Impulse

She twisted against his grip and pressed her lips to his jaw. “How much? Tell me.”

He buried his nose in the hollow of her throat and inhaled deeply. “I didn’t even want them breathing in your perfume. You belong to me.”

Oh, that touched off a shiver—one of fear as much as longing. Those were words she’d heard before. Words that she’d craved, words that had turned claustrophobic and cruel.

She rubbed her back against his chest and closed her eyes. “I’m your girl.”

“No,” he whispered, his muscles tense. “Because it’s not okay. It’s too much, too far.”

“It’s us.” Reaching back, she gripped his hip, dug her nails into his skin and tried to pull him deeper. “It doesn’t have to be okay to be true.”

“Yes, it does.” He didn’t move. “I won’t be that asshole, Sera. I’m enough of one already without adding ‘stupidly possessive bastard’ to the list.”

Frustration raked her, and she snarled and dropped her hand to claw at the grass. He was right, and there should have been relief in it. To know that Julio wouldn’t trap her, wouldn’t crush her.

Human relief, maybe, but this wasn’t a night for human things. She twisted to bite his jaw.

“Mine. Tonight, you’re all mine.”

He pulled her hair again. “I’m what?”

“Mine.” She panted the word as she squirmed, needing him deeper as much as she needed to be claimed. He was hot and hard, but he was still holding back.

He drove forward, pushing into her with a grunt as his teeth closed on her neck. The force pushed her back to her elbows, body bent low to the ground with his chest burning possession against her back as he covered her.

Over her and surrounding her. Inside her. Everything about his touch was proprietary and possessive, and she found she didn’t need the words when his body spoke a language her coyote understood.

Except he wasn’t fucking her. Just pinning her to the earth, every nerve aflame, her entire being focused on how good it would be when he moved…

She whimpered and arched her back. “Julio. For the love of—are you waiting for me to spontaneously combust?”

He flexed his hips against hers. “Shh. Can you feel it?”

“What, your dick?” She rasped out a laugh and clenched around him. Maybe words would get him moving. “Your perfect fucking cock, which feels really good and will feel better when you’re riding the hell out of me?”

“Dirty bitch.” His own laugh tickled her ears as he slipped one hand down and stroked her clit. “Not my cock. Us. When we’re close like this.”

Her hips jerked, a helpless reaction beyond her control, and her knees slipped on the ground as she spread them wider, anything to grind down against his fingers. Release was seconds from claiming her, and nothing would stop it.

But his question hung between them, and she answered with the last bit of air in her lungs, the words escaping as she tipped backwards off the cliff toward glorious free fall. “Always feel it, ’cause I’m yours.”

He answered with a pleased growl, then pulled back and began to thrust, starting with one firm snap that brought bliss in a drowning wave. Only the first, because he kept going, hard and fast, power and lust tangled up together, and the combination undid her.

It wasn’t choreographed and elegant. It was dirty and crude, her eyes squeezed shut against pounding pleasure and her ears filled with her hoarse cries and his grunts and the slick, wet sound of him sliding home, and the damn orgasm had bled into a second without respite because he kept rubbing his fingers over her clit like he was going for a world record.

His teeth grazed her earlobe. “One more, baby. Just one—” A lie, because nothing was just about another orgasm, not with her whole body shaking. Not when she was coming so hard you couldn’t count, couldn’t distinguish. She gasped for breath in the valleys and moaned through the peaks, moaned and begged until Julio dropped his forehead to the back of her shoulder and came with a rough groan.

She wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that, Julio’s body covering hers, her face hidden against her folded arms. The wind played with the leaves on the trees, a quiet rustling underscoring the pounding of his heart against her back.

As her own pulse slowed, a giggle bubbled up. “Dirty bitch, huh? Your sister would wash your mouth out with soap.”

He nipped at her skin. “Are you really talking about my sister right now?”

“That’s what you get when you fuck a girl cross-eyed.” Sera stretched her arms above her head and laughed at the streaks of dirt. “I am dirty. Gonna-need-a-bath dirty.”

“That should get us some fun looks when we meet back up at Syd’s place tonight.”

“Like I’ll be the only one. Shifting gets everyone riled up.”

“Mmm.” Julio pulled away, wrapped his arms around her and rolled to the ground with her on top of him.

It took some maneuvering to turn around without kneeing him in an uncomfortable spot, but in a few moments she draped herself across his chest, her cheek resting over his heart.

With her body exhausted and her head still swimming, talking was easy. “I know you don’t want to own me. And I know you need to.”

“I—” He bit off the words and sighed. “I do. I can’t help that part.”

She traced her fingernail over his skin in a looping circle. “The part that scares me is that I need it too. I’ll never be happy if I don’t have it, but I can’t fake it if I don’t feel it. I tried.”

His voice dropped. “The real question is whether it makes you feel trapped.”

A serious question that deserved a serious answer. “Right now? Naked in the woods? No.

The shapeshifter part of me needs to belong to someone strong.”

“What about all the other times? Every day?”

Panic tried to rise. Her breathing sped, and she concentrated on slow, even exhalations. “It’s not as easy as that. Maybe it’s irrational. Some things I’d like. Some would make me feel smothered.”

His hand smoothed circles over the small of her back. “I guess it’d be easy if you could tell someone, make a list of what was okay and what wasn’t.”

“It’s not fair to be scared of you.” She closed her eyes and whispered her words against warm skin. “You’ve never tried to trap me. You’ve never done anything but try to make me feel strong.”

“Fair’s right up there with easy, sweetheart. Last I heard, life wasn’t either.”

No, it hadn’t been. Not for either of them. She kissed his chest and changed the subject. Not to an easier one, but to something equally important. “Your family’s not going to be excited about you wanting to keep a coyote.”

Julio lifted her gaze to his with one finger under her chin. “The only family I have left that matters won’t give a damn. You know that.”

“Carmen and Miguel?”

“And Veronica, and my Aunt Teresa.” His jaw tightened. “My uncle and father sure the hell don’t count.”

She planted a soothing kiss on his palm. “I wasn’t there at the challenge, you know. Alec fought your uncle, didn’t he?”

“He wouldn’t let me do it,” Julio confirmed. “For Carmen’s sake—just in case the worst happened.”

In case their uncle put power over family and tore his nephew apart on the challenge field, even if it meant the end of his brother’s wolf-born bloodline.

Babies. It always came back to-Oh, damn.

Reaching between them was stupid, but she did it anyway. Brushed her fingers across that tired but still perfect dick and groaned, as if discovering soft skin instead of latex was a surprise.

She rolled off his chest and hit the ground next to him, familiar panic so much stronger this time. Give her another second and she’d be hyperventilating, three generations’ worth of senseless fear rising up to choke the life out of her. “No condom. Fuck. ”

He sat up and held out his hand. “You’re on the pill, right? I saw them in your toiletry bag at the hotel.”