He closed his eyes and groaned, his head dropping low so his forehead was pressed to mine. We breathed the same air for long moments, neither speaking, but it was a profound moment.
“I’m afraid,” I admitted out loud for the first time since all of this started. But I didn’t know what I was afraid of.
The situation? This intense attraction I felt for him, the first and only attraction I’d ever felt in my entire life? The fact that he wasn’t even human and that I didn’t fully understand what a fated mate entailed with his species?
I had so many questions slamming into my head they made me dizzy, yet as I stood in front of Cian, one thing was abundantly clear.
His presence grounded me, leveled everything out. My thoughts cleared, the hazy, dizzy sensation dissipating.
He had both hands covering my face in the next second, his palms calloused, so warm and big that it was hard to focus on anything else but the feel of him. I’d never felt anything so peaceful—or arousing—than having Cian touch me. And it was easy enough to get swept up in the sensations he conjured inside me.
My eyes snapped open when I felt the soft brush of his lips against mine. I was startled, my heart pounding, my body shaking. He groaned roughly from that tiny connection, and then he was stepping closer, fusing our bodies together.
“Ah, gods. Yes, Evie. Fook… yes.” His words were low, husky. His fingers tightened ever so slightly against my temples, and then he was tilting my head to the side and trying to deepen the kiss, letting his tongue slide along the seam of my lips, a silent request for entrance.
God help me… but I opened my mouth and moaned when he dipped his tongue inside.
I felt the way his muscles tightened, all that power waiting to be unleashed. The sounds he made from this simple kiss were unlike anything I’d ever heard, unlike anything I could have ever fantasized.
“Touching ye is better than I could have ever dreamed,” he murmured against my lips a second before probing my mouth once more, fucking me in the way I wanted him to in a bed, both of us naked.
My first kiss was powerful, electrifying, and had this singeing heat inflaming every inch of me. The sounds coming from Cian were so hot, a man untamed, barely hanging on to his control.
“I waited so long for ye, lass. So fooking long for this. Ye’ll be my first everything. Forever.”
I felt my eyes open and flare at his words. His first everything? Oh God, why was that so hot?
I let myself enjoy this as my eyes slid shut once more, as I curled my fingers against the wall, no purchase to hold onto, my nails scraping against the cheap wallpaper. But it was better than reaching for him, pulling him harder against me, needing to feel every square inch of his body plastered against mine.
As if he read my thoughts, he groaned again, pressing his lower body against my belly, the very thick, very prominent outline of his desire for me digging into my stomach. He was huge, his erection big enough this fear filled me at the very thought of trying to take all of him into my body.
A fresh gush of wetness spilled from me, my body preparing itself, the obscene images of him over me, thrusting against me, pushing—making me take—all that dick into my pussy. My face heated, no doubt a flush racing up my neck to encompass my face at the arousal and embarrassment of my thoughts.
He kissed me deeper, delving his tongue all the way in, tasting every inch of my mouth. My teeth and tongue, my inner cheeks, sliding that muscle along my upper and bottom lip before dipping back inside my mouth, claiming me from the inside out.
And that’s exactly what it felt like he was doing.
A claiming.
My hands found their way to his waist, feeling all that hard muscle underneath the thin cotton material. There was so much power underneath his golden skin and strong bones, muscles thick, power immense.
“Ah hell, lass,” he grunted against my lips.
I let my hand slide away, thinking maybe I’d overstepped by touching him, even if that thought seemed ridiculous seeing as he was grinding up on me. And the growl he made couldn’t be called anything but disapproval.
“More. Touch me more, Evie… as much as ye like. All the fooking time.”
There was more kissing, heads cocked to the sides, tongues dueling with one another. I felt insatiable, ignited.
“Gods, I’ve been waiting for ye, for this moment, my entire life.”
I knew he wasn’t talking to me but murmuring the words to himself, as if he couldn’t believe this was actually happening. I could relate, never once seeing myself in this situation. It was both exhilarating and terrifying all in the same breath.