Page 139 of A Wolfe in the Woods

May shook her head. “But you did…pretty good instincts. Maybe ya got something wild in ya too.” Then she smiled softly at me and winked.

She passed Jonathan on the path as she continued toward the reception cabin. She squeezed his arm but said nothing. I knew they’d talk later. About what happened. About the Hollow. About the fires.

But right now?

Jonathan was all mine.

When he came to me, he didn’t hesitate. He wrapped me up in his big arms, bundling me tight, dragging me up toward him until I clung to his bare shoulders and my feet left the ground.

In the crook of my neck, I felt the whistle of his nostrils as he breathed me in. I curled my fingers into his hair, my lips pressing to warm flesh. I felt his heartbeat thudding, strong and fast, against my chest.

A shudder racked through his body when I scraped my fingernails at the nape of his neck, his muscles tightening and contracting. I wanted to be even closer, if only because he made me feel safe in his arms. A little spark of desperate need zipped down my spine.

“Jonathan,” I whispered, worried. “Are you okay?”

He didn’t answer, only pulled me in closer and held me tightly. “I will be.”

He lowered me to the ground, and then my breath hitched as he led us down a familiar path. Toward his cabin.

Oh.

My entire body vibrated when his feet met the steps leading up to his cabin, steps he’d restored himself. Every part of this Hollow had been built or touched by him. He was everywhere, his mark on everything. And even though part of it had been destroyed, I knew Jonathan would make it whole again.

It was dark in the front room of his cabin, but in his bedroom, the full moon cast a silver beam across the sheets and part of the creaking wood floor. My lips drifted across his shoulder, running up his neck, dragging them over the vein that pulsed strong beneath them. A burn of need simmered low in my belly as his hands tightened on me and he lifted me again, as a low groan vibrated his chest and into mine.

“Blanche,” he said lowly. A single word. My name. A plea. And I heard the question in it as he lowered me so my feet touched the floor.

I licked my lips, tasting the saltiness of his sweat, mixed with smoky ash from the fires. When I stepped back to look up intoJonathan’s eyes, they looked like they were glowing silvery blue in the moonlight. Eerie, strange, beautiful, and familiar.

There was so much left unsaid between us. The last time we’d been together…it hadn’t ended well. He’d walked away. He’d thought I’d betrayed him. My heart had splintered, and I’d been determined to prove him wrong.

Underneath it all, however, Iunderstood. Jonathan was still wounded after what had happened in Graymore during his career. He’d been cut deep. Someone had died because of the fallout. I knew his trust wouldn’t be an easy thing to win, and yet I still wanted it.

“I thought…” He trailed off. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say his expression was one of anger. But I knew it was directed at himself. “For a moment, I thought I might’ve lost you. But then I realized I’d do whatever it took to reach you. That nothing would keep me away.”

I felt his hands come around my waist. His grip was hard, a little too strong, but I bowed into it. He was shaken. His beast was still a little too close to the surface, but I wasn’t afraid. Never of him, even in the Circle of Thornblood.

Going up onto my tiptoes, I pressed my lips to his just as he exhaled, dragging me forward. It was a rough kiss, one of demand and relief. And as it deepened, I understood.

This wasn’t just about sex. This was aboutreconnecting. Not just after tonight—which I thought had rocked us both. We were mending, piece by piece, all the tiny tears, the doubts that had kept us apart. Erik might have poked the hole in the tapestry of our relationship, but we were the ones who had ripped at it.

This was an apology.

A promise.

A calming assurance to him and to me that we were both safe.Alive. Together again.

Flesh and blood and need and relief.

His tongue swept my mouth as I clumsily toed off my sneakers. A growl reverberated from his throat when my hand brushed his cock through the thick denim of his jeans.

Our kiss momentarily broke when he tugged up my shirt, dropping it onto the floor. The back of my knees hit the bottom of the bed, but when I tugged off my bra, I accidentally elbowed his bandaged ribs in my haste, making him hiss.

“I’m sorry,” I breathed, biting my lip in worry. He dragged the straps of my bra the rest of the way down my arms. “Maybe we shouldn’t?—”

“Get on the bed,” he rasped, stepping back as his hands dropped to the silver button of his jeans. His gaze caressed my breasts, bared to him. The thickened root of his cock was visible when he let his jeans gape open. My fingers curled for it, making half-crescent moons from my nails in the flesh of my palm.

I wiggled from my jeans, the material filthy from my mad dash through the woods, and they fell into a pool at my feet.