I turned my head until my lips were right near his ear and whispered, “I love you.”
He sucked in a breath, and a dam of emotion burst within him. He pulled back and thrust into me powerfully, the slide of him so fucking good. I rocked my hips up to meet him, clinging to his back as he strove, all his fear and misery and yearning in each thrust. I met each of them, working through my own darkness with every crash of our bodies. Exposing it and showing it to the light.
We struggled to get closer. To get deeper. To meet each other in this place of fear and uncertainty and fuse ourselves together so that we didn’t have to endure it alone ever again. I raked my teeth down his neck, and he shuddered in ecstasy.
Not yet, my dragon said, basking in the feeling of his body filling mine, of his power swirling within ours. The bond locked me in, cradling me in his strength and power. I knew I needed to give him the same connection. I needed to create a safe place for him to retreat to—a place within himself, and me, that he could hide without the world knowing he needed to.
He rose a little, allowing more movement, bending to continue our kiss, to deepen it. The friction, his power, the slick slide of his cock pounding into my pussy—
An orgasm tore through me, making me cry out into his kiss. He didn’t stop, daring me to come harder. His dragon daring me to build more power.
They were showing us the way to claim.
Still he strained, the sounds of my groans and our sex filling the room. The bed creaked under our movement. His hips slapped against mine. I built again, higher this time, harder, the power between us throbbing.
“I love you,” I said again, arching back as he worked, pushing my legs wider now, needing him deeper. Needing more.
“You are everything,” he replied, bracing on his palms on the bed as he ground into me.
I gripped his shoulders then grabbed his hair, about to pull him to me again for a bite.
Not yet, my dragon said, her power flirting with Nyfain’s dragon. Coaxing him. Playing. Wait until we start to wrestle.
Nyfain’s hips jerked in intense thrusts, branding me with pleasure, doing as he’d promised and ruining me for any other man. How stupid Micah had been to think I would walk away from this. To think my love was so shallow that I cared about the color of Nyfain’s scales or the absence of his wings.
How stupid I’d been, confused by a fluttering belly and the intensity of Micah’s presence. He could never compare to Nyfain. I’d found where I fit, and I did not plan to ever let go.
I came again, unexpectedly. Then, again, the waves of pleasure rolled through me, spiraling with the victory of coming home. Of defeating the demons. My high was met and built upon by his body, by the hard push of his cock.
“Yes, baby,” I said, moving against him, my pleasure escalating higher and higher. “Fuck—”
I gritted my teeth as another orgasm took hold of me. The dragons shoved power between each other now, turning more aggressive.
Fuck him hard, my dragon said, the push and pull of our animals spilling over into us.
I shoved at Nyfain with my will, trying to roll him over so I could climb on. He resisted, splintering my efforts. His dark chuckle raked across my heated flesh.
“Try harder, princess. I’m not like the dragons you’re clearly used to pushing around.”
I yanked his hair for a little violence before building more power and shoving again. I felt the mirth of his dragon, resisting my efforts, then the explosion of power through us as my dragon lent me aid.
This time my shove was hard and ruthless, ripping him off me and splaying him across the end of the bed.
“Good,” he growled, grabbing my ankle and dragging me closer. “Never go easy with me. It’s beneath you. It’s beneath us both.”
He pulled me closer, and I climbed onto him, slippery with sweat and wet with desire. I sat onto his hard length, grabbing a fistful of his hair and looking into his eyes as I started a fast pace. I used the other hand to massage my clit, the pleasure driving my breath out of me in fast pants.
“Yes, princess,” he said, his eyes on fire. “Use me. I am yours.”
The power between us throbbed, the feeling expanding through my ribcage. The extra stimulation made me come again, and again, my breathing ragged, my pleasure still building as my dragon wrestled with his for more power. As our bodies waged war with each other, fighting to get closer. To fuck harder.
I cried out with the orgasm, and this time fire burned through my body.
Now, my dragon thought, and I ripped his head to the side and bit down on his neck, allowing my dragon right near the surface. Together, we felt the hot liquid rush across our tongue in sweet satisfaction as he groaned beneath me, gripping my hips and slamming me down onto him. He shuddered his release as the power within us mixed with love and lust and yearning and forever. It washed through him, then back, and settled into the bite I’d ripped into his flesh.
His groan continued, and he pumped his release into me still, feeling this on a level I could well remember. I jerked my hips and continued to work my clit, hitting another high before he finally came down.
He held me close as our breathing slowed and our scents mixed, his on me and mine now on him. But that was all that had changed. I didn’t feel anything different.
“What does imprinting feel like?” I asked, pulling back a little to look out the glowing window. The day looked back.
“We didn’t imprint,” he replied softly, and regret dribbled through the bond.
Fear and pain lanced my heart.
“Am I not…” I swallowed. “Am I not your true mate, then?”
“You know you are. You’ve read enough about the subject, I know you have. The bond is proof.”
“Then why…” Only one other explanation came to me. “Do you not really love me?” I choked out, my eyes overflowing with fresh tears, and these weren’t because of what I had endured in the past.
These were because of what I was enduring now.
THIRTY-SEVEN
FINLEY
He pushed my hair out of my face and tucked it down beside my cheek.
“I love you with all that I am,” he said. “I think the problem is that I don’t love myself. And I’m finding it hard to see how anyone else could. I don’t belong with the dragons anymore. I don’t belong with anyone. Even though I want you more than is probably healthy, I…I’m struggling against the compulsion because I don’t want to force you into this half-life with me.”
My heart twisted and then broke in half. I leaned toward him and touched my forehead to his. If it weren’t for seeing his battle with Micah, I wouldn’t truly understand the gravity of what he’d just said.
But I had, and I did. I’d seen his suffering and his fear of what the future might hold.
I looped my arms around his neck and lightly traced the pad of my finger down one of his scars.
He shivered as I said, “You belong with me. And I have news for you: you’re not the odd one in this pair. I have never fit in—with any crowd—and I’m not suddenly going to start because I have some scales and a pair of wings and a real asshole dragon yammering in my head.”
Suck rocks, my dragon thought.
“I’ll be the one who stands out, not you,” I continued. “I didn’t grow up knowing anything about dragons. I still don’t. I won’t act like one—Weston already told me that. He thought it was a good thing, but I’m sure other dragons won’t agree. Nyfain, I didn’t even know the names of the royal family! That’s how removed we were from court. I’ll stand out at every formal dinner, civilized meeting of the social elite, and…important function or whatever it is you all do. In a bad way. In the ways that matter most in this world, you will fit in, and I will be out of place. They’ll say, ‘There goes that powerful dragon with the weird mate,’ and it won’t be me they are pointing at.”