Mine! - 69. Mine! Part Two Chapter Thirty-five

“What?” He just woke up. He wasn’t thinking right. There was no way Ritch just said what I thought he said.

“Mate me,” he insisted. He wound his hands around my neck, looking straight into my eyes. “Now. Not tonight, not tomorrow. Now.” Ritch’s chest rose and fell in shuddering waves in time with his ragged breaths.

“Talk to me.” My traitorous dick was already hardening at just the thought of claiming him, but I needed to know why he was suddenly insisting on this. “Is this about your bad dreams?”

“They won’t stop. I keep having to watch them rip your tiger soul out of your body and put it into a human, then watch him go feral and start to eat you.” He faintly gagged. “I can see it, smell it… and I have no choice to do anything but watch because you haven’t mated me. If we’re mates, when you die, I die. I don’t want to have to see something like that. I don’t want to live without you. Please, Park.”

While I wanted Ritch as my mate—desperately—I didn’t want him to feel like it had to happen because he was afraid. “That’s not real. The doctor is gone. Trein is dead, killed by the ferals he helped create, and anyone from that compound who is still alive is locked up under triple guard in another clan’s territory. If there were more people involved, the alphas will find out. But the guards are tripled around our territory. We’re as safe as it’s possible to be here.” I ran my hand up and down Ritch’s back. “You didn’t seem this worried earlier.”

“I wasn’t, until you freaked out today. I’ve been telling myself we’re safe, that there’s no place like home, and that my nightmares are just baseless fears.” He looked up and met my gaze. “But you were really upset today, scared enough that you were willing to risk everything by coming into that store after me.”

“I’d do anything to keep you safe.” I should be ashamed of that, because keeping our existence a secret was drilled into us but I had fallen hard and fast for Ritch. He mattered more to me than my own life. Without him….

And suddenly I got it. That sudden pit in my stomach, the fear and anger, the need to pull him close and never let him go catapulted my heart into overdrive. I held him tighter. “Okay.”

Ritch tried to scramble off my lap and, at first, I tried to stop him but then I let him go. What if the reality of me saying yes scared him? Not long ago, I had to be cuffed so he could sleep in the same room as me.

“Okay as in yes, you’ll mate me?” He loomed over me.

I nodded.

“Up. Bedroom.” He hauled me to my feet. “Is your leg okay?”

“My leg’s fine,” I said breathily. The bone could be jabbing out again, and I don’t think I would feel it. My entire body was focused on Ritch.

We came to a stop in my bedroom. The eager, bossy Ritch promptly faded, and he glanced at the bed, then at me, his arms limp at his sides. “I… I don’t….”

This I could handle. I stalked over to the bed and ripped the covers down. Then I rummaged around in the drawer in the nightstand, pulling out the lube. I turned and held out my hand. “C’mere.”

I held my breath until he took that first step, then I let it out with a whoosh. I’d thought endlessly about this, and I knew how I wanted our mating to go. I’d make our mating a night he’d never forget.

He was shaking, so I started slow. I traced the curves his face, his cheekbones rounded instead of jutting out to form the slight muzzle tiger bonded werekin had. His lips parted, and I dipped down to kiss him. This he knew, and he pushed closer. Ritch brought his hands up and gripped my waist.

When I pulled back, his eyes were dilated, and he swayed toward me, his hands tightening. “Take off my shirt,” I said, my voice was low and rumbly.

Ritch lifted my shirt, and I leaned down so he could pull it off. He unconsciously licked his lips, and I nearly growled with the want shooting through me. One day I’d have those lips touching every inch of my body. Today I’d settle for something simpler.

“Lift your arms.” Ritch slowly did as I asked, and I pulled his shirt up and off. His chest and stomach were still flat without muscle definition, but he’d put on the weight he needed since he came to our streak. I didn’t want another bonded werekin, our bodies chiseled with the activity our animal souls demanded. “Amazing.” I dropped his shirt on top of mine.

Then I dared to go further. I dropped my hands to his pants. He nodded subtly, and I unbuttoned them and slowly drew the zipper down. I pulled his pants and underwear down, needing to move things to the bed before I lost control.

He might be nervous, but Ritch wanted me. I could smell his rich arousal, and he was more than half-hard.

“Now you,” Ritch said.

I tore open my waistband and kicked them away. My cock pointed upright, and my fangs itched. I wanted to bite him, to feel Ritch bite me. I crawled on the bed and turned, sitting with back against the headboard. “Come here.” I patted my lap. “You get to be on top. In control.”

Tradition put Ritch on his knees under me, but damn tradition. I could watch him ride me and bite him just like this, and he wouldn’t be trapped under me.

Ritch’s eyes were bright and his mouth was parted. “Thank you.”

I shook my head. I didn’t need thanks. “Whatever you need.”