Page 13 of Bound By Destiny

My arms curl around her, and I bite back a groan when her lush curves press against me. For now – or as long as my raging arousal allows me – I just want to hold her close. I’m not certain where these protective instincts stem from, but how can I resent her, when she’s probably even more lost than I am?

“It’s going to be alright,” I manage to breathe, just as a sharp pang of need below deck tells me nothing can possibly bealright.

I can be friendly only for so long, especially when the temptress in my arms slides her fingers down my chest, wandering perilously low. My rush of sympathy disappears when she grabs my hardness. I buck in her hold, light-headed as whatever was left of my resolve goes down the drain.

Pop. Pop. Pop.All I know is that each snapping sound is blissfully liberating, until I realize Destiny has undone my jeans. I barely have time to appreciate the cool air when my shaft is suddenly enveloped in her velvety soft grip.

Horrified, I reach out to shove her away. Instead, I close my fist around hers so hard, my knuckles turn white.

The cacti, the mountains, the cloudless sky spin as I rock within the clamp of Destiny’s hands, slide inside her palms and my own. I’m about to come, and half of our clothes are still on. To make matters worse, something slick darts across the head of my cock. Something that feels a lot like the tongue I discovered moments ago when we kissed.I’m done for.

I groan and topple down to the sand. Destiny crawls above, a vision of sunkissed brown and iridescent feathers. Even her weight on top of me feels perfect. She peeks at me one last time through the fringe of her long lashes. What I see makes my heart miss a beat.

Destiny is by far the klutziest phoenix I have ever met. Up on the mountaintop, she didn’t seem to have a shred of instinct. Her gaze was jittery with worry and fear, worlds away from the confidence that usually characterizes our kind.

But the woman who fretted over an airplane accident that happened nearly eight decades ago is gone. Her irises seem to have turned an even more vivid shade of violet, dazzling as a pair of glittering jewels. They burn with something wild, almost animalistic. She looks every bit the celestial being, like some pagan goddess from the myths I read as a child with her untamed mass of curls and her endless wings of purple and blue.

My admiration is cut short when she takes me in her mouth. The world rocks as ecstasy like I’ve never known before shoots through me. I’m burning up inside, and even the sand beneath us, warmed by the sun, feels cool in comparison. My entire frame, fortified by centuries of training, is racked with uncontrollable shivers. My cock feels like it’s about to burst.

I’m blissfully close to release, yet I know it won’t be enough. Deep down I’m aware that I’ll have an eternity to regret this moment… but also to wonder how it would’ve felt, to make love to the one destined for me.

My mate.For the first time since I met her, I dare to utter the words in my head. Even now, in the throes of passion, it fills me with rage. But I’ve gone too far now, tasted too much of Destiny to come out of this with clean hands. My personal road to Hell isn’t paved with good intentions but with weak ones, and I’ve already walked too far down to turn around.

Only once,I vow to myself. I won’t fail again. I’ll live with the memory of the one time I blundered and spend centuries repenting for it. I’ll figure out something dreadful – maybe jumping from a cliff or drowning in the lake near the ranch – and fulfill my penance, over and over again, no matter how much Warwick harps over it.

So before it’s too late and I lose myself in Destiny’s exquisite torture, I flip her to the ground. My lips hover above hers, swollen from our kiss. I explore them again, letting my hands do the tedious work of unclothing her. It’s nothing short of a miracle that I succeed given the hazy state of my mind, but then I guess miracles are a given when two mates reunite.

I leave her lips and resolve to savor every inch of her, committing to memory the details that will torture me for decades to come. Like the taste of her tawny skin, sweet and spicy as cinnamon. The fluttering pulse of her collarbone, the generous curves of her breasts. I flick their mulberry tips, fascinated as they turn hard as pearls.

But a scent, musky and wholly intoxicating, prevents me from lingering any longer. My heart pounds vigorously as I ease away to take in the full sight of her.

I gulp, ardent need coursing through me as well as some other feeling, like a missing piece finally falling into place.

I already knew that Destiny was beautiful. I knew it the second I laid eyes on her – which is why I struggled to look away ever since. But minus the moth-eaten shirts and drab jeans, she’s so much more than beautiful. She’s spectacular.

The curves she hid beneath her clothes are even lusher than I imagined, painfully real yet at the same time out of this world. Right now Destiny seems to radiate, and it’s not just because of the Arizona sun, making her dark skin glimmer with a thousand tiny beads of perspiration. For all the beauty now unveiled to me – her round breasts, the shapely swell of her hips, her endless legs and the shadowy triangle between them – it’s her eyes that make her so stunning.

Something fiery brews in those violet depths, some emotion I hadn’t seen in her until today. Intelligence, exasperation, fear... Those have flitted countless times across her gaze since we met. But the passion in her lavender irises right now, raw, wild, and so far away from the slightly neurotic aviation safety engineer I’ve come to know makes her glow from within.

I’m drawn to her heat like a moth to a flame. As I lower my body to hers, our wings brush against each other. The soft vibrations travel from the tips of my feathers and send shivers through every nerve ending in my body. I rest quaking fingers upon the dip of her waist, only to immediately jerk away when an electrical discharge zips up my arm.

Destiny is shaking her head, her breath escaping in ragged pants from her parted lips.

“This can’t be happening,” she manages to utter. “What’s wrong with the...” She gasps for air when I brush her nipples. “The electrons…?”

I chuckle despite the tragedy unfolding before our very eyes – and in which we’re the prime actors. How can Destiny be such a nerd even in such a state?

“Mates,” is all I can offer for explanation, when the scent of her arousal drives away most of my conversational skills. Which weren’t stellar to start with.

Destiny frowns shakily. “Must be an australian thing,” she mumbles for reasons beyond me. Then in a louder voice, she asks: “Isn’t there anything we can do t-to stop this?”

Contrary to her concerns, Destiny’s body bucks wantonly, nearly impaling herself with my cock and sending me into sensual bliss. I bite my tongue, willing myself to stay on Earth at least until Destiny isn’t panicked.

“I don’t think so,” I rasp. Even those four words cost me more than my fiercest battles as a phoenix – including the time I burned back to life from my ashes. “I’m sorry, Destiny. I can’t… I can’t save us.” I gulp, bitterness flooding through me at the same time as heady desire tickles my every sense. “I’m not strong enough.”

I fought against so many things in my long existence, including fate itself. I failed. Isobel died. Yet never, not once, did I say out loud the truth that goes against everything I was brought up with, the deep sense of chivalry that once meant a lot more than holding the door open for your date at the restaurant. When hardihood and forbearance were paramount, and no self-respecting male admitted, let alone gave in to his own weakness.

But Destiny surprises me with a slight nod. “I can’t s-save us either,” she whispers huskily. “Dane, what are we going to do?”

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