Page 19

19

TILDA

I didn’t know I needed forgiveness until now, but as Reyes’ hands clasp around mine, I realize that’s why I’ve felt so out of place here. These aren’t my people…and they can’t be my people until they forgive me.

“You’re only saying that because of what’s between us,” I murmur. I’ve managed to stay composed, even if tears are collecting at the corners of my eyes. A single drop trails down my cheek, and I duck my head so he can’t see. “Would you even be saying this if I wasn’t your…you know…”

“My mate?” he says. “Yes, of course. My wolf doesn’t control me.”

“‘Your wolf,’” I echo. “He’s made a lot of stupid choices.”

“But I don’t make stupid choices,” Reyes says. His hands are still gripping mine, and it’s clear he’s not going anywhere. “Bringing you into the den wasn’t a bad choice. Neither was biting you. I think—and I know you don’t agree—I think God had a plan for us, and that’s why you came here that night. I don’t believe there was any chance you would have killed me.”

“Because of fate or because I didn’t think it through before I came here?” I ask. “You have to admit I’m a little stupid.”

“You’re not stupid,” he says. “You’re brave, Tilda. And I…”

He trails off, shaking his head like he’s not sure what to say. I didn’t realize how close he was, so I’m a bit startled as I take in exactly where we are—on an altar, of all places, on our knees, just inches apart.

“You what?” I ask.

His voice is low and hoarse as he responds. “I think I’m falling in love with you.”

I can’t help but laugh at that, the sound coming out more like a sob. Reyes moves one of his hands to my face, swiping at my tears with a calloused thumb.

“But you’re a priest,” I say.

“That doesn’t stop me from feeling,” he says. “And if this is what God had in store for me, then…”

His hand slides around to the back of my neck, underneath my hair. The bite mark on my hip throbs, sending waves of pleasure over me at his touch alone. I wonder if that’s my own wolf howling to be set free—to lie back on this altar and spread my legs for him. I take a shuddering breath and try to move my hands to splay across his chest, but he keeps them held between us, like the last barrier to what we both want.

“Tell me it’s not just this…chemical thing between us,” I say. “Tell me you want me and not just your wolf.”

His grip tightens on the back of my neck, and I roll my head back with a gasp. “I want you more than any woman I’ve ever met.”

He crushes his mouth to mine in a breathtaking kiss, finally releasing my hands. I grip his shoulders like I’m adrift on the sea, feeling for all the world like I’m battered by waves. His tongue thrusts past my lips right away, picking up where we left off too many days ago, and I can feel the weight of every second we’ve been apart.

His hands grasp the back of my head, tangling in my hair, holding me against him. I can’t collect my thoughts, a rush of pleasure pulling me into a haze, already so wet that my panties are soaked. I squeeze my legs together as Reyes kisses me into a frenzy, unable to do anything but breathe into and out of his mouth.

I finally manage to wrench myself away and we sit like that—still kneeling, our foreheads pressed together. “You changed your mind,” I murmur.

“I can’t stay away from you,” he says. “And ‘what God has put together, let no man put asunder.’”

“Matthew again,” I laugh, then open my eyes to stare into his. “Gotta admit…what I want to do with you doesn’t feel holy.”

“How could this be anything but holy?” He presses a kiss to my neck, and I let out sigh. “This thing between us…” Another kiss, lower down, brushing my clavicle. “The twists of fate that brought us together…”

His fingers slide under the strap of my dress until it’s hanging off my shoulder, his tongue on my breast. I’m dangerously close to getting naked in a church—and while I’ve done a lot of bad things, this isn’t on the list. “Should we do this here?”

“I think we’re already doing it,” he says. “And I don’t think I’m going to be able to make it back to my room.”

Reyes’ lips close around my nipple as the dress falls away, and I arch against him. He’s right, of course. I’m not going to make it back to his room, either, with how wet I am. I don’t even know if I can walk. My legs feel like jelly, desperate to spread for him. The bite pulses, desperate to be licked and cared for. I don’t make any move to stop him as he reaches for the other strap of my dress to drag it down my arm, pulling me toward him with a primal growl.

“You taste just like you smell,” he murmurs against my breasts. “Blackberries.”

I boldly reach toward his waist, and he groans against my breasts when I palm him through his jeans. “Oh God,” I breathe.

“Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain,” he teases.

I can’t be bothered to laugh. “You’re…you’re huge.”

“It’s the knot,” he rumbles. He nips at my breasts one more time before pulling away to cover my hand with his, guiding me to touch farther up the shaft. “What I warned you about—where I’m not like human men.”

I can’t help the shiver of anticipation that runs through me. He ducks his head to my neck at the subtle movement, the tip of his nose running over my pulse like he can scent my excitement. “You like how it feels,” he growls.

“I’m…curious,” I whisper.

His left hand slides around the small of my back, pulling me in until the apex of my thighs rubs against the bulge in his jeans. I’m suddenly struck with the ridiculous urge to play coy, but Reyes growls against my neck. “I can scent how wet you are, Tilda,” he says. “You don’t have to hide it.”

“Fuck,” I curse in a breathy moan. I jerk my hips against him, wanting to grind on him until I come. But he pulls back, looks at me.

“Touch me,” he says. “I’m all yours.”

I stare into his eyes, and with careful hands, I pull down his zipper. He practically falls out into my palm, his huge cock held back only by black briefs. I can see the bulge at the base of him, just a bit wider than it should be.

His right hand falls to my hip and somehow finds the bite mark as he bends to press kisses to my collarbone. His fingers ghost over his mark on me, tracing the place where his fangs pierced my skin. In response, I palm him through his briefs, wrapping my fingers around his shaft.

“Is it wrong that I want you to fuck me even more now?” I say.

He laughs against my bare skin, worshipping my breasts. “I won’t knot you tonight,” he murmurs. “Too big for human women…I have to get you ready.”

I take his hand in mine and, just as he meets my eyes, I put it under my skirt. Reyes’s lips part and I catch sight of a wickedly sharp fang, his fingers deftly finding my soaked panties. “You don’t think I’m ready?” I ask.

“Told you—you’re brave,” he says. He moves the wet fabric aside and strokes between my folds with his index finger, finding my clit like it hasn’t been decades since he last fingered a girl. Maybe it hasn’t; I guess I don’t really know. Regardless, I gasp at his touch, rocking my hips into his hand. “It gets bigger; I don’t want to hurt you.”

“If we’re just doing it this once, I want—ah!” I gasp and bend against him as he pushes that thick finger inside me. “I want it all.”

“I told you one night doesn’t just mean once,” he growls.

He pushes another finger inside and starts to fuck me with two digits. I’m so wet, so ready, that it isn’t nearly enough.

I grasp at his knot and stroke up and down, feeling the alien texture of his shaft, the way it curves at the base…

“Please,” I whisper. “I can’t wait anymore.”

He adds another finger. “We have all night.”

His other hand finds his bite mark, and the lightest brush of his fingers over it brings on a sudden, powerful orgasm. I keep my legs spread for him, gripping his knot in my fingers, feeling how it swells. We’re still kneeling, our hands everywhere–but I want him on top of me, inside me. I need him between my legs. Reyes lets out an animalistic growl against my throat, and I feel his teeth graze me over my pulse.

I want him to bite me. I want him to bite me over and over again. In answer, my mouth waters like I want to do the same thing to him.

Wolf stuff, I guess.

Doesn’t matter.

“Bite me,” I breathe. “Knot me, Reyes.”

“Not tonight,” he says, and the commanding growl of the Alpha Prime shuts me up. I focus instead on the way my body pulses around his fingers, how his knot swells for me.

I gasp when he pulls his hand out from under my skirt—and watch with parted lips when he licks his fingers clean. If I didn’t know any better, I would think he was tasting something sugary sweet from the way he groans. “Just like blackberries,” he murmurs. “Lie back, Tilda.”

It’s another command, but one with which I’m all too happy to comply. I lower to the grass and lean back on my elbows, the ground still soft and dewy from an early afternoon rain. The blades of green stick to my shoulder blades as I bend my knees and open my thighs, Reyes’s hands sliding higher to push up my skirt.

He doesn’t even bother to take off my panties; he practically shreds them from me instead, taking them in his fist and shoving the fabric into his back pocket. I try to process the fact that a priest just ripped off my panties on an altar—and that he appears to be keeping them—but I’m too far gone to see it as wrong.

Especially when everything about this is so, so right.

I’m beyond ready for him to be fucking me, but Reyes crouches over me instead, inhaling deeply as he runs the tip of his nose up one thigh. His hand stays on the bite mark like he’s playing me like an instrument, and I gasp when he moves the dress up so he can press a kiss to it. His lips on the scar feel right, and his tongue feels even better. Reyes tends to it carefully—to the extent where my pussy starts to feel neglected.

I don’t need to worry though. A moment later, and he gets distracted as he inhales again, nestling his nose in the curly hair between my legs.

“Hueles tan bien,” he murmurs. “Mi amor…”

His tongue flicks out to lap at my pussy, and I arch my back in the grass. I’m so overstimulated that I just want to be filled, and I tangle my fingers in his thick hair as he plunges his tongue inside me. “Reyes!” I gasp. “I’m…I’m going to come again and I want you inside?—”

He seems to be done using his words; he clamps his mouth over me and sucks on my clit like a man dying of thirst, letting out a growl as I pull hard on his hair. Another orgasm strikes fast and hard, rolling through me and lighting me on fire. I can’t contain the scream that tears its way out of me, but I don’t care who hears; I want everyone in the pack to know that I’m claiming this man, just as he’s claimed me.

His hands slide to the crooks of my knees as I ride out my orgasm, then he spreads me wide, positioning himself between my legs. He’s rough with himself as he pulls his cock out and rubs it between my folds, coating his shaft in the wetness now covering my thighs. I try to hook my legs around him, but he grunts and looks down at me, a strange, opalescent sheen in his amber eyes.

I can see every bit of restraint in his shaking shoulders as he grits his teeth, stroking his own knot. “I’m not going to knot you tonight,” he groans, but I think it’s more a reminder to himself than me.

“Knot me, mate,” I reply.

I’ll fight him on this until he’s buried in me.

I wrench out a pleasured sob when he presses into me, finally easing the ache between my legs. Reyes takes his time—somehow—sliding in slowly, filling me up.

He’s so big that I feel split apart in the best way, the bite mark on my hip urging me to take him deeper, deeper. I keep begging for him with my body, widening my legs further, hooking my feet behind his back and dragging him further.

“Knot me,” I beg.

“No,” he grits out.

I can feel his knot pressing against my entrance, and I’m certain I could take him. His bite mark surges with pleasure, with heat, rippling over the rest of my body and opening me up for him. “Knot?—”

He cuts me off when he pulls out again and then pounds into me, once again stopping at the knot. I groan and arch, clawing at his back through his shirt. My nails are blunt, but I feel they’ve somehow grown longer—and I’m certain of it when I realize I’ve torn right through his fancy button-up. I pant when he does it again, pulling out, driving back in.

His restraint is remarkable.

And it tells me that I don’t need to keep any of my own.

I keen and howl and sob as he pounds into me, his considerable girth more than enough to fill me up. Even so, I still feel that knot, want it, need it—but all my pleas for more just turn into gibberish on my lips.

The one time I do let it slip, he growls in a way that tells me he’s in charge here, and I lay back and let him ravish me.

The stars twinkle overhead, and his scent envelops me. Incense and red wine. I’m suddenly thirsty—parched, in fact—and when he leans in to kiss me, I catch his lower lip between my teeth. I taste copper as he pulls away with a growl, the two of us little more than animals.

If God wanted this, it’s not the God I grew up with. It’s something more primal—the God that gave us pieces that feel pleasure and placed us in a garden filled with temptation.

I need more. I need my mate.

I lick my lips and taste Reyes’ blood, sweet as port wine. In a beautiful subversion of ritual, surrounded by his incense scent, I eat and drink of his body and blood. I feast on my mate as I kiss him again, as I trail my lips down his neck, to his pulse. And with these strange new sharp fangs, an idea floats to the surface.

It only seems fair, doesn’t it?

To bite him, as he bit me?

Reyes bares his throat for me, and we pull away just enough to lock eyes. I can almost hear the steady thrum of his pulse, pounding with the thrust of his hips. He slows, his breath catches, and he nods his head.

“Do it.”

I tangle my fingers in his thick hair, and I sink my teeth into his flesh.

Red wine, complex and musky and fluid. A bouquet of flavor, my tongue lapping at the new wound. My teeth aren’t quite as sharp as his, but they’re shockingly sharp enough to leave a mark—just two little punctures where my canines have somehow elongated. Reyes groans and rolls his hips against me as I tend to the wound, never letting his knot sink inside me no matter how badly I want it to.

I don’t think this is a one time thing. I can feel that as I lick him.

We’re tied to each other now.

Our gasps mingle as he keeps fucking me hard, my dress pooled around my waist, him still fully dressed. Reyes groans and ducks his head against my chest, and I gasp when something cool slips out of his collar and falls on my breastbone: the silver cross he wears around his neck.

The shock is enough to tip me over the edge, and we come together in the humid Texas night. I scrabble at the grass, barely avoiding knocking over the music stand altar beside us as I come, hands trembling. A slip of paper drifts from the music stand, falling on top of us as we breathe and Reyes finally slides out of me.

He reaches for the paper and frowns as he gazes at it, then shows it to me.

I can’t quite make it out at first, but I realize after a moment that it’s his homily from Sunday morning. Most of the ink has been washed away in the rain earlier today, black blotches covering the weather-worn page, but one sentence remains.

What God has put together, let no man put asunder.

I let out a laugh and stare up at the sky, shaking my head. “Okay, God,” I say. “I get it.”

Reyes laughs with me, then gets to his knees to right his clothes and zip up his pants. The silver cross gleams in the starlight on his chest as he extends his hand and pulls me up, helping me straighten my dress.

“I told you,” he says. “Call it what you want, but I think that counts as a blessing.”

For the first time in a long time, ‘blessing’ doesn’t sound like a bad word.