fighting my eyelids. “You sound good. And smell good too. It feels good to touch you.”
Understatement of the millennium.
“Thank you.”
“Not a compliment.”
His lips brushed my forehead, and I let him do it. Kind of impossible not to at this point. My body was packing up for the day. Or night. But one thing bothered me. “Thank you for stopping me. Earlier.”
We’d be three orgasms deep by now if he didn’t shove me away. From what I understood, a female Luther’s heat completely took over a male. I couldn’t imagine how much control it took him to separate us.
What if the male wolf didn’t want the female? I’d always looked at this as Sascha using his power and knowledge to take advantage of me. Really, women got the most choice in this. What if Sascha hadn’t always wanted me? He’d be a slave to the heat regardless.
My heart panged.
I fucking hated these meets.
“I’m glad you weren’t forced to do anything you’d later regret and hate me for,” he said mildly.
Blood crept into my cheeks. “I’m glad I didn’t force you to do anything you didn’t want to do.”
“There’s no danger of that, beautiful wolf. I assure you.”
Looked like sleep wasn’t happening just yet. I slitted my lids to watch him. The harsh line of his jaw was just visible through the tangled strands of his shoulder-length brown hair. My stomach clenched and I tensed at the surge of need.
That felt way more intense than usual. Almost like the pain I felt in the heat.
Sascha’s nostrils flared and he stopped short, staring at me.
Even I could smell my… want. Lust? Fucking embarrassing was what it was. That his lust rose hard and fast in response only lessened my mortification by a sliver.
“That’s just, uhm, leftover.” I pressed a hand to my cheek in case Little Miss Grope took over again.
The massive werewolf didn’t stop his stare. “Is it?”
Was he asking himself that question or me? “It feels kind of like the heat, but I’m not mindless.”
His eyes rounded a fraction.
“What is it?” I asked. Was this unusual or something?
Sascha pressed his lips together. “We’re not ready for sex, little bird.”
That’s a shame. Because in this state—vulnerable, tired, and horny as hell, I was more than ready to make a delicious mistake. “Why? Out of interest?”
Sascha walked us to a boulder lining the lake and sat down, still holding me close. “From what I witnessed between you and Logan, you use sex as a weapon. Or at the very least, you don’t view sex as emotional. More a need to be fulfilled rather than something… more.”
My mouth dried. An angry retort balanced on my lips, but I refused to give it voice. That wasn’t how I used sex at all. I liked sex. Sex was fun. It felt good.
And boy, had it been a long time. My eyes narrowed. Are you influencing me somehow?
My wolf didn’t answer.
Dang. This was all me.
I looked up at him. “I thought you wanted me.”
“I want you so much that I cannot take that gift from you yet. Not like this. Not until we are one in other ways.”
Yeah, he really wasn’t getting the memo on that front.
I winced as the ache between my thighs became acute. Seriously, it was out of control.
I needed to get home to deal with it myself.
“But I am a man who takes care of his mate’s needs.” Sascha’s voice hitched.
Warmth pooled in my belly. “What do you mean?”
Please mean what I think you mean.
His expression was solemn. “If it comes down to me having front row seats to what will inevitably happen or imagining what you’re doing to yourself for the hour after I drop you home, I choose the front row seats. No sex doesn’t mean we can’t touch.”
My chest rose, and I processed for the first time that we were both naked. He’d been clinical until now, but that dam broke as he dragged his gaze to my breasts and across my stomach.
“Andie,” he said softly. “It comes with conditions.”
“What?” I breathed.
I wanted his hands on me, his mouth on my breasts, and his fingers crooking in just the right spot.
Now.
He didn’t do it. “You tell me, truly, that it’s what you want. That you won’t regret it.”
“Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
I bared my teeth, feeling my claws lengthen, and he grinned. “Easy, beautiful wolf. You know this is important.”
A foreign agreement, and my claws receded. You’re an absolute sucker, I told her.
“I want this. And I won’t hold it against you after,”