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Chapter Nineteen

Xochil

I ’ve always teased my mated cousins and friends over the troublesome mates they’d gotten. Now, as I heard my mate telling me to be quiet after making me moan, I knew I was going to eat every single one of my teasing words.

With a growl, I pulled her up until she was straddling me. She squealed, her hands landing on my chest to steady herself. I looked down at where her hands were grasping my breasts and then back up at her with a smirk.

“If you wanted to touch my breasts again, you didn’t need to pretend to be falling, my love.”

The look of outrage on her face made me grin, but then I squealed and bucked when she took one of my nipples in her hand and pinched it.

Laughter bubbled out of both of us. Aline’s laughter was maniacal while mine was one of surprise. Once I’d recovered from the shock, I grabbed her by the hips and flipped her over, tickling her all over, letting her uninhibited laughter fill my soul for a few moments before I got to work.

Erinda and I had waited as patiently as we could so she could do what she wanted to us, but my patience had run out for the night. As one hand continued to hold my mate down, the other wandered down toward her core while I dipped my head down to her neck. Goddess, who would have known that her scent was so strong here? I sure as fuck didn’t. I could live with my face in her neck, and I couldn’t wait for the day I could leave my mark on her neck, and smell the way her orchid smell mixed with mine.

Aline’s chuckles turned into moans as my finger speared her core, and I smiled against her neck. I would never get tired of that sound, especially after being afraid I wouldn’t ever get to hear it again with the way she reacted to finding out I was a werewolf. I was still surprised she was letting me touch her this soon. Even though she cuddled with me this morning, I didn’t dare hope it meant she was on the way to accepting me.

Then, she called me mate, and now, I couldn’t help but hope. Hope and show her how much I loved her, so I continued to kiss down her neck toward her luscious tits, praying she could feel the love through the bond. Mom said she felt my pain, so if she felt even a tenth of my love right now, there was hope for us.

“Xochil,” she gasped when I curled my fingers to find her G-spot, and I pulled her nipple into my mouth. My name falling from her lips like that sent a shot of lust through my body.

Her hands moved to my hair, and I savored the sting as she curled her fingers around the tresses and pushed her breast further into my mouth. Smothered against her breasts is the way I wanted to die one day. I added another finger into her center and sped up a little, desperate to see her fall apart again.

She moaned loudly and released my hair, shifting until I was at her side instead of on top. I released her nipple with a pop and looked up at her face as I felt her hands gripping and massaging my ass.

She leaned forward and took my bottom lip into her mouth, making me groan at the flash of pain and then in disappointment when she released it. Instead, she pushed me further back, until the only part of me touching her was the hand working her tight center. She kissed me hard again, this time taking her hand down to my folds and pressing against my clit, swallowing my moan as the pressure sent a wave of electricity pulsing from the center through my entire body.

I ripped my mouth from hers, wrapped an arm around her waist, and brought her closer, needing to feel every bit of her against me. I couldn’t help gasping when she inserted two fingers inside me, her eyes hooded as I continued to pump inside her. We were forehead to forehead, and the intimacy of the moment was driving my pleasure higher and higher.

This could be my future. The woman in my arms, giving me pleasure and looking at me like I was her world. The knowledge of knowing that could be mine was driving me closer and closer to the edge.

I pressed my thumb to her clit while pumping into her heated core and began to feel her trembling, her walls fluttering around my fingers. To my surprise, she wrapped her other hand around the back of my neck and brought my lips to her neck.

“Mark me,” she whispered, and I froze. She pulled back to look at my face, doubt appearing on her face. “Don’t you want to?” she asked.

“A-Aline. You don’t know what you’re asking…” I trailed off, closing my eyes while Erinda was barking at me to shut up in the back of my head.

But I couldn’t mark her without her knowing what it meant. I couldn’t live with myself if she tied herself to me for life without knowing.

“What do you mean?” she asked, pulling away from me and sitting up.

Her absence against my skin was already killing me, and I prayed to the Moon Goddess for the right words, so she would stop looking at me with such a hurt look. The same hurt that was flowing through the bond.

“A mating mark is permanent, Aline. It’s not something that can be taken back. If I marked you, we would remain connected until death. You would be able to feel what I’m feeling. The good and the bad. Depending on how strong our bond becomes, when the bond breaks, the pain of it would be excruciating and, as a human, it has the potential to kill you.”

“What do you mean ‘when the bond breaks’? You just said it was permanent. How can a bond be permanent and break?” she wanted to know.

“When a mate dies, the bond breaks. It’s painful, and can claim the life of the human or wolf.”

Her eyes widened, and I saw fear flicker in her eyes for a moment before they were replaced by a guarded emotion I couldn’t decipher.

“And you don’t want to do that. Your mom mentioned wolves tend to live longer, age slower.” She nodded, more to herself than to me, as if her reasoning appeared to make sense to her.

I tried to take her hand, but she moved it out of the way, and pain lanced through me at the rejection. Her hand moved to her chest, and she frowned as she rubbed at it.

“Mom was right,” I whispered.

“What?”

“You can feel the bond,” I answered her.

“What are you talking about?”

“Can you feel sparks when we touch?”

“Like static electricity. Yes.”

“That’s the bond,” I told her. “And the way you rubbed at your chest. You could feel my pain.”

“Your pain?”

“When you pulled your hand away from me as I reached for you, it hurt. It felt like you were rejecting my touch, and it hurt,” I answered, rubbing my chest like she had.

“I-I didn’t—”

“Didn’t mean to hurt me? I know. But you’re wrong.”

“What am I wrong about?” she asked.

“I didn’t stop because I didn’t want to mark you. I want nothing more than to claim you and to have you accept me,” I told her, watching the way her breath caught. “But I don’t want to claim you in the heat of the moment, without you knowing what it means, and then have you resent me or hate me for not telling you what it meant. You think that pain in your chest is aching now? Knowing you hated me for not explaining would be ten times more painful for me, and with my mark on your neck, you would feel every part of it.”

Aline was silent for a minute, looking at me as she fell into deep thought. I picked at a loose thread on the blanket, trying to be patient as she thought about the ramifications of everything I’d said to her. To a shifter, everything I’d explained was common knowledge. Ingrained in our DNA from the moment we were conceived and taught to us from an early age. It was as much a part of us as our wolf was. We were no more afraid of the knowledge than we would be of falling and breaking a bone. But it wasn’t the same for Aline, and I didn’t know if in her eyes, a life with me would be worth the risk.

“Is that all I don’t understand about the mate bond?” she finally asked.

“What?” I asked.

“Do I know everything there is to know about becoming your mate now, or is there more?”

“Th-that’s all,” I answered.

She stood up and paced the room. My heart sank as I watched her picking up her clothes and mine. I took in her beautiful glowing brown skin and the curves of her body, drinking it in for the last time, before she would pull on her clothes and walk away. But, instead of putting on her clothes, she dropped them on the chair in the corner of the room and came to stand in front of me.

She held out her hand to me, and I took it, unable to keep my hand from shaking as I reached for her. She guided me around to the other side of the bed. She sat down on the edge but didn’t release my hand. Instead, she pulled me forward until I was standing between her legs. She had to look up to meet my eyes, and she took a deep breath before she let it out in a sigh.

“I get that I don’t understand everything that goes on with your world, and I appreciate that you didn’t want to trap me into something that can’t be undone. But I did pay attention to your mom and Cory. I did ask questions about what it means to accept you—to let you mark me…” She took another deep breath. “Before I met you, I was burning out, lonely, stressed and afraid. I trusted no one and kept everyone at a distance. In the short time I’ve known you, I’ve laughed more than I had in a year. I trust not only you, but your huge family to help me and keep me safe. You’ve done so much for me without asking for anything in return. You never pushed. All you’ve asked is to be near me. I’ve never had anyone who just wanted to be with me. Not demanding anything but my love. You brought your people halfway around the world to help me with a problem you could have just walked away from. Your dad convinced my grandmother not to do something that would take her away from me.”

She pushed back on the bed until she was resting against the headboard, pulling me with her until I was straddling her in order to keep the contact she wanted.

“It might be too soon to say I love you,” she said, crushing the little hope that had begun to claw its way up my chest. “But, I love you, Xochil. I don’t want to play it safe. I don’t want to keep you at arm’s length. I want to be with you and experience everything that comes with being your mate. So, give me everything you have, mate. Love me. Bite me. Make me yours.”

She wrapped her hand behind my neck and brought me forward, until I was tucked into her neck, her marking spot under my lips. Erinda howled with joy in the back of my head, and I lost the last thread of sanity and objections when Aline’s hand wedged itself between us and found my core again. I moaned when she plunged her fingers back inside me, and then I focused on getting her ready for my mark. I licked, sucked and kissed the spot on her shoulder that would become the resting place of my mark, while using my fingers to bring her back quickly to the edge.

I was desperate now. Desperate to feel the connection between us strengthen. Desperate to feel her fall apart for me. Desperate to fall off that edge with her.

“More!” she begged when I felt her walls fluttering. She curved her fingers into me, hitting that spot that made me fall apart. I moaned as I pulled from her neck for a moment, and couldn’t help but smile when she protested. “Mark me, Xochil. I need to feel you claim me. Please, I want you.”

I let Erinda come forward with me, and I looked my mate in the eye, letting her see the way my teeth lengthened. When I saw she wasn’t afraid, I buried myself in her neck, and just as I felt her orgasm and mine pull us under, I sank my teeth into her shoulder, completing the bond and marking her as my mate for the rest of our lives.

She cried out in pain and pleasure as we rode the crest of our orgasms. I withdrew my teeth from her neck and sealed it with a pass of my tongue over the wound, then kissed it while she continued to hold me tight. I buried my face in the crook of her neck, inhaling our combined scent, and enjoying her feeling of contentment and happiness through the bond.

She was mine now.

She had accepted me.

She said she loved me.

A sudden sob interrupted my joy, and I pulled back, concerned. I cupped her face in my hands, wiping the tears from her cheeks.

“What’s wrong? Did I hurt you?”

“I didn’t… I didn’t understand,” she sobbed, and my heart sank. I tried to pull my hands from her face, but she clasped her own over mine, keeping them there. “You said you loved me, but I didn’t understand the depth of what that meant. I can feel you, Xochil. I can feel your love for me.”

Relief flooded me at her words.

“I thought you were regretting letting me mark you,” I admitted.

“I know. I felt your pain, too,” she sobbed.

“I can shut down my side of the bond. Close it so you don’t feel so much,” I informed her, not wanting to see the tears on her face again.

My mate should be happy. Always.

“Don’t you dare,” she warned me. “I’ve never felt anything so beautiful.”

She buried her face in my chest, and I wrapped my arms around her, letting her feel everything. It would take her a little while to get used to it, but we had forever now. I pulled us down onto the bed and then covered us under the sheets, cocooning us in our own little world.

Once she calmed down, we talked, kissed and held each other for a couple of hours, before her eyes began to droop and we fell asleep, my dreams showing me glimpses of what I hoped was my life with her.