His expert fingers passed under her defenseless panties and darted through her wet folds.

Hot and soft, her cream coated his fingers as he pet her not with aggression but with a surprisingly gentle touch. He spread her lips open then circled her aching bud. Coiling, boiling heat built inside her in a rush. Christine clamped her lips shut to keep from making a sound and dug her nails into the tree bark to try to gain some purchase.

Her hips rocked against his fingers, eager to ride the swift orgasm about to rush over her.

He hadn’t touched her in a week, and now she realized how deprived she felt.

Breaths grew choppy, eyes fluttered closed, and Christine let her head fall back as her body readied to burst at the seams. And then he pulled his hand away.

“What are you—”

She never finished asking the question because her jeans and panties went floating to the ground around her ankles. She heard the whoosh of more clothes dropping and knew it wasn’t hers. His hands were all over her, running over her bare hips to arch her back towards him, trailing up her bare stomach to mold her breasts in his big hands. His touch possessed her, controlled her—and she loved it.

His lips pushed the hair away from her neck and then his lips were there, kissing and licking. She had only a second to prepare herself as his hard, burning hot cock pressed against her wet core. She shook from her ankles to her knees with the intense arousal burning inside her, with the orgasm he left teetering in her body.

The hands on her breasts grabbed hold, his cock nudged her entrance, pushed the barest of inches inside, and then he thrust deep. Full and hot, he stretched her wide and filled her to the brink. She was so wet he slid in gracefully and when he began to move, she felt for the first time, the savagery inside him.

His hips pumped hard and fast, the breaths at her neck growing heavy and labored. She had no clue whether it was her body that was so tight or if he was that thick, but her muscles grabbed hold of him like they didn’t want to let him go. He thrust faster, hips slapping against her bare cheeks.

She rocked forward on her toes and his hands moved to capture her hips, holding her in his possessive grasp.

“Dmetri,” she moaned.

His hands tightened in reflex and then he growled. “So perfect.” She agreed but couldn’t voice the words, so instead she bent over further, offering herself freely to him, trusting him at his word that no one would catch them. The loud slapping sounds made her blush, and at the new angle the pleasure was even sharper. No longer could she hold back her cries. She tried to stay quiet, to keep her panting moans low, but to her own ears she only sounded like she was yelling.

His hand delved between her thighs to circle her swollen bud once again. The pleasure was acute and instantaneous. His cock slid in, pounding her into oblivion, and she flew apart in a beautiful explosion of fiery pleasure and brilliant light. Liquid fire exploded inside her. Her core gushed with release, trembling around his cock. He groaned like he was dying before he thrust deep one last time and jetted long and hard inside of her. The wet mess spilled out from around him, touching her thighs.

Neither of them could move for long minutes. Eventually they pulled apart, righting their clothes, giving each other kisses every other second as if they were unable to stay apart. When they finished, she went into his arms and he held her.

He felt so good, so right. It was almost perfect. Almost. If only a few things were different he could be her mate, could be hers forever. The thought made her heart pound even as it made her sad.

His arms wrapped around her as he kissed her again. A long, sweet kiss that made her heart melt and her knees tremble. When he pulled away, he looked at her with the same odd look in his eyes that she’d seen before. She just wished she knew what it meant.

“You’re my woman now, Christine. No matter what you say that won’t change.” Words failed her. All she could do was swallow hard over the lump in her throat and follow him back towards the garden, hand-in-hand.

Christine finished washing the soil out of her hair and shut off the shower. She sprinted across the cold tile floor and into the bedroom.

“What to wear, what to wear.” She threw open her closet, searching through her abundance of shirts and shorts for the right items. At the back of the closet, she spotted a dark blue-jean skirt. “Aha!” she said and snatched it. Picking out a white, v-cut satin shirt to go with the skirt, she threw that on the bed then began scooping up the clothes on her floor.

Dmetri said he was coming over tonight. Nerves still fluttered through her at the thought.

Something must be wrong with her. How could he make her so anxious when she’d just been with him?

But this just felt different. She wasn’t going to the guest cabin, and they weren’t going out. He was coming to her home. He’d see her things, including the mess of clothes on her bedroom floor.

What would he think if he knew she was part-slob? It still baffled her that he was so interested in her, but she didn’t doubt his sincerity. She was smart enough to know when a man was into her, and Dmetri was waist-deep. Ah, her ego soared in her chest until she grinned foolishly while tossing the clothes littering her floor into the closet.

“Good as new.”

She went around the house inspecting it for anything out of place, and then grimaced when most of it was. The pillows on the couch were either sideways or on the floor, dishes were in the sink, and her kitchen table looked as if every bill she’d ever owned was on it.

“Time to get to work.”

She rarely let anyone sway her own habits on anything, well, okay, maybe her mother, but there was no way she was going to let Dmetri see her place like this. She made quick work of the mess and finished the chores in under an hour. That left her just thirty minutes until he’d arrive.

Christine parted the curtain at the front window and peered outside. The night sky settled in blanketing the horizon in dark shadows. Against her better judgment, she looked down the street to her mother’s house. The lights were on and she knew right about now her mother would be settling in her for evening tea and a book. Dostoyevsky, Aristotle, or something equally intelligent but boring. Christine grunted. She’d spent most of her childhood listening to her mother critique famous dead authors on how their books could be better; and of course, she wanted her to read them, too. Christine preferred her books action-packed and mysterious, not hundreds of years old. But they were great sleep aids.

She shoved the curtain closed and whirled away from the window. That was enough of that. She changed into the outfit she’d picked out, but debated over wearing a bra. Then she remembered how much he’d liked it in the woods earlier when she wasn’t wearing one.

“Whoops!” she said and chucked the bra to the corner of the room. Next, she eyeballed her black panties. She’d picked them because she thought he’d like them. After all, they reminded her of him. Slick, black, and expensive...okay, expensive looking. A grin curled over her mouth as she chucked them to the corner of the room.

She pulled the skirt on and simply stood there feeling the denim against her bare butt. It felt strange, naughty...but good. She wouldn’t prefer it for every-day wear but for a night with Dmetri, oh yeah. She tugged her shirt over her free breasts and checked her reflection in the bathroom mirror. When all angles looked good, she went into the living room and stopped to wait.

The clock on the wall beckoned her until she was staring at it while gnawing on her lip like a piece of meat. She wrung her hands together, and when the knock finally came, she jumped.