“You’re everything to me, Cat,” he told her. It was true. He’d found that out when he thought he’d lost her. “I can’t breathe without you. I’m still trying to catch my breath.”

She stilled under his hands. Her eyes took on a deep violet vibrant hue. She got it. She knew what he needed and why. He felt her body settle, although her breathing remained ragged. He bent to kiss her belly where his child snuggled.

“You’re such a miracle. A real fucking miracle, Cat.”

She laughed. “Honey, seriously, you have to clean up your language just a little bit. You can’t say miracle and drop the f-bomb at the same time.”

He loved the sound of her laughter. It filled the room with warmth and joy. She gave him things that were so intangible he couldn’t tell anyone else exactly what they were, but he couldn’t live without them. Without her.

“I dropped a few of those f-bombs when I was pleading for your life in that waiting room,” he growled, unrepentant. He dropped his head back to the important matter of hearing and feeling her heart beating in every part of her body.

“You didn’t?” Her breath hitched as he shifted his body to slide lower.

“I did.” He pushed her thighs apart and looked down at her body. “You’re so damned beautiful, Catarina, sometimes I can’t believe you’re really mine.”

“I hate to be the one to tell you, but I’m covered in scars.”

Eli had scars too. Cordeau’s lieutenants had taken him down with a stun gun, chained him, and Cordeau had used his claws to rake him open from his chest to his belly and then he ordered his men to get started on the real torture.

“You’re beautiful, Cat, with or without them. Jake has found a plastic surgeon, a shifter, one of us, so we’ll see him.”

“I’m pregnant.” Instantly her hands covered her belly, still flat, her body still not giving away their secret. “I don’t want cosmetic surgery enough to endanger our child.”

He loved her for that alone. “We’ll do whatever you want, baby.” He dipped his head to trace her hip bone, to find the soft indentation where he could feel her heart pounding through her body. He closed his eyes, savoring the sound and feel of life.

Her breath hissed out of her lungs as he wedged his shoulders firmly between her thighs, stretching her legs with his width, leaving her open and vulnerable to him. He scented her, the call of his mate. Already the taste of her was in his mouth. Still, he needed to feel every pulse point. For the moment he was content to just feel her heart right there. Waiting for him.

He kissed her other hip, lapped at the little indentation and then kissed his way down her thighs. First one, then the other.

“No. Eli.” Catarina wailed her protest. She lifted her hips as if trying to follow him. “You’re making me crazy.”

“Always in such a hurry,” he murmured, lifting her leg, bending it, pressing kisses to the back of her knee. He felt it there. Life. He took another breath and his lungs expanded. Sometimes when he woke up beside her, he was choking, his lungs burning. But there it was, the air that he needed. Her. Catarina.

He kissed his way to her foot. Lifted it, pressed a kiss to the sole and back up her other leg. She trembled. Writhed. So alive, his woman. So responsive to his every touch. So impatient.

He took his time on the inside of her thighs. He inhaled, taking her scent deep into his lungs. Maybe if he could keep her scent in his lungs long enough he’d believe she was safe and no one would try to take her from him – not even death. He licked along the inside of her thigh and discovered the sweet, spicy taste, unique to her – his addiction. He craved her taste. He dreamt of it. Woke with it on his tongue.

He lapped it up, taking his time, feeling the beat of his own heart in his cock, telling him he was alive because she was. He lifted his head to look at her as he once more wedged her thighs open with the broad width of his shoulders. Her blue eyes gleamed violet at him. He laughed softly at her glare and dipped his head to blow warm air into the seething, scorching-hot sheath waiting to surround him like a tightest fist.

His body reacted, shuddering at the thought of so much pleasure. He plunged his tongue deep and she came apart just as he knew she would. He loved the abandon, the way she gave herself to him without reservation. So responsive. So sensitive. So willing to let him take her to paradise. He loved giving her that. He loved seeing her pleasure. He loved it more than when she gave it to him, and that was saying something. He lapped at the honey spilling from her body, his private reserve of nectar.

He took his time, changing his rhythm, licking and sucking slowly, languidly, leisurely, and then when her hips were helplessly bucking, he used his tongue to invade, to push deep. He used his mouth on her clit, suckling, flicking with his broad, flat tongue, adding the edge of his teeth until she was screaming for release.

Eli didn’t give it to her this time. He wanted to be inside her. Surrounded by her. He knew when he entered her she’d come apart instantly, shatter around him, and the way her delicate muscles would work his cock would be exquisite. He needed that. Needed to feel that small death and rebirth.

He moved fast, startling her, cupping her rear, dragging her to him as he knelt between her legs. He entered her in one fast, hard surge, driving through the soft folds, feeling her stretch to accommodate the thick, hard invasion. Her breath hissed out of her lungs, out of his. She screamed as her body clamped down like a vise around his, surrounding him with a tight, hot, velvet grip. Her muscles milked at him, grasped hungrily, greedily.