didn’t correct him, too busy trying not to feel the seductive scrape of his stubble along her skin while he dragged his cheek against hers, almost like he marked her with his scent.
Christ, why were people with money so weird?
Worse? Why did she like it?
Chapter Five
Blake Woolven hadn’t ever felt as alive as when he chased Randi through the maze.
He warned her not to run, and he couldn’t help but give chase. Her flight roused all the old instincts, the most basic of needs. His blood pumped like lava through his veins, he was on fire with the beginning of the Change, and his cock hung thick with need of her.
The bloom affected her just as he knew it would, which was why he’d told her not to go into the maze. It’d been designed for the chase, for capture, and for lulling human brides into a state of bliss and need so that when they saw their Woolven husbands shed their skins, they’d be too aroused to care. It ensured the continuation and diversification of the bloodline.
She’d most definitely use his want of her against him, but it pleased him that she wasn’t so unaffected. The staccato rhythm of her heart, the scent of her desire, and her hands moving down over his back…
He couldn’t wait until she clawed at him, crying out. He wanted to take her as a man, as a wolf—he wanted all of her.
But he wouldn’t do it while she remained under the influence of the bloom, as easy as it would be. As hot as they were together. He wanted her to be with him because she wanted it to, because she decided it—without any help from the dark flower.
She gasped and wrapped her legs around his hips, trying to get closer to him, to build the friction between them.
He was wired to give her what she wanted, to claim her, mark her.
To turn her.
If he could manage to give her relief, it would break the hold of the flower’s pheromones at least long enough to get them out of the maze, and to return Randi mostly to herself.
It would be no chore to bring her to bliss, to make her scream his name. The challenge would be not burying himself in her sweet heat when he was done. Not biting the soft flesh of her neck where his venom would change her, brand her…
So close to the full moon, he didn’t know if he could muster the control he needed.
When her little nails dug into his back, he knew he had to do something. He could control himself for her—she was his mate. This is what she required of him. His body and his wolf would obey.
He kissed her again and she arched into him, offering him anything he wanted. Blake pushed her skirt up around her hips, taking time to enjoy the silky feel of her thighs, drawing upward to cup her ass in his hands and grind her against him.
“Oh God, what are we doing?” she breathed.
He pulled back and slid down her body. “I’m going down, and you’re about to be coming.”
“I—”
Blake dipped his head between those thighs, pushed past her sensible cotton panties with his tongue to taste her. She was just as sweet as he thought she’d be.
He couldn’t wait to drape her body in silk and lace, only to rip them off her again. Like unwrapping a gift.
He eased one finger inside her and she gripped him, pulled him deeper. Goddess, but he couldn’t wait until she tugged at his cock, all wet and hot, needing. Demanding.
Blake moved his tongue at a leisurely pace, enjoying the taste of her, the feel of her, the way she filled up all of his senses until all he knew in the world was her. She was the beginning, the end, and everything in between.
“Please,” she begged him, a tinge of desperation to her voice.
He traced the seam of her, lapped and laved, all his movements designed to bring her the most heightened experience of pleasure.
She was so soft and wet, pliant as his tongue delved into her, her fingers pushed through his hair now, the tension in her hands intended to drive him nearer his task. He didn’t mind. He liked it when a woman told him what she