She was here. Right in front of me.
Mine! The beast took his opportunity to argue in favor of the ravish first, explain later, fantasies running through my mind the last three days.
“Not yet.”
Now. Fuck. Mate. Claim.
Below me, my mate paced in bare feet under a covered patio lined with flowers and leafy green plants. A small, round table sat off to one side with four cushioned chairs too fucking small for an Atlan to sit in. Her voice soothed and aroused in equal measure. Her tone was soft and feminine. Lovely. Except she spoke not to me, but to a large cat. She was cooing at him. Petting him.
First time in my life I was jealous of a fucking cat. I wanted her hands in my hair the way she was stroking that cat’s fur. I needed to hear that indulgent, gentle tone, filled with tenderness and laughter, directed at me.
I scanned the area. My Hive sensors focused on the cat…
Warning lights and streams of information flashed on my data feeds.
Fuck. The cat was from Everis. A fierce Hokiax. A renowned hunter and protector known for bonding to just one person with absolute loyalty and devotion. The cats would kill to protect their Everian keeper. Usually, they were deemed too dangerous for a member of the general public to keep. Usually, they were kept and bonded to Elite Hunter bloodlines only. I’d only ever seen one in the field, a feline the size of Earth’s Bengal tigers. That Hokiax had been walking silently next to one of the most deadly Everians I’d ever encountered, an Elite Hunter working with Commander Helion and the Intelligence Core.
The Hokiax rubbing its face against my mate’s soft, exposed neck was a juvenile. Barely more than a kitten. What would happen when it reached its full size? How the fuck did my mate plan on hiding with a gods damned Hokiax in her house?
An Everian cat. Not just any cat, but a bloodline bound predator. This meant Brody was the Everian noble in hiding. My mate was his aunt, not his mother.
Christine James was not who she claimed to be.
My mate had been lying to me for three days. Three fucking days I’d wasted investigating two young human males who were nothing to me.
Nothing.
Three days my mate had been unprotected and in danger while my attention was elsewhere. Three days I’d nearly lost my sanity and forsaken my honor. Three days of intense pain and struggle holding back my beast from the only thing he cared about.
MINE!
Yes. She’s ours. Tonight.
NOW!
Soon. My assurance calmed him just enough for me to maintain control. There would be no more searching. We would claim our mate and fulfil our mission. My female and the boy under her protection were both mine now. I would be at her side day and night, protecting both of them.
Claim. Fuck. Taste.
The beast sent erotic images into my mind, one after another. We could smell her skin from here. Her feminine scent teased the senses. Made imagining the taste of her on our tongue all too easy.
My mate was oblivious to the years of discipline and self-control required to keep me from jumping off this roof and throwing her over my shoulder to carry her inside. I’d remove her clothing as I went. Lock my mouth over her hot clit and make her beg, and claw, and scream my name before I allowed the beast to have his way with her. Mate her. Claim her. Place the matching set of mating cuffs around her wrists so we would never be separated again.
The mating cuffs I wore sent pain burning through my nerves, an agony both beast and male welcomed. I wanted it to hurt. That meant we’d found her. The mating cuffs served as a reminder that we had a reason—other than protecting an innocent boy—to keep fighting, keep existing. For the last three days, the cuffs had been the only thing controlling the beast.
Now that I knew my mission and my mate were one and the same, the mating cuffs weren’t enough. I needed her. She was the only being in the known universe my beast would defer to, serve, obey. Only she would be able to control him, once I let him out.
Tonight, my beast was nearly feral, demanding we come here, to the one home he cared about. Brody seemed like a kind child. My initial interest in him stemmed from the fact that soon he would be my son. As soon as I claimed Christine James. My mate.
At first, I’d thanked that gods that when I’d asked Brody about his parents, he’d informed me that the beautiful and desirable Ms. James, his ‘mother’, was divorced and had cut off all contact with the boy’s father. She was available. Not claimed by another.
Now I knew the boy had lied to me as well. Was Christine even her real name?
MINE! The beast didn’t care what her name was, only what her pussy would taste like when we finally claimed her.
Shut the fuck up, beast. Not yet. She’s not going anywhere. You don’t want to scare her.
CUFFS! He insisted.
