Page 100 of Knotting the Cowboys

He’s still holding back, and I know it. I can feel him fighting for control, something noble and selfless in it. Maybe he’s afraid to push too far, or to take what I’m not ready to give. It only makes me want him more—this paradoxical cocktail of restraint and need.

I drag my hands up his back, feeling the muscles flex beneath my palms. I’m emboldened by his hesitation, and by the impossible fact that he’s even here, wanting me. It’s so different from every other touch I’ve known—careful, reverent, but never patronizing. There’s none of the clinical detachment of a village matchmaker, none of the empty ritual I learned to expect from Alphas who saw Omegas as a job to fulfill. River’s hands on me say nothing about duty and everything about hunger.

My legs go loose and he catches me, using the grip on my hip to haul me up and back, perching me on the low bench of the changing room. I nearly overbalance, but he’s there, steady and calm and grinning like a wolf. His hands find my knees, pushing them apart, and the air between my legs shocks me cold for half a second before his heat fills the space.

He kneels. Just drops to his knees, barely a pause, and looks up through dark lashes that make my guts melt. The position should be vulnerable, but he makes it dominant, like he’s daring me to flinch. I don’t. Not even as he drags his hands up my thighs, slow enough to worship.

River doesn’t ask for permission again. He simply leans in and presses his mouth to the inside of my knee, then trails up with agonizing patience. Each kiss lands softer, wetter, closer to where I want him most. The lace of the panties is already damp, and I flush thinking of what he’ll find there. He noses against the fabric, inhales deeply, and shudders.

I can’t stay silent. “Do you want—” I choke on the word. It’s too much, too soon, but the thought of stopping makes me want to scream. “God, River—please.”

He glances up, all green and black, and my heart forgets to beat. “Whatever you need, Dandelion. You say when.”

And then his mouth is on me, or as close as the see-through lace allows, and I nearly levitate off the bench. He sucks, kisses, licks through the barrier until I’m trembling, every nerve ending alive and pleading for more. He slides the panties aside with two fingers, slow enough to build anticipation, and then his tongue is on bare skin, slick and electric.

I buck against his face, my hands flying to anchor in his hair. The feel of him is beyond anything I’ve ever known—focused, relentless, like he’s memorizing every reaction and saving it for later. He groans when I tug at his hair, deep and pleased, and doubles down on the rhythm.

I can feel myself getting close, the tension winding tighter and tighter, but River slows, deliberately, drawing it out. His tongue circles, teases, never quite giving me the pressure I crave. When I whine, he grins against me, the bastard, and finally gives in—sucking hard enough to make my whole body lock up. The orgasm hits so fast I can’t even warn him; I clamp ahand over my mouth to keep from screaming, but he stays right there, riding every aftershock, licking until I’m wrung out and whimpering.

He finally looks up, face slick, eyes glazed with pleasure. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, still kneeling between my legs, and gives me a lazy, satisfied smile.

“Best damn taste I’ve ever had,” he says, his voice rough, and I have to look away or combust.

He stands, muscles bunching as he lifts me back to my feet like I weigh nothing at all. He steadies me, brushing my hair back from my face, and presses a soft kiss to my forehead, then the tip of my nose, then my mouth. This kiss is different—gentler, almost reverent, like a benediction after the holy mess of what he just did to me.

I collapse against his chest, arms wrapping around him for support, and realize I’m shaking—not from fear, but from the way he’s remade my body’s understanding of want.

We stand there for a long second, just breathing together, my head tucked under his chin. I’m still in the absurd lingerie, and he’s still impossibly hard against me, but neither of us moves to end it. The curtain ripples with every exhale, a hush world all our own.

I should be shy. Should be careful and cautious and all the things I've been taught. Instead, I kiss him back with everything in me, pouring years of suppressed desire into the clash of teeth and tongues. This is what I've been missing, what Iron Ridge with all its rules and restrictions never let me have. Not just physical pleasure but this connection, this meeting of equals despite our designations.

River pulls back just enough to breathe.

"Fuck, Dandelion," before capturing my mouth again. His thumb strokes the side of my throat where my pulse hammersrabbit-quick, and I arch into him, needing more contact, more pressure, more everything.

My body moves without conscious thought, trying to climb him, to get closer than physics allows. I've never been kissed like this—like I matter, like my pleasure matters, like the person kissing me would happily spend hours learning exactly how to take me apart.

"Been wanting this," I gasp when he moves to my jaw, nipping lightly. "God, River, I've been—years of wanting?—"

"I know." He seals his mouth over mine again, swallowing whatever confession was about to spill out. "I know, baby. We've got you now."

We.Plural.The promise of not just him but all of them makes me moan, the sound muffled by his tongue stroking against mine.

My pussy clenches around nothing, desperately empty, and I can feel how wet I'm getting. The delicate lace of the panties is no barrier at all—I'm probably dripping, making a mess, and the thought only turns me on more.

River seems to sense the spike in my arousal because he growls—actually growls—and presses me harder against the wall.

The kiss mutates—no, explodes—into something raw and feral, instantly obliterating any illusions of restraint that might have lingered in the charged air between us. River isn’t just tasting me, he’s devouring, imprinting the memory of me on every sense. The taste of my orgasm still glazes his lips, and the slickness is a badge—one he wears proudly as his mouth plunders mine with animal intent. The hand braced at my throat becomes the sun around which my whole universe orbits: it pins me upright with gentle but absolute authority, sending a shockwave of heat down my spine and into every pulsing nerve beneath my skin. He kisses me like he’s starving, like the onlything tethering him to this dimension is the wet, hungry collision of our mouths.

My own gasp bleeds into his mouth, fueling him—fueling us—as he presses closer, crushing my breasts against his chest until the lace bites into my skin and I relish the sting. The air is thick with our mingled scent—the arousal, the sweat, the aftershock of my orgasm—and he’s inhaling it through his nose as if he’s trying to bring my pheromones directly into his bloodstream. His tongue finds mine again, more insistent now, coaxing and teasing and then retreating just enough to make me chase after him, desperate for the next hit.

I surrender, full-body, to the headlong rush of sensation, years of careful boundaries and survival instincts collapsing in a heap around my feet. With every glide of his thumb along the side of my throat, I feel the pulse thrum in my ears: a primal drumbeat, a call to arms. My fingers claw at the back of his shirt, hauling him closer, refusing to allow even a breath of space between us.

He presses me into the wall, body caging mine, and I swear I taste blood where I bite his lip, but he only growls and plunders deeper. There’s something wild in the way his restraint ratchets tighter even as his hips roll forward, the hardness of him unmistakable, pressing into my stomach with a promise I can barely comprehend. Each movement, each squeeze or pull or tentative retreat, is calculated to wind me higher, to keep me teetering at the edge.

My legs are trembling, not from fatigue but from the sheer voltage of being wanted like this, and every time he relents for a half-breath it’s just to drink me in, to fix me in memory before he loses himself again. He nips at my bottom lip, then soothes the sting with the broad sweep of his tongue, and the tenderness is almost more shattering than the need.

He breaks the kiss only to lap at the taste of me on my own lips, humming in deep, lewd satisfaction, and then dives back in, as if he’s chasing a flavor he might never get enough of. His grip at my throat gentles just a fraction, thumb stroking the frantic flutter of my pulse, and the pleasure is so sharp it nearly tilts into pain.

---