She doesn’t respond at first.
Cold fear lances into my chest, but when I stroke a gentle hand over her cheek, she blinks open her eyes and looks up at me, dazed.
“I’m so sorry.”
She frowns. “What for?”
I stare down at her. “Did I hurt you?”
She shakes her head. “No. Oh my god, not at all. That was amazing.”
The band of pressure around my heart releases a little. I’m still somehow trapped inside her body and am not in any rush to withdraw, but I roll us so she’s on top, her small body barely feeling like more than a blanket. She lays her head on my chest and sighs.
“I feel so much better.”
My mind is still whirling. I bit her. Something I never asked her permission for, something I took by force—the worst sort of abuse.
I cringe a little as I say, “But I bit you.”
“Hmm? You what?”
“I bit you.”
Vera lifts her head and looks up at me. “Bit?” She lifts her hand to trace the spot on her neck and winces a little, and I think my soul actually leaves my body.
“I’m sorry. I never meant to—”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll heal. It’s just instinct, right? It doesn’t mean anything.”
She lies back down, but I can’t let it go. Right or wrong, she’s wearing my mark now.
I owe her the choice. “Vera, you know what it means.”
At this she lifts up into a sitting position to look down at me. Somehow I’m still hard, and the movement rubs the tip of my cock against something inside her that threatens to switch my brain off again, but I fight the feeling. “It means I’ve claimed you.”
She shakes her head sadly. “You don’t have to do that.”
“Yes. I do. Bad enough that I did it without asking. I have at least enough honor to mate you now that I’ve done it.”
For a moment something small and hurt rises to the surface and her eyes go glassy, but as I watch, she controls her expression into something more lighthearted. “Not like that. Bas, it was just an accident. You were doing me a favor. I can’t trap you like that. Especially not since I’m not even a true shifter.”
“Vera, I don’t care—”
“You should!” She shifts and we both look down to where we’re joined still, unable to separate. “You don’t know what it’s like to grow up without the magic while wishing you had it. I don’t want that for my kids. I probably won’t even have kids.” She frowns, shaking her head. “Why am I talking about having kids for fuck’s sake? I haven’t even finished college. Bas, I won’t be your mate.”
My heart squeezes for her. I know it was hard for her growing up in her family and never feeling like she fit in. Even so. “Ver, I bit you. Think about what that means.”
She scoffs. “That no other shifter can claim me? Well guess what? They never would.” She struggles again to lift off me, and the movement sends a ghost of pleasure straight to my balls.
I groan.
Her eyes widen. “Bas, what the hell? It feels like we’re knotted, but I thought that was impossible?”
ELEVEN
Vera
The more I move, trying to get myself free from my position on top of Bastien, the more my body reacts to his huge cock stuffed up deep inside me and the tighter it gets. I choke down a moan as he rubs against a highly sensitive place inside me. I don’t want him to feel like he needs to take pity on me any more than he already has.
