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Prologue

FERGUS

The Scottish Highlands

1687

The castle teemed with dragons.

But I was only interested in one.

He watched me from a chair adjacent to the fire, his green eyes tracking my movements as I swiped a soapy cloth over my chest.

My skin heated, and it wasn’t from the dancing blaze or the tub of hot water I sat in. From the moment I’d met him, Bram McGregor had been capable of leveling me with a look. Of seducing me with nothing more than a casual glance.

But that was to be expected, given that he was my fated mate. The months leading up to our mating ceremony had been torture. I’d wanted to seal our union right away—to sneak off and say the words that would bind us together for all time.

He’d insisted on waiting. “I want to do it properly,” he’d said, nipping at my bottom lip in a quiet corner of the castle. He’d let me pull him there while the servants planned the menu for the post-ceremony feast, but then he’d caged me in with his arms against the wall on either side of my head, his big body warming mine from chest to thigh.

“Can’t wait,” I’d rasped against his lips. Using the swordsman’s reflexes drilled into me since birth, I’d shoved him away, then spun him around and pushed him face-first against the wall. I’d pressed my hips forward, my shaft lined up perfectly with the cleft of his ass. “I won’t wait.”

He moved fast, reversing our positions in a maneuver that left me dizzy and clutching the wall. But my head cleared quickly at the feel of his erection against my ass and the sharp pinch of his teeth at my neck.

“You will,” he murmured, a smile in his voice. He licked the spot he’d bitten, and a moan escaped me before I could stifle it. “And when I’m ready to make you mine at last, Fergus Devlin, you’ll thank me for it.”

Despite the arousal clouding my brain, I managed a startled laugh. “I’ll thank you?”

“Aye.” A rough hand rifled under my kilt, and then his fist wrapped around my cock in a possessive grip. A familiar grip—as if he knew how to handle me already.

“Bram,” I said, my voice like gravel and my cock hard to the point of pain. “Please.”

Warm breath had tickled my ear as he laughed softly. “See? You’re halfway there. Please before and thank you after.” He’d released my cock and delivered a light swat on my bare ass. “I promise it’ll be worth the wait.”

That promise gleamed in his eyes as he watched me now, his hands resting lightly on the arms of his chair. The muffled sounds of feasting drifted up from the Great Hall below. Our kind had come from every corner of the Highlands to witness our joining. Given the devastation that had plagued our race in past centuries, any mating was cause for celebration.

Bram rose from his chair and walked to the tub, his kilt swinging around his thighs.

I raised a brow. “You going to join me?”

He shook his head and extended a hand.

The heat under my skin flared higher. Without being totally conscious of what I was doing, I let him pull me to my feet. Water sluiced down my chest and legs, but I hardly noticed. My attention was on the dark-haired, golden-skinned male in front of me. His green eyes traveled a searing path down my body. As soon as his gaze reached my cock, I let out a strained moan. Something about standing nude before him—and freshly washed at that—while he remained fully clothed set a torch to every nerve ending I possessed.

He seemed to know it, too, because he dragged his emerald gaze back up in a slow, possessive glide that sent fire barreling through my veins. “I’m not going to join you, Fergus. I’m going to take you.”

I knew what he meant. He couldn’t be more obvious about his preferences. That I was willing to accommodate him proved fate had chosen well for both of us. But I couldn’t resist teasing him a little. “Oh really?” I pulled his hips to mine, a thrill jumping through me when our dicks met. “And will you always be the one doing the taking?”

“It depends.”

The fine hairs on my arms lifted, his words conjuring a world of filthy possibilities in my brain. “On what?”

“On whether you please me.”

As I had against the castle wall, I choked out a laugh even as fresh desire blasted me. “That’s a tall order. Are you sure I’m the right male for the task?”

He gripped my cock.

I stopped laughing.