“I’ll never, ever expect more from you than what you’re capable of giving me, angel.” He reached up and tucked her windblown hair behind her ear. “I just want the chance to prove to you that I can be good for you. Please don’t let the actions of another man ruin what we could have.”
“This is just moving too fast for me.” She stumbled back and Rob had to control the urge to reach out for her. She was struggling with her beliefs, and he could wait for her to be ready. She made the step to come find him. He had to believe she would come back for him again. He would wait until he took his dying breath. So he’d do the hardest thing he’d had to do since meeting the woman who would own his heart fully.
He’d let her go.
“I won’t pursue you if you don’t want me to.” God, saying those words was like ripping his heart out while it was still beating. He went from despair to hope and then back to crushing misery. There would be no drug strong enough to dull the excruciating pain that radiated through him in this moment.
She stopped and turned. “I-I can’t, Robbie. This is too much.”
He nodded, too choked up to speak. Too weak to resist begging if he did open his mouth.
“Please,” she breathed, and he was shocked to realize he wasn’t the one uttering the word.
She stepped closer to him, and he didn’t know what she was begging for. Did she want him to run from her? Did she want him to stay and fight? God, he didn’t know what to do.
“We can go slow. Take all the time in the world to just see what happens.”
“I’m scared.” She swayed toward him, and he grabbed her, his greedy mouth finding hers with a desperation he knew all too well since meeting his little waif. He told himself, ordered his body to go slow like he’d just promised they could do. No way was he going to frighten her away with the forceful need coursing through him right now. He eased his kisses, turning them light and teasing while he ran his hands through her hair, just holding her to him, tasting her, drinking from her like a man enjoying the finest whiskey and not a starved man experiencing food for the first time. Easy, sipping kissing that had her clutching at his arms and moaning into his mouth.
Rob eased her to the ground, kissing her mouth and traveling down her neck, licking and lightly nipping her skin. He was hard and wanted her right now, but he had to take his time. Show her that he could be a gentle lover too.
He slid his hand up her shirt and squeezed her breast and his mouth moved to her ear. “I love your body. So beautiful. Perfect.”
Her hand slithered under his belt and into his jeans. Her soft little hand wrapped around his cock and he couldn’t keep the groan from escaping his lips. He rested on his elbow and kissed her again, sliding his hand from her breast to inside her pants like she’d just done for him. He found her wet and ready and gently rubbed her clit in time with her shallow pulls of his cock.
He took his time, learning her body like he should’ve done before. Each time they’d been together it was fierce, all consuming, and now he’d control the burn at a heated simmer.
Ariel pulled her hand out from his jeans and started unbuttoning his shirt, kissing the exposed skin she found. He’d been working all day, so he knew he was dirty, but if she noticed, she didn’t care. They slowly divested each other of the rest of their clothing and within minutes, he was easing into her welcoming body. They fit perfectly together, as if Rob had any doubt.
He made love to her on the ground in the middle of the woods, surrounded by temptation of love, of future, of hope.
When she came, he pulled out and finished right after her, holding her, loving her. There was no doubt in his mind that he was in love with her. Maybe it’d happened the moment his lion acknowledged her as his mate. It didn’t matter. But as she wringed the last of his seed from his body, his fangs descended, a new demand to take. And he was going to.
Just not today.
Chapter Nine
Ariel awoke to soft kisses at the nape of her neck, and she realized she was falling fast and hard for Rob. In the weeks since their misunderstanding and subsequent make up, they’d been practically inseparable. Rob slept in her cabin with her. They’d have breakfast in bed, meet for lunch together in the cabin—followed by some hot and fast sex—and then they’d eat in, begging off offers to join the others at the main house. It was as if they were living in their own little world. It was perfect.
And it scared her. The last time she had something perfect, it had been an illusion. Love was just an illusion. She’d learned that lesson the hard way. But when she was with Rob, he made her forget how reality could be and she was able to live that fantasy with him. And since they’d spent every moment possible together, she never really had time to acclimate herself with the vestiges of reality.