Eventually, Marco caught him in one of his ambushes, twisting to bite gently on Adri’s scruff and using his head to nudge him at Rafe before running off to connect with the rest of his pack. Adri twined himself around his mate as Rafe used his long tongue to lick at the places Marco had touched him, covering his scent with his own.
Adri’s eyes slipped closed as he indulged in Rafe’s touch, and he didn’t immediately notice when tongue and muzzle changed to human fingers stroking through his fur.
“You’re so beautiful like this, kitten,” Rafe murmured.
Lifting his head from where it was resting on his paws, Adri blinked up at him. They’d stopped on the edge of a small lake,the water glinting in the moonlight and soft grasses rustling quietly beneath them. Stretching deeply in a move that made his back arch and his tail lash, Adri let the shift take him.
A low groan escaped Rafe from behind him as he continued to stretch in his human form—his chest brushing against the ground as his hips stayed high. He wasn’t presenting to his mate. He was just being very dedicated to his flexibility.
“If you stay like that, you know exactly how we’re going to end up,” Rafe growled, his voice dropping an octave as his hand brushed down the curve of Adri’s ass to his muscled thighs.
“Can you do it without biting and knotting me?” Adri asked.
A pained moan left Rafe as he leaned in close, pressing a kiss to Adri’s tailbone. Adri’s arch grew even more pronounced as he tried to entice those lips lower.
“There’s no way I can control myself when you’re like this,” Rafe said, his tongue slipping out to circle Adri’s aching hole like he was about to make a whole fucking meal of it.
Hissing in annoyance at himself for denying them both, Adri flopped onto his back, the move taking him out of reach of that clever tongue.
“I can’t,” he said.
Rafe’s eyes shone gold in the night, and Adri’s gaze traced down the veins of his arms to his fisted hands, but none of the tension thrumming through his body was audible in his voice when he spoke.
“Okay, kitten. Whenever you’re ready.”
“You have the patience of a saint.”
Rafe shrugged. “I want you willing, or not at all.”
Adri groaned and threw his arm over his eyes to hide the view of his mate before he jumped him. “I’m plenty willing. I just can’t. Not yet. Not until we find them.”
“You don’t have to earn your happiness, kitten. You deserve it all.”
“I can’t take our forever while five of the people I’m responsible for might be about to have theirs cut short.”
“So, we find them. Together. Now shift back so we don’t get hypothermia sleeping out here.”
Adri’s jaguar was slow to emerge as he shifted, reluctant to give up on the potential mate bond he was denying.
Once he was settled in jaguar form, Rafe wrapped human arms around him for a moment, whispering in his ear before shifting to his wolf—“Our forever is here already, kitten. Whether we ever complete the bond or not. I will always be here for you.”
CHAPTER 15: RAFE
The glittery hospitalfundraiser was about as far as you could get from waking up in the forest in wolf form still wrapped around your mate. The tux Adri was sporting as they arrived at the Town Hall for the evening’s ‘civilised’ violence was just begging to be stripped off him with the way it emphasised every muscled inch of his body.
A wave of satisfaction washed through him as Rafe spied the bruise in the shape of his teeth that was peeking out above Adri’s collar. He’d made sure to refresh it each day and keep it from healing with his power. It was the only way to keep his wolf from becoming frantic with the need to complete the bond.
“They really went all out with the Valentine’s theme,” Adri observed as they paused in the entryway to take in the metallic red and pink explosion of the space. “I liked Emmy’s decorations better.”
Rafe laughed and pressed a kiss to Adri’s temple. Emmy’s version of a fighting ring from the ill-fated bout where Adri had almost lost his arm had involved dead bodies hanging from the ceiling. But artistically, it had certainly been more sophisticated.
“This has its charm.”
“Adri! You made it! It’s so nice to meet you in person at last,” Katie called, pulling him into an embrace before air-kissing his cheeks.
“Wouldn’t miss it,” Adri said, eyeing the temporary fighting ring that was centre stage in the room. “Tell me the safety gear you arranged isn’t also covered in glitter?”
“I couldn’t possibly comment,” Katie said with a smile.
