He smiled a little, and started stripping. Pauline watched it like it was her own personal show, delighting in each new reveal of warm brown skin, tracing the places where his curly dark hair grew, sitting forward hungrily as he unbuttoned his jeans.
When he was naked, she hardly knew where to start. He lay back on the bed, putting his hands behind his head, watching her with that same small, happy smile. Pauline felt like she could bask in that warm look as if it
was sunlight.
She leaned forward and put her hands on his chest, tracing over his massive pectorals, brushing her thumbs over his nipples and listening to his sharp inhale. Down to his abs, then, marveling at the definition. Shifters were all strong, all fit, but it still took work to look like this. “Spend a lot of time in the gym?” she asked.
“My outlet,” he confessed. “I could hardly ever get away to shift and run, but my building had a gym, so I put in some time every day. It kept my tiger from going absolutely crazy.”
Pauline would have to remember to thank his tiger.
Struck by an earthy impulse, she bent down to taste the muscled expanse. He tasted warm with a hint of salt-sweat, and she could smell his arousal. He made a low noise, and the muscles low in her own abdomen clenched in response.
Slowly, she moved south. He was fully hard now, and just as big as the rest of him would suggest. He smelled earthy, musky, and her mouth watered.
Pauline had never felt much of an urge to do this. She knew that other women actively liked it, but she’d never been one. She’d done it occasionally as a favor to Gary, but this was the first time she’d wanted to so badly.
She tasted him, and it was like the taste had a hardwired connection to her clit. The salt-musk of it thrilled her, and she found herself just exploring, enjoying the taste and feel of him in her mouth. Above her, Carlos made a low, desperate noise, and she found she liked that, too—the proof that he was so affected by her.
Soon enough, though, she had some sympathy for him and got down to business, taking as much of him into her mouth as she could, wrapping her hand around the base of his cock, and licking and sucking with purpose. It wasn’t anything like the mechanical act she’d performed before, though—it was like his sex was her entire world, all she could feel and smell and taste. Everything else retreated into insignificance. Her senses were overwhelmed by him, her mouth was full, his groans echoed in her ears and sent vibrations through both of them, and everything was slick and hot and sexy.
“Enough,” he finally ground out, reaching down and catching her by the shoulder.
Pauline pulled back reluctantly. “Weren’t you enjoying it?” she said. It was a tease—she knew he’d been enjoying himself, and had the hint of salty pre-come still in her mouth to prove it. She’d never seen the point of teasing before.
But now, he mock-growled and pulled her down, and she tumbled onto the bed next to him, laughing. “You know I was,” he said into her ear. “So much that I didn’t want to end things too soon.”
“What did you want instead?” she asked, her eyes wide. Playing the ingenue.
Another mock-growl—goodness, that sent a thrilling ripple through her lower abdomen—and he rolled them so he was on top of her, looking down at her, settling between her legs. His eyes softened as she met his gaze, though, and he leaned down and kissed her tenderly.
Then not so tenderly. They tasted like each other, Pauline thought, and she tilted her hips up, asking without words.
He reached down to feel her, and his fingers slipped in her wetness. She scrabbled at his shoulders. “Come on,” she moaned.
He slid his cock inside her in a long, slow glide that stroked pleasure right into her, made her arch her back and gasp in a long, long breath. “Oh, God,” she murmured.
He made a low noise of agreement and started to move. The world fell away—it was just the two of them, just the feeling of him moving in and out of her, the clench of her inner muscles around his thick cock, the way he stroked the hair off her face and leaned down to kiss her some more.
Pauline had never felt this close to another person. She’d never known sex could be like this—something beautiful and close, as well as hot and physical. Something...almost sacred.
Carlos caressed her side with one hand, slipping it down between them to brush over her belly and slide between her legs. He caught her clit between two fingers, and Pauline moaned in startled pleasure. It was like he’d caught the building pleasure and sharpened it into something imminent. She got a hand behind his head, fingers in his hair, and pulled him down for a fierce kiss as he thrust in and pressed down simultaneously—and she came.
It felt like it went on forever. He kept moving inside her as she spasmed, prolonging the waves of pleasure until she wasn’t sure if it would ever end. She moaned and panted and clenched her fingers on his shoulders, and it just kept on going.
Finally, finally, the tight spasms started to lessen, fade away. She was left with a warm golden sense of well-being, like her whole body was suffused with sunlight. She gentled the kiss, tasting her mate, and sighed into his mouth.
Carlos seemed to relax, too. Had he been waiting for her to be done? He must have been, because the moment his grip eased, he was groaning deep in his chest as he gave himself up to his own climax. Pauline held him close as he shook through it, wondering if anyone had ever even discovered this kind of pleasure before.
Afterwards, they lay together. Pauline took the opportunity to run her hands over him, marveling that this was her mate. These shoulders, they were hers. This collarbone—hers. The curve of his hip, the long line of his thigh. All hers.
“What are you thinking?” he murmured as she touched him.
She blushed. “It’s—possessive. Not very flattering.”
“Say it,” he said into her ear.
“You’re mine.” There was a fierceness to her voice that she wasn’t used to hearing in herself.