Page 24 of Bear Your Fate

I barely heard Damien and Selene as they went inside the house. I was too busy claiming my mate’s mouth. I took her mouth with my tongue and lips like I’d been fantasizing about for the past week. And she tasted so damn good. Sweeter. Hotter. More incredible than ever now that she was my fated mate.

My arms wrapped around her, and her breasts pushed against my chest. Having her so close made my cock swell. It also made my mouth water, and this time it wasn’t because I craved the taste of her pussy—or at least it wasn’t the only reason since I always wanted that. “I want to mark you.”

She tilted her head to the side, exposing her neck to me. “Yes, please.”

I stroked her soft skin with my tongue, holding on to my control until I elicited a response out of her. A moan built in the back of her throat, and the sound shot straight to my cock as my teeth lengthened. I sank my teeth into her shoulder, and her fingers dug into my back. Her nails pushed into the skin through a layer of clothing as she held on tight, her body trembling with need.

When I released my hold on her shoulder, she cupped my cheeks with her palms and kissed me with the same ravenous hunger I felt for her. It only took a moment for our mouths to become rougher. For the stroking of our hands to become more demanding.

I lifted her off her feet and carried her to my car. My house wasn’t far from Camden and Selene’s, but it felt like it took an eternity before I got her in my home and on my bed. We ripped our clothes from our bodies and practically attacked each other. My fingers slid through her wetness, and her hand wrapped around my cock.

“This time’s going to be hard and fast. I’ll give you slow and gentle later.”

“Hard.” She pumped her hand. “And fast.” Jerking it up and down my hard length. “Sounds perfect to me right about now.”

“Mine,” I growled as I positioned my tip at her opening. “My fated mate.”

“Yours.”

My control snapped. I flipped her onto her stomach and pulled her onto her knees. Rubbing my cock against her pussy, I coated it with her wetness before sliding the head into her tight hole and plunging inside. I buried myself to the hilt, wrapping one arm around her stomach and the other around her chest to lift her up and down on my length at a frantic pace. I took her like we’d never fucked before, with all the animalistic passion I’d held back previously because I’d been afraid to hurt my sweet witch. But now that I’d mated and marked her, I knew she could take it because she’d been made for me.

I felt the tingling start to build at the base of my spine and knew I wasn’t going to be able to hold on much longer. Sliding my hand at her belly down to her clit, I tweaked it while I scraped my teeth along her mating mark.

“Carrick!” she cried hoarsely, her pussy clamping down hard around me and milking my orgasm from my body.

When the last jets of come left my body, I slumped onto the bed. I took her lax body with me as I rolled over. “You’re really mine.”

“I really am.” She tilted her head back and aimed a big smile my way. Her pretty green eyes were filled with joy, her face was flushed from her orgasm, her lips were puffy from our kisses—and the wrist she lifted to show me had a consort mark on it. It was similar to Selene’s, except bigger. She traced her fingers over my upper bicep, along the tribal tattoo in the shape of waves that had appeared without me realizing it. “Just like you’re mine.”

All the pain. The suffering. The agony. This moment made it all worthwhile.

Epilogue

Audra

Looking up at the beautiful sky, I twirled around in a circle and felt the skirt of my dress billow out around me. It was the perfect day for Carrick and my claiming, albeit about a month later than he’d wanted to wait. But it had been important to me to allow enough time to have all of the people who were important to us there on our special day.

About two-thirds of my former coven were in attendance. I’d formally passed the high priestess role to Tempest about three weeks ago, after Carrick and I had finally come up for air. I’d expected it to feel bittersweet since I’d spent so many years building up the coven, but instead I was excited to start over again in Bear Creek. With Selene and I living there, we already had two witches in residence—probably three since Nyssa was already showing signs of magic.

Almost all of the members of the McMahon Clan were with us too, but they weren’t the only shifters. We had wolves from the Black River pack, as well as Seth, Jane, and Jared. Two lionesses—Tahlia and her mother. A dragon—Damien, of course. Both councils were well represented. Our claiming ceremony was symbolic of the strides the witch and shifter communities had taken over the last fourteen months, which was only fitting since our family had played such a vital role in making it happen.

“Should I give you a similar warning to the one you gave me before my claiming ceremony with your daughter?”

“I don’t know.” I smiled up at Camden and titled my head to the side, tapping my finger against my chin while I pretended to think about it. “Are you well-versed in all manner of spells that could bite me in the ass if I don’t treat your father like gold?”

“Not even close,” he chuckled. “So how about I just escort you to the ceremony instead?”

“By all means”—he crooked out his elbow, and I hooked mine through it—“lead away.”

He walked me to the center of the large yard behind our home. Carrick had offered me a long list of options for where we could hold the ceremony, but I hadn’t considered any of them except for this one. I’d wanted our claiming to happen in the same place as my daughter’s. To maybe even make it a tradition that Nixon and Nyssa could uphold when they grew up and found their mates or consorts, whatever the case may be.

Our family was waiting for us, lined up in a circle with all of our guests surrounding them. When we reached Carrick, Camden lifted my hand from his arm and placed it on his father’s. Then he brushed a kiss across my cheek before moving to stand next to Selene.

Since Carrick was the one who performed the claiming ceremonies for his clan, he’d asked Seth to do the honors for us today. Carrick took my hands in his as we turned to face the wolf shifter. Seth reached for our joined hands and wrapped his own around them.

“Don’t forget, we’re doing this the McMahon Clan way,” Carrick reminded Seth in a low voice. He’d explained to me how there were some variations to how different shifter families handled their claiming ceremonies, and he’d gone over how he’d wanted it done with Seth about a dozen times this morning.

“It’s not something I’m likely to forget with the way you hammered the point into my skull earlier,” Seth grumbled before smiling at me. “And it’s not as though your version of the ceremony is complicated.”

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