Grizzly Promise

by Becca Jameson

  He flicked his thumbs over her nipples again, and waves of desire spiraled through her body. When he released her breasts to smooth his hands down her sides, she whimpered.

  He broke the kiss, meeting her gaze again with a small smile. “Can I take your shirt off?”

  She nodded, biting her lower lip.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Please, Wyatt.” She leaned closer. “I love the way you look at me. I want to see your gaze on my body.”

  His smile widened. “Gladly.” He reached for the hem of her tight tank and lifted it. When he got to the bottom edge of the inside elastic cupping her breasts, he grabbed that too. “Lift your arms.”

  She did as he asked, shivering as the air in the room hit her naked torso. This was the first time a man had ever seen her naked, even though it was only from the chest up. She fought the urge to cover herself, gripping his shoulders again so hard her fingernails would leave marks. Watching his face was mesmerizing.

  His gaze fell on her heavy breasts, his lips moving, but she didn’t think he was making any sounds. Once again he cupped the globes, weighing them, lifting them. His chest rose and fell as she knew hers did, perhaps in sync. When he touched the tips of her distended nipples with his fingers, she moaned. “Wyatt…”

  “I know, babe. Just feel.”

  “I’m overloaded.”

  “Yeah. That happens.”

  “No one has…”

  He lifted a brow and then smiled. “No one has touched you like this. Seen you, either.”

  “Right.”

  His eyes closed slowly, and then he lowered his face. “Need to taste.”

  “Oh.” Shit. “Okay.”

  He flicked his tongue over one bud, circled it maddeningly, and then sucked it into his mouth. Gently. Not rough.

  She arched her chest, her head tipping toward the ceiling, her eyes rolling back. “Jesus…” Her legs shook.

  He switched to the other nipple, giving it the same treatment.

  She clenched her legs together. So much sensation in her sex. A throbbing need. Wetness soaked her panties. Was it supposed to be like this?

  Earlier she’d wondered why people ever had sex. Now she wondered why people ever came up for air.

  His mouth popped free, and he nibbled a path up her chest to her neck and higher until he grabbed her lips again. He kissed them softly and then whispered against them. “You taste and feel amazing.” His hands trailed around to her back and then lower, one resting at the small of her back and one on her butt.

  When he hauled her closer, tight against his body, she couldn’t miss the press of his erection against her belly. Did that pressure feel good to him? Relieve him in some way? She doubted it. She also hated knowing she wasn’t ready for him to go much further.

  The edge of panic seeped in. She tensed. He held her, not moving. “I’ve got you.” How did he know she needed that? His voice. His reassurance. His promise.

  She relaxed enough to enjoy the feel of his hand cupping her butt. So close to her sex. His pinky rested at the seam of her thigh. Instinct made her spread her legs a few inches.

  “You still okay?”

  “Yes.” How could she tell him she needed him to touch her there?

  “You want me to stop?”

  “No.” The word was barely audible, but she meant it.

  “We have our whole lives, Paige.”

  “Mmm.” She somehow managed to press more firmly against his erection.

  He pulled back but demanded, “Look at me.”

  She met his gaze again.

  “I don’t have to take your sexy, tight pants off to make you come. If you want me to take you there, I will.”

  Her face heated to a new extreme. She inhaled sharply. “I’d like that.”

  He smiled. “Then you shall have it.” Holding her gaze, he kept one hand on her lower back and slid the other around to the front, pressing his spread fingers against her belly and inching them lower. “Spread your legs for me.”

  She stepped out, her sex throbbing and hot.

  Suddenly his middle finger hit a spot that made her lift onto her toes and gasp.

  “Oh, baby. You’ll never understand the beauty of this gift.” He dipped lower until he cupped her sex, trapping the heat. When he pressed against her, she lost her balance.

  He held her up by that hand and the one at her back. Her legs were useless. And then his fingers stroked across her folds, and her vision swam. She listed forward.

  “Eyes on me.”

  She tried to focus, failing.

  He paused. “More?”

  “Jesus, Wyatt, yes.” Her voice belonged to some other person. A sex fiend. She winced at the demanding tone.

  He simply continued to smile and rubbed across her lower lips, making her wish her pants were not between his hand and her sex. But when he returned his attentions to what was obviously the key to the universe and flicked his finger over the little nub rapidly, she screamed.

  Something snapped inside her, and she unraveled. Pulses of white hot pleasure caused her channel to squeeze in on itself rhythmically. Over and over. She thought she might have actually died. Surely her heart stopped.

  When it was finally over, and she was left with the occasional quiver, she slumped against him. He continued to cup her sex for several seconds, pressing, teasing, tempting. And then he slid both hands to her waist, lifted her up, and rolled to one side to deposit her on her back next to him.

  He stared down at her, his fingers dancing up her belly and across her breasts. Goose bumps rose in the wake of the tsunami. Her nipples puckered when he tapped them.

  Finally, unable to take another moment of sensation, she grabbed his wrist to stop the torture. Her vision cleared enough to see his eyes. “You… That was…” There were no words.

  “I can’t believe I’m going to ask this, but have you never orgasmed?”

  She swallowed. “If that was an orgasm, I’m never leaving this room again until I’m forty. And no, of course not. When would I have done that?”

  His eyebrows rose, gathering in the center until they nearly touched. “Anytime you wanted?”

  She flushed a deep, heated red. “You mean masturbating?”

  “Yeah.” He said the one word as if he’d said, duh.

  She shook her head, slightly mortified. “No. Seriously? No.”

  He gave a soft chuckle. “People do it all the time, babe. I mean every day. Not just men. Women do too.”

  “Not me.” Her mind flooded with thoughts. Women masturbated? All the time? Who would have told her that? She didn’t have girlfriends. Locker room talk or whatever. Sleepovers. Nothing like that ever happened in her life. The years when she should have been hanging with her girlfriends at the mall or at parties were spent hiding from the world with her safe gay friend who was also hiding.

  Except he had boyfriends secretly on the side. And he had sex. She’d sat alone in her apartment or before that in her parents’ house ignoring her sexual needs, or not even realizing she had them. “I’ve never touched myself like that, Wyatt,” she felt the need to add. “I never even wanted to awaken the idea of being touched. It made me close down and turn it off.”

  “Well, the good news is, I promise to make up for lost time. You have no idea how gorgeous you were coming around my hand like that. Best gift I’ve ever received. I’ve never been so hard in my life.”

  “Shit.” She twisted to more fully face him, leaning slightly on her side. “You, uh…”

  He shook his head. “Didn’t say that so you’d feel sorry for me. I’ll live. Like I said, plenty of time.”

  “Do you…masturbate? I mean, of course you do.” She felt stupid. “But I mean like, do you want to now?”

  He snickered. “Well, yes. But you have to understand men get hard-ons all the time. Several times a day. We don’t always act on it. It will go back down. Granted, I don’t think I’ve ever been this hard, and it will take a while for my cock to tame, but
it will happen.”

  She flushed again. Cock? She was definitely naïve. “I’m a tease.”

  He gripped her waist. “Stop it. You’re not. You’re inexperienced and learning and getting to know yourself. I’d be a selfish prick to pressure you to go further today. But just to warn you, next time I’m going to remove your pants and eat your pussy until you scream my name so loud the mountain shakes.”

  Yes, there were deeper shades of red. She flung an arm over her eyes, flopping onto her back.

  Wyatt laughed. “I absolutely love your innocence. It’s hotter than hell.”

  “It’s equally embarrassing.”

  “Don’t let it be.” He kissed her nipple, stunning her since she wasn’t looking. But also shocking was that she didn’t pull away. It felt right. Perfect. She wanted more. She wouldn’t tell him that, but she definitely wanted more.

  He nuzzled her breasts, kissing them reverently. “I gotta tell you something.”

  She froze. Uh-oh.

  He lifted his face, shaking his head. “Not something bad. Don’t wig out.” A gentle kiss landed on her lips before he continued. “Women don’t usually orgasm that easily. Not that quickly and not through their clothes. Some do. Not gonna lie. But most don’t. You’re absolutely not lacking in the arousal department. Super sensitive. Eventually, I’m gonna make you come like that over and over, piling one orgasm on top of the other until you don’t know up from down.”

  She definitely stopped moving or breathing. Slowly she lifted her hand up to cross it over her breasts and rolled into his side. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  “And you’re telling me this now when you aren’t willing to take off your jeans?”

  “Yep.”

  “Who’s the tease?”

  He laughed, his body shaking. It felt so good, pressing against her mate while he held her and talked dirty to her and made her feel like a princess. She wouldn’t have believed it would ever be possible for her to let a man so much as touch her arm, let alone cup her sex and rub her through her pants. Forget that she knew for a fact she wouldn’t enjoy it and it would hurt.

  Only a handful of hours after she dumped her soul on a platter in front of Wyatt and he had her putty in his hands.

  Good thing?

  She hoped so.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “I don’t like this plan,” Wyatt told Paige the next morning over the phone.

  “I’ll be fine. She’s a reporter, Wyatt. For the school newspaper. Not a member of the Secret Intelligence Service.”

  “She’s strange, and she spent half the morning yesterday spying on you at my house. Our house,” he amended, making her smile. “Even though you didn’t sleep in it last night, it’s still yours. There’s always tonight.” Of course, he would take the first opportunity to point that out and rub it in.

  She had left him several hours after he gave her that life-altering orgasm. After lying in his bed half naked talking and cuddling. After eating lunch in his kitchen while Dale worked outside. After sitting on his couch with their feet on the coffee table, his arm around her while he checked his email on his computer on his lap. After she watched his profile for long stretches of time, knowing he’d been right and everything between them would be okay.

  Even once she came to that conclusion, she still thought it was best to go back to her apartment and take a break from the intensity so she could regroup.

  It might have been better to remain at Wyatt’s, however, because in the tiny apartment she was subject to the inquisition. She’d told Gavin nearly everything that had transpired, including her total meltdown after seeing Antoine’s picture but excluding the fantastic orgasm.

  Gavin was supportive. He liked Wyatt. His only hesitation was based on his total lack of understanding about how shifters could meet and nearly instantly bind themselves for life.

  He’d flushed and turned away when she asked him about Dale, giving her only two quick sentences. “He’s older. And he’s a shifter.”

  “He’s the same age as Wyatt, and therefore also eight years older than you. So, don’t give me that unless you’re willing to admit Wyatt is old for me too.”

  “Not the same,” he’d responded.

  She figured he was crazy, but said nothing and changed the subject. “I’m worried about you.”

  “Don’t be.” He’d eyed her crossly. “I’m a big boy. I’ll figure this out. I knew I wouldn’t be able to lean on you forever.”

  “I expected you to be the one to bail.”

  “Well, I never would have had the balls. So it was always going to be you.”

  Wyatt, still on the phone with her, yanked her back into the present. “Paige? You still there?”

  “Yeah. Sorry. My mind wandered. What did you say?”

  “I said Kelly is strange, and I don’t like you alone with her. She gives me the creeps.”

  “Strange doesn’t make her dangerous. She didn’t stick around your house long, and she didn’t come back.”

  “You do realize that only makes me more suspicious. You’re not helping your case.”

  Paige sighed. “Like I said, I’m sure she thinks she’s gonna catch me not doing my job like some sort of spy for the university. She probably thinks it would be to her advantage to tattle on me so that she appears to be holier than thou. She’s nothing but a brown-noser, Wyatt. That’s why I’m going to meet with her this morning like nothing’s wrong. I have a perfect story all made up to convince her why I was legitimately at your house yesterday. Hoping if I tell her something she already knows, she’ll stop being so suspicious of me.”

  “Did you at least call your professor?”

  “Yes, but I got voice mail.”

  “Damn. And he didn’t call you back?”

  “At this point, I’m inclined to think he’s not working this week. I’m sure it’s no big deal. He’ll get back to me when he can. It won’t change anything. I’d just like to know what he expects.”

  “You’re awfully articulate for nine in the morning,” he teased.

  “I’ll have you know I’ve already been up an hour. Two cups of coffee, shower, even dressed.”

  “Please tell me you’re wearing more than you were yesterday morning when you declared yourself dressed.”

  She smiled. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  “Yes, so why don’t you come by the brewery before you meet Kelly?”

  “For wardrobe approval?” she joked.

  “Call it whatever you like if it will lure you this direction.”

  “Well, for future reference, I can tell you wardrobe approval will not win you any brownie points. Ever.”

  “Okay, then let’s say I want you to come by so I can taste your lip gloss.”

  She couldn’t keep from smiling. All the time lately. But she wasn’t ready for that. “Not ready for that. Not sure I can face your entire pack yet.”

  He didn’t respond or make a sound.

  “Wyatt?”

  “Yeah.” He sighed. “Do your thing. But be careful, and I want to see you later, after work. Dinner.”

  “Bossy.”

  He snickered.

  “Are you mad I don’t want to come to the brewery?”

  “No, not mad. I totally get it. The truth is my pack will be more overwhelming than you’re even imagining. So no. I’m just…antsy.”

  “Antsy,” she deadpanned.

  “In a hurry. Not your problem. Don’t worry about it.”

  “What kind of hurry?” She wasn’t following.

  He hesitated. “Paige, I waited a long time to find you and then what seemed like even longer before you would see me, and now I just want to get past this awkward stage and get to the part where you move in with me, sleep in my bed, eat your meals in the same kitchen I’m standing in, and stroll into my office at the brewery like you own the place. I’d give anything to skip the part where I have to introduce you to everyone and get a slap on the back.”

  S
he couldn’t breathe. He’d said so much, and things were moving so fast. But also she felt a tightness in her chest, and her clit pulsed as he listed off what her future would look like.

  “Sorry. Didn’t mean to freak you out.”

  “No. It’s okay. You’re right. That will be nice. But what’s wrong with your family congratulating you? I’m the antisocial one.”

  “It’s not me I’m worried about, babe.” His voice was lower. Soothing. Filled with emotion and love and caring.

  “Oh.” He was stressed worrying about her being overwhelmed when she met his family. His thoughtfulness was abundant. “Don’t worry about me.”

  A sharp chuckle. “For the rest of my life, I’ll be doing nothing but worrying about you.”

  The twinge in her clit turned into something much more powerful. For the first time in her life, she had the urge to reach between her legs and touch herself. Imagining Wyatt doing so. “I’ll see you tonight?” She needed to get off the phone before she broke down and begged him to drop what he was doing and come bind her to him.

  “I’ll pick you up after work. You’ll be at the apartment?”

  “Yeah, but I could drive. Then I’d have a car to get home.”

  “I’ll pick you up.”

  “You worried about my driving too?” She straightened a bit. If he was that overprotective, she would have a problem on her hands.

  “Nope. I just don’t want you to have the means to leave before I’m ready for you to.”

  She relaxed. “Okay.” That damn pulsing. More intense. Demanding. Maybe she would rub herself. A knock at the door made her jump and spin around. “Gotta go. Kelly’s here.”

  “I’ll text you when I’m leaving work.”

  “’K. Later.” She ended the call as she headed for the door. Gavin had left earlier, saying he needed to get to the library to work on his thesis, though she suspected he simply didn’t want to be within a hundred yards of Kelly Smith.

  Not shocking in the least, Kelly was all smiles and excitement when Paige opened the door. “Hey.” She rushed into the apartment without being invited. “You’re up and dressed.”

  “It’s rare, but I figured I owed you after yesterday. Sorry I was so busy.”

  “Where did you go? You weren’t even home.”