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His voice was near a growl. “You don’t think if I’d known we were scent-sympathetic I would have never looked at anyone else? One breath from you and I would have been yours.”
I shook my head, or tried. I couldn’t move with his hand in my hair, his lips at my ear, and he had no idea what it was doing to me. “You didn’t want me. We were just friends.”
“Inever said we were just friends. When you told people that, I kept my mouth shut, because I wasn’t going to risk scaring you off or changing our friendship,” he growled, the sound vibrating through me down to my toes. “There was never a time I didn’t want you. I wanted you more than anything.”
“Ash.”
“Anything.”
“If that’s true—”
“It is.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“You wanted scent sympathy. Desperately. No matter what I thought, I didn’t believe you’d be with me because we weren’t a match. So I tried to make myself move on, telling myself you were better off. But if we’d both made it to graduation and hadn’t found it, I would have said something.”
“What about Vivian?”
A slow kiss just below my ear. The suppressant was wearing off, and perfume filled the air around us. “Me trying to move on. My own desperation because I was so close to snapping and telling you everything. I didn’t want to lose you, Sloane. Whatever way I could be near you. Every instinct I had told me you’d run if I admitted I wanted you. And after you left,” he paused. “After you disappeared… it felt like Vivian was all I had. But in the end we were better friends, and she agreed. Didn’t even last a year. We didn’t have enough in common, and if I’m telling the truth, I was still in love with you.”
I closed my eyes against the truth. “So I ruined everything for the last five years.”
“No.” Ash turned me back around, arms braced on either side of my head so there was still nowhere to look but him. “If you’re a coward then so am I. If I’d told you I was interested at all, or had been less afraid of taking a risk, you never would have thought I’d be disappointed with you.”
His eyes dropped to my lips, and I didn’t even think about stopping him. Ash kissed me and held nothing back. Every moment in the last five years I’d wondered what it would be like… nothing even came close.
I lifted my arms to wrap them around his neck, and he let me, taking the opportunity to draw me in once more. He tilted my face and deepened the kiss so I couldn’t eventhink, put me exactly where he wanted me, purr loud in the silence of mouths meeting.
Kissing Asher was like dancing a tango. Slow and smooth, filled with passion you knew was leading somewhere inevitable. Following the lead and not caring where it went because it was all pleasure.
Something snapped between us.
Suddenly I couldn’t take slow anymore. My hands sank into his hair and pulled him closer. This Alpha wasmine,and I needed him to show me. It felt like we’d been kissing forever. No awkwardness or hesitation. Just pure desire.
Asher lifted me, hands coming under my ass to press me against the wall. I clung to him, our mouths never stopping or slowing. There were five years of kisses to make up for, and I didn’t care if I gave up oxygen to do it.
This was what we could have had. “I’m sorry,” I whispered between kisses. “I’m sorry.”
He groaned, breaking away from me and pressing his mouth into my neck. Pulled the strap of my leotard off my shoulder and dragged his lips over my skin. I wanted his mouth everywhere.
Everywhere.
“Are you going to run again?” Words and breath burned hot against my skin.
“No.”
That was the truth. I was done running. From him, his pack, and everything else. I’d already fucked up enough. Like hell was I going to destroy this. I was still scared, but I didn’t care.
Ash kissed back up my neck and beneath my jaw, every press of his lips at once reverent and wild. “Tell me you’re mine.”
“I’m yours,” I breathed. It was true.
A low rumble, somewhere between a growl and a purr. “Mine.”
If I hadn’t been perfuming already, that would have done it.
Ash kissed me again, hard. His mouth was punishing and pleasuring, marking himself on me and taking what was already his. He kissed me until we were both gasping.
