18. Mate
MATE
did mother, cousin, and gus have to leave so
Those two could bounce without fur on?
Gus is pretty sure… yes.
— gus
“Ineed you,” I promise him. I think I always have, but as the mating dance wraps around us almost as effectively as Riordan’s curse…
it’s time I finally stop fighting it. “Tell me I’m lying, and we both walk away.
But if I’m telling the truth… you have two seconds to get me naked and on that bed if you want to claim your mate tonight. ”
It’s less than one before his hands are on me again.
We’re both completely naked, though I’m not so sure how that happened.
Maybe it was magic; later, I’ll laughingly say that, distracted by my beautiful mate’s sculpted chest, tapered waist, and gorgeous dick, my magic worked all on its own to remove our clothes for us. Either way, it doesn’t matter.
He lifts me, and I wrap myself around him without thinking, trusting him to lay me out on the bed. By the time he’s fumbling to join me on top of the comforter, I’m laughing against his mouth, and Riordan is looking at me with such stunned happiness that something inside me finally gives way.
Screw magic. When you have a love as predestined and undeniable as ours, that’s the true magic.
And that’s when I realize that, while we’re both suddenly naked, Riordan is drawing away from me.
I’m flat on my back, legs folded at the knees, my top half propped up on a couple of pillows.
My normally suave wolf shifter partner scoots backward awkwardly on his.
He’s upright, watching me as I stare up at him, unable to help wondering what the hell is going on while my anxiety shouts that he’s having second thoughts about Fate and me and all of this.
I’m as vulnerable as I’ve ever been—and suddenly very aware that I’m very naked—and he’s taking the sight of me spread out in front of him as though he can’t believe I’m real… or that I’ll actually let him fuck me.
One hand is curved around his erection, stroking it lightly as thought petting himself and telling his cock he has to be a good boy and wait.
His other hand reaches out, landing on my nearest knee. It takes a single touch before I trust my own instincts and let my legs fall open, revealing a glistening patch of red curls and my swollen pussy to him.
His eyes flash so brightly, I choke on my next breath. At this moment, I’m not sure if I’m looking at Riordan the male or Riordan the wolf as he gazes at my sex. Thankfully, when he inches reverentially toward me, reaching for me with his free hand, I don’t see claws.
Good thing, too, or when he reaches for my center, running two fingers down my slit, it wouldn’t be half as pleasurable if his wolf made an appearance.
Same as when his eyes flutter closed, the big male muttering about how soft I am, how hot I am, how wet I am…
one finger dips inside of me, gathering up enough moisture to satisfy his male need to know I want him.
The delighted squeal I let out at his first penetration doesn’t hurt, either.
Riordan cracks open his eyes, lifting his fingers to his mouth. He laps at one, then the next, grumbling softly as he grates out, “You are fucking delicious, witch. I could eat you for breakfast, lunch, and dinner if you left me.”
“For every meal if that’s what you want,” I agree huskily.
“Only, I don’t know if it’s this mating dance thing or if I’m finally letting myself admit how much I’ve been dying to find out what your cock feels like ever since you shifted in front of me and I got my first peek of that monster between your legs, but I don’t think I can wait much longer. ”
He chuckles. “That wasn’t the first time I caught a hint of your arousal and knew it was for me, but it was the first time I let myself think… maybe. Maybe we had a chance. Maybe I’d finally find out for myself what it was like to bed my mate.”
I dig my fingers in the sheets beneath me. “This is your chance, Chief Deputy Lobo.”
He gives me a look.
I smile breathlessly in return. “Mate me, Riordan. Make me yours. Then we’ll both find out what it’s like, won’t we?”
I don’t have the ability to give an order and make someone listen. I didn’t think I would have to when it comes to Riordan, but instead of moving any closer, he stays at my feet, suddenly hesitating.
I swallow roughly, casting aside my very obvious arousal for the moment to look up at him with concern. “Riordan? If you don’t want to—”
“No. No. I want to… it’s just. I don’t want to hurt you, Pen--”
“You won’t.”
He gives his cock another, rougher stroke. “You called my cock a monster. You’re smaller than me, witch. What if--”
“I promise you, we’ll fit,” I tell him, cutting him off. “Isn’t that how it works? I’m your mate. Your fated mate. If your goddess picked me out for you, then I have to be able to take you.”
I have no doubt about that.
His face shadows over. He’s straining toward me, his big body wanting nothing more than to climb up on me, but for some reason, he’s still holding back.
And, suddenly, I know exactly why he is.
“I’m not afraid of you, Riordan,” I tell him, pushing myself up so that I’m resting on my elbows. My stomach is tight, my chest heaving enough that my boobs are super obvious, and Riordan is gobbling me up with his gaze as I keep my legs open to him. “I want this. I want you.”
It must finally sink in, too, because that’s the last thing I have to say before he murmurs my name like a prayer and moves like the predator he is.
Before I know it, he’s on top of me at last, my arms are wrapped around him, holding him tight, and while he fumbles at first, inserting himself inside of me, mating is instinctive and, suddenly, he’s breaching my entrance, giving me everything he has in one possessive thrust that has me crying out his name to Hecate herself.
Just as our bodies finally come together as Fate has suggested and we both know it’s right, there’s a moment when everything inside of me believes that, for the first time in my life, this sort of magic is something that actually comes easy.
Then again, mating is easy when you have an attentive partner that is both gentle and consuming at the same time.
Loving is easy when the male flicking your nipples and kissing your neck and fucking you so intently, you forget everyone who’s ever comes before him and will never come after is Riordan Lobo.
My lover.
My mate.
Because, by the time Riordan’s mouth finds the curve where my neck meets my shoulder, I already know what’s going to happen next, though the only speaking we’re doing is a symphony of pants and groans, pleas and promises.
I know what he’s going to do. What his instincts must be screaming at him to accomplish.
And, yet, Riordan still pauses.
Even now. With his body buried deep inside of me, my nails digging into the taut muscles on his back as he presses his weight down on me in the bed, he pauses mid-thrust so that he can make sure that I’m one hundred percent with him.
His breathing is ragged against my skin.
His entire body is tense, his wolf so close that I can feel the faint scrape of elongated teeth when his lips brush my neck.
Before Moonburrow, if I was ever in this situation again, I think I would rather die than sense fangs about to sink into my skin.
I believed that I would be tied to that feral, and now that I know bonding only takes when both partners are open to and accepting of that tie, I probably would’ve fought back even harder if another feral attacked me.
But this isn’t a feral kissing me softly while fighting the urge to pull out and slam back into me.
This is Riordan. The male that is meant to be my mate, that I finally know has thought of himself as my mate for months, and who will only be my mate if he bites me as the same time as he comes, leaving his mark on my skin and inside my body.
I know he’s close. From the moment he gasped into my mouth, telling me how long he’s been waiting for me…
I already understood that our first mating would be something all-consuming and memorable, but it wouldn’t be an evening of leisurely love-making.
That can come after, but from the moment Riordan was fully seated, claiming my pussy as soon as I assured him I could take him… I expected him to nut quickly.
Only he’s trying to hold out, and when he shudders my name against my skin, I’m pretty sure I know why.
“Pen…”
“Yes.”
One word. Another affirmative. That’s all he needs. To know that he asked me to choose him and that, at my most vulnerable, I can still find it in me to tell him that I want this… that I want him… Yes, Riordan. Make me your mate.
With one perfectly positioned strike, he does.
This is the worst possible moment to think of my previous lovers, but I can’t help it.
I’ve been with male witches who thought they were lotharios who couldn’t find my clit with a locator spell.
I’ve been with humans that heard me mutter ‘Goddess’ in disappointment as they came without doing little more to stimulate me than tug on a nipple once or twice and think that I was crying out to my deity in gratitude.
I don’t always come during sex, but whether it’s because this is my first time with my new mate or because bonding is that fucking magical, I don’t know.
All I can tell is that I barely notice the pain of being bitten because, right as he penetrates me fully with his fangs, he does the same with his cock. So full of Riordan in every way that counts, the mate bond slams into place so suddenly, I hit the hardest climax I ever have in my life.
That has to be what happened. There’s no other way to describe it.
One second Riordan is someone outside of me, someone I love—because I do, and I can have a breakdown about realizing that later—and the next there’s a connection between us so powerful that I can feel him inside of me—and I don’t just mean his dick.
Riordan shudders against me, putting as much of his weight on me as I can handle as he experiences what it’s like to have me on the other side of our newly cemented mate bond.
And that’s not all. Somewhere beneath that, something else snaps. It’s almost nothing compared to the bond, but I’m a cursebreaker. There’s no way I don’t notice it when, after fifteen years, the curse wrapped around Riordan fractures.
I didn’t even realize my eyes had closed as I came down from the high of my own orgasm. I open them just in time to watch the neon green magic break, looking less like smoke and more like cracked glass.
A heartbeat later, the curse shatters completely. Green sparks scatter over his skin and vanish before they can touch the sheets. The twisted magic buried inside his alpha power simply ceases to exist, leaving behind Riordan’s own magic, warm and wild and entirely his.
I smile, squeezing whatever part of him I can reach. His side, I think. Maybe. I keep my hands on Riordan—on my mate—and say giddily, “We did it, Riordan. Your curse… it broke.”
For a moment, he just angles his sweat-slicked face so that he can stare down at me.
I wonder if he’s going to have second thoughts. If he’s going to let doubt come in and convince himself that I only did this because I would do anything to break a curse. If he’s going to—
He closes his eyes and exhales.
The relief that moves through our brand new bond is so enormous that tears sting mine.
He presses his forehead to my shoulder, breathing hard, and I hold him while he realizes that, for the first time in fifteen years, the next careless command out of his mouth can’t steal anyone’s free will.
More importantly, he lost his curse, but he finally claimed his mate.
Which is why, because he’s still Riordan, curse or no curse, he doesn’t spend long celebrating his own freedom before his attention returns to me.
To his mate.
His mouth brushes the new bite at my shoulder.
I shiver.
He does it again, slower this time, his tongue soothing the angry bloody mark he left behind that, come tomorrow, should be a silver mate mark that tells the entire supe world that I belong to this male.
“Riordan,” I groan.
A low, satisfied sound rumbles through his chest as I cry out his name.
But then he chuckles, and says, “Sorry, my mate, but you really are such a sweet, sweet witch,” and any doubts I had about rushing things with this male… yeah. They’re gone as quickly as the residue left over from his shattered curse.
And I couldn’t be fucking happier.