“I am not intentionally seducing you, Layla,” Hunter spoke softly as he watched her, reading her mind yet again. “It is simply this bond we share, calling us both.”
As he said it, Layla felt an intentional sending from him now, as if he was trying to show her what he meant. Layla saw an image of herself stretched out in silk pillows before the same roaring fire that she’d seen, gazing into it with a deep wistfulness as she lay there naked, as if they’d already made love. She saw him come to her and cuddle up behind her, gloriously naked also, wrapping his arms around her in a moment of deep quietude as they watched the fire burn.
“Is that what I want?” Layla breathed as Hunter’s hands pulled her closer in the sunshine. “Or what you want?”
“I don’t know.” He spoke back as he bent his head and brushed his lips over hers. As Layla’s eyes closed with rapture, he moved – and suddenly his lips were on hers. A moment of shock surged through her, before she sank into it.
And then she sank hard – as her drakaina flooded up in golden glory.
It was the kind of kiss sages dream of, as their lips came together and their hearts met. It was the kind of kiss poets write a thousands sonnets to try and capture, yet still fail to find the right words, as Layla melted into Hunter and he melted into her. It was the kind of kiss songwriters ached to convey and knights died for upon the battlefield, wanting to share just one more moment with their lady-love. It was a kiss that sparked all desire in the universe and sublimated it instantly.
Into love.
Love flooded Layla as she and Hunter kissed. At first she thought it impossible, but as they kissed deeper beneath the summer sunshine and he pulled her closer with his strong hands, she felt the golden love of the universe flood her from head to heels – and him. It was the vast love of the ether she discovered as she kissed him; the love of the universe pouring through her and loving this wayward creature it had made, despite all his vast flaws. As Layla found the bright, merciful love of the universe, Hunter devoured it; moulding to her now, kissing her deeper, taking everything she offered and flooding it back a hundredfold in an endless loop – the cycle of the ouroboros devouring its tail for all eternity. Layla felt her etheric golden love stretch to infinity as Hunter kissed her.
As his magic of beating the impossible devoured them both.
Layla didn’t know how she’d become swept up into Hunter’s arms, she just suddenly was. As he carried her with her arms tight around his neck, their kiss did not break. Walking them back to his stone house, he stepped across the threshold, taking her inside his abode. Moving them through a common room as he and Layla kissed, he passed into a smaller room and suddenly knelt.
Spilling her down upon a feather duvet as their kiss stretched on and on.
It was him who at last pulled back. With a gasp, he broke their connection, as if he was afraid Layla might just swallow his soul by their kiss. Layla saw fire in his dawn-bright eyes as he breathed hard from the enormity of what they had just done. Layla breathed no less, as waves of glory flowed all through her, her heart thundering a thousand miles a minute as her drakaina roared in her veins. As Hunter paused, watching her with an amazed look, Layla felt an incredible golden coil begin braiding between their bodies.
Just as had happened with all her other men.
Something about that deep golden coil forming between them suddenly shocked Layla to her senses. Sitting up swiftly, she struggled against their mutual ardor, even though her drakaina and Hunter’s roared against her. Reality came flooding in as she fought her and Hunter’s passion; understanding how much of a shitshow it would be to truly bring Hunter into the Bind. Even though she felt she could accomplish the impossible now, he was still her enemy.
He was the enemy of all her men and had been tearing apart their lives for ages.
Before she knew it, Layla had pushed up from Hunter’s bed – skirting around him and rushing for the door. She’d made it outside when Hunter suddenly seized her, pulling her back in against him. Without his blazer now, he trapped her close to his incredible body as he buried his face in her hair with a growl. Layla’s gut dropped and her heart hit her throat from that growl – sexual and lustful and deeply possessive all at once. It was everything her drakaina desired in a powerful mate as Layla writhed back against him and he gripped her closer with his big hands. He was biting her neck now, with need barely restrained as Layla’s inner beast ground her ass back against him. Her arms were up around his neck, her hands holding his growling kiss to her as his hands gripped her ribs and waist. Their Dragons careened through each other.
As Layla felt his power touch her everywhere.
“Would you deny this, Layla?” Hunter growled into her neck as he bit her again, his hands sliding up to grip her breasts. “Would you deny everything we could be to each other?”
Layla’s head whirled with the roaring of her Dragon as her drakaina danced with Hunter’s. Golden heat careened through her, ecstatic and wild as their Dragons danced in a hard prelude to mating – roiling and diving into each other in the dappled sunshine of the patio and spilling their power out over the entire garden. They already bit each other; they already coiled each other up in the mating dance. As their dance roared through Layla and Hunter both, their power expanded.
Growing tenfold with every surging writhe and a hundredfold with every bite.
It was enormous; so enormous Layla could no longer feel the edges of her drakaina’s aura as they blasted out like an atom bomb of shimmering scales and hot power all through the garden. Mirages of magic blazed through the air; the lavender below and trees above were charring to Layla and Hunter’s tremendous heat, locked together in an endless dance. It was too much; to insane for Layla to handle suddenly – and with the full roar of her Dragon, she twisted out of Hunter’s arms. She had made it out into the lavender rows when Hunter’s power caught her bodily now rather than in his arms, throwing her down upon the soft grass. Layla writhed with need as his power stroked her everywhere like hands.
Diving in her lips and kissing her hard as he approached.
His steps were measured, his roaring aura intense as he knelt and moved over her, biting her lip as he kissed her again. Layla screamed into his kiss as his power drove into her, and he roared into her mouth as her power flashed into him. She felt their magics become an endless loop as her drakaina surged through Hunter’s body and his drake careened through Layla via their lips. It was pain and so much pleasure – and Layla and Hunter both broke their kiss at the same moment.
Roaring to the skies from the power of their Bind.
Layla felt their Dragons spin. She felt that powerful sand-funnel movement sweep both her and Hunter up, and suddenly they were changing, shifting; swirling up fast into their Dragons in a furious wave of light and heat. He was a dawn Dragon, Layla saw now as they both shifted. Hunter had gold and sky-blue, rose and opal and so many other colors shimmering through his amazingly huge serrated scales as he twined around her in his true form. Immense and strong, the enormous spines down his back and the triple-rows of corkscrewing horns from his skull were made of twisting white fire and ether.
And blazing dawn light just like his eyes.
Those eyes devoured Layla as Hunter curled tight around her, pinning her with his massive strength – and Layla loved it as she writhed, caught in his coils. She was just as changed as he since the last time she had shifted, her scales shining gold now with fractal patterns of red and white, her spines and horns made of the same fire-bright ether as Hunter’s. Her talons were pure gold, and as she twisted in Hunter’s grip, digging her talons into his soft belly, he let her. Light seared out where her talons gripped him; the same blazing everywhere they touched. They crushed the lavender beds and all the herbs now as their enormous bodies roiled over the patio and fully half the garden.
Their shivering nimbus of power growing by the moment.
I want you.Hunter’s thoughts seared into Layla’s, and she twisted in his grip as he slid the great length of his body over the entire length of hers. The sensation was silken and wild, and it devoured Layla as much as his blazing eyes as she felt him stroke her. As he slid over deeply erotic places Layla didn’t have in human-form, she shuddered for him, feeling their prelude to sex. Their eros was so high now, their Dragon-auras still surging and coiling together beyond their bodies, mating fully in the ether. But for the first time, Layla had awareness of both her human mind and her Dragon-mind while inside her Dragon’s body.
And she made a decision with her human self – that her Dragon had to abide.
