Page 81 of Handcuffed to the Bear

“With company this gorgeous, how could I object?”

He undressed with care, and Casey lay on the bed and watched him. First the T-shirt came off, revealing the broad shoulders and muscular chest she’d surreptitiously admired on the island—laced, now, with the purplish marks of healing claw wounds. He was still bandaged with gauze in places. Looking carefully, she could discern the scratches she’d left on his chest during her panic attack, now almost healed to invisibility.

“Should we compare scars?” Jack asked, seeing her looking. His eyes crinkled at the corners.

“I think you’re healing faster than me,” Casey complained. “I’m not even off those stupid crutches.”

“Different shifters heal at different rates. Doc Lafitte has a theory that the more often you get hurt, the faster you heal.”

He pushed down his jeans and underwear. His legs were less scarred than the rest of him, except for a swathe of bandaging where Rory had bitten him. Casey’s eyes traveled up his legs, and lingered on his long, hardening cock.

Jack opened a drawer in the nightstand. “Regular condoms okay with you?”

“As opposed to what?”

“Flavored. Ribbed.”

“You have all of that in there?” She pushed herself up to see. “How much sex do youhave?”

This produced a blush that, with his shirt off, she could see went down his neck to his chest as well. “It’s not a different girl in every port, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’ve sown my wild oats, I won’t deny that, but, well ... I’m looking for something longer-term now.”

“Are you?” she asked softly.

“I am.”

He sat on the edge of the bed and opened the packet with his teeth. “So,” he said. “You planning to take anything else off? Want some help?”

Casey lifted up her hips and pushed her jeans down, working them carefully over her bandaged leg. Her underwear was next, followed by socks. She smiled at the way Jack’s eyes roamed appreciatively over her naked body. He touched her ankle, traced the ball of his thumb around the little rose tattoo.

“Can you actually see me, or is it just a vaguely woman-shaped blur?”

“I can see you.” Jack put an arm around her waist and pulled her forward. “Smell you, too. You smell good.” He buried his face in her shoulder.

“What do I smell like?”

“Shampoo. Woman. Mostly, just you.” He flicked his tongue against her skin. “You aren’t wearing perfume.”

“I don’t very often. Just at work. I don’t really like it, to be honest.”

“Most shifters aren’t fond of artificial scents. They cover up the natural smells of the world.”

“I didn’t know that was a shifter thing. I thought it was just something unique to me.”

“Oh, Casey,” Jack whispered. He kissed her neck again. “I’m looking forward to showing the shifter world to you.”

He laid her down and she went willingly—kissing him, breathing him, feeling him.

His cock was hard now, fully erect and wet at the tip, and she leaned forward to help him roll the condom down its length. She was wet herself, her thighs slippery. When Jack dipped a hand between her legs, she arched to meet him, spreading her legs.

He guided himself into her, and heat flooded through her hips and lower belly. It felt as if she’d been waiting all her life for this—and, in some ways, she had.

His first thrusts were shallow and careful, but Casey wrapped her arms around him and thrust back passionately. She wanted him deep; she wanted to feel the entire length of him fill her.

Responding to her urgency, he pumped harder. His lips were parted, and his brown eyes were steady on her—forest eyes,she remembered thinking when she first looked into them. Now she felt as if she could lose herself in them, as if she could fall forever, and never regret a moment of it.

Jack raised a hand to grip hers: automatic, unthinking. It was the same hands they’d held on the island, her left and his right. When he pressed her hand down to the bed, above her head, his fingers girdled her wrist.

She was unprepared for the shock of lust that surged through her at the sensation.

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