Chapter 8 #3
It dawned on me. Something I never even considered before.
Gareth was a shifter male. He was part wolf, and currently he was partially shifted, which meant he was equally as much a wolf as he was a man until he shifted back.
I didn’t know much about the wild animals themselves yet, but I did know that when wolves mated, they produced something called a knot.
It was a strange part of their anatomy that physically locked a male and a female together to mate.
It was a biological response. Something that better ensured the production of offspring. Thank the goddess for birth control.
I felt that knot right now, locking us tightly to one another. I should have been freaked out by it, but somehow I wasn’t. If anything, it just excited me even more.
Gareth kissed my shoulder, licking the bite wound to lessen the sting. Then, slowly, he lowered us both to the ground, him lying behind me, spooning me as he wrapped his thick arms around me for warmth. “Let me feel you,” he whispered against my hair. “My mate…”
Something in my brain clicked at those words.
It was a physical feeling, as if I was opening some kind of mental door, allowing him to take a step through.
Suddenly, everything was heightened. His heartbeats, his intake of breath, the blood rushing under his skin, his smell, his touch...
He was everywhere all at once, and it was dizzying.
We laid there for close to twenty minutes before I felt the knot behind me recede.
Eventually, he was able to pull himself free.
He got to his feet first, slipping on his shorts before helping me to my feet.
I pulled down my oversized shirt, suddenly feeling the bone-deep chill in the midnight wind.
His arms encircled me, and I let myself sink against his chest, burying my face against him as I breathed in deeply.
It hit me a moment later that his scent had changed.
I pulled back, looking up into his eyes.
They were still bright and glowing with that inner light, and he smiled down at me softly, pushing my hair back from my face.
“You smell like me,” I whispered in awe.
He laughed, and the rumble of it sent a flush of warmth through my whole body, like a blanket against the chill. “And you smell like me now. You’re mine.”
“And you're mine,” I added with a grin. I was giddy and nervous. But mostly giddy. “What does this mean for us?” It was probably a stupid question, but I needed to know. I felt like I was standing on the edge of a cliff, and one word from him would send me sailing over the edge and into oblivion.
He cupped my cheeks, his warm palms caressing me softly as he placed a gentle kiss on my cold lips.
“It means we’re going to spend the rest of our lives, however many centuries it might last, by each other's sides. I’ll kill any male that tries to come between us.
” I opened my mouth to object, but he laughed again.
“Except for those two fucking assholes. They’re lucky we have an agreement, or else I’d race you back to the cabin and slaughter them before you could ever stop me. ”
I nearly choked on my own spit at that morbid admission, but something in his eyes told me that he was one hundred percent serious about that. I shook my head. “Wait, you're in on it, too?”
“What, the agreement?” he asked, raising a brow. “Of course I am.” He rubbed his arms up and down my arms as snow began to fall around us. “That night in your room before everything went to shit, we had a discussion while you were sleeping.”
Now it was my turn to give him a look. “Did you now...?” I asked skeptically. “And what was all this gossip then?”
He grinned devilishly, and I breathed a massive sigh of relief because I could sense the old Gareth rearing his head. “Oh, you know, I simply informed them that I intended to lay claim to you as a mate and that if they wanted to fight me for you, I was game.”
I smacked his chest. “You didn’t!”
He laughed. “I fucking did. But unfortunately, they're just as obsessed with your pretty ass as I am, and the warlock has magic that could probably turn me into a toad if he wanted to, so I figured I’d hear them out.” I rolled my eyes, picturing that exact scenario.
Gareth sighed, pulling me in closer to his warmth.
“I know how you feel about both of them. I can feel it whenever we’re all in the same room.
There’s this…electricity between the four of us that I’ve only seen once. ”
“And where was that?”
“With Serenity, August, Atlas, Faust, Merrick, and Bastian,” he said. “I never understood how my cousin could stand back and watch his mate be with other males. For a long time, I thought it made him weak. Less of an alpha.” He frowned, shaking his head at the thought.
“I was an idiot. I didn’t pay attention, but I think I get it now.
They’re a team. A family, and every one of them loves Serenity in their own way.
Even if it borders on obsessiveness. But I get it, because even if you chose not to be my mate, I would still follow you.
” My heart leapt around in my chest at his admission.
His lips pressed against mine again as I lifted up on my toes to reach him.
“I accept your feelings for Warrik and Thane on one condition.”
I pulled back, peering at him skeptically, my heart in my throat. “And what’s your condition?”
A deep rumbling emanated from his chest as he wrapped his arms tight around me again, sealing me to his body in a grip so tight I couldn’t move if I wanted to. He kissed my hair as the wind picked up and shafts of moonlight glinted off the snow-capped trees around us.
“As long as they know who loved you first. Or else I'll make their lives hell.”