Her thighs shake as she struggles to contain herself against my mouth, and I paint circles around her clit, even grazing it with my teeth. When she bucks against my face so hard that I have to force her still with my hands, she makes the softest sound, one that rings in my ears and makes me feel hot all over.

When she begins to tremble, a soft cry escaping her as her head lolls forward in pleasure, the flare of contentment in my chest is overwhelming. I did this to her. I know what she needs.

It’s only when she’s still that I allow her to sit back against me, shifting so that she settles over my stomach as she struggles to catch her breath. I’m left with a mess of fluids in her wake, and I let my fingers trail lazily through them to gather them up. She watches with wide eyes as I bring them to my mouth and suck them clean without looking away.

When I move to do it all over again, I instead let my fingers hover, holding her gaze before offering the slicked digits to her instead.

“Open.” She obliges, letting her lips part as I push my fingers into her mouth. “Taste.”

She sucks softly, pupils blown wide to the point that her eyes appear black. Her lashes flutter somewhat as she tastes herself on my fingers, and it only heats my blood further.

“Do you need more, Tess?”

She nods dazedly, still sucking my fingers. It makes my insides clench up with want, and in an instant I’m wrapping my arms around her, rolling us so that she’s beneath me. I spread her across the blankets like an offering, her hair fanning out like a halo as she looks up at me with complete trust in her eyes.

“So pretty.” I run my hand down her belly, causing her to wince slightly as her body tenses, and I reach to let my thumb brush across her lip. “Does it hurt?”

She nods, her eyes glassy as my hand cups her cheek, and she turns to nuzzle into my palm. “Please.”

She squirms, her legs falling apart to welcome me, stirring up her scent that robs me of rational thought. I can hear my pulse in my ears, my instincts chanting for me to take, take, take—but I don’t have to. There’s nothing to take because she’s giving it to me.

I curl my body so I can brush my lips against her throat, and my tongue traces the heated flesh just below her ear. I press my lips there, sucking softly as a rush of her scent overwhelms me, so potent I can taste it. My cock slots along her core, and I thrust lightly as I drink in her scent and taste, feeling them cloud my mind.

“Such a tiny thing,” I murmur. “I’m going to fill you up, omega. I want to feel you taking everything I give you.” She whimpers, and I let my cock slide heavily along her slick center. “Want to feel you stretch around me.”

“Yes,” she breathes.

I hear a slight growl in my chest, and I can’t pinpoint where it comes from. “Yes what?”

“What?”

My jaw clenches as I take in her confused expression. She hasn’t called me it since that first time, weeks ago, and even then, it was no more than an accident. I can’t say why I’m so desperate to hear it again, the need building inside me at a constant pace since she first went into heat.

“Alpha,” I tell her, nipping at her earlobe. “I want you to call me alpha.”

And she doesn’t hesitate, gasping when I tease the sensitive flesh between my teeth as she utters, “Yes, alpha.”

I feel the word as if it’s reached out and caressed me, my chest swelling and my cock doing something similar as I thrust against her again. I let a hand slide down the length of her side and wrap it around her hip to steady her squirming body as I dip into her.

The first press of my cock against her entrance actually takes my breath away. I brace myself on my hands when I begin to push into her, needing to see her face. Needing to watch every expression as she takes me. To commit them to memory. There’s a kernel of fear deep inside me that grows each time I touch her like this, because I have no way of knowing what comes after. I can tell myself it’s just hormones making me feel this way, that her heat is triggering my more possessive instincts—but I don’t think that’s true. How can it be, when I spend most of my waking moments lately thinking about her?

I’m distracted by the way she clenches around me—she’s so tight, so small. I feel every inch, every ridge of her, gripping me, holding me. Her mouth parts in a silent cry, and she watches my face as I push deeper. She tenses, and I reach down to hold her face as my thumb strokes her cheek. “Relax, sweetheart. You have to relax. You can take me. You already have. You were made for me. For this.”

She blows out a breath, and I feel the tightness of her pussy relax a fraction as she tries to obey. I press my lips to hers, gripping her tight as I sink farther. Every time I’m inside her, there’s a slight resistance at first—I’m so much larger than her, I’m not sure if there will ever be a time that there isn’t—but there’s relief in knowing that she can take me, that she was meant to.

My body acts on its own now, taking what she’s offering—claiming. When I surge deeper, the quietest of sounds escapes her, and I cover her face with kisses over and over as I seat myself inside her fully.

It’s torture.

It’s bliss.

It takes everything I have not to move.

My chest is tight with some primal satisfaction, and the sound I make can only be described as a purr. “You take me so well, Tess. Such a good girl for me. You feel incredible, do you know that? So wet, so warm—I don’t ever want to do anything else but this.”

“Alpha.”

“Tell me how you feel.”

“Full. So full.” She shifts her hips, pressing closer as I hiss out a breath. “I need you to move. Please, move. Please, alpha.”

Pulling out of her is sweet torture. Every inch of her tight channel grips me as I withdraw, my cock wet with her fluids and yet still snug inside her. “You’re so perfect,” I groan into her skin. “Made for me. This pussy was made for me.”

“Hunter.”

I love the way even my name sounds as if she’s begging for me. “I’m going to knot you, Tess. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

I thrust back into her a little harder. “I’m going to knot you because you need it. Because I need it. I’m going to knot you because you belong to me.”

And I don’t know if that’s true, but I can’t seem to stop asserting that it is. She might not be mine next week or even tomorrow, but right now? Right now she absolutely is.

“Say it, Tess,” I urge. “Who do you belong to?”

“You,” she whines. “You, Hunter.”

I’m driving into her now, abandoning my feeble attempts to be gentle. She doesn’t protest—only wraps her legs around my waist as she clings to my shoulders, taking everything I give her. Her breathy sounds wash along my throat, her face buried in my hair. I feel her lips as they find my skin, the light flick of her tongue along my gland, and I’m lost, utterly lost in her.

I don’t know what comes after this, don’t know what it will mean for us when it’s over—and I realize all at once that it terrifies me, the not knowing. I told myself I would never feel this way about another person, not again, and yet here I am, wanting to own this woman like she was made for me, because right now…it feels like she was.

“That’s it,” I huff. “That’s it, Tess. Do you feel that? The way your body accepts me? Welcomes me, even?” I roll my hips and bottom out, feeling that flood of heat building at the base of my spine as my balls draw up tight and my cock hardens further. “Because it’s mine. Your body, your mouth, your sweet little pussy—every inch, every curve, every fucking piece of you is mine. Do you understand?”

She’s nodding against my skin, her little tongue at my gland until my vision is nothing more than a blur of colors and the world a haze of sounds and there is nothing—nothing but her and this moment.