then thrust his tongue inside her only to drag it up around her clit. He suckled it with the same measured intent as he’d done with each of her nipples.
Slow, steady, torturous bliss.
Stefan guided her where he wanted her, using her hips to lift her closer to his demanding mouth. She thrashed and cried out. Her hands fisted around the silk sheets as she bucked up to meet his caresses.
She crashed over the edge like a hurricane with a howl that shattered the windows of the vardo , but Stefan still didn’t stop. Not until she bucked against his mouth and everything inside her was filled with bursts of bright ecstasy and she felt the aftershocks of her orgasm all the way in the soles of her feet like blasts of a thudding heartbeat.
Still, he wasn’t done with her.
Quivering and trembling, eyes half-closed from bliss, he guided her legs to wrap around his hips and drove his cock into her still-pulsing sheath.
She cried out again as he hit the core of her, and she clawed at his back—begging both for more and a surcease of sensation, but he was relentless. His hips pistoned like a perfect machine, drilling into her.
The bliss wound tight again, shoving her forward toward the edge. Beth wasn’t ready to go and she didn’t want to go alone.
She scraped her teeth along the healed scar where she’d marked him, and a low sound was torn from him.
It was sensitive.
“Do it,” he commanded.
Beth didn’t question him. Instead, she bit him with her human teeth. His mouth found her neck and he bit her back—sending them both skyrocketing to orgasm.
Afterward, she lay in his arms—wrecked. It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him she loved him. They’d said it before. They said it all the time.
Even though they were mated, even though they were forever, it was still different now. It didn’t seem right to say, not only because it didn’t feel like enough, it didn’t feel like it was something he wanted to hear.
What they’d just done he’d said was loving. It was incredible, to be sure, but she couldn’t forget how he’d looked into her eyes and whispered “I love you” with the utmost conviction and sincerity while she’d been nothing more than an asset.
It was possible she was simply an asset now. Whatever had happened between them had been the catalyst for his ascension. Beth reminded herself yet again to be happy with what she did have. The past was in the past and it was nothing more than an anchor. She couldn’t live in the present or move toward the future if she was always looking back. She knew that.
Beth still couldn’t help herself.
“Next time, let’s use the mind link. I want to feel what you feel.”
She gave an awkward laugh. “I don’t think that you do.”
“Why not?” He propped himself on his elbow. “Did I do something you didn’t like? You came really hard.”
“No, it was amazing.”
“But?”
“But nothing. Why do you want to use the mind link? Don’t I get you off well enough?” She tried to deflect from her earlier statement.
“Sweetheart, you’re perfect.” He grazed his lips over hers and she tasted herself, sending another jolt of desire through her.
She crossed her legs. Beth didn’t think she could handle another round, but the beast wanted her to try. It was attention-hungry and loved his hands on her body.
“I’m surprised you didn’t suggest it first. It’ll be a power trip. You’ll be able to see all the things I do to thwart you when you try to make me come before I’m ready.”
“And you’ll see the same.”
He flashed a wicked grin. “We’ll both have to come up with new strategies.”
She thanked the heavens for her regenerative powers. Before her infection, she would’ve been done for the night, but she suspected they both had more staying power now.
Her infection. Panic seized her and she grabbed his chin, looking into his eyes.
“What’s this?” he asked, amused.
“I was checking you for infection.”
“And