Her entire strategy centered on action, on pushing boundaries between them, on growing stronger as she sought out his weaknesses. There could be no room for hesitation.
Resting a hip on the table, Claire did as he suggested. His face … that was where he wanted to be touched, so that's what she did. She traced his jaw and nose, ran her fingertips over his lips as he did so often to her. Next she stroked down the back of his neck, kneading the flesh he'd once claimed caused him pain.
Shepherd turned his head up to her, his calculating eyes watching with such intensity, Claire found her gaze rested far more comfortably on the Alpha's broad shoulders.
Keeping her mind separate from how familiar his body had become, Claire tried to approach it clinically, unsure if she was doing well. When a large hand came to rest on her hip, she took his touch as encouragement to continue. Her touch flowed over his arms from shoulder to wrist and back again, forming to the contours of honed muscle, reaching around his back to lightly scratch her nails over the broad expanse of flesh.
He liked that. His breath hitched and Shepherd made little grunts and groans as she traced his spine, his purr husky.
She rose from her perch and took his hand so he could stand from the chair and she could continue. There seemed to be a shift in power when he was suddenly so much taller, and her uncertainty returned.
Timid, Claire's hands went to his belt.
Shepherd took her lowered chin, brought her face up to see the contented expression on his. "You are doing well."
His voice was gently encouraging, those expressive silver eyes liquid. Claire assumed he wanted her to continue and licked her lips, trying to seek out the fastening of his pants. Fumbling, she pulled down his zipper and eased the fabric from his hips. Shepherd stepped out of his remaining clothes and stood naked under her touch.
When the Alpha made no move, Claire understood she was expected to continue.
Her hands found a path from his thighs, near his groin, and across the hard planes of his stomach. She nosed his chest, and pulled in his scent the way she once thought she would do for the husband she had imagined for years. Holding on to the comfort of that thought, she put the conjured image in Shepherd's place, and pressed closer, breathing in the smell of his excitement.
It was so much easier to stroke and hum as her fantasy unraveled, that she didn't even hesitate to tease. Pretending he was hers, the mate she had dreamed of, Claire let it all go. Biting his chest, she playfully scratched near enough his groin that his cock twitched in expectation of attention-attention she denied, to instead reach around and caress his buttocks, relishing his groan of pleasured frustration.
By the time she closed her fist around his cock, touching it for the first time only to please him, Shepherd was already dripping, pulsing in her hand, and arching into her grip.
To be continued …