Page 62 of More Than I Can Bear

He liked to watch.

Or so he thought. None of us had ever messed around with another woman, so it was hard to know, but I felt my heart start to race even faster at the thought of it. Kaine said it was because he wanted to see our mate, catch all of her reactions, feel the ache to be the one making her gasp, until he couldn’t stop himself from taking over.

I looked down at Freya, and smiled slowly.

“These lips?” Hers parted the moment I ran my thumb across that full bottom lip. The pad slid across all that softness, feeling the slick surface and making me want to delve it deeper into the hot, velvety wetness of her mouth. “They’re not that swollen yet. Not as much as they could be.”

I kissed her again, to show my sleuthmate what it was like, to let him hear the sound of her little gasp that transmuted into a muffled moan, but mostly because of her. Freya smelled so fucking sweet that kissing her was like licking honey straight from the pot and that shivery feeling of pleasure that came each time I did had me going back for more. At first I was just showing off, taking it slow, drawing out each kiss until it became something else again. A drowning in my senses, in her.

“Slow it down.”

I pulled away, automatically. Kaine was a bossy prick and Adam and I humoured him most of the time. When he had control he could settle down, take a full breath in. But his needs weren’t my focus right now.

“If you think Kaine was pushy before,” I told Freya who was staring at me, eyes glazed. “You haven’t seen anything yet. You want this?”

“What…?” she asked, blinking, looking like a swimmer coming up from under the water.

“You want him to dictate what we do?”

She blushed instantly, something she did a helluva lot, obviously having no idea how fucking cute she looked with pretty pink cheeks. But then those eyes; they glittered like diamonds, even as they grew heavily lidded as she slid them towards Kaine.

He was holding himself back by a thread, no doubt wanting to shove me out of the way. Not from jealousy, but because he wasn’t content until he knew a job was done right. He didn’t micromanage on a work site because he knew that actually would make the end result suffer, but still. Kaine had to know that we had achieved the desired result and that went double where Freya was concerned.

“You want—?” she started to ask Kaine, and that’s all it took for him to take over.

“I want to see him please you.” His eyes bore into hers. “I want to know that he’s making you feel better than you’ve ever felt before. I want you to experience your every sensual dream.”

“And you think you can make that happen?” I watched her eyebrow rise in challenge, and I chuckled. Kaine’s lips twitched, a smile wanting to form, but he was too obsessively focussed right now. Offering my sleuthmate any kind of provocation was likely to get a response. But this? He settled against the bench beside her, on the surface looking cool and calm. Freya turned back to me and the devilish light I saw dancing in her eyes made clear what she was thinking, so when she reached for me, I came willingly. “Maybe I just want this.”

She kissed me then, hard and hungry, and I forgot all about the game as soon as I felt it. My hands went to her hips, pulling her hard against me, giving her something to grind against, which she immediately started doing. Her mouth opened, her tongue sought mine and I gave and gave everything I had. Quick kisses, deep ones that felt like I was trying to crawl inside her, right as she did me. I was caught up in a cyclone of sensation, one I couldn’t bear to pull free of until Kaine spoke again.

“Slow it down.”

I let out a huff of frustration, then shot him a dark look.

“Maybe you should find some quotes to send out, some reports to prepare,” I growled. “While I see to our mate.”

“Slow it down,” he repeated with a nod. “Feel the need that burns inside you and only give in to part of it.”

Freya’s hands went to my face and she directed my gaze back to her and I felt it, that need to reconnect. I’d been drawn to her the moment I’d seen her, Adam’s impetuousness making sense the moment I touched her, because when I was close, I wanted to watch her, and when we touched, I wanted to kiss her and when we kissed…? I kept getting flashes of what it’d be like, her stretched naked across Kaine’s fancy bed as I kissed my way across… But I swallowed hard and then did exactly as Kaine suggested.

The kiss was a soft one, a ghost that was there and gone again. It wasn’t so much the feel of her lips brushing against mine that had me throbbing in my jeans, but the promise of more. If I just delved deeper, opened her mouth wider, took more I’d… I kissed her again, just a fraction deeper and then smiled. She seemed to catch on, her hands moving restlessly, communicating a passion that rose between us, but we hadn’t surrendered to it, not yet. Small kisses, delicate kisses, that made your mouth tingle, needing more, they were layered on top of each other like veils of paint, creating something beautiful between us. Maybe Kaine had meant this as a kind of punishment, because it made me ache. Tut just like art, it might hurt to make, but the end product was always so fucking beautiful tears formed in my eyes. My sleuthmate was right. By slowing shit down, it allowed the feelings to rise and they were just as intense as that need.

There was the feeling like I’d come home after years of being away. The feeling of needing something for so long the ache had become like an old friend, one you almost mourned the loss of when it was finally satisfied. But mostly this incredible, terrible feeling of rightness. I didn’t want to be anywhere or with anyone else ever, not when I had Freya. The weight of her in my arms, the way she felt pressed against me, the ragged little pulses of her hips, rocking her jeans-clad cunt over my aching dick—you could’ve put a gun to my head, telling me I’d die if I didn’t let her go and you’d still have to prise her from my grip.

“Freya…” I gasped.

“Tell her.” Kaine’s voice wasn’t a whip anymore, but a firm hand, guiding me where I needed to go. “Tell her how it feels to kiss her.”

“Good.” I let out a frustrated hiss, the response so inadequate in response to her. “Soft. Beautiful. Can’t get enough. Need more.”

“Take more,” she urged, pulling my head down, so I did. But finally I pulled away.

Maybe this was too soon. Maybe I was rushing things. I was all in with her, but she wasn’t there yet with me. But I had to let her know, that’s what Kaine allowed me to do. I had to put my cards on the table so she knew exactly what she was getting herself into.

“Like this is the place I’m meant to be.” I stared into her eyes, willing her to understand, knowing then the terror of being a bear shifter. I could give her my heart and she might reject it, but that knowledge didn’t seem to stop me. My eyes studied her, catching the rapid rise and fall of her chest, the shine of her eyes. “Like I’m home.”

For a moment I was standing on a precipice, not sure if I was going to jump, but her eyes became suspiciously shiny as she reached out and touched my cheek. Her fingers played with the stubble there and I cursed myself for not having shaved before, looking now for signs that I’d scored her face with beard rash, right before she spoke.

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