Bearly Hanging On (The Jamesburg Shifters #6)(42)

Jamie raked her now-normal fingernails down Ryan's flannel-covered back, relishing the lines of his muscles, and the way he rolled his eyes back in pleasure with every scratch. "Mistake?" she asked.

He kissed her again, forcing her mouth open to taste her deeply. Her back, and her spread-out wings scratched against the cave floor. One of them fluttered and brushed against the place Ryan's shirt had pushed up above his jeans, but instead of recoiling, or really reacting at all, he just smiled and kissed her again.

"This won't hurt them, will it?" he asked a second later.

"The only thing getting hurt," Jamie said, reaching up and grabbing Ryan's face to pull him back for another kiss, "is you if you don't shut up."

With a laugh, and then a smile that made his dimpled right cheek more prominent and somehow more panty-soaking, Ryan cocked his head to the side and held Jamie's shoulders on the ground as he resumed his slow path of kisses down the middle of her chest, unbuttoning the shirt a little more with every gently placed kiss.

Each one, he previewed with a touch of his tongue, a soft, circling lick. He sucked, and pulled, and stroked her, wrenching her shirt off one shoulder, then the other. He dragged his tongue over her bra, letting it settle where her nipple was so that she felt the heat, the wetness, even with the fabric separating her from him.

"You always wear a sports bra?" he asked.

He was talking, sure, but he was also still stroking her with those rough, beautiful, massive hands. When he pinched her covered nipple softly, then slid his hand underneath to warm her with his palm before he did it again, Jamie decided she could let it slide that time.

"You try flying in some stupid, lacy number." She gasped, she moaned, and then smiled as her hair mussed into a frame around her head when she relaxed again, completely unaware her bun had come undone.

"Worse than running?" he asked, lowering his head for another suck, though this time he slipped the tip of his tongue under the fabric, teasing the rim of Jamie's nipple with playful flicks.

"So, so, so," the last word was drawn out into a nine syllable groan. "So much worse. Also, permission to speak?"

"Revoked?" he chuckled, before biting gently on her breast, and then her nipple.

"Revo—holy shit," Jamie hissed.

"Too much?" he pulled the finger he was pressing against the opening of her sex back. "Too fast?"

"When someone interrupts what they're saying to curse and then groan, you keep doing it, you big jackass," she said with a laugh.

As his finger sank into her, up to the first knuckle, the physical pleasure was only part of what Jamie felt. The fact that this huge bear made sure she was okay? That he wasn't going to hurt her? That he didn't mind her damn wings? She couldn't believe it. She never would, not in a million years, except... he was right here. He was right here, and it was real hard to deny the reality of his fingers stretching into her, and his sucking, wonderful kisses that were just about to require a lot less skirt if they were going to get any lower.

He didn't ask permission for that part.

Jamie whimpered as his huge finger slid out of her for a moment, but as soon as the skirt was unhooked and his tongue was on her panties, the finger came back, and she forgave him for the momentary inconvenience.

With one leg on either side of his head, Jamie draped her knees over Ryan's shoulders. His kisses - up one side of her and down the other before settling back on the middle - brought her right to the edge.

"My body," she gasped, in between thrashes of his tongue and curls of his finger, "my body never does this. I never get wet like this, I never open up to someone like this. I never have."

Breathing hard, eyes focused, jaws tight, Ryan lifted his face from between her legs, kissing along the inside of Jamie's left thigh until he couldn't turn his head anymore, then he fixed his eyes on hers. "I fought this for as long as I could," he whispered, kissing her bare belly, and then tugging the top of her black panties down to kiss the tuft of hair there. "I tried to stop myself, tried to convince myself I should just go on with life, just keep surviving."

He curled his finger hard inside her, lingering on that place that not only got her gasping, but also made the muscles in her sex twitch and pull at him. "You know what I realized?"

She shook her head, biting her lip and hooking her thumbs through the sides of her underwear and pulling them over her hips, which he helped with, never taking his eyes off Jamie's for a second.

"I realized that surviving wasn't worth it. Living hidden away? Without," he swallowed hard. "Without you?"

Jamie felt that familiar heat on her cheeks. A flush crept up her chest. Every nerve in her body was alive, flaring at his touch.

"Without you, it isn't worth doing. If I can't have you," he paused again. Jamie interrupted him with a hand on his chin, her thumb pulling gently at his bottom lip.

"You make me feel safe," she said. "You make me feel like I don't have a thing in the world to fear. I couldn't explain what the hell you did to me, Ryan Drake, but you made me feel a way I didn't even think was possible."

"And you," he said, grabbing her hand and kissing down her wrist, then her inner elbow, and then her neck, "you broke my walls."

"Fair is fair," she whispered with a smile, returning another of his kisses. "I'm naked in a cave." She quirked an eyebrow at him and then looked downward.