Thalia straddles me in the dark, and the first thing I register is weight.
Physical weight—the press of her thighs bracketing my hips, her palms flat on my chest, her body settling against mine with the deliberate intention of a woman who's decided to take what she wants.
"We don't have to rush," I tell her. "We have all night."
"I'm just deciding where to start," she shifts forward, her center pressing against me through thin fabric, and my hips jerk involuntarily. "There. That's what I needed to know."
"What?"
"That your body still wants mine." She pulls her shirt over her head and the moonlight catches the bruises across her ribs, the cuts from combat.
"I feel everything," I sit up, pulling her against me, pressing my mouth to her throat where her pulse hammers.
"I feel your heartbeat on my lips. I feel the goosebumps under my thumbs. I feel you getting wet against my stomach and it's making me lose my mind."
She exhales something half moan and half relief, fingers sinking into my hair, pulling my head back to kiss me.
The kiss starts tentative—testing whether this works without the supernatural current. I answer by opening my mouth against hers, tongue finding hers with a slowness that makes her groan.
"Off," she murmurs, tugging my waistband. "I need to feel you."
We strip each other with clumsy urgency. She pushes me onto my back, rises over me, takes me in her hand. The contact sends a shudder through my body.
"You're shaking," she says.
"It's been weeks. And your hand feels incredible."
"Just my hand?" She positions herself and sinks down in one slow, devastating motion—tight, wet heat enveloping me while her face goes slack. "Oh. Oh God, Kieran."
"Tell me what it feels like. Without the bond, I can't read you."
"Full. Stretched. Like my body remembers the exact shape of you and is relieved to have you back."
She braces on my chest and begins rolling her hips in slow circles. "Right there. When I move like this, you're hitting something that makes my whole body flush."
I watch the heat climb from her chest to her throat, skin pinking in the moonlight. I have to hunt for her pleasure—in the way her thighs tighten, her breathing hitches on every downstroke, her stomach muscles clench when the angle works.
"Lean back. Brace your hands on my thighs."
She does, shifting the angle dramatically, and the sound she makes when I thrust upward is worth every week I spent believing this was gone.
Head fallen back, throat exposed, body arched, war-marked and scarred and beautiful.
"Harder. I need to feel it, Kieran."
I grip her hips and drive up with the force she's asking for. The sound from her throat is raw, broken, real.
No supernatural enhancement—just the wet rhythm of our bodies meeting and separating, the headboard tapping the wall.
"Come here," I pull her down chest to chest, rolling us so she's beneath me. Her legs wrap around my waist immediately, heels pressing into my lower back.
"Better," she gasps. "I can feel all of you like this—your weight, your chest against mine, the way your ribs expand when you breathe."
"Too heavy?"
"Perfect. The kind of heavy that makes me feel held instead of crushed."
"Your face," she whispers, tracing my jaw. "I can see everything now. Before, your eyes would go gold and I'd lose you to the instinct. Right now you're just here, watching me."
"I see you." Forehead to hers, breath mixing, hips never stopping. "I see the way your eyes change when I'm deep enough. The crease between your eyebrows when you're holding back."
"The crease is because you keep hitting that spot and I'm trying to make this last."
"Stop trying," I increase the pace, shifting to the angle that furrows her brow. "Let go. I'll catch you."
"I want us to come together, through our bodies choosing the same moment."
"Then tell me when you're there."
"I'm almost—God, right there, don't change anything—"
I slide my hand between us, thumb finding her clit, and the noise she makes is guttural, stripped of pretense. Her body clenches in rhythmic pulses signaling the edge, and I match her stroke for stroke.
"Now!" Nails raking my back. "Kieran—now—"
She shatters beneath me. Waves tighten around me with a force that drags me over—my cum tearing through, raw and honest, every pulse felt through human nerves that process pleasure without amplification but with an honesty the bond never quite achieved.
I collapse against her, face in the curve of her neck, both breathing like we've sprinted uphill. Her hands stroke where her nails left welts, gentle now, soothing the marks.
"We're okay," she breathes. "More than okay."
"There was terror. Weeks of lying beside you afraid to reach over because I thought it would feel empty without the bond guiding my hands."
"Your hands found me just fine tonight," she kisses the corner of my mouth. "Better than fine."
I roll to the side, pulling her against me—her back to my chest, her body fitting the way it always has. Spine against stomach, feet tucked between calves, breathing synchronizing.
There's grief woven through the gentleness. The feral edge is gone—the claiming, the primal ferocity that left us bruised and wrung out by something bigger than ourselves.
I mourn it quietly, in spaces between breaths, without letting loss overshadow what remains.
What remains is enough. A woman whose heartbeat pulses against my forearm, whose body just proved that want doesn't require supernatural permission.
"That was different than before," she murmurs. "More honest. Like the bond was a beautiful translator that sometimes got the nuance wrong, and now we're speaking directly."
"I like that."
"We should do it again," she settles deeper. " Frequently. Well, for research purposes, you know."
"Rigorous scientific inquiry. Hmmm, I support that."
She traces the scar on my chest—the blade's permanent topography. I cover her hand with mine and let the quiet hold us for a while, her breathing slowing toward sleep while my mind drifts toward what's been pressing at my thoughts for days.
"Thalia…"
"Mmm," half asleep, exhaustion claiming what adrenaline held at bay.
"I've been thinking about the vampires. How traditional wolf responses won't work against something this old and patient."
She stirs against me. "You have an idea?"
"I guess so. Formal communication to the vampire council—using the skills I still have. The things that don't require a wolf."
Her fingers tighten on my scar. Not rejection—interest. The sharp attention of a Luna whose mind never fully powers down, even with my taste still on her lips.
"Tell me everything," she says, turning in my arms to face me.