Before he could question how far she wanted to go, she murmured, “Hmm,” and slid her fingers lower, past his navel, lower still until she slipped them underneath his waistband and gingerly caressed the skin beneath the elastic.
He sucked in a breath, waiting for her to move her fingers even lower, where his erection had curled upward begging for her touch.
Then a horrible thought occurred to him. They didn’t have much time. What if Darien called and wanted Carol to go to the hospital pronto? Yet Ryan couldn’t move, the anticipation of her touch suspending him in time.
Her fingers surged deeper into his briefs, sweeping across the tip of his penis, which jumped at her touch.
He still wanted to know how far she was willing to go. Oh, hell. Forget words. He couldn’t come up with the right ones. And he assumed she wanted what he did at this point anyway. He rolled her over on her back and straddled her leg so he could slide his fingers under her waistband. He didn’t take as long to find her sweets, slipping his fingers through her curly hairs and then lower until he found her warm wetness and began to stroke the jewel that made her arch slightly against his fingers.
He knew then that she had to be his. Or he would never have taken it this far with one of his own kind. But he also knew he had to take this slowly until she was ready to accept him all the way. After all, she was newly turned and probably still didn’t completely understand what taking a mate meant.
She barely breathed, her fingers touching his chest but not moving, just frozen in place as she concentrated on how he stroked her hard little nub, her body undulating with fever. He leaned down to kiss her gently, to savor the wine on her lips. To his surprise and delight, she devoured him as if she’d been starved for affection forever, her lips caressing his, her tongue darting around his mouth, tasting, memorizing, and tangling with his.
She drugged him with her sensuous urgency. She might not have been born a lupus garou, but she knew how to stir up the wolf in him. He plunged his tongue into her open mouth, and she sucked on it, her fingers groping for his erection. He almost forgot what he was doing, considering the way she fueled a fire deep inside him, until she gave a soft moan and writhed under his fingertips. He stroked her willing, hot little nub, as her fingers dug into his arms, her eyes closed, her lips parted. A soft moan escaped, and her body trembled with orgasm. He smiled, loving how willingly she’d responded to his touch.
But no sooner had he had those thoughts than she worked his erection, coaxing and stroking up and down with the right firmness. He couldn’t last. Before he could begin to draw the sensation out, he felt as though he were freefalling from an airplane without a parachute— free, on top of the world. Her hand on him kept up the pressure until he came. He groaned her name, wishing that he could have been inside of her as she milked him, with her eyes half lidded and her tongue sweeping over her well-kissed lips.
He pressed his mouth against hers again, savoring the softness, the sweetness, moving down to her throat and then to her silky sheer bra. Pushing her bra down with frantic urgency until he exposed a breast, he sucked on one of her firm, eager nipples that was greedy for his touch.
“Did you envision this?” he asked, his voice still husky with need, his hands cupping her other breast, fondling, and drawing his thumb over the nipple still confined in silk and loving the different textures.
She gave him a tender smile and swept her hands over his bare shoulders. “Envision, yes, when I saw you shift and standing as such a healthy specimen of a man in the woods nearby. And again, when I imagined you wearing your plaid. But a premonition of the actual act? No. If I had, Ryan McKinley, I probably wouldn’t have told you. Some things are just not meant to be said.”
“Yet we agreed you would tell me everything you perceived. Everything.” He smiled at her, and removed her bra and panties and his boxers. Then he drew her out of the bed, swept her up in his arms, and carried her to the bathroom.
“Lelandi will hear the shower running and suspect something isn’t quite right,” she whispered.
“She already knows I’ve claimed you for my mate.”
She raised a brow as Ryan set her on the bathroom floor. “I didn’t think werewolves were considered mated unless they truly consummated the relationship.”
“That doesn’t mean you’re not mine,” he said, not caring how possessive he sounded as he turned on the shower. “It just means we only have one more hurdle to cross.”
“Hurdle.”
He lifted her and set her in the tub under the pulsating showerhead. “Yeah, hurdle. You’re no longer available, even if we haven’t consummated the relationship. Once that’s done, we’ve overcome the last barrier.” He smiled down at her as she rolled her eyes.
“Darien or the others won’t go along with that.”
“He and the others will know better than to challenge me in this. I know this isn’t the time, but on a lighter subject, we have another difficulty.”
“And that is?”
“Jake’s ready to have a showdown with me.”
She frowned. “What are the two of you in disagreement over now?”
“You.”
“You guys are funny… you know that? He’s never shown any real interest in me. You’re the one who came sneaking around Darien’s house in the middle of the night, hoping to catch a glimpse of me. Only my hair wasn’t long enough to let down out of the window to give you a way up to rescue me.”
“Rescue you?”
“From Darien’s ruling that I have to have a mate—soon.”
“If I’d known how you felt, I would have brought a ladder.”
“Hmm…” she said, reaching out to grab his hand and pulling him into the shower with her, her heated gaze raking over him in a seductive pass, “… you would have been naked.”
His hands molded to her shoulders, and he caressed them with his thumb, remembering how she’d taunted him with her scandalous nightgown. He reached down and softly pulled on one of her erect nipples. “Why did you go to the window in such a see-through gown? Hell, what if I’d been bad news?”
“Ryan McKinley, you are bad news.”
He slyly smiled, and she slid her arms around his neck and leaned into his body, rubbing a little to stir him up. And hell, it did. She was arousing him with the way she touched him, pressing, demanding more.
The hot water ran over her shoulders in a silky stream and slipped down between their chests. She raised her chin and offered her tantalizing mouth. Despite not wanting to appear overzealous, he couldn’t help the way he wanted her. Again.
Quickly succumbing to her seduction, he realized he hadn’t the strength to show restraint and kissed her hard with uncontrolled yearning, his tongue deeply penetrating her mouth, tasting her, wanting her. As if of their own volition, his hands slid down her back, with the water sluicing over her skin, and firmly cupped her buttocks.
She moaned and tightened her hold around his neck, leaning against him further. Then she sighed and released him. He thought she meant to stop him in his quest for fulfillment, dashing his hopes, and for a second, he was annoyed with himself for pushing her so fast. But she separated from him only enough to squeeze some soap out of her lavender body-wash container. Then her fingers were all over him again as she ran the pearly substance over his chest, the sensuous touch making him groan with want.
Making a special stop, first on one nipple and then the other, she teased just around the edges and then rubbed the tip with a soft thumb. She was killing him softly, came to mind as his hands returned to her tantalizing behind.