Page 80 of His Greatest Treasure

When the first rays of sunshine peeped through the window, I twisted round to look at my mate.

“Wake up, my darling.”

“What is it? Are you okay?”

His voice was sleepy and slurred but his arms tightened around me again, adjusting to our new position. I laughed as he pulled me closer, even though we were already almost as close as we could get.

“Yes, I’m fine. I had a wonderful night.”

“Good.”

He closed his eyes again as though he were going to go back to sleep, and I wanted to laugh.

“You need to get up, my darling. You need to get back to your room before anyone realises you’re missing.”

He opened one eye and it focused on me.

“Why?”

“So that we don’t get in trouble. You weren’t meant to come here last night.”

“But they’ll all need to know we mated.”

He said it as though it were obvious. And as though he expected his family to welcome me with open arms.

The fear I’d had flickered back to the surface. They’d be angry about our mating. They’d be angry that their golden dragon had mated just a fire spirit.

“Blaze?”

Alfie sat up so he could look down at me and see me more clearly but, as he did, I caught sight of my claiming mark for the first time.

I stared at his chest, where I’d burned him. My flames had seemed to shoot straight out of my heart and burn their way into his and I’d thought that was just a feeling, but it wasn’t.

There, on Alfie’s chest, was a bright flame rightabove his heart.

I reached out a hand to touch it, wondering if I’d feel the heat of those flames, but I didn’t. It was burned into his skin, a tattoo.

He looked down too and touched the mark just like me. Our fingers brushed. Then Alfie grabbed my hand and held it to his chest, pressing it against my claiming mark.

“You marked me,” he said. “You marked me like I marked you.”

“Is- is that okay?”

His grin nearly split his face in two. “I love it! It’s such a beautiful mark, Blaze. And now everyone will be able to see that I’m claimed.”

“Not everyone, not if you keep your shirt on,” I muttered.

Alfie kissed me until I didn’t mind the thought of other people seeing his claiming mark any more and then we were just starting to sink lower onto the bed, about to make love again, when Alfie’s stomach grumbled loudly.

“Oh my gosh, I can’t believe I did that.”

“Are you hungry, my darling?”

“I’m starving!”

I pressed a kiss to his lips, just because I could.

“You did a lot of work last night. You shifted and flew round the castle, and then you made love to me twice.”

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