Chapter Six
He still hadn’t taken his lion form since last night and he refused to. Instead, he prowled on two feet, walking the familiar paths of the ranch compound until his legs ached.
His thoughts were unsettled, out of balance. He saw the logic of Mara’s decision—he wasn’t exactly prime genetic stock—but his heart still couldn’t makes sense of it, and the clashing of emotion and logic refused to give him any peace.
“Michael?” The raspy, feminine voice was nothing more than a whisper on the breeze, but his lion-keen hearing picked it out easily.
Michael paused, waiting for the quiet footsteps to catch up to him. “Ava.”
He didn’t want company, but his little sister was the one person he couldn’t brush off. She’d had all four of the Minor brothers wrapped around her finger from the day she was born.
“I thought I heard you out here.”
Michael glanced around, taking in his surroundings, and realized he’d just passed Ava and Landon’s bungalow. For the third time. “Always the diplomat. Did Landon send you after me?”
“My husband doesn’t
send
me anywhere.” Ava tossed her head, her white blonde hair catching what limited moonlight there was. “I heard you walk past,
again
, and came to walk with my brother. You got a problem with that?” She tipped her chin back aggressively, staring him down even though she had to crane her neck back to do it.
He snorted softly. “Not at all. Let’s walk.”
She fell into step beside him. Michael measured his pace, reining in the ground-eating prowl into something his petite sister could match.
“You wanna talk about it?”
“No.”
“Tough.”
Michael choked out a laugh. Landon had been good for his baby sister. The flashes of spunkiness that had always been part of her personality were now matched by a steady confidence she never used to have. He would have sworn allegiance to the Alpha for no other reason, but the man had turned out to actually be damn good for the pride.
When he wasn’t arranging to have Mara deported.
Michael lurched to a stop as if his feet had taken root. He fixed Ava with an angry glower. “You knew,” he snarled.
“I knew what?”
“You knew Landon was transferring Mara to another pride. He would have discussed it with you. He discusses everything with you.”
Her eyebrows flew up. “Yes, I knew Mara was leaving, but I had no idea you would care.”
Anger bubbled up, but Michael pushed it back down. He couldn’t shift now. If he shifted, he wouldn’t be able to vent his anger. “You knew we were together. It’s not like it was a fucking secret.”
“Yeah, but no one thought you were a good match.”
Michael snarled at her, baring sharp teeth.
“Michael!” Ava cried, shocked.
He hastily reined in his anger. He’d just sniped at
Ava
of all people. He didn’t think he’d ever been angry with her before. Now he could barely see through the rage. “Not a good match,” he forced the words out through a throat that felt bumpy and rough. “Meaning I’m not good enough for her.”
“Meaning you’re a flirt and she’s desperate for kids. Everyone thought you just wanted to get laid, but the entire pride knows that isn’t all Mara wants.”
“That isn’t all I want either,” he growled. “Just because I’m young and emotional, I can’t want kids? I can’t want a family?” A bitter laugh ripped out of his throat. “Oh, that’s right. I
can’t
want children. I can’t be allowed to pass on an unstable gene. I’m a threat to our entire species. I could expose us to the entire world. God forbid I be allowed to
breed
.”
“Michael. That isn’t how it is anymore and you know it. The Alpha doesn’t control who is and isn’t allowed to breed anymore. Landon picked me as a mate, didn’t he?”
She was right. Landon was changing things, but accepting the runt of the litter as his mate wasn’t the same as allowing a threat to the pride to expand into a second generation. He’d said he would allow Michael to mate, but he was sending away the only woman Michael wanted in that role.
Michael met Ava’s pale grey eyes, holding them steadily, forcing her to see the agitation eating at him. “You could have convinced him to make her stay.”
Ava looked away, her fingers absently plucking at the fabric of her pants. “Why are you doing this? Do you really love Mara or is this just wounded pride talking?”
Michael didn’t need to ask which she thought it was. Ava wouldn’t have asked the question if she thought he loved Mara.
Puppy love. That’s what everyone thought it was. It probably didn’t help that he’d had a crush on Mara in school. But this was not a crush. Not anymore. He was not a teenager and this wasn’t a fling.
Even Ava, his baby sister, didn’t treat him like a grownup. By human standards, Michael had been an adult for years. In his lion form, his mane had fully grown in. He wasn’t an adolescent by any definition of the word, but they wouldn’t stop treating him that way.
Just a crush. Nothing serious. Because Michael wasn’t
capable
of being serious. He was just a kid. A flirt.
“No.”
“Michael?”
He rolled his shoulders, feeling the lion pressing against the inside of his skin, goading him. He’d been ignoring the beast riding him for too long. “I’m not a cub.”
“I never said—”
“I’m sick of being treated like a child. None of you have any faith in me. That’s fine. But you don’t get to decide my life for me.”
He would prove he was man enough. Prove he deserved Mara. Show her she didn’t need to go anywhere else to find a mate. The right mate for her was right here.
The lion inside him roared in agreement.
Michael bolted down the path as fast as his human legs would carry him, ignoring Ava shouting his name. Rational thought had been burned away by instinct and need. He would go to his mate, prove himself to her, convince her to stay. The beast urged him on, hungry for dominance and the scent of her skin.
Mara was his. They both knew it. Tonight, he would hear her admit it.
Chapter Seven
She couldn’t stand the way they’d left things. Of course their relationship had to end, but she didn’t want his memory of her last words to him to be whatever she’d said. She couldn’t even remember now what she’d thrown at him before running away. All she could remember was her frustration.
She had to talk to him. They could part as friends, at least. And he was her friend, as unlikely as that seemed. Over the course of the last few months, Michael had become one of her best friends. She would miss the way he could make her crazed with lust, but she would also miss the lazy conversation in the quiet hours before morning. They would talk about everything and nothing. Nonsense conversations that hadn’t really meant anything, until she realized how much they meant to her.
He listened to her. He didn’t always understand her—they came at life from such different angles—but he always listened, with such intense concentration, bringing everything he had to puzzling her out.
Through the stillness of the spring night, she heard footsteps rushing up the path to her house. A fist pounded on her door and Mara hesitated for a moment before going to open it.
She was safe, protected here in her pride. But would she have that same confidence in another pride? Or would she have reason to fear an unexpected knock in the small hours of the morning? Doubt seemed to be wrapping around every aspect of her plan.
She knew who would be waiting on her front porch before she opened the door, but she made herself walk slowly. Michael often surprised her. They’d played out this moment dozens of times before and the thought that this would be the last shortened her breath. Mara wanted to drag out the feeling of nervous anticipation, to live in it forever.
As soon as she turned the knob, the door sprang open. He stalked through, grabbing the door from her hands and flipping it closed behind him. The sheer size of him made her breath catch. He exuded strength, his blue eyes lit from within by the force of his determination.
“We aren’t done yet,” he growled. Michael caught her around the waist, jerking her forward, and she fell eagerly into his arms. His body slammed hard into hers. His mouth was rough and demanding, dragging against hers hungrily. He closed one hand around the back of her neck, kneading her nape with firm pressure as his kiss turned the world inside out. Everything was pressure and heat, every touch a push, as if he could press his will into her until she was nothing but his.
She tugged at his shirt and he ripped it in two, flinging aside the pieces. Mara gasped, more turned on than she cared to admit by the sight of the animal driving him so hard. He was out of control and her only thought was
bring me with you
. She wanted that wildness. If this was going to be her last time, she wanted everything. She wanted all the insanity in his blood to be rushing through hers too. Only if she got it all would it be the closure she needed.
Their clothing only lasted a matter of seconds, and then they were flesh to flesh. He was so hot his skin seemed to burn right through hers, branding her with his scent, his need. He pivoted, pinning her between his body and the wall. Mara cried out, surprise and arousal blending in the sound. He was so strong. For a man with no control of himself, he was in perfect control of her.
Michael caught her wrists, trapping both of them above her head with one hand. “Admit it,” his dark voice rumbled into her ear before his mouth slid down the side of her neck. His sharp teeth nipped at the sensitive point where her neck met her shoulder and Mara moaned.
“Admit…what?” she panted, arching into his touch as his free hand cupped her breast, plumping it then sharply tweaking her nipple. Sensation shot straight to her pussy. She pressed her thighs together, wet and wanting.
“You need me,” he growled against her skin, licking his way down to her breasts, teasing flicks that made her writhe. He shifted his hand to torment her other breast and sucked the nipple he’d released into his mouth.
“Michael.”
“Admit you love me.” He took her other nipple into his mouth, catching it gently between his teeth. His fingers speared between her folds, sliding to either side of her clit and curling just barely inside her. Mara gave a ragged gasp. She was tuned to his touch, primed to do nothing but feel, all thought long since abandoned. Her only coherency was the need for
more
. Michael released her breast and lowered himself to his knees. A devilish smile quirked his sexy-as-sin mouth and her heart stuttered.
More.
Michael pressed her back against the wall and hooked one of her knees over his shoulder, so she was completely open to him. His hand held her pussy, inches from his face, though his fingers stayed still and he made no move to bring her over the edge. Mara squirmed in his hold, urging him to give her the rhythm she needed.
“Michael,” she murmured breathily, his name both praise and plea.
He leaned forward and flicked his tongue across her clit. Mara gave a short, sharp shriek and her hands locked on his shoulders for balance. He was the only steady point in her world. He lapped against her again and she nearly saw heaven. Need built underneath her, coiling like a spring.
“Admit it, Mara.”
What was she supposed to be admitting? She could barely remember her own name. Right now she’d admit to being the Queen of Sheba, as long as he didn’t stop what he was doing.
“Yes,” she moaned, the only word she knew.
He set his mouth against her, sucking her bud into his mouth. The delicious pressure popped inside her and she came in a rush, sobbing his name. Pleasure rippled through her limbs, making them feel heavy, but Michael wasn’t done. He kept sucking and teasing her clit until she was back on the edge of need before she had time to come down.
He brought her again, a fast, hard, shuddering orgasm that wrenched through her, bone-deep.
In a moment of pleasure-induced clarity, Mara remembered why they were here. Their last time. She wanted it to be good for him. He’d already made it beyond good for her.
She threaded her fingers through his hair, palming his scalp and pulling him back. He put his thumb on her clit, as if marking his place, rubbing it in a slow circle.
“Come up here,” she pleaded. “I need you inside me.”
He shrugged her knee off his shoulder, rising so quickly he had her leg wrapped around his hip before she had a chance to lower it. He caught her other leg and lifted her, settling both her legs circling his waist. Mara wrapped her arms around his neck, expecting to feel him pressing into her, but Michael surprised her. Always surprising her…
He spun them away from the wall, crossing to the bed and lowering her gently onto her back on the mattress.
Something in his care, his tenderness, brought tears to her eyes, but Mara blinked them away. Michael was wonderful, but even if this was their farewell, she refused to cry. He pressed a kiss onto her lips, so soft and sweet it was more the promise of a kiss than a kiss itself.
She wanted more than promises she would never be able to redeem. Mara sank her hands into his hair again and pulled his head down to hers. She feasted on his lips, drawing on them and rolling her body in a sinuous wave beneath his until they were both back on the sharp edge of need.
He notched himself against her entrance and Mara released his mouth on a moan. “Last time…” she panted. “Make it good.”
An odd flicker passed through Michael’s eyes, but then he pressed inside her in a slow, luscious stroke and Mara couldn’t think to wonder about it. She couldn’t think of anything but the thick, hard feel of him stretching her tight.
He brushed her hair away from her face, framing it with his hands and dropping a kiss on her cheeks, her temples, and beneath the curve of her jaw. His eyes were an intense, burning blue and she couldn’t look away. Holding her gaze, he drew back and thrust slowly back again. Mara angled her hips to take him a fraction deeper. He thrust again and she released a ragged sigh. Before it had been a thundering rollercoaster of lust, but this was a sultry, sensual vise of passion, tightening slowly around them.
Michael took up a measured, punishing rhythm. Each stroke dragged along every nerve inside her. She gripped his buttocks, trying to urge him higher and harder, but Michael kept his brutal, deliberate pace. Her breathing matched his, their groans catching together at the end of each thrust. Mara felt like she was being held at the edge of madness.
Then, finally, he began to increase his tempo bit by bit. His eyes still bore into hers like blue lightning, branding her to her soul. His speed picked up, his thrusts growing rougher, and Mara reveled in the animal behind each fierce lunge. She needed all of him, every bit, even the wildest parts. Only then would she be free of him. She couldn’t find closure without a complete surrender.
She threw herself into this moment with all the passion he poured into his life. He pistoned into her, growling words that might have been her name or something more tender. They raced for completion together, a wild, bruising sprint. Mara flew over the edge first, with Michael a heartbeat behind. She burst into a thousand points of light as his hips jerked between her thighs.
He collapsed against her, his weight pressing her down into the mattress. Mara closed her eyes, drinking in that delicious heaviness for the last time, trying to imprint this moment into her memory so she would have it forever.
No wonder people always talked about break-up sex. It was incredible. Transcendent. Mara couldn’t think of better words to describe it, at least not until her brain came back online. She wanted to hold onto this moment, make it last, but exhaustion stole over her. Wrapped securely in her lover’s arms, Mara slept, resting easy.