Page 104 of The Beast

She rose up, now sliding her hands higher, finding his shoulders, teasing the soft skin of his neck, so vulnerable there.

The beast woke up.

It prowled through his chest. Snarling. Straining. His wrists jerked against the ties, twisting at the waist as her hands clung to his shoulders, his head whipping sideways and back as every nerve screamed at him to break free, to fight, to take control before something terrible happened.

But the bonds held. And Bella kept touching him. Kept kissing him. Drawing a line with her tongue down his torso, teasing his cock in a way that had him wanting to scream in fear and desperation, even while crying out in absolute, pure pleasure.

“It’s okay,” she murmured over and over. “I’m fine. I’m safe. And so are you.”

She bent forward again, her breasts brushing his skin as her lips teased his nipples. As her mouth closed over his, hard and demanding. As she rocked her hips so that her ass stroked his cock until he wasn’t sure anymore if this was torment or pleasure, heaven or hell. All he knew was that he wanted her. That he needed her.

That maybe—just maybe—this was working.

When she finally stripped off the rest of her clothes and straddled him, he nearly lost his mind.

“Stay with me,” she breathed, sinking down onto him. “Right here.”

“Izzy.” Her name tore out of him.

“I’ve got you.” She started to move, slow and deliberate. “Let go. I’ve got you.”

The beast howled.

He opened his eyes, saw her dual-colored ones, and arched completely off the bed, straining toward her, pushing against the bonds. Lust and fear and desire and need all mixing together like a whirlwind inside him. But he couldn’t fight. Couldn’t take control. Could only surrender to the sensation, to her, to the terrifying vulnerability of being completely at her mercy.

And somewhere in the white-hot center of the pleasure, something broke open.

Not the beast. Something older. Deeper. The wall he’d built in that cabin five years ago, the one that said vulnerability meant death. It cracked. Crumbled. Let in light. Not completely gone. Not yet. But finally fading.

And when that white hot pleasure ripped through him—when his entire body exploded with his release—he knew that this was it. Not a cure, but a path. A well-lit path to lead him back to his Izzy, and to the man he’d buried deep inside himself.

She untied him afterward, pressing kisses to his lips, his chest, his wrists. Then she curled against his side, her head on his chest.

“How did you know?” she finally asked.

He pulled her closer, pressed his lips to her hair.

“Travis,” he said. And then, slowly, haltingly, he told her everything. The conversation. The realization. All of it. “I’m not cured,” he said. “Not yet.”

“But it’s a path,” she said, her choice of words making him smile.

“Will you walk it with me?”

“You know I will.” For a moment, she was quiet, her fingers tracing patterns on his chest. “I love you.”

“I know.” He kissed her forehead. “I love you, too.”

They lay there in the quiet, wrapped around each other, breathing together. And for the first time in years, Gabriel’s mind was still.

His phone shattered the silence.

He tensed, old instincts surging. But Bella’s hand pressed flat against his chest, grounding him.

“It’s just the phone. And it might be important.”

With a groan, he reached for the damn thing, then sat up the second he saw Leo’s name on the screen.

“You’re on speaker. I’m with Bella. What’s up?”