If it wasn’t for Marlowe’s intervention, I know that Kaleb would have made love to me right now with a reckless abandon without care for anything else.
But he does.
Marlowe’s arm pulls Kaleb up enough to separate his face from mine. Kaleb’s eyes are glowing too, and with such a fervent yellow that they seem to radiate their own light.
“Easy there,” Marlowe says as he keeps hold of Kaleb’s shoulder and pats him on the back. Kaleb leans up, leaving his body sitting against my hips with one of his legs straddling me on either side. I can still feel his body quaking in small tremors that run down into his thighs. He takes a few deep breaths as he tries to calm his heaving chest. When he seems to be a bit more in control, Marlowe finally lets go of his shoulder.
“As much as I want to hate you,” I say, my breaths coming shallow and quick as I reach up to rest one hand on Marlowe’s chest, “You should know I love you too.”
He grins down at me. “I know, don’t worry. I’ve known for a long time.”
Kaleb reaches down to pull me up so that I am sitting against him and kisses me softly on the top of my nose, his burning yellow eyes still staring into mine.
“That was fun,” he says, smiling.
I lean forward to kiss him, but he presses his lips to the side of my face to whisper in my ear instead.
“You know,” he says, his hot breath making my skin alight, “one of these days … very soon, I’m going to actually make love to you. I’m going to push us so far that the both of us lose control.”
I feel my heart leap in my chest, and I’m too lost to speak.
Kaleb chuckles. “I felt that,” he says.
“What?” I ask.
“I felt your heart skip.”
Kaleb stands up and the separation of our bodies feels like absolute torture as I stay sitting on the ground. Marlowe shifts to sit beside me, his heat replacing Kaleb’s.
“How do you manage to keep up with all of us?” Marlowe teases as he laces his fingers between mine and gently kisses the side of my neck, sending more tingles down my spine.
I lean into him and turn my head so that his kisses fall against my mouth now instead of my neck. His tongue against mine feels smooth and warm and I can’t stop myself from urging my body closer to his lap. Once I am sitting straddled over him, he wraps his arms behind my back and pulls me into his chest. I feel him start to rise beneath me as I rock my hips and feel the sense of relentless pleasure claw at me again.
“You know,” I whisper between our mouths. “Once one of you turns me into a wolf-shifter too, we can all truly be together. Not just like this, but in every way.”
And just like that, the last of the spell is broken.
Marlowe pulls his head back just enough to look me squarely in the eyes.
“Sabrina,” his voice is soft and gentle. “You know we can’t turn you.”
A sudden rush of fear, anger, and embarrassment sweeps over me. I climb off his lap and sit in front of him, my muscles tense and my spine stiff. Kaleb and Rory sit down on either side of me at once, all the playfulness gone from their posture.
This is the wedge between us, the ever-present shadow. I should just shove these dark thoughts, these concerns, into the background and ignore them. But I can’t do that.
“You promised,” I say, struggling to keep my voice from sounding like a whine. “How can we all be together if I stay a frail and mortal human that’s going to age and get sick and die, while you guys outlive me by lifetimes? You need to turn me.”
My eyes plead with each one of them in turn, and although the boys look like they desperately want to lie and tell me something’s changed since the last time I asked, none of them do.
“It’s just not something we can do,” Rory says, as the other two boys eagerly let him be the one to deliver the blow. “You know that.”
And that’s when I start to feel myself falling again, into an encompassing black pit that gnaws at my heart. No matter how many times they tell me this, I refuse to believe it.
I have to convince them to turn me. It’s the only option.
I won’t give up until they do. I can’t.
They came into my life and changed everything. I can’t imagine a life without them anymore.