“You don’t have to…”

She touches me again, and my knees almost buckle.

“I want to,” she tells me.

And with the same fervor I showed her, Tess tugs at my swim trunks, freeing my cock, which is still half hard, and going straight for the swollen base to wrap both hands around it and squeeze it like I did. I have to lean back and grip the edge of the tub to keep my balance, my breath rushing out of me as if I’m being punched in the chest when she starts to massage my knot.

“Fuck. Fuck, Tess. Just like that.”

She looks dazed again, and her scent burgeons slightly—not like when she’s in heat, but enough that it makes my cock twitch with interest all over again. It makes me bolder.

“Harder,” I murmur. “You won’t break me.”

She shudders with my command and does as I ask, squeezing me tighter. The relief is instant—I can almost imagine it’s the warmth of her pussy gripping me, can almost imagine that my knot is safe and snug inside her.

Where it should be, something whispers.

And even as she’s wringing the swollen flesh of my knot, she still takes me by surprise by leaning in, licking at the head to taste me too.

I hiss through my teeth, watching as she does it again, humming her approval.

“You want to taste me, Tess? You want my cum in your mouth?”

Her scent blooms, and I can smell it, how wet she is all over again. It’s clear she likes it when I talk. If her scent is any indication, she fucking loves it.

“Suck me,” I groan. “Please, Tess. Just the head. I’m—I just need—Shit.”

Her lips close over the head of my cock, sucking gently even as she kneads my knot. It feels impossible that we’ve gotten here, that she’s down on her knees with her pussy freshly licked and my cock in her mouth while she massages my throbbing knot—but I can’t find an ounce of regret inside. Not with her looking so sweet, not with her being so good for me as she swirls her tongue around my glans, flicking the tip against the sensitive slit at the head.

And that’s all it takes to have me careening over the edge all over again.

My eyes roll back, and my cock pulses, and another burst of cum spurts out of me, just enough to make the throbbing at the base of my dick start to quell, finally. My breath is ragged, and my limbs feel like jelly. Tess gives me one more kitten lick before pulling away, licking her lips as she does so.

“Feel better?”

I swallow, my throat dry and my voice scratchy when I answer, “I don’t think there are words for how I feel.” I slowly slide down to my knees, reaching to cup her face with one hand. “And you? Do you feel better?”

She gives me a slow, languid smile. “Much.”

“We should…probably get out of here before your brothers come back.”

She winces. “Yeah…Not a conversation I’m dying to have. Ever, maybe.”

I don’t know why that makes me want to wince—it’s not as if I’m dying for her to tell her brothers about us either—and yet the idea of her keeping it a secret…irks me. Is that my instincts, residual feelings from my past experiences, or is it just…me?

“You go to bed,” I tell her, trying not to dwell on it too much. “I’ll clean up.”

She nods as she finds her underwear and wriggles back into them, then climbs out of the tub, grabbing for her robe to hastily put it on. I watch all this, mostly because I can’t seem to tear my eyes away from her. I’m fighting the urge to drag her back here and touch her some more. Something that is proving to be incredibly difficult.

“Good night,” she calls from the door. She makes a face. “I feel like I should say thank you. Is that weird?”

A laugh burbles out of me. “No weirder than anything else that’s been happening.”

“Well…thank you,” she says with a soft chuckle. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

I nod at her, watching her go back into the lodge as if she didn’t just turn my world upside down in what was possibly the most gratifying sexual experience I’ve ever had—furious as it may have been.

But more pressing than the thought of what just happened, more urgent than wondering what it will mean if we keep doing it…is the overwhelming realization that I don’t want to stop.

“I can’t believe you were in a hot tub with an actual mountain man with washboard abs—”

“I never said he had washboard abs.”

“Of course he has washboard abs, Tess, but still I—”

“You’ve never even seen him, how do you know—”

“All wet and steamy and close together—”

“We were sitting across from each other I already told—”

“—and you didn’t let him clean your pipes.”

“Sorry for disappointing you,” I huff.

“I’m kidding,” Ada says. “I’m glad you got to relax. I just wish you would’ve done it, you know, naked. Preferably in the afterglow of some hot lovemaking. Maybe on a bearskin rug. Oh my God, is there a bearskin rug there?”

“I feel like it’s not in my best interest to answer that question.”

“There is,” she hisses with glee. “So spill. Did anything salacious happen? I haven’t had a real date in six years, Tess. You have to give me this.”

I feel my face flush as I remember what happened in the hot tub. I still haven’t told Ada everything—and at this point, I’m not even sure why. Maybe it’s because I’m still figuring things out when it comes to my new life, or maybe I’ve just wanted to keep the bubble Hunter and I have made for a little while longer.

But I know I can’t stave Ada off forever.

“Well…something might have happened.”

“Oh my God. If you don’t spill right now…”

I chew at my bottom lip. “Well…there have been some…weird things happening.”

“Penis-related things?”

I roll my eyes. “You know, for someone so anti-dating, you sure do think about penis a lot.”

“If you’d sworn off chocolate, you’d think about it a lot too. Now spill.”

“I mean, the doctor said there might be some weird side effects, right?”

“Right.”

“Well…there have been.”

“I swear to God if you don’t start making sense soon…”

“It turns out that Hunter is actually an alpha.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I am not.”

“That’s gotta be hell on your hormones.”

“You can say that again,” I huff. “Not long after we met, I started having these…mini heats.”

There is silence on the other end of the line for several seconds before: “I swear, if you fucked the hot innkeeper and didn’t tell me—”

“I didn’t!” I protest. “I mean, not really.”

“Not really?”

“We may have done…some things.”

“But not sex.”

“Not sex.”

Not yet, my brain taunts.

It’s something that has been playing on a loop in my head since last night. Thoughts of how close we got, how much we have done—and what more we might do if this continues.

But mostly…I can’t stop thinking about how much the thought appeals to me more and more every time I touch Hunter.

“Oral?”

“I’m not telling you that,” I scoff.

“At least tell me you touched his penis.”

“Please stop saying ‘penis,’ ” I grouse. “But…yes. I did.”

“Fuck me. That’s perfect,” she sighs. “Did you see his knot? That’s really the only thing they have going for them in my opinion.”

“Wait, you know about the knot thing?”

She goes quiet for a moment, her voice softer when she says, “Perry’s dad was an alpha.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

“I don’t exactly like talking about him. You know that. And it wasn’t really relevant until now.”

And I do know that. I feel guilty for bringing it up, even inadvertently. I know how sore a subject Perry’s dad is for Ada. I try to steer the conversation away from him.

“I didn’t even know knots existed until last night.”

“And? How was it?”

I blush furiously, remembering the way I touched him.