Page 32 of Match Made In Growl

Her thumb traced along his jaw, and Criss held very still because the adrenaline in his own blood was screaming and his tiger was right there, so close to the surface he felt it in his teeth, and the woman underneath him was looking at him like he was the only solid thing left in a world that had just tried to swallow her whole.

"Steph," he said, his voice low, almost hoarse with need.

TThat was all it took before she pulled him down to her.

19

STEPHANIE

She pulled him down and the world narrowed to his mouth on hers.

It wasn't like the first time. The first time had been whiskey and firelight and the slow, deliberate decision to let herself want something reckless. This was different. This was the ground still settling beneath them and dust in her lungs and the taste of adrenaline so sharp on her tongue. She was alive. She was alive and he was here, all of him, bare skin and muscle and the heat of his body pressing her into the earth behind the oak roots where he'd shielded her from tons of falling stone, and she needed him with a primal ferocity that was a screaming demand of a person who had just been told it was about to die.

His mouth was hard on hers, urgent, tasting like dust and sweat and the wild edge of the shift. She could feel the difference in him, the animal still so close to the surface that his muscles moved with a fluidity that wasn't entirely human, and when she bit his lower lip he growled against her mouth, a sound that started in his chest and vibrated through hers.

"Here?" he managed, pulling back just far enough that his breath hit her wet lips in a hot rush. His amber eyes were nearly black, pupils blown wide, and the cords of his neck stood out with the effort of holding himself in check. "Steph, we're in the middle of..."

"Here." She fisted her hand in his hair and pulled. "Right now."

Whatever restraint he'd been holding shattered. His hands found the hem of her thermal and shoved it up, palms rough and calloused against her ribs, her stomach, the underside of her bra. She arched into his touch and yanked the shirt over her own head because his hands were too busy mapping skin to bother, and the cool night air hit her sweat-damp body at the same time his mouth found her throat and the contrast made her gasp.

He was everywhere. Hands dragging down her sides, thumbs hooking into the waistband of her jeans, teeth scraping the curve of her shoulder. She could feel how hard he was against her thigh, the full heavy length of him pressing into her through the denim she was still wearing, and the friction made her hips roll up into his on instinct. He made a sound against her neck that was barely human, half groan and half snarl, and his hand dropped between them to work the button of her jeans with fingers that weren't entirely steady.

She lifted her hips to help him drag the denim down. The ground was cold against her bare skin and she didn't care. The oak roots dug into her shoulder blade and she didn't care about that either. All she cared about was the weight of him settling back over her, the heat of his skin on hers as his thigh pressed between her legs making her vision blur.

She reached down and wrapped her hand around him and he jerked, his whole body tensing, a sharp exhale punched out of his lungs. He was thick and hot in her grip and when she stroked him, slow and firm from base to tip, his forehead dropped to her shoulder and his breath came in ragged bursts against her collarbone.

"Fuck," he whispered. "Steph..."

"I need you." She tightened her grip and stroked again, felt him pulse in her hand. "I need to feel you."

He caught her wrist and pinned it above her head, fingers locking around her like a cuff. His other hand slid down her body, over her breast where his thumb caught her nipple through the thin fabric of her bra and rolled, then lower, across her stomach, between her thighs where she was already wet and aching.

His fingers found her and her back arched off the ground. Two fingers, sliding through the slick heat of her, circling the spot that made her legs fall open and her hand grip the oak root above her head hard enough that bark bit into her palm. He watched her face while he touched her, those dark amber eyes cataloguing every reaction, every catch of breath, every shift of her hips. He was learning her again, the way he had the first time, but there was nothing patient about it now. This was focused and relentless, his fingers working her with a precision that built the pressure fast and steep.

"Don't hold back," she told him, and her voice came out wrecked. "Not tonight."

His mouth was on her breast suddenly, pulling the bra cup aside with his teeth to get to bare skin, and the hot wet suction of his tongue on her nipple sent a current straight to where his fingers were still moving and she cried out, loud enough that it echoed off the ruined ridge face.

He added a third finger and curled them and she shattered. The orgasm tore through her, sudden and violent, her body clenching around his hand as her hips bucked off the ground. She bit down on her own forearm to muffle the sound and tasted dust and sweat and didn't care because wave after wave was rolling through her, pulling her under, and he didn't stop, just slowed his pace and worked her through the aftershocks until she was gasping, boneless and tugging at his shoulders.

He pulled his hand free and braced both arms on either side of her head, and the muscles of his forearms stood out like ropes in the moonlight as he positioned himself at her entrance. She could feel him there, blunt and thick and burning hot, and the anticipation alone made her clench around nothing.

He pushed into her in one long, steady stroke and the sound that came out of her was something she'd never heard herself make. Not a moan. Deeper than that. A full-body gasp of being filled completely, stretched around the hard length of him until there was no space between them, his hips flush against hers and his breath shuddering out of him like he'd been punched.

He held still. She could see the restraint in his jaw, in the locked line of his arms, in the slight tremor that ran through his whole body as he gave her time to adjust. But she didn't want time. She wanted the opposite of time. She wanted to burn through this moment so fast and so hard that there was nothing left but the two of them and the raw, screaming truth that she was alive and he was inside her and the world could collapse again and she wouldn't move.

She wrapped her legs around his waist and dug her heels into the small of his back and pulled him deeper.

He moved.

The first thrust was controlled, testing, his hips pulling back slow and driving forward with enough force that she slid against the ground. The second was harder. By the third, control was a memory and they were both gone, his hips snapping into hers with a rhythm that was brutal and perfect and exactly what she needed. The sound of skin against skin filled the basin, punctuated by her gasps and his low, rough groans and the wet, obscene noise of their bodies meeting over and over.

She raked her nails down his back and felt the muscles jump under her fingers. He dropped his head and bit the junction of her neck and shoulder, not gently, teeth sinking in hard enough that the sharp bloom of pain mixed with the pleasure building between her legs and turned into something she couldn't separate. She arched into the bite, one hand gripping his shoulders, the other braced against the oak root above her to keep from sliding.

"Harder," she heard herself say, and she barely recognized her own voice.

He hooked his arm under her knee and pushed it up, changing the angle, and the next thrust hit something so deep inside her that her vision whited out. She screamed. Actual screaming, into the night air with dust on her skin and his body driving into hers and the ruined dig site spread around them like a battlefield. He didn't slow down. He held the angle and fucked her with a focused intensity that stripped everything away, all the arguments and the avoidance and the week of pretending they hadn't left something unfinished.