Chapter 4: Claimed in the Shadows

"Look at me... say you are mine!"

His voice was a deep, rough command that rattled the cold night air, shaking her straight to the bone.

She could barely breathe. Her eyes fluttered open, heavy with tears that pooled in her hair and washed into the black mud beneath her head. The darkness of the woods had settled thick around them, but his golden eyes burned through the shadows like two glowing coals, piercing right into her soul.

He did not wait for her to speak. Before she could force a word past her dry, trembling lips, he thrust his hips forward, driving his massive length deep into her tight, untouched body in one sharp, unforgiving push.

A high, breathless scream tore from her throat, but the sound was instantly lost to the wild wind howling through the tall pine trees above. A wall of blinding, white-hot pain split her in two. She felt as though her small body were being torn apart from the inside out, the sharp stretch of his broad frame breaking through her innocence without a second of mercy.

Her back arched off the cold ground, her knees shaking as her toes dug desperately into the wet soil. She tried to push him away, her small hands slapping frantically against his hard chest, but her weak blows felt like nothing to the beast crushing her down.

"Hold still," he rasped, his breath hot and ragged against her damp cheek. His jaw was set in a tight, pained line, his sharp teeth grinding together as he held himself buried deep within her. He was huge, filling her so completely that every tiny shift of his weight sent fresh waves of burning heat shooting through her lower belly. "Hold still, girl... let the fire settle."

"It hurts!" she sobbed, her fingers clawing at the muddy earth beside her head as fresh tears spilled over her lashes. "Take it out! Please, it hurts so much!"

He let out a low, guttural groan that vibrated straight through her chest. The agonizing fire that had been tearing through his blood for hours suddenly began to change. The moment he stretched her tight flesh, the unbearable curse in his heart eased, transforming the burning agony into a dark, heavy tide of raw pleasure. He felt her heat wrapping tightly around him, hugging his length like a velvet vise, pulsing with her fast, terrified heartbeat.

Driven by a desperate, wild instinct he could not control, he pulled back slightly and drove into her again.

She gasped, her fingers reflexively digging into the hard muscles of his broad shoulders as the second stroke hit her deeper than the first. He setting a fast, punishing rhythm, taking her right there in the dirt with a fierce, overwhelming passion that shattered her remaining strength. Each time his heavy hips slammed into hers, the force knocked the breath straight out of her lungs, sending heavy ripples through her small frame.

He was relentless. He moved like a creature possessed, his massive chest rising and falling in heavy, ragged thuds as he buried himself inside her over and over. He took her with a raw, primal strength that made the cold forest floor feel like it was shaking beneath them. The slick, wet sound of their joining mixed with the low, wild growls rising from his throat, drowning out the rustle of the leaves and the distant howling of the night wind.

"You are so soft," he muttered, his deep voice slipping into her ear like a dark spell. His mouth trailed down her jaw, his warm lips brushing against her sensitive skin while his sharp teeth lightly grazed her pulse point. "So small... yet you hold the storm in my blood. You belong to me now. Do you hear me? You are mine."

She shook her head blindly, her senses spinning out of control. She could not comprehend his words, could not understand why this dangerous, beautiful monster was whispering sweet, possessive promises while ripping her world apart. The pain in her body was so sharp, yet as he kept pushing into her with that heavy, steady rhythm, the sharp bite slowly began to twist into a strange, terrifying ache that made her heart race for a completely different reason.

His hand slid down her back, lifting her hips higher off the mud so he could drive deeper into her core. He set a harder, faster pace, his chest slick with sweat as he claimed her without rest. Every time he filled her, a soft, pathetic whimpering sound escaped her lips—a sweet, high-pitched noise that drove him even wilder.

"Say it," he growled low in his chest, his golden eyes flashing dark as he looked down at her flushed face. His thumb brushed over her wet lip, pressing hard into her mouth. "Say you are mine, little sound."

"I... I can't," she whimpered, her voice breaking into soft, breathless gasps as an unnatural warmth began to build deep in her lower belly. The strange sensation was overwhelming, coiled tight like a spring, making her hips lift up to meet his heavy thrusts without her permission. "Please... you're taking everything..."

"I am taking what is mine," he rasped back, his mouth slamming down onto hers once more.

He swallowed her cries, his tongue moving inside her mouth with the same possessive, rough rhythm as his hips. He held her pinned flat beneath him, his broad hands gripping her waist so tightly that his dark nails left light red marks on her pale skin. He was taking her completely—her body, her breath, her innocence—leaving no part of her untouched by his heat.

The woods around them seemed to shrink away, leaving only the sound of his heavy breathing, the slapping of flesh against flesh, and the wild, unstoppable surge of his passion. He pushed her further and further over the edge, his strokes becoming faster, harder, and more erratic as the pressure inside him reached a breaking point.

High above the dense forest canopy, the full moon reached its highest peak in the ink-black sky, casting a cold, silver light down through the bare branches.

The silver rays hit them just as he drove into her with a final, devastating force, burying his length to the absolute hilt.

A sharp, electric shock exploded through her body, causing her muscles to contract tightly around him as a wave of intense, unimaginable pleasure crashed over her mind. She let out a loud, breathless cry, her entire frame trembling violently beneath his heavy weight as the raw impact of his passion completely consumed her senses, leaving her utterly broken and helpless in the dark.