Page 26

ELLIETTE

The next morning

I hadn’t been able to sleep.

This was hardly a surprise. After the club, the kiss, the chaos with Daniel, the night in Lukas’s bed… Suffice it to say, I had a lot to process.

Like, how close had Lukas come to killing Daniel? And why had he behaved so brutally when, just a few minutes later, he was trying to scare me away?

And then he wanted me in his bed. Platonically —like a little kids’ sleepover—but still.

And now he expected us to be nothing more than colleagues? As if none of that had happened? As if our history meant nothing? Running into him at the rink yesterday had felt like a gut punch.

All of this was to say that it was now only nine in the morning, but I’d been up for hours and was already several episodes into a new streaming series.

At this rate, I’d finish Season One before noon. I figured there were worse ways to get my head sorted. The sack of powdered mini donuts from Connors’ Bakery didn’t hurt either.

There was a knock at my door, and I glanced at it before pausing the show, rolling down the top of the paper sack, and getting off the couch.

I put my eye to the peephole and saw Lukas. He wore a dove gray hoodie, and he’d pushed his hands deep into the front pockets of his matching joggers. His head was bowed, and his long, chocolate-brown waves hung forward, brushing his broad shoulders.

I sucked in a breath at the casual, Saturday-morning beauty of him, and he must have heard me because his head jerked up, and his pale blue eyes seemed to burn with their intensity.

I didn’t open the door right away. Quite frankly, I didn’t trust myself once the barricade was removed.

A few more seconds passed while I chewed on my bottom lip, trying to figure out what to do.

“Elli,” he said, his voice low but penetrating. “Let me in.”

“It’s not a work day,” I said, hoping he understood my meaning. Colleagues were a Monday through Friday kind of thing.

“We’ve got work to do.”

We did? What work was that? I opened the door.

He stepped forward, and I took a step back.

The door closed behind him, and he slid one arm around my waist, pulling me against his warm body.

“What are you doing?” I asked, putting my hands to his chest.

His lips pulled up into a grin, and he dusted what I assumed was powdered sugar off the end of my nose. “Embracing the mess. ”

“ What? ” Like, what was happening? Did I miss something? I felt as though I’d been dropped into the middle of a conversation without any context.

Lukas kept walking, forcing me to move backward, right up until my ass hit the edge of the kitchen island.

I tipped my head back and stared up at him, silent.

It was then, close up, I saw his eyes warm. I didn’t realize that eyes as icy and pale blue as his could look warm, but they did.

Still standing frozen, Lukas so close that his heat should have melted my freeze, his arm tightened around my waist, and his other hand combed gently into the hair at the side of my face.

His gaze slid to the corner of my mouth. “Powdered sugar?”

I didn’t respond.

“That’s okay,” he said. “I’ll find out for myself.”

I watched him, mesmerized, as his head tipped down. He moved so slowly, I was sure he was giving me the opportunity to pull away.

Of course I didn’t. He was an idiot if he thought I would. I was all in for making messes. I could always clean it up later.

Right?

His lips touched mine, and just like the other night, they were a delicious luxury.

The kiss started soft. Sweet. His heat soaked into my palms, which were still pressed against his chest. In fact, I liked his heat so much, I moved in closer, wanting to soak him up.

His hand left my hair and he gripped the edge of the counter with both hands, leaning over me, and making my back arch .

His tongue touched my lips. I opened my mouth. And that was all it took. It was a high-speed, blistering replay of the scene at the club, though this time we couldn’t blame the alcohol.

And it wasn’t pretend, like when we had Daniel for an audience.

This was intentional. This was real. This was me and Lukas, the way I’d always imagined.

I wrapped my arms around his neck, pressed my hips up toward his, and the kiss went from soft and sweet to a hot unleashing of frantic sexual energy. Hotter. Deeper. Making me question the wisdom of it while telling myself to never let go.

Wetness pooled between my legs.

Lukas reached down, grabbed me behind the knees and lifted me onto the counter.

I wrapped my legs around his hips, and he ground into me, intensifying the kiss, taking it into the next stratosphere.

Then he tore his mouth from mine and buried his face in my neck. By then, I was hyperventilating. His chest heaved against mine.

“What’s happening?” I asked.

“It’s like I said,” he replied, his warm breath brushing my skin. “I’m grabbing on to a little bit of happiness for as long as it lasts. Are you with me?”

“I’m with you,” I said.

“Good,” he growled.

“We probably shouldn’t tell my brother though.”

“Agreed.” He released his grip on the counter and wrapped his long fingers around my rib cage.

“Lukas?” Tingles shot straight through me.

“Yeah? ”

“Kiss me again?”

“I could manage that.” His head slanted, and he kissed me again, instantly making everything go white hot.

My hands slid under his sweatshirt, feeling the sleek magnificence of his smooth skin, and the taut muscles flexing beneath it.

His tongue moved against mine, and I was hit with another blast of heat.

Instinctively, I knew this was a sign of his wolf, pressing against the inside of his skin.

Maybe this should have scared me.

It didn’t.

I grabbed onto his hair and tightened my fists, tugging at the roots and holding him to me.

His animal side must have liked the roughness because a low growl escaped his throat, and he jerked away.

His eyes were a piercing burn, and the way he looked at me caused my legs to tighten around his waist.

“Lukas?” I asked, for a second, wondering if I’d done something wrong.

“That’s enough for now.” His voice was low and rough.

Wait. What? He could just flip a switch like that? My body was hot and ready for more.

“We’re easing into this,” he explained, even while his thumb stroked the side of my breast. “I’m grabbing on, but I don’t want to crush it.”

“Okay,” I said, partly disappointed, partly intrigued by the realization I’d pushed Lukas to the edge of his control. I licked my lips.

Lukas’s expression darkened. “What else do you want to do today? Because I’m spending it with you.”

I was hard-pressed to come up with an equally interesting activity. “Have you discovered the gym on the fourth floor?”

One side of his mouth quirked. “I know it’s there. Haven’t bothered with it. The facilities at the barn are state-of-the-art.”

I pursed my lips, and my eyes lowered to his chest for a second before rising again to meet his gaze. “Take off your hoodie.”

His eyebrows went up. “I was serious about needing a breather.”

“I know. I thought maybe I could grab my ring light and camera, then meet you in the gym.”

“More photos?” He lowered his head and nuzzled the side of my neck, inhaling deeply.

“Uh-huh.” I swallowed hard, my insides tightening in a very pleasant kind of way. “Just from the waist up.”

“Keeping it PG,” he said. “Smart.”

“How many pull-ups can you do?” My voice was now barely more than breath.

“How many do you want?” He kissed the back of my ear, and a shiver ran down my arms.

“Enough to make you sweat.”

At that, he straightened. He reached over his shoulder, grabbed the back of his sweatshirt, and pulled it over his head, exposing his bare torso.

It wasn’t the first time I’d seen Lukas half naked, but his body never ceased to make my mouth run dry. My hungry gaze slid over his washboard abs and that tantalizing trail of dark hair disappearing under those soft gray sweats.

The outline of his cock angled upward toward his hip and made me bite my bottom lip.

“If you’re looking for sweat,” he said, “I’m already there. ”

Yes, he was. A fine sheen made his tanned skin glisten.

“Then let’s get those photos,” I said, my eyes still on the front of his sweats. “Your fans will eat ‘em up.”

“There’s only one fan I’m interested in,” he said.

“Fine. Maybe I’ll eat you up too.” The words came out before I even knew what I was saying, and I blushed at my boldness.

“I’ll look forward to that someday soon.”

Then—with superhuman self-control—we went to the gym to take more photos. They went viral in minutes.