The Alpha's Bargain

CHAPTER EIGHT

The wedding night arrived with a formality that dissolved the moment the manor's bedroom door closed behind them, six days of careful distance collapsing all at once into something neither of them seemed inclined to resist any longer.

"I meant what I said in the garden," Dorian murmured, framing her face in both hands with a gentleness that contradicted the coiled, barely-leashed intensity radiating off him. "I don't know how to do this carefully. The bond doesn't leave much room for careful, on nights like this one."

"Then don't be careful," Jo said, breathless already just from the proximity of him, the mate bond humming so loud between them it felt like a physical current. "I don't want careful, Dorian. I want you."

Something in him seemed to break open at that — six years of careful control finally, fully surrendering. He crashed his lips unto hers and kissed her with a hunger that stole her breath entirely. While maintaining his lips on hers, he backed her toward the bed with firm but soft hands that mapped her like he'd been aching to for six long days of forced restraint, and when they finally tumbled onto the sheets together, the wedding dress and his formal clothes discarded in a scattered trail across the floor. The mate bond between them ignited into something almost unbearably intense.

Dorian separated his lips from the kiss as his eyes feasted on Jo's naked body. Her porcelain skin seemed more radiant than the brilliant moon. Her breasts heaved as she took soft breaths to recover from the kiss but her n*****s begged Dorian for his attention. He lowered himself and enclosed one of her n*****s in his mouth, cupping the other breast with his hand. Jo took a sharp breath and let out a vulnerable moan. Dorian felt himself harden as he heard the moan once more, flicking on her n****e with his tongue. Jo could barely contain herself as she intertwined her fingers in his luscious hair, holding on to his head and he teased her n*****s and squeezed her supple breasts.

"Tell me if this is too much," he said as he lifted his lips off her n*****s. They were hard now, and covered with a warm layer of his saliva. His voice was rough, hands trembling slightly despite their obvious competence. "The bond amplifies everything, Jo. What you feel, what I feel — it doesn't stay separate tonight. I need you to be sure."

"I'm sure," Jo gasped, arching into his touch as he traced a finger over her n*****s, stimulating them again. The mate bond turned every point of contact between them electric in a way she'd never experienced with any partner before him. "Dorian, please—"

He didn't make her ask twice. What followed was overwhelming in a way that had nothing to do with inexperience. Their bond seemed determined to make up for six days of enforced distance all at once — Dorian worshipped her with a thoroughness that left her trembling and desperate long before he finally settled his hands between her warm thighs. Propping on one forearm, he watched her face with an intensity that felt, through the mate bond's strange amplification, like he could feel every single thing she felt in return.

"Mine," he said again. This time, lowering his lips on her belly and planting soft kisses on her navel, carefully making his way down till he got to her groin. It was smooth and clean-shaven, housing her little bean which he teased with a kiss. Jo's breathing quickened as his lips hovered directly above her c******s. Then, without warning, he crashed his lips on her p***y, licking, sucking and eating out her entrance like a ravaging beast. Jo's lips parted for loud moans that filled the room. Her hands clasped to handfuls of his hair as he enjoyed making a buffet out of her.

Dorian lifted his head, licking of her juices that had gotten all over his face and seized her hands, holding them with a firm but soft clasp over her head.

When he finally, achingly pushed every inch of his d**k into her, Jo bit her lip to stop herself from moaning any louder. He filled every inch of her, pulsating as his d**k stretched her p***y. Every word broke from him like a vow renewed. "Say it back to me, Jo. I need to hear it."

"Yours," she gasped, pulling him closer till his chest rested atop her breasts, the bond between them turning the word into something that felt less like surrender and more like the truest thing she'd ever said. "I'm yours, Dorian."

What followed was slow and then desperate and then slow again, the mate bond turning every thrust into gasps, intensified moans and murmured names— his pleasure bleeding into her awareness. Jo found herself answering back through every shock wave he sent down her spine with each stroke. Soon enough, the two of them found their release together in a wave that left them both shaking, undone, entirely wrecked in the best possible way.

Afterward, tangled together in the aftermath, Dorian pressed unhurried kisses along her bare shoulder, something soft and wondering in the gesture that had nothing left of his earlier careful restraint.

"I didn't expect this," he admitted quietly. "Any of it. I walked into that hall six days ago prepared to honor a political treaty and nothing more. I did not expect to find someone who'd make me want to rebuild everything I thought I understood about safety."

"Is that a complaint?"

"It's the furthest thing from a complaint," Dorian said, pulling her closer, the mate bond settling into something warm and certain between them. "It's the first time in six years I've felt something other than the weight of holding this pack together alone. I intend to spend a very long time being grateful for that, Jo Hale — Jo Vane, now, I suppose."

"I like the sound of that," Jo murmured, already half-asleep in the solid warmth of him, the danger and politics of the world beyond this room feeling, for tonight at least, entirely and blessedly far away.

She would learn, in the days that followed, exactly how temporary that p articular peace would prove to be.