Yes.
I nodded, and he let out a rush of air, sinking down once more to press his chest against mine.
“Your inner beast wants to be claimed.”
I gulped at his statement, and that sense of rightness flooded through me, sending another rush of arousal through my entire body.
Inner beast.
Claim.
Surely, I dreamed … so why the hell not?
I turned my head once more, holding his steady gaze. “Yes.”
He buried his dark head in my neck, a trembling shaking him atop me. He licked my skin. “Mine.” Teeth scraped—and sank into my flesh.
My body bucked beneath him as pain and euphoria crashed against my mind, my cells, igniting fire to race through my bloodstream. The sting of his bite lasted but a heartbeat, the pull his eyes had held on my soul nothing compared to the energy radiating between us, connecting us.
Mate.
Mine.
I cried out the words whispering in my head, his answering growl pebbling my skin. My legs wrapped around his thighs, holding him close, my body weeping for him. To be claimed in all ways—but he released his hold on my neck and lifted to plank once more, dark eyes shining down at me.
“My truck is just a mile or so away—can you walk?”
I took stock of my shaking limbs clinging to him and nodded. “I-I think so, yes.”
“I’m taking you home,” he said, sitting back on his haunches—and I realized I could still see him clearly at the distance my lack of glasses wouldn’t usually allow. Wide and muscular. Thick pecs and abs for days—and a swollen cock rising past his belly button.
I wet my lower lip, tearing my focus off his perfection. Blinking, I pushed up onto my elbows, glancing around the woods. “Good Lord,” I whispered, blinking again. “I-I can see!”
“What?”
I jerked my focus back to his face, his scowl, and laughed while checking my face just to be sure. “I can see—without my glasses!”
His gaze slid down over my torso, the torn shirt revealing more than covering clean, healed skin.
The stinging between my thighs had disappeared, and I squeezed my inner walls, testing.
No pain.
“Your bite healed me...” An unexpected sob ripped from my lips, and I clamped a hand over my mouth.
He pulled me up into his arms as though I weighed no more than a hay bale, and pressed my face against his hard, warm chest. I clung to the man, my Pisoiaș, who had saved me.
His nakedness drew my focus again as we gathered up what few things my attackers hadn’t taken with them. I tied my other sneaker back onto my foot and managed to zip up what remained of my shorts I’d found lying nearby. My t-shirt had been ripped beyond repair, but I tied the shredded pieces together to at least cover my exposed nipple. My too-large girls hung out, unsupported by the bra that had also been torn from my body, but for the first time in my life, I didn’t feel embarrassed by my size.
He stood before me without a stitch of clothing on his body, seemingly at ease, without an ounce of self-consciousness, and I knew in that second—without a shadow of doubt—that the paranormal wasn’t myth. Wasn’t fable.
My Pisoiaș was a leopard shifter—a black as night cat beast resided inside him.
Yes.
He quirked an eyebrow at the hissed word whispering in my ear. “You hear her?”
I was his mate—marked by his teeth—which also meant that I, too, carried an inner beast within my body. I nodded.
“Have you ever shifted?”
I shook my head, still unable to vocalize a single word.
“You know what we are.” He didn’t ask a question, but I forced my lips to respond.
“Yes.”
A slow smile lightened his scowl, awakening the desire to be fully claimed. He entwined his fingers through mine, drawing me closer, and I held my breath, blinking up at him.
Well over six feet, he towered over my five-foot-ten inches, and the breadth of his chest, the width of his shoulders made me feel small in comparison. Feminine to his raging masculinity. Fragile to his strength.
No man had ever made me feel that way. Some had claimed to love my too-many curves, my large breasts and thick thighs, but him … I wanted to purr against his neck, snuggle against his hardness, cradle his body with my own—
His smile widened, and I squeezed my thighs together against the need to drop to the ground and beg for it.
“Soon, iubita, but not until you’re fully healed and ready for me,” he told me.
I opened my mouth to state he’d healed me completely—that I was ready to spread my legs right there on the forest floor and consummate us, but he turned away. I stepped after him, my fingers holding tightly to his as he led me away from the gurgling creek toward the setting sun.
“How did you arrive here?” he asked, holding back a bramble for me to pass.
“Car. I parked at the camping area south of here.”
“My truck is less than a mile ahead of us—I’ll drive you down to pick it up.”
I held tighter to his hand, the thought of being separated from him sending a rush of adrenaline through me—the kind of fear that threatened to choke off my air. I would be lost without him. Alone. Floundering through life as I’d done for twenty-seven years.
As though he sensed my anxiety, he stopped and turned me toward him, his eyes flickering over my face. Reading. Assessing. Learning.
“You wish to stay with me.”
I nodded even though he hadn’t asked a question.
“I’ll send my brothers for your car—I’ll take you to the cabin in my truck.”
Brothers. Truck. Cabin.
I knew nothing about this man—not even his name—and yet I’d never felt more secure.
“Is Pisoiaș your name?” I asked.
His brow furrowed once more. “No.” His gruff reply hinted I’d touched upon a sore spot. “It means little male cub in Romanian, or something close to it, I think,” he continued, glancing over at me. “It’s what my mom called me—what you heard her
