Royal Wolf Box Set by Haley Weir
Chapter Fifteen
Dex seemed more disarmed than usual now. He had just talked some sense into Holly and was getting ready to toss back a cold ale by the warm fire before escorting her back home to the castle. There was nothing that should have been making him uneasy, and yet Holly’s question made him unable to hold his eyes steady as they darted from the flames to Holly to the trees.
“Why do you care?” she asked again when he didn’t answer. She wasn’t going to let this question go—not this time. She wanted to know why he seemed to show up every time she needed him and why he was suddenly concerned about business that affected the kingdom and the wolf packs, even though he was part of neither.
“About the shifters?” he asked benignly. “Just because I’m not in a pack doesn’t mean that I don’t care what happens to shifters. I am still a shifter too. If we become hunted, then it risks my safety as well.”
“No, that’s not what I meant,” she said. She had a feeling that he already knew that wasn’t what she meant. “I meant why do you care about me?”
The blunt nature of the question made Dex instantly toss back the rest of the contents of his mug into his throat and then he made ready to stand up to refill his ale. But Holly reached and grabbed his forearm before he could get to his feet.
“Answer me,” she said.
Dex froze. His eyes looked at Holly as if there was a battle beneath them—a struggle against himself that he was quickly losing.
“I just didn’t want to see you get hurt,” he said.
Holly’s hand was still holding onto his arm, and she felt his muscles trembling beneath her fingers. Without thinking, she sat up on her knees to bring her body closer to his until her chest was nearly pressed against his and her face was so close that she could feel his breath on her cheek. She stayed there and let go of his arm, waiting to see if he would back away. But they were unable to resist each other any longer, and Dex’s last thread of restraint was quickly severed.
He threw his arm around her waist and pulled Holly into him, putting his mouth on hers and pushing his tongue through her slightly parted lips. As their tongues encircled around each other, Holly put one hand against his chest and twisted the fingers of her other hand through his dark and messy hair. There was a feverish urgency between them that resulted in a pushing, pulling, clashing explosion of limbs as they tried to get closer than was physically possible. When the barrier of clothing between them became too much to bear, Holly tugged at his shirt and he pulled his chest away from her just enough so that she could lift it over his head and toss it onto the snow-covered ground beside them. It was cold out, even for a wolf shifter and even with a blazing fire. So Dex lifted Holly up and carried her into the den. Once there, he made swift work of removing each piece of clothing between them and stared at her beautiful body in awe.
The moment didn’t last long before the throbbing mass between his thighs begged for release. Holly urged her body toward him as Dex laid her down and climbed over her. He kissed her passionately and she wrapped her thighs around his waist and pulled him into her. With a steady and strong motion, he pushed into her, and she let out a gasp of pleasure as he filled her completely. His eyes looked into hers as he moved within her and Holly was so consumed by him that she felt as if everything in the world had suddenly fallen to its knees before her. There was nothing that she wanted more than this—than him. If she could have any one thing in the world, it would be to have this rogue shifter belong to her forever.
They both tried to hold on to the escalating climb for as long as they could before their bodies quaked and trembled and no longer obeyed their desire to prolong it. When they released together in an explosion of sensation, Dex’s trembling body collapsed upon her and she held him against her chest as if she would never again let him go. They both took a moment to catch their breath, and the contradicting sensations of the cold and biting breeze that wafted into the den met with the heated beads of sweat on their prickled skin. Dex gently rolled to the side and pulled Holly with him to lay against his chest. She listened to the furious pace of his heartbeat as he ran his finger along the side of her torso. For a while, they rested quietly in the peaceful enjoyment of the delirium that followed their love-making. But then, Holly remembered something. She remembered that Dex never did answer the question. She wanted an answer that would tell her he had feelings for her. One that would let her stop worrying that what Rubius had warned her about was true.
“What will happen now?” she asked.
It was the same question, disguised in a different way.
“What do you mean?”
“You are a loner who belongs to no one. And I am a queen who belongs to everyone. Yet somehow, the two of us have managed to join together. What will happen to us now? Will we go back to the way we were before, or will we be something else?”
“Something else? What is it that you want to be?”
Holly thought for a moment as she pressed her head against his shoulder and rested her hand against his chest.
“I don’t know,” she said at last. “But I do know that I don’t want to go back to how things were before.”
Dex chuckled and kissed her temple.
“Well, I don’t think that you have much of a choice. You have to go back to being queen. And I will go back to being a recluse shifter who cares nothing about anyone other than myself.”
Holly was instantly horrified and tilted her head up to look at him. But she was met with Dex’s wide grin and knew he was teasing her. She smacked her hand against his chest.
“Ow,” he said playfully as he rolled her over and climbed back on top of her again. “You know, there is something else you don’t know about rogue shifters.”
“What is it?” she asked as she tried to keep her eager body still beneath him.
“We are very, very active.”
“Active?” she asked, confused.
When she felt the hard swelling between his legs press against her thighs, she knew what he was referring to. She also knew that he was taunting her again. There was no rogue shifter myth about an increased ability to make love again and again throughout the night. But she was nonetheless ecstatic for it.
“You cannot leave me,” she said as he lingered torturously just above her body.
Holly had never felt this way about anyone, and she knew that she would never feel it again. Everything that her mother had ever said to her about following her heart made sense now, and she knew without a shadow of a doubt that no matter what else she dealt with as queen, she wanted Dex by her side. The only thing that scared her was the fear that maybe he didn’t want to be by anyone’s side for long.
“Leave you?” he asked as he looked deep into her eyes. “Why would I ever want to leave you?”
It wasn’t an actual answer, but then again, she hadn’t asked an actual question. His words were good enough to appease her worries, at least for now. She smiled and leaned her head up to kiss him as she used her thighs to pull him into her again. This time, when Dex pushed steadily into her warm body, he let out a groan of pleasure that echoed throughout the little den and carried the sound out onto the breeze in the night. In a few moments, the entire forest was full of the sound of howling wolves, and the night was impassioned with the two of them making love again under the moonlight.