She hesitates, then rises, moving around to stand before me. I pull her onto my lap, one hand gripping her hip, the other tangling in her hair to tug her head back.
“If you ever—ever—put yourself at risk like that again,” I growl against her throat, “I will lose my f*****g mind, Rowan. Do you understand me?”
She shivers, not with fear but with something darker. “Yes.”
“You think you’re protecting me?” I bite the sensitive juncture where her neck meets her shoulder, hard enough to mark her. “You think I need your protection?”
Her breath hitches. “Sometimes, yes.”
I stand abruptly, lifting her with me. Dinner forgotten, I carry her to the wall and pin her there, my body pressed against hers.
“I protect what’s mine,” I tell her, voice rough. “Not the other way around.”
Instead, her pup
