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“I don’t wish to do this,” I told her as I looked up at her, hating the words as they came out of my mouth. Hating how little those words conveyed, and how much I needed to say toexplain the tangled mess that lived in the conflict between my mind, body, and heart.

“Oh,” she said, her skin flushing as she looked down at her hands, which rested on my chest and shoulders, the soft strands of her hair brushing her shoulders. She hesitated a moment, biting her lower lip. “Is it because you don’t want to have children?”

She was so sharp, so intelligent.

I didn't even have to say why I was hesitating, and she had already put the pieces together based on what she overheard.

Her intelligence just made her even more attractive to me than the thick, muscular bulk of her body.

“The thought of having a child now is terrifying to me,” I told her. “This world is about to become even more dangerous before it is healed. Chaos must break and rebuild.”

“Will your people toss me out if I don’t, you know, conceive?” she asked.

“Not at all,” I said. “Please know that it isn’t because I don’t find you attractive. I am utterly devastated by you. The strength of your body, the sharpness of your mind - you are a phenomenal woman, and if I knew that it would not bring a child into a devastating world, I would be blessed to bring you to the peak of your pleasure.”

The nervous smile on her face shifted into something warmer, something deeper.

“I also find you attractive,” she said in such a simple and direct manner. "I would also like that."

“Do you now?” I smiled at her even as my heart twinged with the torture of it. We both desired one another, but we couldn’t be together, not in the way that my obligations demanded. Still, there were other options. I ran my thumbs along the inside of her thighs, slowly circling upwards.

“I could pleasure you without a full mating,” I said, licking my lips as I anticipated the taste of her there. I could slide my hands up so easily from this position, drag her hips forward to the edge of the table, and find the feast that waited for me. “If that is something you desire.”

She sucked in a sharp breath, and the flush on her skin deepened.

“I have something to tell you,” she said.

I waited, letting my hands fall still on her thighs.

“I got my tubes tied a while ago,” she said, the words coming out in a rush. “It was pretty hard to get a doctor to do as young as I was, but I was determined and every morning at that school, I woke up grateful that I did.”

“What does that mean?” I asked. “What is tube tying?”

“I can’t have children,” she said. “I had a part inside of me severed so I wouldn’t be able to conceive.”

“A healing spell would repair that,” I said, pointing out the obvious issue.

“I’ve only had localized healing, and not to that area,” she said. “I’ve been careful to keep my protection intact.”

I thought about that, taking in her words.

She took a deep breath.

“I mean, that’s the problem, though,” she said. “I appreciate your offer of pleasuring me, but I don’t know if we should do that to ourselves. Holding back would be torture.”

“Then let's not hold back,” I purred. “Let me pleasure you and mount you and bring you to the fullest satisfaction you have ever felt with a mate.”

She hesitated, and fear flashed across her face.

"No," she said, the word coming out suddenly and abruptly. She lifted her hand up to her mouth, as if she hadn't meant to say it.

Disappointment flooded me, but I let it pass through me and let it go. It didn’t matter. I didn’t have the right to her body any more than she had the right to mine. She could say no or yes at any time, and I would abide by her choices while honoring my own. She could ask questions, tease me, offer the idea of mating, and yank it away, and it didn't change her right to her own body.

I lifted my hands away from her thighs and set them on the table on either side of her.

Every ounce of my desire screamed that she was mine, but I was not a beast ruled by my body.

I was the ruler of myself.