Chapter 53. Driven by Instinct

Daniel POV

Four weeks had passed since I first felt the spark of our bond surge between us, and they had been a relentless test of my restraint. Four interminable weeks in which I’d forced myself to keep my hands to myself, while every fiber of my being screamed for release. Each day was agony, every hour an ordeal. In my mind’s eye I saw Elizabeth everywhere I went—her soft curves outlined beneath the shifting torchlight of the training hall, the gentle rise and fall of her breath in sleep, the subtle flush of her skin when she laughed. And yet I did nothing. I held back. I locked away the feral hunger in my belly, the primal ache in my crotch. All I wanted was to draw her close, bare her beneath me, and worship her body from crown to toe. But I’d vowed to wait. For her sake and for mine, I would not cross that line.

Still, temptation attacked me from every angle. I could claim small victories—an extended brush of fingertips as she passed me a water jug, a timid grazing