I licked my lips.
Crap. Why did I do that? Why did I make them ready to be kissed while he could easily see? Stupid. That was stupid.
“I guess it wasn’t the worst attempt in the history of bad attempts,” I caved.
“Last chance to back out then,” he all but purred, once more cupping my jaw in his hand.
His grip was firm and commanding but not restrictive. Despite the predatory prowl, the billboard-sized proclamation of intent, he was still giving me a way out if I wanted it.
Lincoln was going to take, but he wasn’t going to force it on me.
And I didn’t step back.
His lips curled up in wicked delight, and then he bent over and kissed me. Hard. Firm. But somehow soft and full of desire at the same time. Heat seared through my brain as hekissed me,so very differently than the way I’d done it to him mere minutes earlier. This was a triumphant howl of victory, sealed between our lips, even as I rose on tiptoe to meet him.
Fresh hormonal chemicals took over, lighting me on fire from head to toe, his touch the ignition source. I couldn’t fight it. I didn’twantto fight it. What I wanted was him. All of him. His lips were scalding hot yet soft and full as he covered my mouth with the perfect amount of aggression. I surrendered, nanosecond by nanosecond, sinking deep into whoever, and whatever, Lincoln was. Whateverthis was.
Arms moved, fingers grasped flesh, and suddenly I was airborne, my legs wrapping round his waist out of pure instinct. Muscles made of wound titanium held me aloft, my fingertips sinking into his biceps and feeling the power contained in there as he didn’t even quiver with the effort to hold me aloft.
He pulled back a fraction of an inch, forcing me to lean in deeper to him. Caving, revealing that I wanted it too. I was under attack, and on every front, I surrendered to his advances without a fight. I flung the walls open, and he marched in.
The kiss lengthened and deepened as his tongue parted my lips, conquering yet more territory. As he did, a single thought fluttered across my mind like a banner falling from the castle tower in defeat.
I am in so much trouble.
Whoever Lincoln truly was, whatever he truly wanted, there was no way I was stopping him. Not now. If he wanted to take me to the bed, or the couch, or even the counter right next to us, I was powerless. That assumed I evenwanted to stop him. That was why I was in trouble. Because I couldn’t differentiate needs from wants from desires. They were all a blur. A mess.
My body was crying out with need now. Sensitive tips rubbed against my undergarments, and vicious heat coiled like a serpent between my legs, burning brightly with a need to be released. To besatiated.
The intensity of it all was wildly out of line for being a kiss. A great kiss, as promised, but a kiss nonetheless. What did it mean? I didn’t know. Stringing two coherent thoughts together was impossible with the way his fingers effortlessly curled around my legs, holding me tightly to him like I was a feather.
A flash of guilt at the ease with which he’d seduced me flickered through my brain. Was I really the type to just jump into bed with the first guy who showed interest?
Then again, is Lincoln really “just another guy”?
The answer to that question scared me enough to break the seal and put the moment on hold. Cold slivers of fear breached my stomach. Fear at how easily I’d surrendered, and how much more I wanted, but also at the intensity of how muchmore I wanted.
“You need to go,” I whispered through heat-scorched lips and a parched throat. “Now, please.”
Lincoln immediately set me down, and I braced myself for the fight. For the insistence he stay, that it was okay, that he could behave, and a list of all the myriad other tricks men played to convince a woman to let them back in.
He looked me up and down once and then nodded. “Okay,” he said evenly without a hint of protest. “I’ll go. But I need to know first. Did I hurt you? Did I take something that you didn’t give?”
Relief flowed through me like fresh rains down a dry creek bed at his concern. “No, Linc, nothing like that. It’s just-“
He pressed a finger to my lips. “You never have to justify yourself to me, Sylvie.
Ever. Your reasons are your own, and that’s okay. I just had to be sure.”
I nodded, unsure of what to say.
Lincoln took a deep breath and smiled, backing up a step toward the door. “Thank you for an incredible evening, it was …” He paused, searching for words, but then shook his head. “It was.”
He spun and headed for the door, pulling it open. But then he paused and reached into his pocket for his phone. “Here,” he said, handing it to me.
I looked at the screen to see a new contact page.
“I promise, I won’t text unless you text me. But this seems easier than waiting in your grandmother’s house for you to get back from wherever you’ve been.”
Blowing air from my nose, I considered for a moment. Then I took the phone, punched my number in, and handed it back. Lincoln looked at it, saved it, and then sent me a message with the single word “hi.” My phone pinged.
“You know,” I said as he strode through the doorway and stopped at the top of the porch stairs. “You could always try this wild new thing where you just come up those stairs right in front of you, knock on the door, and wait for me to answerbefore you go inside.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said with a wink and a smile. Then his face grew solemn. “By the way. Just because I’m leaving now doesn’t mean you can deny what just happened between us. I know you felt it too, Vee.”
Then he was gone.
Lincoln
Halfway down the driveway, I paused and smiled as the familiar sensation of eyes upon me lifted the hairs of my neck. Sylvie had come back to the door to watch me go. I turned, eager to lay eyes on her one more time. Perhaps a wave goodbye. It didn’t matter what it was, all that mattered was she’d come for more. It was an acceptance of my final comment to her.
The front door was still closed. I searched the windows one by one, looking for her silhouette, for some sign that she was watching me. But while the blinds were open, and lights were on in much of the house, there was no sign of Sylvie anywhere.
My neck continued to tingle as I swept my gaze up and down the street instead. Perhaps it was her douchebag ex, waiting to come back after I left. He had no idea I was a wolf and would be able to spot him with ease wherever he was cowering. I grinned toothily, eagerly awaiting my discovery of his hiding location. Earlier, I’d been as gentle as I could while summarily shoving the jerk back into his car.
Now I was under no such restrictions. Perhaps an encounter with a wolf in the night would make it clear that he was in no way, shape, or form welcome anywhere near Sylvie. And if that meant I had to chase him out of town on foot … well, then, I’d just have to make the time to do that, now wouldn’t I?
Despite my eagerness to dispense a well-deserved ass-kicking, even my eyesight could not locate the mewling pitiful excuse for a human. Nor did I see his car parked anywhere on the street or in any driveways.
But I was still being watched. The tingle in the back of my neck was slowly becoming the prick of icy nails digging deeper. Turning back round, I focused my gaze on the woods beyond the houses on Sylvie’s side of the street.
Inhaling deeply through my nose, I sifted through all the aromas for anything that stood out while also ignoring the echoes of lavender and cinnamon that were all I could smell. Sylvie wasn’t easily forgotten.
The wind, however, was blowing across the street and into the forest. Whatever was in there, it was downwind and in the cover of pitch darkness. No way could I see it from here. I would have to go looking.
Throwing up my best shrug, I kept on walking, hoping whoever was watching would think I’d decided Sylvie wasn’t coming and had given up waiting. Then I headed down the street to where I’d parked my truck out of easy sight of Sylvie’s grandmother’s house. Just me, leaving town. That was all I was doing.
Three houses down, the building itself blocking me from view, I darted up the lawn and to the side of the house, taking shelter in the inky blackness created by a large woodpile, the logs stacked four deep and six feet high. There, in the darkness andhidden from everyone, I shifted, keeping my wolf crouched low on all fours to reduce any chances of being spotted.
I didn’t want to waste even that much time, but our secret had to be protected, no matter who was in the forest watching. Even if it was another one of the Chained’s shadow creatures.
Fangs pushing out from between my lips in preparation, I stepped from the shelter of the woodpile and headed toward the forest. The distance between the older houses meant I could move mostly in the dark. Just as thankful with the older homes was the lack of fences on most of them.
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