“Are you sure about this?”
“I am, my darling girl.” Carrick’s happiness was worth any risk, and the hours Selene had spent working on this had resulted in a spell that I thought had a decent chance of working. And I was almost positive that I’d figured out a way to make sure that I was the one who’d suffer from magical recoil once the spell was done. My daughter had two babies to look after, so I’d made tiny tweaks to ensure I was the one to bear that burden.
“Okay, let’s do this.” Selene carried the baby monitor out to the back yard and set it on the porch railing before we walked to the circle we’d arranged. We sat on opposite sides, in meditation poses while facing each other.
As we began to chant, power circled around us and swept through every inch of my body. It pulsed and grew as the words spilled from our lips. Faster and faster. The air around us crackled with magic. Thunder roared and lightning flashed across the perfectly blue sky. My eyes were locked on my daughter, watching as
a wave formed around her body. It twisted and turned as the water spun in a circle. But then the back door to the house opened, and it felt like time stood still as Carrick and Damien stepped onto the porch.
“Audra?” His dark gaze moved to Selene and stunned shock filled his eyes. “Selene! No! I told you I didn’t want you to work this spell. The risks are too high, and I’ve no need for a fated mate.”
“Let them finish,” Damien urged, gripping his arm to hold him back.
“Who are you to play Fate with our lives?”
“You trusted me to help keep Audra safe. Trust me in this too.”
Carrick didn’t have a choice because Selene and I uttered the final words of the spell and the water that had been circling her raced towards him. It swept around him, lifting him off his feet and turning him in circles. Selene and I rose to our feet, watching in awe as the shadow of an enormous black bear separated from Carrick’s body and roared. Its giant head swiveled in our direction, its eyes locked on me as the shadow was pulled back inside. As soon as man and bear were reunited, the water evaporated and Carrick dropped to the patio floor. Based on what I’d just seen; I was certain the spell had worked. But what I didn’t know was if Fate had decided that I should be his new mate.
Chapter Fifteen
Carrick
I went from fury to elation in what felt like the blink of an eye. When I first saw Selene and Audra in the yard and realized what they were doing, I would have given anything to make them stop. But it had been too late because the spell was working its magic already.
Audra rushed over as I rose to my feet. I stood stock still with my eyes closed, refusing to even take a breath because as soon as I did I’d know if my greatest wish had been granted and Audra was my second chance at a fated mate. And then I realized it didn’t make a difference. Even if the end result of the spell was that I was paired with someone else, it would be no different than the situation with Audra’s intended consort. I’d still choose her, just as she’d chosen me.
When I opened my eyes and breathed Audra’s scent into my lungs, I knew. Fate, helped by magic, had finally gotten it right.
“Congratulations.”
I’d forgotten that Damien had been behind me. He’d called my phone when I’d been dropping Alasdair off at his house and told me I needed to get to Selene’s house quickly. We’d arrived there at the same time, coming from opposite directions. I had a sneaking suspicion he knew more than he’d let on about, just like usual with him.
I pulled Audra into my arms and turned to face the dragon shifter. “Did you know that it was going to end this way, with Audra as my newly fated mate? Did you have a premonition about us or something?”
Damien offered us a mysterious smile. “Who said anything about the two of you being newly fated?”
Dammit. He’d known all along, hadn’t he? “It was that damn prophecy again, wasn’t it? There was more about our family in there, and you didn’t share it with us last year?”
“If I had, nothing would’ve turned out the way it was supposed to. There were choices that needed to be made without undue influence. Ones that meant true sacrifices. For Carrick, it was loving Audra despite knowing he might lose her to a consort someday.” He shook his head and chuckled softly. “Although being the show-off that he is, he had to take it a step further and give up his chance at having a fated mate if it meant the possibility of losing Audra.”
My mate looked up at me with wide, green eyes. “You did?”
“I’m not sure why she sounds so shocked when Audra’s sacrifice was loving Carrick so deeply that she’d risk her own happiness to give him the chance to have a fated mate again. There was no guarantee it would be her, but she didn’t allow that to factor into her decision.”
“You did?” I echoed her reaction.
“And Selene knew there would be a magical price to pay for working a spell that powerful. It could have been much steeper than merely losing her water magic, but she wanted Carrick to experience the same joy she found in being Camden’s mate. She was willing to make the sacrifice for him because he’d become more than her father-in-law. More than the grandfather to her beloved child. Carrick is the man who she’s grown to see as a father.”
“I thought that’s what the price might have been.” We all turned to find Selene at the bottom step of the porch stairs, running her fingers lightly over a drop of water that remained on the railing. “Which is why I changed all the tweaks my mom made to the spell because I can afford to lose my water magic since I still have earth, air, and fire. But if my mom had paid that particular price, she’d be left with no magic at all and I wasn’t willing to let that happen.”
“Oh, my darling girl,” Audra cried out, tears streaming down her cheeks as she left my embrace to wrap her arms around Selene.
“But why?” I asked. “Why was all the emotional suffering necessary?”
“All those sacrifices made Selene’s spell so strong that she was able to realign the threads of Fate to where they would have been in the first place...if your family hadn’t been needed to accomplish the nearly impossible feat of bonding the shifter and witch communities together.” His gaze swirled with fire as he looked at Selene. “She did the impossible. Demonstrated a magic so great, those who were conspiring against us have backed down. At least for now.”
“Only because they’re too scared of the amount of power my daughter yields. They’ve never seen anything like it before,” Audra said as she moved closer and pressed her body back against mine while Selene went to pick up the baby monitor.
“For the shifters it’s a mixture of fear, but also respect because family is the foundation of our culture. Wolf packs, bear clans, feline prides, dragon holds...by any name we call them, the underlying meaning is still family. And it means everything to us.”
I offered my daughter-in-law a proud smile. “And Selene proved it means everything to her too.”
“Yes, and it doesn’t hurt that both witches who’ve mated with shifters have proven themselves to be as dedicated to their mates as any shifter could ever hope their own mate would be. You’ve proven it wasn’t a one-off with the bond between Selene and Camden. That you’d go to the same lengths for Carrick as well.”
“And for the witches, there will be a healthy dose of awe because they understand magic. They’ll respect her power,” Audra added.
“I still wish you’d filled me in on this particular part of the prophecy since it was about me.”
“Quit grumbling and enjoy the fact that you’ve found your fated mate.”
My fated mate.
Audra.
I turned to her in awe and growled out the mating words of my clan, “Tá mo chroí istigh ionat.”
“And that’s our cue to leave before we see something I’ll never be able to un-see. There isn’t enough brain bleach in the world to remove the image of my mom and Carrick having sex.”
I barely heard Damien and Selene as they went inside the house. I wa
s 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.”
Having been there for Camden and Selene’s ceremony, I had to agree with him about that. “Relax. Seth’s got this.”
The wolf shifter leaned forward and whispered, “It’s lucky for you I like your mate or else I’d be tempted to fuck with the plan just to irritate you.”
Everyone laughed, except for Carrick who growled instead. Seth got the hint and yelled, “Bless mé an aontas!”
It was just that simple. With those four words, the final step of our mating was complete and I felt a rush of power surge through my body.
“Whoa,” I breathed against Carrick’s lips before he kissed me.
When we broke apart, we were swamped by people offering us their congratulations. With such a big crowd, it took us almost an hour to work our way through everybody. Damien was the last one to approach us.
“Your mating has been a long time coming, and I’m happy this day is finally here.”
“It might’ve happened sooner if you’d just have given me a tiny hint,” Carrick grumbled. “But I understand why you didn’t.”
“And at least we escaped this challenge unscathed,” I added.
“Except that we still don’t know who was behind the petitions in the first place.” I knew it was a fact Carrick struggled with regularly. It was difficult for him to accept that there was someone out there who’d t
ried to harm his family and they hadn’t paid for it. Yet. We hadn’t given up hope that we’d find them some day. “Are there any other prophecies I need to worry about?”
“Only the one about me.”
I couldn’t help but wonder if I could use the debt he felt he owed me to find out exactly what that prophecy said.
Curious about Seth and Jane’s story? You can read about them in Ask for the Moon (link will change in mid-July 2018 due to a publishing change required by Amazon.)
Also by Rochelle Paige
BLYTHE COLLEGE SERIES
Push the Envelope
Hit the Wall
Summer Nights (novella duo)
Outside the Box
Winter Wedding (novella)
BACHELORETTE PARTY SERIES
Sucked Into Love
Mixed Into Love
Checked Into Love
CRISIS SERIES
Identity Crisis
Protection Crisis
FATED MATES (BLACK RIVER PACK & McMAHON CLAN)
Crying Wolf
Shoot for the Moon
Thrown to the Wolves
Bear the Consequences
Bear It All
Bear the Burden
Ask for the Moon
BODY & SOUL SERIES
Bare Your Soul
Save Your Soul
Sell Your Soul
Feed Your Soul
STANDALONES
Star Pupil
About the Author
I absolutely adore reading—always have and always will. When I was growing up, my friends used to tease me when I would trail after them, trying to read and walk at the same time. If I have downtime, odds are you will find me reading or writing.
I am the mother of two wonderful sons who have inspired me to chase my dream of being an author. I want them to learn from me that you can live your dream as long as you are willing to work for it.
Bear Your Fate: McMahon Clan 4 (Fated Mates Book 7) Page 8