Neela

Neela

After the trial, Ronan turned to leave the forest clearing, but I grabbed his wrist as though he were mine.

I liked the sound of that. “Mine,” I whispered, my fingers tightening around his thick wrist.

He turned startled black eyes on me, the dappled sunlight of late afternoon slanting across his tanned face.

He stared at me, licking me with his gaze, while the others departed, leaving us all alone among the trees.

He didn’t move a muscle, just stared at me with smoke in his eyes. “What did you just say to me?”

I’d spent the past few days worrying about accepting his help and trying to solve the equation of his life versus mine, but I was done with analyzing.

The intensity in his gaze sent warmth flooding through me, and his wrist was damn near burning my palm. “I said, you’re mine.”

This male had haunted my dreams since I’d first laid eyes on him in the Slippery Silkworm, fucking with my mind, messing with my body, and infiltrating every waking thought.

There was no point in resisting him any longer. It didn’t matter if he had to sacrifice his life for me, or if I had to offer my future for him; all that mattered was his muscled chest heaving a foot from mine and his hungry gaze.

I yanked him closer with growing need, urgency making my movements ragged and uncoordinated. I jumped, and he caught me, so I wrapped my legs around his waist, hooking my ankles together.

I leaned forward to kiss him, needing to taste him, to feel his lips, to be closer. I wanted to meld with him like I’d melded with the damn bracelet.

But he pulled back, teasing. “Say it again,” he growled.

“You’re mine.” Louder this time, insistent, demanding that he give in and kiss me.

His perfect lips quirked. “Good girl.” He claimed me then, his mouth pressing, moving, and devouring, and I claimed him back, urgent and needy.

Desire coursed through my body and made every inch of me ache. I pressed against him, chest to chest, but it wasn’t enough.

“Take your shirt off,” I managed to say between kisses, and he whipped his T-shirt over his head in a smooth motion, then slid my shirt off, too, leaving me in only a black bra. He growled, and I pressed forward, eliminating the space between us, squashing my breasts against his hard broad chest.

He felt even better than I remembered, and I let my hands roam over the ridges of his body, curling around to the smooth skin of his back, pressing my lips into his, overwhelmed with sensation but still needing more.

My pussy ached, and I bucked against him but couldn’t get the friction I needed.

He grabbed my ass and squeezed, drenching my core with desire and need, but still, it wasn’t enough.

Frantically, I reached down to unbuckle his belt, letting my knuckles brush my pussy as I did.

With one hand on my ass holding me up, he brought the other forward and stilled my fumbling fingers. “I wanted our first time to be slow and special.”

I guided his hand to press against my wet panties, and his breathy moan was so sultry I could have climaxed on that alone. “We already had our first time, remember? It was not slow. It was fantastic. Let’s just do that again.”

He resisted for half a second longer before diving for my mouth again and pushing the crotch of my panties aside with one finger and caressing me.

“Harder.”

He smirked. “Yes, ma’am.” He walked forward and slammed my back against a rough tree trunk, then kept enough pressure to hold me up while unbuckling his belt and sliding down his jeans.

I had to watch. His cock was reaching, eager, long and thick, and throbbing with desire. Perfect. I had to get it inside me, I needed every inch of it buried in me so I could ride him. My prince.

“Now,” I demanded, and he guided his tip inside me and rose to his full height, pushing every inch of himself up into me.

He was agonizingly slow about it, but I was so lost in the throes of sensation that I couldn’t complain. Every nerve ending was alive, dancing in fucking joy as he slowly pushed into me.

When our bodies met, clamped together, I bit his lip in reprimand for teasing me, then I began to grind.

For a moment, he threw back his head with a look of agony on his perfect face, exposing the muscle column of his neck, which I licked. He groaned and bucked, and I ground my hips. The rough bark scratched my back, and his hand squeezed my ass, and I kept grinding and riding and moving while his cock found all the magical places inside me.

This felt better than anything, just as good as when my inner power burst from me during the trial.

This felt like home. “You belong inside me,” I said, voicing my wild thoughts, not caring, feeling intimate enough with him that he wouldn’t laugh.

“Yes,” he snarled, biting my lip in return. “And you belong on my dick.”

That tipped me over the edge. I crescendoed. Every cell in my body had coalesced to a single point, and it shattered. I came apart in long pulsing waves.

My release gave Ronan permission, and he followed me to climax, holding me close against his chest, wrapping his arms around my back and squeezing so hard it hurt.

He stayed inside me while I rode my orgasm to the end in long, pulsing waves, and he held me tight the whole time. Then he raised me gently off him and lowered me to the ground.

“I love you, tomcat.”

I stood on the ivy, still wearing my skirt and bra, and looked up at him, waiting for him to take it back, act ashamed, or look away. He’d shouted it at me before, but this was thrown out like a simple fact.

He just stared at me, blinking calmly, not expecting anything in return.

Generally at this point, I would run away and hide—my usual go-to solution. I’d make some smart-ass comment, then get the hell out of there and ghost his ass.

But I didn’t want to. I didn’t even want to leave. I wanted to stay by his side and face the world with him.

I leaped into his arms, and he caught me again, this time sideways like a bride. “Good.” I planted a soft kiss on his lips. “Then you won’t mind carrying me home.”

He laughed, and joy suffused the entire forest, soaring through my spirits. He scooped to retrieve our shirts, which he stuffed in his jeans pockets, then he sprinted through the woods, holding me tight.