Gaze solemn, thoughtful, she watched me. “He found her.”
“Yes.”
“And she’s okay?”
“Yes. Her mate will not allow anything, or anyone, to hurt her.”
Our gazes locked and I felt as if she were staring into my soul, stripping me bare, as if she could see through me without effort. As my mate, perhaps she could.
“Just as I will not allow anything, or anyone, to hurt you.” I held my breath as I awaited her judgment. Would she believe me? Trust me? Trust Warlord Kai to keep her sister safe? She said she knew about Atlans and our beasts. But did she truly understand just how far we would go to protect our females? I doubted anyone who was not ravaged by mating fever could comprehend the depths of a beast’s devotion to his mate. My need to care for Lavender went beyond instinct, beyond logic, to the core of my existence. Now that I held her in my arms, I could no longer exist without her. When she perished, I would follow her to the next life. I had neither the will, nor desire, to exist without her.
Acutely aware of her hand where it rested on my abdomen beneath the cool sheet, I sucked in a breath when she moved. Was she unaware of my arousal? My need for her? Was she teasing me, her fingertips a delicate, whisper-light touch so close to my hard cock? I’d been hard and aching for hours, her naked body pressed to mine. The feminine scent of her delicate skin and silken hair filling my mind with erotic images of all the ways I would take her.
The beast had his turn to claim her, taste her, fuck her. I had yet to claim her for myself.
She moved again, positioned her thigh on top of mine, the soft skin made deliberate contact with my hard length. A barely-there smile curved her pink lips as she ran her wandering hand over my stomach to my chest and back in a seductive motion that held me captive. As long as she touched me thus, I would stay bound, under her spell. Hers to command. Hers to soothe. Simply, hers.
Deep within, my beast rested. Content for the first time in memory. My mate had well and truly tamed him.
“Do you think to seduce me, mate?”
“Do I need to?”
My laughter was a shock to both of us. “I have been hard and eager to take you for hours.” I lifted a hand and gently smoothed a wayward strand of hair from her eyes. “I will always want you, mate. Every moment we are together.”
“You’re really intense. You know that?”
“Is that a good thing? Or a bad one?” I traced her bottom lip with my finger. I wanted to kiss her. Everywhere. Feast on her wet heat, feel her fingers frantically tugging at my hair as I drove her to the edge. I would tease her, push her to her limits, make her so sensitive, so aroused, that the first thrust of my cock would make her explode in my arms.
“I don’t know yet. I still don’t understand why you chose me.”
“The beast chose you.”
“So, do you agree with him? What if the beast likes a woman but the man doesn’t? Then what happens?” The worry I saw in her rounded eyes and tight lips made me want to kiss her. But my female was not asking for seduction, she was asking for truth, a truth I was more than willing to provide.
“We act as though the beast is separate from us. We go to battle and the beast fights, the beast kills. In truth, we are the same male, the same heart, the same soul. We are one being with two forms, each meant to serve a distinct purpose.”
“If the beast is for battle and killing, what is your purpose?”
“The beast fights to protect our people. He kills to eliminate threats, not for sport. He exists to protect. That is the core of his creation. A beast without a home, a family, a people he cherishes, is lost, without purpose.” As my mate’s hand continued to wander over my chest, and her thigh remained pressed against my achy cock, I decided turnabout was fair play. As she stroked my flesh, I caressed hers, from thigh over her buttock to the small of her back, the dip of her waist, the underside of her breast. The journey proved pleasant, so I repeated it.
“Okay, so the beast—” She gasped as I cupped her breast, ran my thumb over her taut nipple. “—protects. What is your purpose?”
I abandoned her breast to cup her soft, round bottom. Gods, touching her was perfection. Pure bliss. Nothing I’d ever experienced had been so soft. So warm. “I make sure the beast is exactly where he is supposed to be, when he needs to be there. I hold him in check when the killing becomes too much, when the battle rage threatens to consume him. The beast is an ancient, primitive part of us, one we would not have survived without. But he is also ruled by instincts as ancient and primal as he.”
She arched her back, the mound between her legs rubbing against my hip as she rubbed the soft skin of her inner thigh over my cock. “So, he’s the heart and you’re the head? His conscience?”
That didn’t feel right. “No.” Gods her breasts were divine. “I am logic. He is emotion. I am thought. He is instinct. I am ice. He is fire. I am the organs. He is the armor. But we are one body. One soul. We have but one heart, mate, and we have given it to you.”
She turned her head slightly to press a kiss to my arm, which currently served as her pillow. “I don’t understand why your beast chose me. You are so much more than I am. I’m no one. Nothing special. I’m a vet tech going to night school because I can’t afford college. I live in a shitty apartment with my sister and we barely scrape by. I’m not a model. I’m not that pretty. I’m not a genius or rich or beautiful. I’m no one. I just don’t understand. Why me?”
“I shall ask him.” I slipped my hand between our bodies and pressed into her sex. She was wet, her pussy lips swollen, ready. I slipped one finger inside, held back a growl of satisfaction when her eyes dilated, her back arched. Gods, she was wrong. She was beautiful beyond imagining. Beyond words.
Beast? You heard her. Why did you choose her?
I’d exposed him to hundreds, thousands of females. He’d rejected them all. Why this female? I wanted to know as much as she did, not because I disapproved of his choice, but because I needed to understand how he’d known this female was meant to be ours.
Deep within, my beast shrugged. Typical. This time, however, rather than be irritated with my beast’s attitude, I found him amusing. A smile teased the corners of my mouth and my mate noticed immediately.
