Page 79 of Fetch Me A Mate
"You." Rowan leaned forward, his forehead nearly touching hers. "Everything worth protecting."
Diana reached up and touched his face, her thumb tracing the edge of a bruise. "Are you staying, Rowan? Really staying? Not just until the next crisis or the next time your past catches up?"
"I'm staying."
Diana kissed him then, soft and careful around his split lip.
"I love you," she said quietly.
"I love you too."
Diana had fought for her place in Hollow Oak and won it through competence and community support. Rowan had faced his past and conquered it through courage and conviction.
Now they could finally build their future without looking over their shoulders.
"Rowan?"
"Yeah?"
"Next time you decide to fight an entire pack of wolves, give me some warning. I would have made a bigger first aid kit."
His laugh rumbled through his chest, and Diana felt it settle into her bones like coming home.
“What do you say we go look over our new little sanctuary?” she suggested, holding out her hand to head to the attic.
He smirked and grabbed her fingers. “Lead the way.”
38
ROWAN
He followed her up the stairs to the attic suite, every ache in his body a dull thrum against the sharp, clean wire of need that pulled him after her. The fight was over. The running was done. He had said the words, admitted what he felt, and she hadn't bolted. She’d stayed. She’d looked at his battered face and seen the man underneath, not the monster.
The attic was their sanctuary, a space they had reshaped together. The wide windows looked out over the sleeping town, and the air smelled of fresh paint, sawdust, and the faint, sweet scent of Diana herself. Canvas drop cloths were still spread over the newly finished floors, a soft white landscape under the pale light of the moon.
She turned to him in the center of the room, her amber eyes luminous in the dark. “Are you okay?” she asked, her voice soft, her gaze tracing the bruises on his face.
“I am now,” he said, and it was the truest thing he had ever said. He reached for her, his hands gentle as he cupped her face. He was done being careful. He was done holding back.
He lowered his head and kissed her, a slow, reverent exploration that was an apology and a promise all at once. Hepoured every ounce of his relief, his gratitude, his overwhelming, terrifying love for her into that kiss. He felt her respond, her hands coming up to tangle in his hair, her body melting against his.
This was not a claiming. His wolf, for the first time, was not demanding possession. It was content to simply be near her, to feel her warmth, to know she was safe and she washis. This was an asking. A prayer.
He broke the kiss and began a slow, worshipful journey over her skin. He worshiped patience into her, his mouth trailing from her jaw to the frantic pulse at her throat. He unbuttoned her dress with hands that trembled slightly, not from weakness, but from the sheer force of the emotion coursing through him. He slid the soft fabric from her shoulders, his lips following the path of newly revealed skin. He knelt, kissing the curve of her belly, his hands stroking the soft skin of her thighs.
She undid every lock he had ever built with her mouth and her hands. As he worshiped her body, she ministered to his, her fingers tracing the lines of his scars, her touch not one of pity, but of acceptance. Of understanding.
“Let me,” she whispered, her voice rich with an emotion that mirrored his own. She sank to her knees before him on the drop cloth, her hands going to the button of his jeans.
He had never been looked at the way she was looking at him now. There was no fear, no hesitation. Only a fierce, determined love that saw all of him, the broken parts and the healing ones, and wanted it all.
She freed his cock from the confines of his jeans, her fingers warm and sure against his straining length. He was painfully hard, aching with a need that was as much emotional as it was physical. He watched, his breath hitched in his throat, as she leaned forward and took him into her mouth.
Her warmth enveloped him, and a low growl rumbled in his chest. She took all of him, her throat muscles working as she drew him deeper. Her tongue was a decadent torture, stroking and swirling, and he could feel her own arousal through the bond, a rising tide of heat and need that fueled his own. She was not just performing an act; she was consuming him, taking his pain and his past and transforming it into a pleasure so profound it bordered on pain. His hands tangled in her soft, honey-blonde hair, his hips beginning to move of their own accord.
“Diana,” he gasped, his control slipping.
She pulled back, her lips slick, her eyes dark with passion. “My turn,” she said, her voice a husky promise.
