“So get one,” I replied, purring out the words. “Make me respond to you.”
I was already, as Haze’s groans made clear. My body felt like it wanted to hold onto Haze and take Ryan in, all at the same time, making me think of Haze’s complaint, but I had to work with what I had.
Ryan’s eyes shifted from blue to silver in a second then, his smile widening just slightly. He drew closer, fitting his hand to the mark he’d left on my butt, then glancing down at it in satisfaction.
“You want that?” he asked me, but it wasn’t really a question. He just wanted to hear the words, because feeling them was a lonely thing, but sharing them out loud? Those words bound us together just as much as my stinging bites and the feel of them in my body. I held his eyes as I twisted as far as I could go to stare at him.
“I want you, Ryan,” I said. “You’re my mate, aren’t you?”
It was supposed to be a rhetorical question, but there was some doubt there. Haze and Colt, they wore their hearts on their sleeves to different degrees, but Ryan? Whatever worries I’d subconsciously been holding onto, they were quickly dissipated. He crawled over, staring into my eyes, reaching over to stroke my face before his mouth came crashing down.
This was a harsh messy kiss, something I hadn’t expected from him, which just made me cling harder to him, wanting to see what else would come out. Fen’s hand slid between Haze and me, sending extra trills of pleasure through me as his brother claimed my mouth. Then Ryan quickly shoved my head sideways, doing just as Haze had. Licking and sucking my bite marks with a rough urgency, one that brought everything that was going on to a roaring conclusion.
“Riley…Riley…!” Haze panted out my name, his fingers clawing at me as I clamped down tight around him, squeezing out everything he had to give before he was forced free. “Fuck!” he yelped, letting out a feral growl.
“Now you know how that feels,” Colt pointed out mildly. “You started rushing shit.”
“I just want back inside her,” Haze said, his fingers going to claws. “I need to.”
“Calm down!” Fen’s bark was a sharp slap, one that seemed to bring Haze back online and let his beast subside. “You will. She’s your mate. You can feel that now, can’t you?” He waited for Haze to finally nod. “Well, let us do the same.”
Ryan picked me up then, holding me in his arms, like he had to protect me from his brother, but Haze reluctantly nodded, getting off the bed.
“I need a shower,” he said with a tone of resignation.
“Haze—” I began to say.
“Let him go,” Fen said. “He’s just raw. We all are. When you left—”
“Don’t, brother,” Ryan said, his grip on me tightening, as if that would be enough to protect me.
“No,” I said, unfolding within Ryan’s embrace, but not going far. “Tell me.”
“It felt like someone had ripped our hearts out and drop kicked them over the fence.” My focus was jerked around to see Blake sitting there against the wall. The lines were there again in his face, even as he smiled gently at me. “I’ve taken direct kicks to the nuts during footy that didn’t hurt as much as that. Nothing does. You walked out. You left us.”
“Because of Mum,” Ryan rumbled.
“Janine told you what to do?” Colt asked. “Or you just spontaneously felt like now was the time to kick Mum’s arse?”
“She told me, everything.” I went limp then, Ryan pulling me closer. “I’m sorry—”
“No,” Fen said with a definite shake of his head. “Nah, we’re not doing that.” He glanced at his brothers in confirmation. “That’s what this is—moving on from all the bullshit of the past. Our mate wears some of our marks. She won’t be leaving this room until she wears all of them.” Then his focus switched to me. “And if you give her that, you give her your protection, your love, and your future. The past can go fuck itself.”
I snorted at that, then when I recovered, I turned to Ryan with a question in my eyes.
“You want to commit to a bright and glorious future with me?” I asked.
“Fuck, Riley,” he responded, much more seriously now. “I can’t think of anything I want more.”
For a second, he just held me close, and I found myself letting out a breath as a result, sinking into this moment of quiet, just feeling him. It was all so shiny and new, decadent almost, that I could do this, spend this time with him, and so many moments like this if I chose. I chose. I felt him stiffen as my arms went around him, my face nestling into his neck, breathing his woody scent in, just being with Ryan.
“Riley girl…”
I felt that rumble inside his chest, heard my name like a summons, then in the silence, I realised exactly how this needed to go.
With the others, it’d been this tender moment during sex, but Ryan and me, we were still working out the details of our relationship to allow for that kind of thing to happen. Still, I wanted it, wanted him, wanted his mark on my skin, claiming him as mine. I also wanted to get a reaction from him in return. I grabbed his shoulder and his head in my hands and held him down in the split second it took for me to strike like a viper. I heard his shout as I sank my fangs into his flesh, sucking hard to make sure it took and then pulling free, smiling through a mask of blood.
“Looks like I’ve gotta get a reaction too,” I said, before throwing myself off his lap.