Page 27 of Unbreakable Bond
Chapter 12
Zoey tracedthe scar that ran across Rafe’s temple. It pinched when he winced like this. Otherwise it was almost invisible. She wondered if he’d gotten it during the attack on his family but she didn’t dare ask. Notyet.
Someday. Someday they’d know everything there was to know about each other. Someday they’d have a foundation of friendship and love and support. They would have their someday because she wasn’t going to back down fromthis.
Fate hadn’t made a mistake. Maybe the heat had been driving her before. The need to touch and feel and secure the bond had been pulling them together from the moment Rafe walked back into her life. But her mind was clearer now and she knew, this, the two of them, mates, wasright.
She pressed her lips to the scar and felt Rafe shudder beneath her. So she does it again, and again. His hands slide around her waist, his arms pulling tight so she kept going. Peppering kisses across his scar and down his cheekbone, along his jaw as he held her close and she could feel the swell of too many emotions to name. She pressed a soft, sweet, kiss to his lips and he kissed her back for a second before pullingaway.
“Zo…”
“Shh…” She tried to kiss him again but he shook his headseriously.
“If we do this, there’s no going back. We belong to each other. Now andalways.”
Her throat felt tight and she couldn’t find the words. Not this time. So she simplynodded.
Rafe kissed her then, wrapping one hand in her hair the way he seemed to like and she absolutely loved. He tilted her head just so and then he claimed her mouth with a slow, burning kiss that branded her lips and her heart andsoul.
Her lips parted on a sigh and he deepened the kiss with a stroke of his tongue. It was so different from their kisses before, when the heat had been on them. Those had been passion and need, fire threatening to burn them to ashes. But this was something else entirely. There was still passion, still need, but the fire had settled into a simmer, one she had a feeling would burn between themforever.
Now andalways.
God, how was it possible she was falling in love with this man already? She couldn’t. She shouldn’t. It wasn’t possible and yet. With the bond strengthening between them, she could feel what he was feeling, knew it mirrored her own and amplifiedit.
The poor, broken man that had lost so much and given up even more. The sweet, caring man that had insisted she accept the bite instead of simply taking what his wolf must already see as his. The tough, determined man that had tracked her down and fought his brother to claimher.
He was hers and she was falling in love withhim.
Rafe’s big hands went to her ass, pulling her tight against him and she moaned into his mouth. She could feel him through the fabric of his clothes. Hard and wanting. Wanting her. Again. She arched her hips to rub against him. She could feel her own wetness. She wanted him. Again. Rafe growled low in his chest and then he was moving and she broke the kiss to squeal as he stoodup.
“Where are yougoing?”
“Bedroom.” He nipped at her jaw as he carried her through the cabin. “Gonna do it right thistime.”
Zoey wrapped herself around him and nuzzled his neck. The words were on the tip of her tongue to tell him just how right it felt. Nothing had ever felt so good as being in his arms. Being wrapped up in his warmth and safety soothed the raw parts of her that had spent years alone, wondering why fate had been socruel.
Now she knew. Fate wasn’t cruel. It was twisted and convoluted. It was impossible to change and no matter how hard you fought, there was no denyingit.
Rafe was her fate. He always had been. But he hadn’t been ready for her when she came of age. He’d been half-crazed from his parents and brother’s deaths and he’d been feral. If he was worried about claiming her now she knew he would have ravaged her then. So he’d gone away, for years, and they’d both been all alone, healing, trying to find their place, until finally, fate saw fit to bring him back home, back toher.
Finally.
Rafe carried her into the bedroom but surprised her when he didn’t lay her down. Instead he sat on the edge of the bed, keeping her in his lap, and kissing herdeeply.
His hands stroked over her ass now, kneading and pulling, shifting her on top of him so that his hard length hit her in all the right places. Only, he was still dressed and she couldn’t have that. She unwound her arms and desperately searched for the hem of hisshirt.
“Off.” She broke the kiss as she tugged the material upwards and though he made a low noise of protest he raised his arms forher.
Zoey gasped when she got a good look at his chest. In the woods, she’d been drunk on the magic of the heat. She remembered him taking off his shirt so that they were skin to skin. She remembered stroking her hands all over him and feeling the raised marks. But she couldn’t remember actually seeing the scars untilnow.
Puckered, round scars dotted his right side from chest to hip in a random, haphazard pattern. Bullet holes. The scars from when he’d been shot. She remembered that day. It had changed the entire pack. She’d known Rafe was shot but she hadn’t seen him then and somehow, in her mind, no matter what she’d heard since, she hadn’t imagined it was thisbad.
There was no way he should have survived this. She traced her fingers over the scars slowly, carefully, and felt anger and sadness well up inside her. Someone had hurt her mate. Tried to kill him. And if they’d succeeded she never would have even known he washers.
“Hey.” Rafe’s voice was rough as he tipped her chin up to meet his gaze, “It’s okay. I’m okay. I’m here. Withyou.”
Her throat felt tight again but she nodded. She could feel him tense when she touched the wounds. Knew she should leave them alone. She should focus on making him feel good, on sharing this night with him and sealing their bond. But she couldn’t do that without showing him that she understood the importance of these scars, of what he’d lost, and of what she represented tohim.
