by Selena Scott
“Oh, ace,” Ivy whispered, her tears wetting the fur around his ears. “You did it.”
“Good job, boy,” Maxim whispered, gathering him up into a huge hug. And then he was just hugging Linc in his human form. He’d effortlessly, painlessly shifted back. Skinny and wiggling and grinning with barely contained excitement.
“I did it!” He threw himself into Ivy’s arms. “I did it!” And then back into Maxim’s arms. “I did it, Papa!”
The party didn’t exactly screech to a halt. But there was definitely some confusion on where to look.
Oh boy, Dora thought when she saw the look on Ivy’s face. “Burgers are ready!”
Grateful for the interruption, everybody else hopped over, picking up plates and starting to load up with food.
“Ace,” Ivy started, opening and closing her mouth for a minute. “Pants on first, before getting some dinner.”
The little boy did so quickly, apparently completely oblivious to the fact that he’d just referred to Maxim as ‘Papa’.
Ivy and Maxim, however, stayed crouched down where they were on the deck, watching the rest of the family get food.
Finally, when he couldn’t stand it for another second, Maxim broke the terrible silence that was stretching out between the two of them. “Do you want me to talk to him about it?”
“No,” Ivy said curtly, rising and moving toward the food. “I’ll do it. Tomorrow after he gets home from Emin and Glory’s.”
Maxim caught her by the elbow before she got away. He could feel a small crack between them and he feared that it might become a chasm. “What will you tell him?”
“I don’t know, Maxim.” And the look on her face was one of such resignation, such confusion and discomfort, that he let her arm drop. He struggled to make his peace with the fact that something that had made him so happy had made her so upset.
***
Ivy was quiet on the drive away from Katya and Ilya’s. Surely it had been a little hard for her to say goodbye to Linc, to let Emin carry his sleepy little form into the darkness, up to his cabin. Ivy had told Maxim that the only time in Linc’s entire life that she’d spent the night away from him were those few nights she’d spent in Spokane over the winter.
When they’d first met.
Inspiration hit Maxim and instead of veering right at an intersection that led to Ivy’s house, he pulled a U-turn and headed back toward his own house.
“Where are we going?”
“Home,” he replied, pulling into his driveway just a few minutes later.
For a second, Ivy looked as if she might not get out of the car, but she followed him up the driveway and into his house.
Ivy wandered over to his aquarium, lit blue in the dark room. She cupped her elbows and leaned down to get a better look at them.
She’d never looked more like a mermaid than in that underwater light. He knew she was uncomfortable. God, he didn’t want that. He wanted her to be so comfortable in his house that she would kick her shoes off, flop down on the couch and channel surf.
“I was surprised, the first time I saw your house,” she said, turning to face him.
“Da?” Maxim said, kicking off his own shoes. “Beer?”
“Sure.” She wandered after him into the kitchen. “Yeah, I thought for sure we were going to a hotel room. And then we came here and I thought for sure it was gonna be some bare-walled bachelor pad with left over pad thai in the fridge and beer bottles on the nightstand.”
Maxim cracked two beers, handed one to her and fished some pretzels out of the cabinet, setting them on the kitchen table. He raised an eyebrow. “I see I made a very good first impression on you.”
“I didn’t know what to expect.” She shrugged tightly. “And then we came here. And there’s pictures of your family all around and your socks were all matched in the drawers and it smelled good. Like you’d baked bread earlier in the day.”
She was working herself up, getting madder and madder and Maxim didn’t understand why. But he could see the sparks in her eyes.
“And then,” she took an angry swig of beer, slammed the bottle down onto the counter hard enough that he winced, “you let me tickle you. Jesus!”
“All of this was bad?”
“No, Maxim.” She turned away from him and for just an eyelash of a second he heard her voice quaver. “All of it was great. You made me comfortable. And you’ve been fucking doing that since the day I met you. You shouldn’t have done that!”
“Ivy.” Maxim rose from where he sat, moved across the room to lay his hands on her shoulders but she danced away from him.
“You shouldn’t have done that!” she shouted again, and this time she was dashing tears out of her eyes.
“Done what?” he asked, jamming his hands into his pockets.
She took two fast steps toward him, planted her hands on his chest and sent him stumbling a full step backwards. “You lulled me into - into submission!”
He raised his eyebrow even higher. “I doubt this very much. You are not submissive in the least.”
“No! I mean that you brought my guard down. All my defenses. And then you made me need you.”
She clapped her hands over her mouth like she couldn’t believe she’d said it. She turned away from him and paced halfway down the dark hallway toward the living room. He gave her half a second before he was on her there as well.
“I need you, too.”
“No!” She dropped her hands from her mouth. “You don’t! You have your job and your family and a hundred girls just begging for it, I’m sure. You don’t need a 32-year-old single mom with a bear shifter kid. You don’t need me the way I need you. And I’m so fucking angry that you made me need you, Maxim. How could you do that to me? What the hell am I supposed to do now?”
Her color had risen to her cheeks and her hair swung down her back like silk. Her breasts were rising and falling against her shirt. She was like a bobcat cornered by a grizzly and he hated that he’d made her feel that way. That she was looking at him like he was the one who’d put that fear in her.
Stepping forward, he scooped her right up, pinning her to his chest in one smooth movement. He expected her to stiffen and twist but she melted right into him. Like a baby. Like Linc might after a tantrum. She didn’t want to be fighting this so hard, Maxim realized. Because she wasn’t actually fighting him. She was fighting herself.
It was the half of her that had gotten along fine before him and the half of her that needed him. They were at war inside her right now.
She breathed hard and pressed her face into his chest. He wondered if she knew that she was soothing herself by being close to him. That in so many ways, she’d already answered all her own questions about this; she just needed to listen to her own answers.
Well, it wouldn’t hurt to make things a little more clear. He paced down the hallway toward his bedroom, kicking the door closed behind him. He set her down on the bed and immediately began stripping her clothes off. Nothing stayed. Not even the hair tie in her hair or the thin gold chain around her neck. He held her eyes as he stripped himself.
She looked lost. And terrified. He simply couldn’t abide that.
“What the hell are you supposed to do now?” he asked, repeating her earlier question. “First, I will show you. And then, if you are still confused, I will tell you. Da?”
Ivy nodded her head, her eyes wide.
Maxim planted two fists on the bed and crawled over top of her. When she was completely caged in underneath him he lowered his mouth to hers, gently, but not softly. His tongue met hers, challenged hers, took from hers. When she wiggled her hips and moaned, he broke the kiss and took her eyes in the same way.
“Our first night together,” he began, pinning her with his gaze, giving her no choice but to hear his words, “I felt something I had never felt before in my life.”
“Maxim,” she whispered, but he ruthlessly ignored the plaintive tone. He knew he was making a case right now. He couldn’
t afford to go easy on her.
“Do you remember how I first fucked you, rusalka? We lay on our sides on this bed. You had one leg thrown over my hip.” He rolled, brought her leg up and imitated his own words. They stared into one another, the empty space between them heated by their racing pulses. “I pushed into this little pussy of yours and your hair was everywhere and your eyes had a hold on me like magnets. You remember this moment, da?”
Maxim’s cock was pressed lengthwise against her pussy and Ivy couldn’t fight the urge to slide her wetness along him. She nodded her head. Yes, of course she remembered that, how could she in a million years have forgotten it?
“I felt it then, rusalka. Like electricity. It was here.” He dropped a hand to her pussy, let her push toward the heat for a second. “It was here.” He pressed that hand to her lips, then to his own. “It was here.” He pressed his hand to his own chest and then to hers.
Ivy’s eyes widened in a momentary panic at the insinuation that he’d felt something for her in his heart, but he didn’t give that panic room to grow. He rolled them.
“And then I took you like this, rusalka.” She was on all fours and he pressed his length against her pussy from behind. “I liked this very much because I could see all of your back and your ass and when I looked down I could see my cock, so hard for you, push and push into you.”
Ivy moaned and pressed herself back onto him, but he held her hips and carried on. He’d kept her panic at bay, but he wasn’t ready to stop.
“But soon, I wasn’t touching you enough, so I fell forward.” He planted his hands on either side of hers and nestled his face into the crook of her neck, took her earlobe in between his teeth.
She turned her face, her eyes challenging his and he couldn’t help but groan. “And then I fucked you,” she whispered.
“Da, rusalka.” He rolled them again so she straddled him the way she had that first night together. “You rode me.”
She planted her hands on his chest and lifted her hips and let them drop. She dragged her wetness along his cock, torturing them both.
“I couldn’t believe how big you were,” she whispered. “I looked down at you and you were like a giant. I couldn’t believe you could fit inside me.”
“You took me,” he said, banding an arm around her hips and lifting her slightly. “Your body took me like I was coming home. You never fought it.” He poised her at the tip of his cock, pushed in a scant inch. “I will never forget that. You were so small, so tight. But you opened for me. You took every inch of me.”
And then he pressed inside her and she took every inch of him exactly the way she had that first night. And that same feeling erupted between them. Puzzle pieces. Rightness. Home. Perfect.
Ivy couldn’t help but clamp her lips against the scream that was rising inside her. She knew now that this was so much more than pleasure. God, she was laid out and bare and giving him everything. Even when she’d tried to pull herself back. She couldn’t. He pulled it right out of her. This tenderness. God. This love.
She rose up and pushed back down, feeling his cock touch every part of her, pushing in deeper than anyone else had ever been. Erasing everyone but him.
Maxim flipped again, putting her underneath him. He wanted her to see nothing but him. Not even the world. He wanted her to know that when she was with him, he would always protect her. That needing him wasn’t terrible or scary. It should be a relief. A glorious relief to her.
With that thought, he pulled out of her and slid down her body, clamping his mouth to her pussy.
“Maxim!” Ivy moaned, arching up off the bed. She hadn’t been expecting the move.
Suckling and circling her clit, Maxim ruthlessly brought Ivy to orgasm. She screamed his name and arched and nearly ripped the hair out of his head. But it wasn’t enough for him. He didn’t stop. He gentled the stroke of his tongue against her sensitive places, but he lapped and licked and didn’t stop. Time sprawled out as he kissed her there like he was a teenager making out before curfew. He barely came up for air. He rolled her so that she straddled him and made her come and come. Some time later, he found himself kneeling on the floor with her feet dangling off the edge of the bed while he licked and licked at her.
And then they were on the floor while he greedily swallowed her pleasure.
“I can’t,” she panted. “I can’t come anymore, baby.”
Well, they’d see about that, Maxim thought as he lifted her back to the bed and spooned her, spearing into her from behind.
Ivy cried out as he slammed into her over and over, her hands clawing at the sheets. One of his hands gripped at her breasts while the other gently circled her clit. This time, when she came, he had no choice but to go with her. Her body clamping around him and milking his cock to release. He spilled inside her velvet heat and gritted his teeth against the pleasure, squeezing her to him in every way.
They panted as they came down from the high of it. Ivy pressed her face into the pillow, still spooning him. He was still inside her. When she tried to move away he held her still, pressed himself into her a little more.
“Jesus, Maxim,” Ivy whispered. “Jesus.”
“I told you I was going to show you what you were supposed to do about needing me.”
Ivy stiffened a little. “What do you mean?”
“And then I was going to tell you.”
“Maxim,” Ivy spoke very carefully and clearly. “What do you think just happened here?”
“I showed you that all you have to do is stay here and accept my love for you.”
Now she was definitely stiff.
“And I will make everything so good for you,” he kept going, ignoring the tightness of her body. “I will make everything feel so good if you let yourself stay and take it. Have what you want.”
Ivy pulled away, his softening cock pulling out of her. He winced at the loss of her warmth.
“Hold on here. I know we’ve been having some really great sex. But.” He didn’t like the way she was looking at him. Like he was crazy and she was the only one who could see the truth. “What did you think was happening, Maxim? Did you think we were gonna get married or something?” She choked out the words as if they were poison.
And maybe they were, for the amount that they burned him just to hear them. He refused to answer that question. He knew a losing game when he saw one. He knew what she wanted him to say and he refused to lie to her.
Instead, he asked something that he needed the answer to. Something that he needed out of the way from between them. Something he suspected was in Ivy’s way. “Why do you not ever talk about Linc’s father?”
She recoiled as if he’d slapped her. She slid off the bed but didn’t start putting her clothes on. Instead she put her hands on her plush hips and faced off against Maxim as if they were at war with one another.
“Not sure why you’re asking about that at a moment like this, but I can only guess that you’ve made some assumptions there. But sure, why not? Let’s talk about that. Maybe it’ll get your romantic head out of the clouds and teach you some important lessons about who I am.”
She paced to his dresser, picked up the picture of Katya and Ilya and slammed it back down. “I don’t mate for life, Maxim. That girl you picked up in the bar? That’s me. I occasionally go home with dudes when I want to get laid. Just because we had a connection here that first night, it doesn’t change the fact that both of us went home with a stranger to fuck, okay? That’s pretty much the extent of the romance I want in my life.”
She paced over to his nightstand, whipped out the handcuffs and the lube and the condoms he kept there and tossed them cruelly onto the bed. “You and I aren’t so different, okay? So don’t go acting like a Romeo because you caught some feels. You’re just salty that I didn’t catch them back.”
“Rusalka.” His voice was low with warning. Yelling he could handle. Temper he could handle. But lying, he could not. They both knew she had the same feelings right back for him.
“Don’t ‘rusalka’ me. You asked about Linc’s dad. Well, you want to know the hard, ugly truth about that one? He was just some guy. And he didn’t mean anything to me. He was a jerk. But he was hot, so what did I care? I slept with him three times over a four-year period and the third time I accidentally got knocked up.” She grabbed her hair band off the nightstand and started throwing her hair up in a bun.
“He didn’t want anything to do with us when he found out I was pregnant, and I was relieved.” Next came her necklace. She ignored the fact that her fingers were trembling so much that she could barely do up the clasp. “I realize now that he was probably such a loner because he was a bear shifter and didn’t know how to control it. And that makes me sad. He had a tough go of life. I knew that at the time and it’s only more apparent to me now that I know what he was. And one night he got drunk and rode his motorcycle and that was the end of it. I didn’t even hear about it for three weeks after. Didn’t even make the funeral. And that was it. Linc was out a dad. But that’s okay. Because Linc’s got me. And I’m not going anywhere. Ever.” She beat one hand on her chest and thrust her chin up in the air as if Maxim were arguing with her instead of sitting quietly on the edge of the bed.
“He’s got me,” Maxim replied after a beat. He knew it was a risk to say that thought out loud. But it was the truth. And if she didn’t want to hear it, that was her problem. Because he was going to say it.
“Don’t. You. Dare.” She paused halfway through putting on her clothes and glared at him. “Just because of the whole ‘papa’ thing. Don’t you dare say that to me!”
“I do not say this to you because a young boy calls me ‘papa’. This was either a slip or a small wish from Linc, but it doesn’t mean anything. I know this. I would not use Linc to manipulate you, Ivy.”
He ran a hand through his hair, impossibly frustrated that she was twisting everything he was saying. “I say this because it is true. Linc has me. And so do you.” He stood now, threw his hands in the air as she ripped her shirt over her head. “And you act like this is capital crime. To be there for you. To support you. To love you.”
