by Zoe Chant
Not right now, though. Right now, she needed to touch him.
Naked, he took a step forward, and she wrapped her arms around him and leaned up for a kiss. The feeling of all that hard, smooth muscle against her bare skin inflamed her, and she moaned into his mouth.
Zach's hands ran down her back, cupped her panty-clad butt...and lifted her clear off the ground, depositing her gently on the bed. Teri stifled a shriek, and pulled back to look at him indignantly. "Warn a girl next time."
"Sorry." His eyes sparkled with mischief. Then he pulled back to look at her, laid out on his bed nearly naked, and the amusement disappeared, replaced with hot desire. He reached for her panties. Teri lifted her hips as he tugged them down, and then she was totally naked.
He crawled forward onto the bed, until he was kneeling over her, and bent to kiss her mouth. Then her neck, and her chest again, except this time he kept going. He spent a long time kissing her breasts, burying his face between them, licking a hot stripe down to a nipple, taking the nipple into his mouth and sucking gently. That last made Teri let out a strangled noise as pleasure spiked in her, making her clench and shudder.
“Now,” she said. “I need you now.” There was a pulsing heat between her legs, an empty ache that needed to be filled.
Zach lifted his head from her nipple; his mouth was shiny and his breath was coming in ragged pants. "God," he said. "Teri. God. Okay." He ran a hand down her stomach, his fingers sliding through her curly pubic hair to explore the warm slipperiness between her legs.
Teri gasped and moaned, twitching her hips forward as his hand brushed her clit. He caught it between two fingers, pressing gently, and then a bit harder, as he bent down and took her nipple in his mouth again. The hot sensation on her breast combined with the quick, firm strokes over both sides of her clit sent her off like a shot. Orgasm pulsed through her, and Teri let out a surprised cry, twisting against Zach's fingers and mouth.
She'd never come that quickly in her life. She didn't even come that quickly when she was using a vibrator.
"Wow," she said shakily, when she came back down enough to speak. Zach gave her a surprisingly boyish grin. Proud of himself, she thought—but the sudden warm fondness faded away against her rising arousal.
After that intense-but-fast orgasm, it felt like the whole area between her legs had been overtaken by liquid heat. Coming so quickly had just whetted her appetite, and Teri pushed her hips forward against Zach's hand, impatient for more.
He pulled away to rummage in the nightstand. Teri bit her lip to keep the bereft noise from escaping, and scooted herself up the bed so she was lying against the pillows. The second Zach emerged with a condom held triumphantly in his hand—the dry one, fortunately—she grabbed his bicep and pulled him back to her.
He had to take a second to open the condom and put it on, so she experimented with kissing down his jaw, along his neck, seeing if the hot, wet kisses that had worked so well to give her the shivers would have the same effect on him.
Apparently so, because after a minute, he pulled away with a laugh. "I'm never going to manage this if you keep doing that," he said. "You're completely destroying my fine motor control."
"Well, we can't have that." Teri watched him roll the condom on, one hand drifting down her own stomach, fingers brushing against her clit. Could she bring herself off again, just really fast, before—
Zach looked up and saw what she was doing, and his eyes went black with desire. "Oh my God," he said. "Look at you. Will you do that for me sometime?"
Teri thought about that. Touching herself, hands on her clit, fingers pushing inside, while Zach watched, his eyes hot on her right up until she came. "Yes." Her voice was hoarse. "Yes, I'll do that for you. Not right now."
"No." Zach moved fast, catching her in his arms and kissing her fiercely, then reaching down to tangle his fingers with hers on her clit. "Now is for this."
And then he was pressing into her. He was big, bigger than she'd ever felt before. Teri could hear herself making noises as he eased inside, but she couldn't quite focus enough to make herself quiet down. She was caught up in the press of him, the clench of herself around him. She couldn't think about anything else but the hot liquid slide as he pushed in to the hilt.
When he was all the way in, he paused. "All right?"
His voice was wrecked. "Yes," Teri moaned. "Move."
He took her at her word, and moved.
If the first long slow push had driven her out of her head, the way she felt when he started to thrust was beyond words. Teri lost control completely. Her legs were spread wide, her hips tilted up, and as he moved inside her, she moaned and shuddered and cried out, fingernails digging into his back.
Zach groaned as she started clenching around him, thrusting in harder, faster. Teri could feel a scream starting in her chest as the pleasure ratcheted up, higher and higher, the tightness building. Zach was pressing hard against that spot inside her that made her muscles lock up, overwhelmed by sensation, and he stroked over it, and over it, and over it—
Teri came. Her shriek echoed in her ears. Zach kept moving, stroking her through it, as she spasmed around him and bit down hard on his shoulder. “Teri,” he groaned. “I love you, I love you, I—oh, fuck—”
He kissed her as he came. Teri sucked on his tongue as the last aftershocks wrung her out, shuddering weakly underneath him. All she could feel was Zach. All she could smell, all she could taste...it was like they really had become one person. Like she could feel Zach’s heart beating inside her own chest, hold his own self inside of her.
“I love you,” she sighed. “Oh, God, I do love you.” It was true. She was overflowing with love for him. She felt like she was spilling it out of her—like it was too much love to contain in her skin.
Slowly, slowly, Zach relaxed over her. His muscles, knotted up with orgasm, untensed, and he let himself come down next to her on the bed. He was looking at her like she was...something precious. There was a light in his silver-gray eyes that she hadn’t seen before. He reached up, and his fingers brushed through her hair, down her cheek.
Teri thought about saying something, like, Wow, or, That was amazing, but she didn’t want to add anything else to this moment. It was perfect the way it was.
So instead she reached out and ran a hand down Zach’s side, marveling at how smooth his skin was, and cupped his hip, looking into his eyes. She just wanted this: looking at Zach, touching him, feeling his warmth and love surrounding her.
She didn’t know how long they stayed there in that little pocket of heat. Zach’s thumb glided across her cheekbone, while Teri stroked her own thumb over his hip. Those little touches connected their whole bodies; Teri felt like their heartbeats were synced, like her heart was pumping blood through Zach’s body, and vice versa.
Finally, after a long time, Zach leaned in to press a soft, gentle kiss to her lips, and then pulled back. He got up, and Teri heard him moving around in the bathroom, water running.
Alone, Teri stretched out, marveling at how good she felt. If she’d taken the time to think about it, she would have said she probably wasn’t up for sex that...vigorous. But she hadn’t hurt herself anywhere at all. She was just pleasantly achy, like after a physical therapy session.
Or, well, a lot better than after a physical therapy session. But she didn’t feel like she’d exerted herself too much. The thought made her wiggle in pleasure—she was definitely, absolutely better. Being able to go nuts like that in bed...surely that had to be the final sign that she was better.
Too bad she couldn’t use this as evidence for her mother and Dr. Campbell.
When Zach came back, he pulled back the covers, and they crawled in together.
“I’ve never felt anything like that before,” Teri confessed once they were curled up together in the blankets. She kept her voice quiet. It still felt like they were inhabiting some precious space together, and she didn’t want to shatter it.
“Neither have I.” Zach
’s voice was quiet, too, a deep purr. “Teri...” he trailed off.
“What?”
“You said you loved me.”
Teri thought she should probably be embarrassed. Who said they loved each other on a first date? But...Zach had said it too. And she didn’t want to take it back, because she still felt it. She felt overcome by how much she loved him. “I did. I do.”
“I do, too. Do you remember, earlier tonight, when I was talking about...shapeshifter relationships?”
He’d been talking about his parents, about how they ran away because they were—“Mates,” Teri said, hearing the awe in her own voice. The skepticism she’d felt about the concept earlier had melted away, somehow. All she felt was wonder. “Are you saying we’re mates?”
“Yes.” His voice was deep and sure. “Teri, I knew there was something special about you from the moment I saw you. I wanted to be closer to you every time we were together. But it wasn’t until just now that I realized what that meant. We’re mates. We’re meant to be together.”
Meant to be together. “Does that mean...forever? Is it like being married?”
Zach hesitated, and then nodded; Teri felt the motion more than she saw it. “My parents said that for shifters, it was even more than being married. Closer, more permanent.”
“Permanent,” Teri said wonderingly.
She thought about what that might mean. She and Zach were meant to be together. That meant that her crazy fantasy—living here in this house with him, watching him build his deck and coming to barbecues where kids ran around and neighbors chatted—that could all be real.
“Are you all right with that?” Zach asked tentatively. “I know that if you weren’t raised by shifters, it might seem too—sudden, or too intense. It’s okay if you’d rather take this more slowly.”
“No!” Teri said, almost surprised by her own vehemence. “No. I don’t want to take it slowly. I don’t think it’s too sudden or too intense. I—I—” Unexpectedly, she felt her eyes filling up with tears. “I never thought I’d have something like this.”
“Teri, what’s wrong?” Zach’s fingers were brushing her cheek again, his thumb swiping the corner of her eye and coming away wet.
“I always—my relationships in the past have always been...dry. Friendly. Men that I liked just fine, that I didn’t mind touching or having them touch me.” At those words, Zach tugged her close; she wasn’t sure if it was jealousy at the thought of other men, or the desire to show her what it was like touching someone she really wanted.
Either option was fine with her, though.
“I thought that was just how it always was,” she continued, curling close to Zach’s chest and loving the feeling of his arms tightening around her. “I thought that love like you read about, or see in movies—that either it just didn’t exist, or that I wasn’t capable of it. I was sure I’d never have a relationship based on real, passionate love. But now it’s just—fallen out of the sky right in front of me, when I wasn’t even looking for it.” Her voice choked up, and it took her a minute to get herself back under control.
“I’m glad,” she said, when she could finally talk again. “I’m so glad, Zach. We’re mates, and I couldn’t be happier about it.”
He kissed her, and it was like he couldn’t say what he was feeling in words—he couldn’t bring himself to speak, just kiss her. Teri tasted salt, and she wasn’t sure if it was from her tears, or his.
“I’m glad, too,” he whispered finally, into the intimate space between them. “I haven’t...had a lot of things just for me.”
Teri thought about Zach losing his parents, working two or three jobs to take care of his teenage brother, following Joel into ranger school and into a job because he wanted them to be together. She held him close.
“I’m for you,” she told him. “I’m just for you.”
***
They stayed curled up together for what felt like a long time, but when Teri finally stretched and turned to glance at the clock, it was still early—only ten o'clock. The night stretched out before her, hours and hours of glorious freedom to spend with Zach. Touching him, breathing him in, learning about him...
She turned back to see him smiling at her. She reached up to trace the shape of that smile, imprint it on her memory. She loved how happy he was, how after everything he'd been through, he could still be so cheerful, and smile and laugh so easily. Sometimes it felt like she never heard anyone laugh, at home.
"Tell me more about you and Joel," she said impulsively. "You raised him?"
Zach nodded. "Well, since he was thirteen."
Teri wrinkled her nose. "That sounds hard. If my sister had had to take care of me when I was thirteen, she probably would've murdered me in the first six months. And I would've deserved it."
Zach breathed out a little laugh, and ran a thumb over her cheekbone. "I doubt that."
"You didn't know me then," Teri said seriously. "I was impossible. I think most thirteen-year-olds are impossible."
"Well," Zach admitted, "Joel was pretty impossible. But...he'd just lost his parents."
"So had you," Teri said softly.
Zach shrugged. "But I was an adult, and he was a kid. We—well, we struggled. Of course we did. He wasn't doing so well at school for a while, and I was trying to make him do his homework and go to class and respect his teachers, and he just wouldn't. He'd cut school and run off into the woods. I had to work so much that I couldn't keep an eye on him, and we'd get into huge, screaming fights. You know, 'you're not my dad, you can't tell me what to do.'"
He said that last with an overdramatic expression, and Teri knew he was trying to make it sound lighthearted. But she could just picture it: Zach trying desperately to take care of his brother, working two or three jobs to make ends meet and dealing with a grieving, angry teenager—while still a teenager himself.
It broke her heart, at the same time as it filled her with admiration for him, that he'd managed to actually do it. Bring up his brother into the strong, good man he clearly was today, forge such a close relationship that they followed each other to the middle of nowhere.
"What changed?" she asked.
Zach's mouth firmed. "One day," he started, and then trailed off almost immediately.
"You don't have to tell me." Teri didn't like the look of pain in his eyes. She didn't want to make him relive whatever memory was behind those eyes right now, as much as she wanted to know what had hurt him that much.
"No, I want to." He wasn't trying to make anything lighthearted anymore. He met her eyes seriously and started again. "One day, Joel was running around in his shifted form. As a snow leopard. I was out looking for him, but I didn't know where he was exactly, so I was just combing his regular hangouts to see if I could find him and haul his ass home. He'd skipped school again."
All the little details were giving Teri chills, as Zach clearly skirted around the real story.
"I found him," Zach said. "He was—he was half-shifted. He'd been caught by some kids. Teenagers, maybe a little older than him. They'd seen him shift and freaked out, but instead of running away, they were throwing things. Rocks, bottles, whatever they could get their hands on. He was hurt, and stuck halfway between human and leopard. Bleeding, and making this awful noise. I've never heard a noise like that."
Teri caught Zach's hand, squeezing it between hers. "What happened?" she whispered.
"I shifted," Zach said. "We were never supposed to shift in front of other people. Never anywhere near the city. Never without our parents around. But our parents weren't going to be around again, and I couldn't think of anything else to do. So I shifted, and ran towards the kids. They saw me and got scared and ran. But Joel—he was still stuck. I had to talk him through it. I hadn't even known that could happen, I'd never seen it before, our parents had never mentioned it was possible.”
He drew in a deep, ragged breath. “It took what felt like years for him to get out of it, shift back. It was probably only a few minute
s, but I was so afraid he'd be stuck like that forever. When he finally made it back to human, he was crying. It was the first time I'd seen him cry since our dad died."
Zach's eyes were bleak. Teri had tears in her own eyes, thinking about it. Zach was clenching her hand in a hard grip, almost painful.
Teri welcomed it. She wanted to be there for him while he remembered this, because she knew he hadn't had anyone to be there for him when it happened.
"After that...things changed. Joel was more wary of going out and shifting, he was more willing to talk to me about stuff. It became more 'us against the world,' than him against me." He quirked a little half-smile. "Still took me a while to convince him to actually do his homework, but he got around to it in the end. And once he started putting some effort in, he was better at school than I'd ever been."
Teri could hear the pride in his voice, and the love. "I'm so sorry that happened."
Zach nodded. "For all it brought us closer together...it wasn't worth it. He had nightmares for years afterward, and...” He hesitated. "So did I. Seeing my little brother all twisted up and wrong, bleeding on the street while those kids threw rocks at him..." He shivered, and pulled Teri closer. "I would've taken a hundred screaming fights with him over that."
Teri hugged Zach hard, feeling the pain and sadness in his tight embrace. It was an awful story, but she was glad to be here for him while he told it, glad to be a source of comfort or strength for him.
“Anyway,” Zach said into her hair, “that’s one of the things that’s made working at Glacier so strange. Everyone knows about shifters, here. Joel and I are both so used to keeping it an absolute secret, because we know what could happen if someone found out, if someone saw us. Even talking about it with other shifters is weird, because we never knew any other shifters except our parents.”
“I was always taught that shifters were dangerous.” They were wrapped up so close that Teri was speaking against Zach’s shoulder, and it felt like she was whispering the words directly into him, against his skin. “I never thought about how dangerous humans could be to shifters as a kid, but as I grew up, I realized that the shifter kids had been told to avoid my family. Their parents were probably afraid of what might happen.”
