Abyss - Book Five of the Alpha Series - MxM

Chapter 22 (M)

My back arches at the feeling of his mouth on me, teasing my nipple with his teeth under the overheated spray of the shower. Verando lifts me, bringing me up to his height in a way that I find so delicously intoxicating. 

It makes me laugh, breathless. I always discover myself in this predicament, wondering why he chooses the shower to take possession of me. From his perspective, I have to stay in control; I can't lose myself when I'm trying not to freeze or scald us, and control is his guilty pleasure.

I shiver at the feeling, and he kisses back up to my neck, moving me out of the water to press my back against the cool stone. "How's your nose?" I gasp, trying to distract myself as my hands wander over his chest, raking my nails over his pectoral muscle as his teeth catch my ear. 

I don't know what my hesitation is, or why I'm holding back. My body resists, tense, as if this were now foreign to me, as if he were exploring me for the first time. I had already betrayed him by agreeing to marry Fillipa; did I deserve any of this after how I'd spoken to him?

"Surprisingly, I'm not thinking about it right now." Verando's voice is a low rumble, and one of his hands slides down my back to grip my ass, pulling me firmly against his body in a sudden movement that makes me exhale through my teeth in response. 

"Do you have any idea how attractive you are when you handle me like this?" I mutter, making him grin as he sinks his teeth into my neck. I knot my fist in his hair, squeezing my thighs around his waist. 

The constant access to him is not helping with my insatiable appetite for this sinful man. When we first got together, we were both caught up in the novelty, his first time with a man and my first time feeling seen. After losing him and each other, it had been challenging to find our intimacy with the same fire as before.

Lycans were sexual creatures, and I, myself, communicated through physical touch. Being apart from each other's bed had been tough on us both.

Where we made sacrifices in the bedroom, we became friends and partners, so much more than just lovers. With running for our lives, I had grown accustomed to not having enough time; I was used to having mere moments with him before we would need to be off again. Then I had been tortured, and we had to start all over again.

Only for our rekindling to be inhibited by my impending rise to the throne.

My libido had been locked away in its black box, and the key lost, when we spent months passing like ships in the night, my hunger for him tamed by his absence.

 But now, in the holiest of places, the fire has been lit, and the box has been reopened.

My body sings in response to his taste as I kiss him, hearing him wince as I drag him to me, "To broken to service me?" I muse, earning a rumble in his throat as he invades my mouth with his tongue, parting my lips with his own. 

I felt desirable, even bordering on attractive. 

Healing from Corina had been a long and agonizing process, regaining my weight and strength had come with many trials and setbacks that none of us had anticipated—my lack of tolerance for being touched, my disgust at my own, newly mangled form.  But as my free hand traces over the scars that run up across his shoulder and crawl up his neck, it's a gentle reminder that we match. 

"I've taught those men to well, I nearly got my ass kicked." I can hear the grin on his lips, knowing that some part of him had come back to me. "I'd like to remind you that you had quite the outburst earlier." 

"I did." I encourage, panting as he hooks my knee with his arm, and I can't help but chuckle at his desire to contort me into positions my body had never dreamed of going. "What're you going to do about it?"