to excuse the raw, overwhelmingrightnessof it. This was choice. This was her body accepting mine because shewantedme, because she’d looked at all my sharp edges and calculated risks and decided I was worth the gamble. The realization nearly undid me.
"You’re thinking too much," she accused, her internal muscles clenching around me in a way that made my vision blur at the edges.
"Impossible," I managed, my voice tighter than I intended. "I’malwaysthinking." But my control was fraying, thread by thread, as I began to move inside her. Each thrust was measured, angled for maximum effect, my hands gripping her hips to hold her exactly where I wanted her. "Currently thinking about how you’ll look wearing my mark. How it will feel to know youchoseme. How?—"
She cut me off by sinking her teeth into my shoulder, not hard enough to bond, but enough to send a jolt of pain-laced pleasure through me. My hips snapped forward without permission, earning a cry from her that was loud enough to test the soundproofing of my office. I made a mental note to upgrade it later.
