Cade watched me, still close. The droplets of water lingering on his skin were slowly drying, and his tattoos stayed still. It was easier to focus on the ink on his skin, the jagged lines of a sword, a knife, the thorns of a rose, the magic in him, than it was to focus on his eyes. If I looked into his eyes, I would remember who my parents were and whohisparents were.
“My dad stopped believing when he was a teenager, but he couldn’t leave until college. Then he told his parents he wasn’t coming back. He met my mom when she was doing outreach for unaffiliated wolves.” I quirked my lips at his raised eyebrows. “That’s the polite way to say no pack, no last name. Anyway, they started talking, and shelistenedto him. She already had a small pack then, just a couple of members—college students who felt naked without a pack, so she would be their alpha, and they could feel safe. He said he knew she would be a good alpha because she could have forced any number of the unaffiliated to be in her pack, to submit to her, but she didn’t. She let them choose their own path.”
I couldn’t help myself. I reached out with a fingertip and brushed it over the swirling rosebush vine on Cade’s shoulder. When I followed it to the end, a single perfect rose bloomed under my fingertip.
Cade shivered, his breath hitching. “So you feel bad that you forced Tyson to submit?”
“I didn’t just force him to submit. I claimed him as an alpha. But it wasn’t just him. I claimed the pups in the forest. I’m becoming the sort of alpha that my dad ran away from. I’m becoming the sort of alpha that my mother would have challenged and won against.” I fisted my hands, then loosened them and pulled the towel from my shoulders.
Gently, I wrapped it around Cade, drying the last trace of moisture from his shoulder.
“So the alpha of your father’s childhood pack would have claimed several pups to protect them from being murdered? He would have claimed them even though it meant losing the glory of a successful hunt? He would have put his own freedom up for trade in order to save their lives?” Cade’s words were quiet, and he spoke to the edges of the towel as I dried under his chin.
“No, but—”
“He would have used his position as alpha to claim a rival rather than proving once and for all that he was the more powerful wolf by killing him in combat?” Cade wrapped his hand around mine, forcing me to look at him.
I was drowning, and he was throwing a rope into the water, giving me a single thing to grab hold of and save my life.
“It’s not like that. It’s a violation. I took away their ability to choose.” My breath hitched when Cade raised a hand to my cheek.
“You saved their lives. Tyson was counting on killing you. Which means the only way to stop him would be to kill him or to claim him.” Cade stared at me. “I understand why you’re conflicted, but you need to ask yourself what your choice was. Not paint yourself as the villain because it makes you feel better about the guilt.”
I stared at him. If he knew who my mother was, who my father was, he would know exactly who the villain was in this situation.
Cade’s thumb brushed over my cheekbone, stroking across the skin. His fingertips dipped lower, pressing on my lips.
“You didn’t die,” he observed.
“So you don’t have to bring me back so you can kill me.” When I smiled, I felt it move his fingertips.
Then one of them dragged across my lower lip. I shivered. Even though that was the only place we were touching, my skin felt raw and desperate.
“No. I don’t think I could ever kill you. And since I’m the only one allowed to…”
“Is that how you’re going to get me to live forever?” I smiled again and this time let my lips fall open so his forefinger dipped inside. I suckled and watched him inhale sharply, his breath coming unevenly.
I pressed forward, and his finger slipped out of my mouth, and then both of his hands were in my hair, dragging me into a kiss. He moaned against my lips.
I lifted him up, wrapping his legs around my waist and stumbling the last few steps to the bed. The damp towel fell on the mattress first, and I threw him down. He tugged the towel loose, tossing it to the side.
He was spread out underneath me, pale flesh cut with dark black lines. For a long beat, I looked at him, the taut lines of muscle, the slender waist, and long, lean legs. His eyes were luminously blue, and his blond hair looked almost white against the sheets.
He gazed up at me with wide eyes, and he brought one hand up, tracing the line from my shoulder down to my hand where it rested on the mattress next to him. He wrapped his palm around my wrist, squeezing once.
I felt it in my cock, and my eyes snapped to him once again.
“Lie down. On your back,” he said.
After a moment of hesitation, I obeyed, and he slid himself over me. The feel of his soft skin against mine made me growl, and I brought both hands to his hips, thrusting up, our cocks sliding against each other.
He tsked, then took hold of my wrists and placed my hands on my pelvis, pressing them firmly against my hip bones. “Don’t move.”
As I inhaled, whatever I wanted to say died in my throat when he slid down, placing himself between my legs and swallowing my cock in his mouth. His head bobbed up and down, the slurping impossibly hot.
I whimpered, a whine that built in the back of my throat and choked me. He sucked, one hand gently cradling my balls, squeezing just slightly, the slightest bit of threat that made it that much hotter.
As he sucked on me, I realized how much I wanted to reach up and dig my fingers into his hair, how much I wanted to press my hand to the back of his skull and thrust up into the warm, wet heat. My palms were too hot on my hip bones, framing my cock. They burned, the skin searing, my breath short and desperate.
