"I have my reasons." His hands went to my hips, his touch almost bruising. "Move, or I'll make you move."
I gripped tight with my thighs. "Pretend I'm Barbie, fust another seductive brunette you're planning to wine, dine, and bed. Nothing serious will ever come of us, and you'll never see me after tonight. I'm just a quick and easy fuck."
"I can't do that," he said, voice tight with the tension I could see in his eyes, feel humming through his body.
"Why not?"
"Because you're not Barbie, and you'll never be just a quick and easy fuck."
I raised my eyebrows at the edge in his voice. "But that's all I was when we first met. You admitted that yourself."
"That was then."
"Nothing much has changed since then."
"Everything has changed since then."
"For God's sake, we don't even know each other beyond the realms of sex. And being great in bed doesn't mean we'll be great out of it."
"I know, I know." Frustration edged his voice. "Riley, I want you. I need you. I just don't know if I can stand being with you."
"I'm not asking you to become my full-time lover right now. I'm just asking you to take what you need."
He touched a hand to my face. "You don't get it, do you?"
"What?"
"One touch, one taste, is never going to be enough."
I smiled. "It doesn't have to be enough."
"I know. And if you were something other than a werewolf, I would take all you could offer in an instant."
I sighed. "But I am a werewolf, I will always be a werewolf, and asking me to forget all that I am is like asking you to stop taking blood."
"It's not the same - "
"It is," I insisted. "The moon celebration is vital to a wolf. The dance is vital. Sex is a part of what we are, as vital to us as blood is to you."
"You would not die if you didn't have sex."
"Wouldn't I? You know that for sure, do you?"
He didn't answer. I sighed again. "Look, take however much time you need to make a decision about us, but in the meantime, you can't go to the function emoting like you are. An orgy is not what we need to happen tonight."
"I can control it."
"Have you any idea just how strongly you're projecting?"
"I'm not."
"Maybe not at the moment, because you're holding it fiercely in check. But when I walked to the car, you weren't controlling it, and when I took off my coat, you weren't."
"That was a moment of surprise, nothing more."
"It's at dangerous levels."
"No, it's not."