Chapter 19
POV: Riven
For a moment, I couldn’t move.
I couldn’t breathe.
I couldn’t do anything except stare at her.
Amara stood in front of me wrapped in Lyra’s blanket, her dark hair a mess from the shift, her cheeks flushed, her green eyes bright with tears and disbelief and a hundred emotions I knew because I was feeling every single one of them.
Mine.
The word crashed through me again.
Mine.
Not because I owned her. Not because she belonged to me. Because she was mine in the way the moon belonged to the night sky.
The way a heartbeat belonged to a living chest.
The way I’d spent fourteen years searching for something I had almost convinced myself didn’t exist.
My mate.
My knees felt weak.
I laughed because if I didn’t laugh, I thought I might actually break apart right there in front of everyone.
“Lyra,” I said hoarsely.
My sister was crying and laughing at the same time.
“It’s her.”
“Yes, idiot,” she shot back immediately. “It’s her.”
The room erupted into noise around us. People were cheering. Joseph was saying something.
Guinevere was crying. Someone was laughing. But all of it sounded distant.
Because Amara was still staring at me, and then she reached for my hand.
The moment her fingers wrapped around mine, everything settled.
The ache.
The hunger.
The constant tension that had lived beneath my skin for years.
Gone.
Just gone.
Her eyes softened.
Then confusion flickered across her face.
“Wait.”
My smile faded.
“Amara—”
“No.” She tightened her grip on my hand. “No, before you carry me away or before Lyra starts throwing blankets at us again, I need an answer.”
A nervous laugh escaped Lyra.
“That is honestly fair.”
Amara didn’t even look at her. Her eyes stayed locked on mine.
“Why did you send me away?”
The question hit like a blade. The joy was still there. The relief was still there.
But guilt crashed into it so hard my chest hurt. Because she deserved an answer.
She deserved every answer.
I exhaled slowly, then I lifted my hand and brushed my knuckles against her cheek.
“The Oak Alpha line carries a curse.”
The entire room seemed to grow quieter.
“My father carried it. I carry it.”
I swallowed.
“If we take someone who isn’t our mate, we die.”
Amara froze. I forced myself to continue.
“When I was younger, my mother died. Years later my father found another woman. He cared about her. Maybe he even loved her.” The memory rose sharp and brutal. “I watched him choose her anyway.” My voice grew rough. “I watched him ignore the curse.”
Pain flashed through Lyra’s eyes. She remembered it too.
“He died three days later.”
Silence.
Heavy.
Absolute.
“I watched it happen.” My throat tightened. “I watched him scream. I watched him bleed. I watched him die.”
Amara’s eyes widened.
“Oh God…”
“So when you came to Oak…” I laughed bitterly. “When I saw you walk into my office, everything went wrong.”
A soft snort escaped Lyra. I pointed at her.
“Everything.”
She rolled her eyes. Amara almost smiled. Almost.
“I was supposed to meet an old silver specialist.” I looked down at her. “Instead a beautiful scientist walked into my office and stole every intelligent thought I had.”
Color flooded her cheeks.
“Riven—”
“I spent all this time telling myself to stay away from you.” I shook my head. “It didn’t work.”
“It definitely didn’t work,” Lyra muttered.
I ignored her.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”
The confession felt terrifying, and freeing.
“I couldn’t stop wanting to be near you.”
Amara’s eyes glistened.
“I thought you hated me.”
The words shattered something inside me.
“No.” My answer came instantly. “No, Amara.” I stepped closer.“I was terrified.” Her breath caught. “I was terrified because I wanted you anyway.”
The truth hung between us.
Raw.
Ugly.
Honest.
“I knew what the curse could do.”
I lowered my voice.
“And I was still considering it.”
Shock crossed her face.
“What?”
“I was considering choosing you anyway.”
The room went completely silent.
Because everyone understood what that meant.
I laughed once.
A broken sound.
“I spent years preparing myself to live without a mate.” My eyes burned. “I built my entire life around control.”
I looked directly at her.
“And then you showed up.”
Amara’s lips trembled. I brushed away a tear before it could fall.
“When I sent you away, it wasn’t because I didn’t want you.”
The confession nearly broke me.
“It was because I wanted you too much.”
Her eyes filled instantly.
“Riven…”
Lyra stepped closer.
“It was the silver.”
Both of us looked at her.
“The exposure delayed everything.”
She pointed toward Amara.
“Her heat.” Then toward me. “The bond.”
Her smile turned watery.
“You weren’t missing each other.” The realization hit me all over again. “You were waiting for each other.”
Amara let out a shaky laugh, a tear slipped down her cheek, I caught it with my thumb.
Fourteen years.
Fourteen years of waiting.
Fourteen years of wondering.
Fourteen years of believing fate had forgotten me.
And she had been there all along.
When I finally wrapped my arms around her, she came willingly.
Like she belonged there.
Like she’d always belonged there.
I buried my face against her hair and laughed. Actually laughed. The sound felt foreign coming out of me.
For once, I didn’t care.
For once, I wasn’t the Alpha.
I wasn’t the cursed heir. I wasn’t the man holding the entire pack together through sheer force of will. I was just a male who had finally found his mate.
Behind us, Lyra groaned dramatically. “For the love of the Moon Goddess, would you two please go to your room?”
That finally made Amara laugh.
The sound hit me harder than any battle ever had.
I looked at her. Really looked at her.
And for the first time since she had walked into my life, there was no fear attached to it.
Only certainty.
Only relief.
Only love.
Then I bent, hooked an arm beneath her knees, threw her over my shoulder despite her indignant yelp, and headed toward the pack house while everyone laughed behind us.
For the first time in fourteen years, the future didn’t terrify me.
For the first time in fourteen years, it felt like it was finally beginning.
I opened the bedroom door and walked in with Amara over my shoulder, and it was impossible not to remember the first time I had brought her here.
Back then, she had been terrified of her heat, terrified of everything happening to her. She had been scared, confused, vulnerable.
Beautiful.
And I had been terrified too.
Terrified that she wasn’t my mate.
Terrified of how much I wanted her anyway.
Gently, I lowered her onto my bed. The blanket wrapped around her shoulders slipped slightly as she settled against the mattress, and for a moment I simply stood there, looking at her.
God.
She was so fucking beautiful.
My gaze traveled over her face, her hair, the soft curve of her body beneath the blanket. I had spent so many nights trying not to think about her, trying not to imagine this exact moment, and now she was here.
Mine.
The realization still felt unreal.
I climbed onto the bed and covered her body with mine. Somewhere behind me, the blanket wrapped around my own waist loosened and fell away, but I barely noticed.
The only thing I could see was her.
The only thing I could feel was her.
Her eyes searched mine with the same devotion, the same overwhelming emotion that was tearing through my chest.
“I waited all this time for you,” I whispered.
It was all I could manage before I kissed her.
Kissing Amara after the bond had settled between us felt completely different from anything before. Every kiss we’d shared until now had been tangled with fear, restraint, doubt, and pain.
This felt like coming home.
My mouth claimed hers, and she opened for me instantly. Our tongues tangled together as I drank in every sensation. I wanted everything. Every sound. Every touch. Every breath she gave me.
Her hands slid up my neck, and I felt her nails scrape lightly against my skin.
The sensation nearly shattered what little control I had left.
Then her hands drifted lower.
Across my chest.
My stomach.
My abdomen.
I was already hard, already aching, already struggling.
When her hand moved lower, almost reaching me, I caught her wrist.
I looked directly into her eyes.
“I waited fourteen fucking years for this,” I said roughly. “I need to take my time with you.”
A soft smile touched her lips.
I lifted her wrists above her head and kissed her again.
Slowly.
Deeply.
Like I could spend the rest of my life doing nothing else.
Then I moved lower.
I kissed her jaw.
Her neck.
The sensitive skin beneath her ear.
My gaze lingered on the place where my mark would someday rest, and a fierce possessiveness surged through me.
Soon.
Soon she would wear it.
I pressed another kiss there before moving lower, trailing my mouth across her collarbone.
Then her breasts.
I worshipped every inch of her.
The moment my mouth closed around one of her nipples, her entire body arched beneath mine.
A breathless sound escaped her lips.
My wolf nearly lost his mind.
She responded to every touch, every kiss, every brush of my tongue, and it only made me hungrier for her.
I had waited too long. Wanted her too long. Dreamed about her too long.
I wasn’t going to rush this.
I wanted to memorize every inch of her.
I kissed lower, following the line of her stomach.
Then lower still.
Across her hips.
Her thighs.
Her knees.
I pressed kisses along the inside of her legs, feeling them tremble beneath my hands. When I finally opened her thighs for me, my breath caught.
She was beautiful.
Perfect.
And she was mine.
I lowered my head and tasted her. A low sound escaped her throat instantly. Her sweet taste flooded my senses.
I had done this before, but before there had always been fear behind it. Fear of losing control. Fear of crossing a line I couldn’t come back from.
Fear of dying.
Now there was nothing except her.
Nothing except the bond.
Nothing except the overwhelming certainty that she belonged with me.
I could feel how ready she already was, how much she trusted me, and it nearly brought me to my knees.
For a moment, I forced myself to hold on to the last scraps of restraint I possessed.
I slid two fingers inside her.
She gasped.
So tight.
So warm.
My entire body tensed. I couldn’t stop imagining what it would feel like to be buried inside her. Couldn’t stop imagining finally having everything I’d denied myself for fourteen years.
My heart pounded violently against my ribs.
Still, I kept my pace slow.
Patient.
Giving her everything.
Watching every reaction.
Listening to every breath.
Every soft sound she made felt like a reward.
Like a miracle.
Like something I would never stop chasing.
And when she finally came apart beneath me, her entire body trembling as pleasure swept through her, I felt it all the way down to my bones.
The sight of her shattered what remained of my composure.
She was breathtaking.
And for the first time in fourteen years, I didn’t have to tell myself no.