I reach down and make a V with my fingers around the place where his cock enters me, wanting to feel him with all of me.
He roars, his movements growing jerky. “Fuck, little wolf. You’re driving me crazy.” He rubs his thumb over my clit and orgasm, my muscles squeezing around his dick. He comes at the same time, and I swear to Fate I feel every hot drop of cum that shoots inside me. It sears me. Sizzles and pops and changes me. So much heat floods through me that my vision turns black with fireworks exploding around the edges. And then pleasure. Oceans of it, washing over me, cleaning me, clearing me, leaving only the purity of my essence and his. Fated mates.
Something makes me touch my shoulder, the place where the skin was knotted with scar tissue from repeated dry bites. Only a true fated mate will cause a male wolf to produce the serum that leaves his scent in his female’s flesh. Dirk wasn’t my fated mate, but that didn’t stop him from savaging my shoulder every time he forced himself on me. After a few years, I just stopped healing. But now my shoulder is as smooth as a baby’s skin. Soft, supple. Reborn.
Mark’s panting, eyes still silver, his canines long. “When I mark you, babygirl, it won’t be there.”
I blink up at him. “No?”
“No.” He shakes his head. “I’ll mark this cute little ass.” He slides his hands under my butt and squeezes both cheeks in his large hands.
“Oh.” I start to laugh, then. Almost hysterically. It’s relief and joy and nerves bundled into one. “You’re an ass man,” I say.
The brown of Mark’s eyes return, and he grins at me. “You could say that.” He eases out. “I want you in my bed tonight,” he says, somehow correctly guessing that I plan to make a run for it back to the guest room. “I won’t mark you. You can trust me. But I need you here.”
I think about my pups. But they’re deep asleep, exhausted by the fun of the day. They don’t need me.
And the thought of sleeping beside Mark makes my she-wolf…
I spontaneously shift just thinking about her.
It’s the first time in years, and my wolf is so happy, she turns in circles on the bed before flopping to her side and offering her belly up.
“Hey beautiful,” Mark croons, stroking my face and belly, rubbing my ears. “You’re so gorgeous. I can’t wait to run and hunt with you.”
I will myself to shift back, and it happens with ease. As if I’d never lost my wolf, never lost the ability to shift at will. To heal. To be who I truly am.
“Oh Fates.” I sit up and cover my face with my hands, happy tears running down my cheeks.
Mark’s smile fades, and he crawls on the bed with me, prying my hands from my face. “Fuck, baby. Had you lost your wolf? Is that why you couldn’t heal?”
I nod through the tears. “It’s been four years.”
He kisses them away and pulls me into his arms. “Never again, angel. You’ll never lose her again. She was always with you.”
“You brought her back out,” I say.
“We did,” he says. “I can’t believe I found you. I feel so blessed.”
I want to feel blessed too, but there’s still a shadow looming over me. Over us. And that’s the part I hate. I care far too much about Mark to let him risk his life for us.
4
Mark
I may have promised not to mark my sweet mate, but that didn’t stop me from fucking her twice more by morning.
She curls into me, nuzzling my neck. “What made you enter law enforcement?” she asks. “And which came first, being enforcer, or working for the DEA?”
I burrow my fingers in her hair and massage the back of her head. “DEA came first then enforcer. The council loved the idea of having me in human law enforcement as a means of helping to hide shifter activities when they go outside human law.”
“And how did you end up with the DEA?” she asks.
“I grew up near here, in a western suburb of Denver that bordered the foothills, so we could run and hunt. Our high school was mixed—human and shifter—and my best friend was a human.”
Colleen lifts her lovely face, her blue-green eyes trained on mine. She braces, like she already knows what I’m going to say.
“We were just screwing around, partying. Of course, drugs had no effect on me, but I figured my job was to keep them safe. Be designated driver. The guy who kept a clear head. My friends didn’t know I was a shifter. Our recreational use had sort of escalated from pot to sampling a little cocaine. I guess it had been laced with something else. It burned my nose, and I felt sick for a few minutes. But my buddy…”