Need in his eyes, he knelt back and skimmed her shorts from her. Panties next, Carly helping, then Tiger tossed them both away, though her T-shirt remained pushed up around her shoulders.

Carly lay back down, heartbeat speeding, ready for the man who excited her and was excited by her.

Her breath left her when Tiger lifted her by the waist and flipped her over, drawing her up onto her hands and knees. Tiger pulled her hips back to the stiff c**k that she glimpsed before her hair tumbled into her face. Good God . . .

“Whoa, wait.” Carly squirmed away, turning to sit on the big bed, her T-shirt falling to cover her lap. “What are you doing?”

Tiger remained on his knees, his c**k pointing toward her—his long, thick, no-way-anyone-is-that-big cock. His brows drew down. “Mating.”

“I know that, but why the back door? You’re really . . . big. You’ll kill me.” Carly would die happy, but he was going to be a tight fit.

The c**k dipped slightly. “If it will hurt you, then . . . I won’t.”

Carly saw how much it cost him to say that. Tiger wanted her. He pulsed with it. She wanted him as well, with every pump of blood through her veins.

“I mean we should take it slow,” she said. “Let me get used to you. Me with the soft bed cushioning my back, you easing on top of me.”

The c**k went completely firm again, but the look on Tiger’s face was one of confusion.

Pieces of information clicked in Carly’s head—stuck in a cage, researchers, treated like an animal, given a mate. Not a girlfriend, or a wife, or a lover. A mate. Tiger hadn’t said whether the woman had been Shifter or human.

“Are you telling me you haven’t ever done it front to front?” she asked.

Tiger shook his head. “It was only the once.”

“Oh.” The loneliness of his words struck her to the heart. “You make me want to hug you more and more. Come here. I’ll show you. You’re a quick learner, I said. Now you can learn this.”

Tiger came to her so rapidly that Carly laughed. She stopped laughing when he took her down to the bed.

“Now you’re getting it.” Her words ceased as he kissed her, his mouth firm, no longer hesitant.

Carly wrapped one leg around his thigh, caressing his calf with her bare foot. She liked how he kissed her, mouth warm, taking but giving, knowing what he wanted and what she wanted. Tiger nipped her cheek, her neck, all the while his body shook as he held himself back.

Carly guided him with one hand on his hip, parting her legs so that he could come between them. His skin was hot but smooth, his ass tight as he moved over her. Carly raised her hips a little, her one leg up and around his, encouraging him with her hands to come on inside.

Tiger’s body heat covered her, and then his body. He brushed her tangled hair from her face, lips coming down in a long kiss as he slid inside her.

And stopped. Carly’s eyes opened wide. She was certainly wet enough for him, slippery and wanting, but she tightened, the sudden ecstasy turning to an aching.

“Wait.” She pressed her palm to Tiger’s chest, feeling his heart beating triple-time.

Tiger pulled out quickly, kneeling back, the look on his face one of anguish. “I’m hurting you.”

“Only because I’m not used to you.”

At least Carly hoped that was the explanation. It would be a tragedy if she’d finally met a man who made her feel like this and they couldn’t consummate their relationship . . . or whatever this was. For once in her life, Carly didn’t stop to analyze her connection with a man. She wasn’t thinking about whether he was going to run off with all her money, or whether he’d dump her after a few dates, or what it was they were building together, if anything.

She liked Tiger and wanted to be with him. Nothing more. No hidden agendas.

“How about we try it me on top of you?” she asked. “That way I can guide things, ease in however much I can take before we go on.”

From the look on Tiger’s face, it hadn’t occurred to him that this position was possible either. Carly seriously needed to work on his education.

She got to her knees. “Lie down.”

Carly pressed her hands to his chest again, and Tiger lay back on the sheets, his gaze never leaving her. The fading sunshine clearly showed the pink marks where Ethan had shot him, and more scars where the other bullets had come through. But the blood was gone, his skin whole again.

She climbed over him, positioning her knees on either side of him. His c**k was still stiff and long, Tiger waiting.

Carly pulled off her T-shirt, breathing a sigh as the fabric left her now-itchy skin. She tossed the shirt aside and filled her hands with Tiger’s swollen cock.

Large, but not unmanageable. She drew both hands up its sides, around the head, back down to his firm balls. His hair there was multicolored too—orange and black. She was falling in love with a man who was tiger-striped all the way down.

The thought made her smile. Carly leaned down and kissed the tip of his cock.

Two strong hands closed around her wrists. Tiger pulled her up, his eyes molten gold, his voice a growl. “Now. Do it now.”

Yes. Carly wanted him with every thought, every breath. Tiger wanted her too, she saw, was afraid he wouldn’t be able to contain himself.

Carly felt even sexier knowing he could barely hold it in for her. The fleeting thought of a condom ran through her head, but she knew one hadn’t been made that would fit Tiger. And she’d read somewhere that Shifters couldn’t give humans the illnesses that humans could give one another through sex.