Ryenne and Lucien had another meal alone. She would miss these. His presence, his kind face, his juicy lips, all had become familiar to her. Even comforting.

How unlike her.

“What are you thinking?” he asked.

She sighed. No point in admitting now how much she’d come to care for him. Not when they were about to go their separate ways. Instead, she ate another bite of mango.

“I feel the same,” he said.

“You do?” How did he know what she felt? She’d hid her feelings from everyone, including herself.

“When Steven had you tied to the pole and I couldn’t help you, I thought my world would end. I hated leaving you there.”

“I know, I could see it on your face. Thank you for leaving when I asked you to. I wasn’t sure my plan would work and I really feared what I might be like as a new shifter. And I was afraid he’d use our friends here against me in some way. If nothing else, I knew you’d protect them.”

He came around to her side of the table and knelt down next to her chair. “I know you distracted Steven and John to give me time to get away, so I know you care about me, too.”

She smiled. “Fine, yes, I like you.”

“Even though I’m a shifter.”

“Yup.”

He raised one of his eyebrows and it was the sexiest thing she’d seen since they’d slept together. “What do we do about it?”

She leaned down and kissed him. He tasted like mango. “How about we start here?”

“Sounds good. But I have a better idea.” He scooped her into his arms and carried her to his room, kissing her the entire way.

In his room, he placed her gently on his bed and began to remove her clothes. “You haven’t explained yet how you weren’t turned into a shifter by Steven’s bite.”

She ran a hand through his hair. “You really want to talk about it now?”

He smirked and turned his head to place a kiss on her bruised and scratched wrist. “No, but the curiosity is eating at me.”

“My mom created a sort of shifter vaccine.”

Lucien jumped off her. “What?”

“It’s hard to test, obviously, because most people don’t want to turn into shifters, so we don’t know how effective it is. But it seems to do the trick as long as I take a dose within a few hours before and an hour after a bite. I usually take a daily dose when I’m on a job. Just in case.”

“Oh, was it the vial of vitamins you kept drinking?”

She nodded.

“Have you been bitten before?” he asked.

“No, this was a first.”

“So you didn’t know it would work.”

“No, but since I was cuffed to the pole, I had no other way to fight him except to let him get close.”

“I don’t know if it was the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard or the bravest,” he said, throwing a leg over her thighs.

“Yeah, I get that a lot.” She pulled him back on top of her, ignoring the pain in her belly, and kissed him. His warm lips helped release the tension she’d been holding for the past day.

He lifted up again. “One last question.”

She flopped back on the pillows in an overly dramatic fashion, wincing at the pain in her neck.

“You killed him, didn’t you? Not John.”

Her stomach somersaulted. Moment of truth. Did she only trust him with her body or also with her freedom?

She nodded.

“I thought so. John didn’t strike me as particularly talented and Steven was brought down by one perfect shot. That’s my Ryenne.”

He kissed her again and his tongue explored the inside of her mouth, cutting off any thoughts or reactions she might have had to his use of the possessive.

Ryenne moaned with pleasure and a flooding of warmth throughout her body. She’d forgotten how much she enjoyed the feel of Lucien’s body on hers, his breath mingling with hers.

He sat up and unbuttoned and unzipped her jeans, sliding them off her. She wiggled as the air hit her skin. His mouth between her legs made her wiggle even more.

“Ahhh.” She threw her head back, her fingers grasping the sheet on either side of her.

He used his tongue to bring her to the height of pleasure then inserted a finger to push her over the edge. She moved one of her hands from the sheet to his hair as she writhed against his bed and against his mouth until she couldn’t anymore.

Crying out, she stopped moving, except for the pulsing in her core.

Lucien lifted his head and looked at her. She managed a weak smile. After the pleasure he’d given her and the sleepless night fighting for her life, she thought she could fall asleep now and sleep for days.

Lucien got up on all fours and brought his head even with hers. They kissed and his erection pushed against her hip bone. Her core responded with a flip. So much for sleeping.

After another orgasm—each—and a lot more writhing, moaning, and pleasure, Lucien stared into her eyes. “Maybe I shouldn’t say this, maybe I’ll jinx it, but...I think I’m falling in love with you.”

A smile broke across her face. “Me, too.”