His still scarlet cheeks flushed deeper, color spreading down his neck and disappearing beneath his collar, and his scent—Goddess, his scent—was flooding my senses again, overwhelming everything else, drowning out reason and restraint.
Sweet, sharp, wild. Pine and snowdrops tangled with the raw, unfiltered ache of arousal, thick and intoxicating in the air between us, wrapping around me like smoke.
It was like he was wrapping invisible threads around me, drawing me closer with every breath he took, pulling me into his orbit like gravity itself had shifted, like the entire world had narrowed down to just him and me and this moment.
And I let him. Because this time, I didn't want to stop. Didn't want to fight it. I didn't want to pretend I could resist what my entire being was screaming for—what Sirius demanded and what every cell in my body craved.
I pressed in closer, letting my thigh slide between his just enough to make him gasp, to feel the heat of him against me, to hear the sharp intake of breath that told me he felt it too. My fingers shifted from his chin to his throat, slow and possessive, brushing the soft skin just below his jaw where his pulse hammered wildly, erratically.
I traced the curve of it with the pad of my thumb, watching the way his body arched instinctively toward mine, responding to my touch like he'd been made for it, like we were two pieces finally clicking together.
Still not pulling away. Still not saying no. Still looking at me with those wide, uncertain eyes that held more want than fear.
"I can feel your heart racing," I murmured, voice low, rough with want. "Seems like you're burning under me, little wolf."
He made a soft sound—half plea, half disbelief—and it only made me hungrier. Made me want to hear every sound I could draw from those lips.
I moved my hand up to his waist again, then higher, splaying my fingers across his ribs, feeling the rapid rise and fall of his breathing. His body was so warm, so responsive, like it had been waiting for this. Waiting for me to finally stop fighting and give in. For me.
My lips hovered over his, close enough that I could taste the tension in the air, the pulse pounding between us like a living thing. But I didn't kiss him. Not yet. Not when I could draw this out, make him want it as desperately as I did. No, I wanted him desperate first. Wanted him trembling with need.
"You know," I said slowly, savoring the look in his eyes, the way they darkened with desire, "if you keep using those pheromones on me like this… something might happen. Something neither of us can take back."
His breath hitched, chest heaving, but he didn't speak. He couldn't. The words seemed stuck in his throat.
I could see it—feel it—in his entire body. He was overwhelmed, drowning in whatever this was between us right now, lost in the heat and want that crackled like lightning about to strike.
His pupils were blown wide, swallowing the blue of his eyes until they were almost black, lips trembling with the words he wasn't brave enough to say, with the confession I could taste in the air between us.
Yet. But soon. So soon. I leaned in, lowering my mouth to his neck, and breathed him in, letting his scent fill my lungs completely, letting it sink into my very bones.
The scent was even stronger here. Just beneath his ear, where the skin was soft and thin and vulnerable, and his pulse fluttered like a trapped bird trying to escape. Sirius howled in the back of my mind, clawing at my control, demanding I claim him, mark him, make him ours forever.
I didn't bite. Instead, I let my tongue graze his skin—slow and deliberate, tasting salt and want.
His entire body shivered against mine, a full-body tremor that I felt everywhere we touched. The sound he made—Goddess, the sound he made—was the most sinful thing I'd ever heard. A choked gasp that shot straight through my core and settled low in my gut, stoking the fire higher.
He felt me then, with all the length of me. Pressed against his hip. Hard, and wanting almost aching with need.
My restraint was fraying. Badly. The thin thread of control I'd been clinging to threatening to snap completely.
"You feel that?" I whispered against his skin, my voice rough, barely recognizable. "That's what you do to me. That's how much I want you."
His hands gripped the front of my shirt like he didn't know whether to push me away or pull me closer, fingers twisting in the fabric. His lips were inches from my neck, parted in anticipation, his warm breath ghosting across my skin.
My mouth moved along his jaw, slow, reverent, possessive. I could already taste him—salt and want and something uniquely Atlas that made my blood boil, made me want to devour him whole.
And then—his voice. So soft I almost didn't hear it over the pounding of my own heart. "Why…" he whispered, the word barely more than a breath, "Why are you doing this to me?"
I pulled back just enough to meet his gaze, one hand still on his ribs, the other lifting to cup his jaw again, tilting his face up to mine. His eyes were searching mine—confused, trembling, needing an answer I wasn't sure I could put into words.
"You already know why," I said quietly, the truth heavy between us. He swallowed hard, his throat working.
"You feel it too," I murmured, letting my thumb trace his bottom lip, feeling the soft warmth there, the way it trembled under my touch. "The way your body reacts. The way your wolf stirs when I'm close. The pull between us that neither of us can deny anymore. You're not denying it anymore."
I let my lips brush his—barely. Just enough to make him inhale sharply, to feel the tremor that ran through him like electricity, to taste the want on his breath.
"If you want me," I breathed against his mouth, each word deliberate, "if you want to be mine… all you have to do is say it."
He blinked up at me, wide-eyed, lips parted, breath coming in shallow gasps. The moment was so fragile I could've shattered it with a whisper, so charged with tension it felt like the air itself might ignite.
He was going to say it. I felt it in every fiber of my being. The word hovered on his lips, trembling at the edge of his breath. One second more and he'd say yes, would give himself to me completely—
Then pain exploded in my back. A violent force slammed into me, knocking the breath from my lungs and hurling me forward with brutal strength.
I stumbled, catching myself just before I crushed Atlas beneath me, my hands slamming into the tree on either side of his head.
Snarling, I spun around, my body shifting on instinct, claws sliding free as fury took over, as the haze of desire transformed into rage. Who the hell dared interrupt me?