Page 46 of Claimed By the Vykan

For a moment, he was silent. When he spoke, his voice was quiet and laced with something dangerous. “No. Not yet. My breath is still too potent for you. What you experienced earlier was only the beginning. You need slow exposure. Gentle attunement. It is the only way.”

A shiver slipped down her spine—fear, anticipation, something between them she didn’t have a name for. She felt his restraint like a living thing.

“Then let me feel something,” she whispered. “Not your breath. Not your venom. Just… you. Your skin. Your hand.”

He considered her. Then slowly—deliberately—he lifted one arm and unlatched the gauntlet with a soft metallic click. Thearmor pulled away to reveal a large, powerful hand, rough with calluses and faintly luminous beneath the skin.

Blue.

He wasblue.

The color shimmered subtly, deeper than Raeska’s tone, alive with veins of faint azure beneath the surface. His fingers were long—six of them—and tapered into ridged, mother-of-pearl nails that caught the light.

Her breath left her, and she touched him.

His skin was warm—warmer than she expected—and textured in a way that made her own seem paper-thin by comparison. Her small human fingers curled around his larger ones, fitting easily into the spaces between.

She brought his hand to her nose, needing the scent, needing the reality. It washed through her like a slow wave—faintly musky, clean, resonant with some deep, forbidden undertone that made her vision sharpen, and her breath quicken.

Her knees pressed together.

And then—without thinking—she lifted his hand and guided it to her neck.

His fingers curled around her throat, firm but careful, the pressure a silent claim he made with nothing but touch.

Her eyes fluttered.

God, she should be terrified. She should recoil. She should fight.

But the truth hit her hard and humiliating…

She liked it.

Morethan liked it.

Needed it.

Craved it.

His hand held her gently, possessively, grounding her in a way no one ever had. Memories of every past relationship fadedto smoke. None of them had felt anything like this. None of them had awakened this terrifying hum of energy under her skin.

He held her there for a moment—just long enough for her pulse to sync against his palm—then withdrew, slow and reluctant.

“You are stabilized,” he said, the words edged with something he struggled to contain. “For now. I will go.”

She almost told him not to. The word hovered on her tongue, heavy and dangerous.

Stay.

She bit it back.

He had shown restraint. She would not push him beyond it.

“Fine,” she whispered. “Go do… whatever it is you have to do.”

Her voice lacked conviction, and they both knew it.

He leaned in before rising, his bare hand brushing gently along the side of her face. The touch was warm, reverent, devastating. It undid her more thoroughly than his grip on her throat had. Her breath trembled.