“You want relief?” Quiet, gruff words.
She tensed. Before she could even think to answer, he’d pushed her inside the house, kicked the door shut, and slammed her against the wall. Then his mouth was on hers and he was devouring her. There was nothing gentle or coaxing about the kiss. His mouth ravished hers, his tongue forcefully thrust into her mouth, and he kissed her like it was the last thing he would do before he died. It was deep, commanding, devastating. The force with which he took her mouth should have scared her, but instead she was on fire, and all she could do was kiss him back. He wouldn’t have settled for anything else.
Both his hands threaded into her hair, angling her head exactly how he wanted it. There was no denying that just then his lips and tongue completely owned her. It felt like a claiming, a promise, and a warning. Then he was sucking on her tongue while digging his hips into hers, crowding her with his body in a way that had her level of arousal spiking. As one hand splayed possessively over her stomach, the other suddenly yanked on her hair, forcing her head back and breaking the kiss. His face loomed over hers; his expression was fierce.
“I’m not going to fuck you.” As he spoke, he slid the hand on her stomach down to the hem of her skirt and bunched it up around her waist. “I’m not going to be some casual encounter. I want you to want me, your mate—not sex. But if you need relief that badly, I’ll give it to you.” He cupped her hard. Gasping, she reflexively snapped her legs together, effectively trapping his hand. He shook his head, his gaze chastising. “Open your legs.”
“What?” she squeaked at the very firm command, feeling off-balance by his sudden change of mood. He didn’t repeat himself, just raised an expectant brow at her. Gulping, Shaya slowly did as he’d asked.
He pushed two fingers past her panties and drove them into her. So hot and wet. “Mine, Shaya. Understand? You’re mine, and this pussy is mine. And if you ever again think about giving another guy what’s mine, I’ll kill him. I will. I’ll fucking tear him apart, and then I’ll spank your ass so goddamn hard, you won’t be able to sit down for a week.”
Shaya would have told him that she’d never intended to sleep with Simon, but then Nick was on his knees. He’d hiked one of her legs over his shoulder, and he was tearing off her panties. Only an idiot would distract him from what he was doing. She was a bitch, but she wasn’t an idiot.
When she felt the tip of his tongue swirl around her clit, her head fell back just as her eyelids drifted shut. She had been so damn aroused for so damn long that that one touch had her melting against the wall, moaning. As his tongue fluttered between her folds, she moved the hands she’d braced against the wall to his hair and pulled, needing more. He growled against her flesh, making her womb clench. She was glad he was gripping her thighs hard because she strongly doubted she’d be able to stand without help.
His tongue branded her with every stroke, reducing her to a sensual state that was so intense, she was almost afraid of it—almost afraid of her body’s equally intense response. Everything other than the feel of his mouth faded away as he licked, sucked, nipped, and fucked her with his tongue. And she moaned, gasped, groaned, whimpered, and sobbed. But he didn’t let up, didn’t give her any reprieve, practically torturing her with pleasure. He might have been the one on his knees, but it wasn’t Shaya who was in control. With his unrelenting grip, Nick controlled her every movement. With his talented mouth, he controlled her pleasure and her body’s responses.
“Nick…I need to…”
He growled again, and the reverberations heightened the sensations. Her legs shook as he suddenly thrust two fingers inside her and began suckling on her clit, demanding that she come. He got what he wanted. She screamed as her climax forcefully slammed into her, shattering her. Nick bit down hard on her inner thigh, prolonging her orgasm.
Panting hard, she watched as he fixed her skirt and got to his feet. He gave her another possessive kiss, overwhelming her mouth and biting down punishingly on her lower lip, making it clear just how pissed he still was. Then he was gone. And she was realizing that Nick had been holding back his dominant side big-time.
As Nick tossed back a handful of pills and Derren sat at the dinette frowning in disapproval, Nick was thinking that this was becoming too familiar. Either the headaches were becoming more painful or the pills were becoming less effective, because he now had to take a higher dosage to dim the pain. The bitch of it was that the dosage and the pain thrown together acted as one hell of a sedative. Any minute now, he’d be in the land of the fairies. It wasn’t until Nick slumped on the sofa, eyes closed, that Derren spoke.
“That’s three headaches you’ve had today.” His voice was quiet, which Nick appreciated.
“Yeah, well, it was a stressful day.”
Derren cursed. “Nick, you need to go back to Amber for more healing sessions.”
“No.”
A heavy sigh. “Nick—”
“They’re just headaches. Besides, you know as well as I do that if the sessions didn’t work the first time, they aren’t going to work a second time.”
“It’s always worth a shot. Or maybe you could go find another healer.”
“I’m not leaving Shaya.”
“I hate to say it, Nick—and I really, really hate to say it, because you deserve to be happy—but you’re fighting a losing battle here.” More sensitively, he added, “Shaya’s not going to come around.”
Nick was thinking he might be right about that. She had said that what he’d been doing was working, but she’d also said that she didn’t want it to work. Still, he wasn’t ready to admit it could be hopeless to himself, let alone to anyone else. “Leave it, Derren.”
“You know I’m right. Christ, Nick, she went out with another guy.”
“The reminder isn’t necessary.”
“If that doesn’t tell you that you’re making no headway here, I don’t know what will.”
“Derren, I can’t have this conversation right now.” He couldn’t have any conversation right then. The sounds of their voices were blurring together, and it felt like someone was striking his head repeatedly with an iron rod.
“Let me call Amber and have her look at—”
“No.”
“If I have to, I’ll ask her to come when you’re asleep—nothing in this world could wake you.”
Nick was in front of him in a second. “You do that, and I’ll kill you. You know as well as I do that if Amber touches me even once, I don’t have a chance in hell with Shaya.”
“It’s possible that you don’t have a chance anyway.”
“I mean it, Derren. Do it, and that’s it with you and me. Now I’m going to bed.” Going to a room free of noise and light where he could fall asleep with the taste of his mate on his tongue and the smell of her on his hands.
He hadn’t meant to unleash the full force of his arousal on her, but he had lost control the second his lips had touched hers. They had been so soft and pliant beneath his. Christ, she had been so responsive—moaning, writhing, and clinging to him. Moreover, he had tasted that natural submissiveness of hers, and it had only made him want her more.
Every cell of his body was urging him to go back to that house and take what was his. His wolf was clawing at him, annoyed with him for not claiming her there and then, despite how angry he was with her and how betrayed he felt. His wolf refused to consider what Nick was thinking, refused to accept that the whole situation was hopeless and that his own mate might never want him.