Easing sideways, she takes my hand and spreads it over her abdomen, where I left a damp trail on her skin. “It means I’m going French this week and not showering so I can smell you on me.”

God, I swear only my woman would say that. Groaning, I shift us sideways so that we face each other, then I reach between her legs and slide my semen up the inside of her thigh, into her pussy. “Sticky?” I croon as I bend my head and tongue her shoulder, meanwhile penetrating my wet finger back inside her. “Do you want to wash me off you?” I gently prod.

Brooke wiggles almost unnoticeably, but not so unnoticeably that I don’t see she wants to get closer to me, my lips, my body, and my fingers. I fucking love it. “No,” she breathes, parting her legs just a little bit for me. “I want you to give me more.”

What I want is for her to taste us, so I rub my wet finger across her lips and push it into her mouth.

“I wanted you since the first night I saw you,” I gruffly murmur to her, watching her suck on it.

“So did I.”

Her admission tangles all over my gut, and I shove a second damp finger into her mouth, watching her soft, gold eyes drift shut as she licks up our taste like it’s a banquet. When she moans, I’m swelling back up again.

“Do you like my taste?” I prod.

“Hmm. That’s all I want from now on.” She lightly bites my fingertips, and my cock jumps to full length as her teeth sink into my flesh. “I’ll always want my Remy fix after dinner,” she continues. I’m getting painfully hard and the teasing glimmer in her eyes is driving me insane with lust. “And maybe before breakfast. And after lunch. And at teatime.”

I groan, I can’t take it. A man with a purpose, I slide down her parted legs and my tongue lashes out to taste her sex. She archs up in offering, and I grab her buttocks to lift her higher to my mouth, her taste intoxicating. Sweet, with a little kick that lands straight in my fucking balls. I’m so fucking horny and thirsty for her, I can only speak in between licks. “I . . . want to . . . come . . . on every part of your body.” I suck her taste in, pinching my eyes shut as I savor, then I rise to stroke my erection along her entry once more.

She grabs my head and rocks in a silent plea as she takes my lips with hers. “Come wherever you want, inside me, outside me, in my hand, in my mouth.”

Her fingers curl around my cock, and the touch is so unexpected, so sweet and so bold as she gently strokes me, my cock jerks and I start coming, splashing semen all over her arm, her wrist. She rolls me onto my back and jumps on me, impaling herself on my shaft, and I bark out in pleasure and thrust my head back as I grip her hips and pull her up, then ram her back down, still jetting off inside her.

Later, she shudders with a soft scream, tossing her head back as she explodes with me, then she falls, limp and unresponsive, on my chest. I spread her over me and leave my cock inside her, panting, sliding my hands down her back, tracing her ass, the dents of her spine.

We lay for hours, petting. She’s weak, but I’m still hyped up from being with her. I can’t stop stroking my hands down her curves. I touch her knee, her bottom, her hair. “The night they sedated you . . .” she asks me groggily, hours later, “that was an episode?”

She caresses my abs, but not even her touch keeps me from tensing up at the topic.

“Can we even talk about it?” she asks.

I close my eyes as she continues caressing. I haven’t been given caresses that aren’t foreplay before. I don’t allow these when we’re done, I’m done. Like a fight. But she’s touching me and I like it so much, I press her down to my neck so she doesn’t put any distance from me. “You can talk to Pete about it,” I whisper.

“Why don’t you talk to me about it, Remington?”

Ah, fuck. I sit up and twist my feet off the bed, then drag my hands down my face. “Because a lot of episodes I don’t remember what I do.”

I start pacing. I hate talking about it. The topic distresses me. It’s something I can’t remember and usually have no clear control over. What does she want me to say? I do shit, and then I’m not sure I did it? I seem to lose control, and when I come to my senses, I usually find out from someone else what a major dick I seem to have been?

“All right, I’ll talk to Pete about it, but come back to bed,” she blurts out, but she ceded too easily. I’m no moron and I know she wants to know. Hell, she deserves to know.

“I remember you,” I tell her, just to be clear about that. “In my last episode. The tequila shots. The way you looked. The little top you were wearing. The nights you slept in my bed.”

She seems to absorb that for a moment and then whispers, her voice holding the most tenderness I’ve ever heard anyone address me with, “I wanted us to happen so bad.”

My chest tangles with emotion, and I swing around. The depth of her eyes is endless. The way they stare right into me. I feel seen. Without reproach, disgust. I feel hungered for. Wanted in a way I have never, ever, been wanted.

“You think I didn’t?” I whisper in disbelief. “I’ve wanted us to happen since . . .” Heading back to bed, I can’t resist kissing her. “Every second I want us to happen.”

Three fingers touch my jaw, her gaze curious on my face. “Have you ever hurt someone?”

God damn I hate having to tell her this. I want to tell her I’m strong, fast, the strongest and the fastest. I don’t want to tell her I’m a fuckup. Dangerous. Volatile. Yeah, I’m a mess. But I’ve never been a liar. “I hurt everything I touch. I destroy things! That’s the only thing I’m good at. I’ve found whores in my bed I can’t remember bringing back with me and I’ve tossed them naked out of my hotel room, pissed like hell because I don’t remember what I did. I’ve stolen shit, vandalized shit, woken up in places I don’t even remember getting there. . . .” I drag a breath, then sigh. “Look, since Pete and Riley alternate days off, there’s always someone to knock me out for a day or two when I get out of hand. I hit a low, and then I’m back. Nobody gets hurt.”

“But you. Nobody gets hurt but you.” With a worried crease in her forehead, she takes my hand in hers, and I can’t believe how something smaller than you can give you such a great sense of well-being. “Remy, do they have to knock you out like that?” She laces her fingers through mine, and I glance down and stare at her. At that crease on her forehead. Those gold, gold eyes, worried for me in a way that’s so new to me, it’s almost amusing. But it’s not. I want her to know I’ve got this. She’s holding my hand, and I grip her tighter so that I’m the one holding her. I will always hold us both.

“Yes,” I say emphatically. I don’t care what Pete has to do, but I need to be kept in line, now more than ever. “Especially if I want . . . this . . .” Using my hand, I signal to her, then at myself. “I want this. Very badly.” Then I nuzzle her. “I’m trying not to fuck it up, all right?”

“All right.”

I kiss the back of her hand. “All right.”

* * *

BROOKE WAS MISSING her friend, so I decided to bring her up from Seattle. With some reluctance, I agreed she could go with Pete to pick up Melanie at the airport.

“Remy, you’re so good,” Brooke said, sloppy kisses all over my jaw, making me laugh. Yesterday I caught her and her best friend laughing, and Brooke made love to me all night. I’ve never been so connected to anyone in my life.

When I handed her one of the sedatives Pete and Riley use—because I want her to know how to put me down if she needs to—she wouldn’t so much as look at it.

“No, Remy, don’t ask this of me.”

“It’s just to make sure I don’t hurt you.”

“You’d never hurt me.”

I get hot just thinking about the ways she keeps on trying to protect me. I’m fucking sure she knows I’m her mate. If we were in other times, and I couldn’t hunt for a day, I know damn well she could hunt for both of us.

Coach yells from the corner, “Too slow, Riptide, too damn slow. Hit it!”

I glance at the hard bag and punch. Whack. Whack. Concentrating on hitting. It comes from your core, and as long as you direct it properly, there’s no fucking way there won’t be power in that punch. I work my core more than anything. Everything I do works it, even jump rope.

I spend all day at the gym, and when I get to my sparring partner, I see Brooke and Melanie at the door. My chest swells with happiness and proprietariness. She signals that they’re leaving, and I pull off my headgear and smile.

I get a rush making her happy. I turn back to my partner and focus. My life had never felt so right. So good. I’ve never felt so accepted or so fucking understood.

That night, Pete summons me to discuss my finances. Brooke is having dinner with Melanie. I glance at my phone but get no text from her.

We’re at the hotel bar.

A woman walks up. “You have amazing eyes.”

I ignore her and turn back to Pete, drilling him: “At what time did she say she’d be back? . . . You sure Riley’s getting her? . . . Why the fuck are they taking so long?”

“Riley texted they’re on their way back,” Pete tells me after like the tenth question, and he sends me up to my room.

I’m withdrawing into myself. I’m restless. My gut feels tight and I don’t trust when I feel this. I grab my headphones and sit down, tapping my foot. I listen to Chevelle’s “The Red.”

When she finally comes in, my chest tightens. Her cheeks are pale, but her eyes well with emotion when she sees me. I don’t know why my gut tightens.

She jumps on my lap, pries off my headphones, and slips them over her head. She frowns at the song. Yeah, she hates those rock songs, and I need to kiss away that frown. I kiss her nose, cradle her jaw, and rub her lips with my thumb. She jumps, drops the headphones onto the desk, and runs to the bedroom.

My gut tightens again, and I sit there, turning off my headphones, restless. I can feel the darkness teasing into me. I’m trying to calm myself. She’s here. She’s back. She’s all right.

I watch her return. Something in her eyes that I can’t pinpoint is feeding my monster ten times over.

“Remy, would you hold me for a bit?”

I study her, confused about what I feel. Then I realize she looks anxious and in need. “Come here.” I shove my chair back and extend my arm, and she wiggles against me as I engulf her. I chuckle softly, instantly calmed in a way that only happens when I touch her.

“You missed me?” I cup her smooth cheeks and tip her head to me.

“Yes,” she gasps.

I gather her to me and set my smile to hers. We stop smiling as the heat crashes through me.

My fingers outline her breasts, my mouth on her jaw, then I’m at the back of her ear, inhaling her, growling softly when her scent fills me. Winding me up and relaxing me. “Remy . . .” I hear the need in my name as she pushes my T-shirt up my shoulders.

I grab it in my fist and toss it aside, then strip her down to her skin, then yank her down to me again, my covered erection grinding in between her thighs. She strokes my chest and kisses every part she can.

“I missed you so much,” she says, running her lips over my jaw, grabbing my hair as she presses close to me.

I engulf her in my arms and stroke her back, then seize her face. “I missed you too.” I set a kiss on her sweet lips, and her nose, and her forehead.

She trembles, pressing so close. I want to open up and let her in any way I can. “But I missed your voice. Your hands. Your mouth . . . being with you . . . watching you . . . touching you . . . smelling you . . .” She takes my lips more desperately.

I try to slow down, but her mouth tastes amazing, and I need to remind myself that she is mine, mine, so I unbutton her and strip her bare as quickly as I can.

I draw her back to my lap when she’s naked.

My whole body clenches when I feel her pussy nestling my erection. She seems undone.

She slides between my thighs and I yank my sweatpants partway down my hips until my hardness pops free, and her fingers are all over me, rubbing, squeezing, caressing.

“I want to kiss you here. . . .” Brooke’s voice shakes with desire as she looks into my lust-tightened face, into eyes that I can barely keep open from the want. “I want to drown in you, Remington. I want your taste . . . in me. . . .”

She takes me in her mouth. Ecstasy burns through me as a sound rumbles up my throat. I need this so bad I rock my hips, slowly, up to her mouth, giving her what she wants and taking what I need. Her tongue runs all over me and her eyes are halfway down as she watches me, and I watch her back, amazed, undone . . . losing myself in her, praying she can rescue me from the dark already starting within me, the high of being manic.