by Zoe Chant
“Rose,” he whispered, his breath warm on her lips. “What—?”
She stopped him with a finger across his mouth, her other hand curving around the back of his neck. “I’m listening to my animal. Listen to yours, Blaze.”
He held very still. He wasn’t even breathing as she drew her finger across his lips, slowly, tracing the line of his mouth. With her fingertips, she explored the planes of his cheek and jaw.
In years to come, she knew, she would know the shape of his body better than her own. They would match each other so well that they would move as one, two parts of the same whole. There would be a joy in that deep, earned familiarity.
But oh, there was a profound sweetness in unfamiliarity too. In discovering him for the first time—the slight roughness of his jaw against her palm, the way his mouth parted with a shuddering gasp as she trailed her fingers behind his ear and down the strong, sensitive column of his neck.
His hands fisted in the bed covers. She smelled smoke, rising from where he gripped the sheets. She felt his pulse beating wildly against her fingertips, in the hollow of his throat.
“Rose,” he said hoarsely. “I want—I can’t—I don’t want to burn you.”
“I’m already burning,” she whispered, against his mouth. "I always will be."
His hands came up at last. His fingers wound into her hair, his whole body arcing up as he pulled her down to him. And if she’d been on fire before, it was nothing compared to the explosion at that first touch of his lips on hers.
There was nothing restrained or tentative about his touch now. He devoured her like wildfire, hot and hungry, claiming her mouth with fierce need. Every kiss and bite fanned her own desire. She pressed against him desperately, her fingernails digging into the thick muscle of his shoulders. She needed more of him, all of him, but she couldn’t bring herself to pull away for even an instant.
He solved that problem by hooking two fingers into the neck of her sundress. With a sharp, impatient motion, he ripped the thin cloth apart, never relinquishing her lips. Her bra and panties went the same way, falling in tatters to the floor.
Now, now she could glory in the heat of his bare skin against hers. She bit his lip to stifle her cry as his hard chest pressed against her sensitive nipples.
A deep, feral growl rumbled through his throat. He broke their kiss at last, pulling back just enough to be able to slide his hands up over the soft curve of her belly. Everywhere he touched, her skin burned with need.
He spread his fingers wide, cupping her breasts as if they were priceless treasures. She squirmed against him, pushing herself into his hot hands, shameless and urgent. His thumbs teased her hard peaks, making liquid fire pulse between her legs.
“This is right?” His voice was a harsh rasp, shaking, edged with the crackle of an inferno. “This is what it means to be mates?”
“Yes.” She tipped her head back, abandoning herself to ecstasy. “Yes, Blaze!”
With a groan, he pressed his open mouth to the base of her throat, tasting her skin. She could barely stay standing as he trailed lower, across her collarbone, down the swell of her breast. When his lips closed over her nipple, her vision went white, sparks exploding through her.
“Blaze!” she cried out, lost to everything except the heat of his mouth and her own aching need to be filled. “Please, more, now!”
His hands slid down to her waist, her thighs, though his tongue never stopped its exquisite, tormenting circles. He stood, scooping her up effortlessly, lifting her so that he could continue to feast. She wrapped her legs around him, back arching, his supporting fingers tantalizingly close and yet unbearably far from her slick, yearning core.
Shifting his grip, he held her up with one hand, his other diving between them to fumble with the button of his pants. Through the waves of pleasure, she felt him snarl in frustration against her breast. Releasing her nipple, he lifted her even higher for a moment. She gasped, startled, as a wash of intense heat licked against her thighs.
“What—” she started to say—and then lost all coherent thought, because he was lowering her again. Only now he was bare as well, his hardness pressing into her folds. Just the barest contact, his straining tip stretching her entrance. She writhed, trying to take more of him, but his arms were like iron.
“Rose,” he gasped, holding them right on the edge of fulfillment. "I feel—I know—this is forever?”
Her wetness slicked his shaft, her body completely ready and open. The mate bond was a broad, brilliant path between them, leading straight into her innermost heart. She had a sense of gathering power at the other end, a raging inferno held back by the thinnest of firebreaks. Ready to sweep over her, through her, consuming and transforming.
She wasn’t afraid.
“Yes.” She opened her body and mind and soul to the fire. To him. “Forever.”
His power lanced through her, a white-hot ecstasy as great as the surge of his body into hers. He drove in deep, into her mind, into her soul.
Our mate! her swan sang, black wings stretching wide, welcoming him home. Our mate!
Chapter 9
It was wrong, he knew. But he was so thoroughly damned already, what was one more small sin?
Her fingers intertwined through his. The soft sweetness of her pulse echoed through his own veins. He couldn’t let go.
Not again.
So Ash held Rose’s hand, and let her lead him through the darkening night.
The streetlamp was lit outside the Full Moon, bathing the old, homely building in a warm yellow glow. Rose tugged him up to the front door, casting a shy, hesitant smile up at him. Even in the flickering artificial light, he could see that there was something new in her expression. A tentative unfurling, like the first flower of spring turning to the sun.
He looked away, unable to bear that faint, shining hope in her eyes. But he still didn’t let go of her hand.
After decades apart, every second in contact with her was a gift. A grace. He was not strong enough to refuse it.
Especially not now.
Rose unlocked the door. The main room of the pub was dark, chairs upturned onto tables for the night. By sheer force of habit, he turned in the direction of Alpha Team’s usual corner, but Rose tugged on his hand.
“Not down here,” she said, guiding him past the bar and through the door at the back. “Come on.”
The corridor was even darker than the front room, but he didn’t need light to know the way. The worn stairs were familiar under his boots. He’d climbed them many times over the years, usually due to some crisis. Whenever one of the team needed help, whenever something threatened their mates…it was always to the small private room at the Full Moon that they came.
Dai, Chase, Griff, John, Hugh…he’d witnessed all their struggles and their triumphs here. Helped them, inasmuch as he could. Watched them gather together, friends, colleagues, family. Sometimes at odds with each other, like any group of brothers, but always, ultimately, united.
Tonight the meeting room was locked and silent. He went past it without a pause.
There was a door at the end of the corridor. This one he had never been through. He’d dreamed of opening it so often that it seemed unreal to step through it now.
“Well,” Rose said, peeking up at him sidelong. “Here we are.”
She opened her fingers. After a moment, he made himself open his, releasing her hand. She left his side, moving around to turn on a couple of lamps. Darkness gave way to a soft, welcoming light.
His first impression was vibrant color and warmth. Her room above the pub was not much larger than his own living space, but whereas his territory was plain and utilitarian, hers was filled with homely details.
A thick rug with a geometric orange pattern that reminded him of flames softened the worn oak floorboards. A single armchair, deep and comfortable, with a tangle of half-finished knitting draped over one arm. From the rich indigo color and wave-like texture, he guessed it was a baby blanket f
or John and Neridia’s yet-unborn child. Half the shifter infants in Brighton slept swaddled in the loving work of her hands.
She only had a small kitchenette up here—just a hot plate and a microwave. Of course, she would do her cooking downstairs in the pub, much as he prepared his own meals in the fire station’s kitchen. A single plate and cup were upside-down on the draining board next to the sink. She ate alone, as he did, above the place that was her life’s work.
A half-open door on the other side of the room showed him a glimpse of her bed. He jerked his gaze quickly away, and found himself staring at a wall of framed photos. He recognized some of them—Brighton Pier, the shingle beach, the sweeping view over the city from the top of the enclosing hills. An open day at the fire station, a long time ago, Dai and Chase with their arms draped over each other’s shoulders. Young, so young.
Others were clearly family photos. Aunts, cousins, nephews, nieces. Some of them dark-skinned, some pale, but all with Rose’s elegant, swan-like poise. A succession of pictures tracked half a dozen children growing from chubby-cheeked infants to smiling or scowling adolescents.
There were photos that an ordinary human would have assumed were digital paintings, but he knew better. Hayley leaning against the side of a great golden griffin, his beak preening her hair. Two sea dragons sporting in the waves. A unicorn glimmering through a winter-bare wood.
And one that looked like a misprint, an error. Just a yellow-white blur streaking over a faded blue, overexposed, all the colors blown out.
Rose came to his elbow, following the direction of his gaze. “You remember that day?”
He touched the glass over the photo, carefully. It had been her fortieth birthday. A picnic in the countryside, sunlight caught in her hair. Dozens of shifters, a little drunk, a little silly, safely out of sight of human eyes. He’d asked her what she wanted as a present.
“I warned you it wouldn’t come out,” he said, looking at the bolt of fire across the sky.
“It’s my favorite anyway.” She didn’t say anything for a moment, gazing at the photo of the Phoenix. “How long, Ash?”
He knew what she was asking. “Always. Since the day we met.”
Her breath sighed out of her. “Ten years…and you never said anything.”
“Neither did you.”
She slanted her eyes at him, a flash of the fire that he knew so well. “I did eventually.”
“Yes.” He couldn’t delay any longer. “Which is why we need to talk.”
She sighed again. “Wait a moment.”
He stood back, a misplaced, foreign presence in her cozy home, as she dragged her single dining chair over so that it was opposite the armchair. She gestured him to sit down, but didn’t take her own place. Instead, she went to a low cabinet, crouching to rummage around inside.
“This sounds,” she said, emerging with a tawny bottle and a pair of tumblers, “like a conversation that might require a stiff drink.” She hesitated. “Or do you still want the usual?”
He’d tried to numb himself with alcohol, a long time ago, when he’d been younger and the self-inflicted wound still fresh. It hadn’t worked. He’d avoided it ever since, the taste forever associated with bitter grief and hatred.
He took the glass from her anyway. “This is not a usual situation.”
She poured a generous measure for both of them. He knew the bottle—Scotch, from Griff’s family distillery up in the Highlands. Made for shifters, by shifters, with a punch that could fell a full-grown bear.
He knocked it back in a single swallow. Smooth smoky sweetness. Ashes and rage and emptiness.
When he lowered the glass, Rose was watching him, her expression troubled. She put her own drink down on the coffee table between them, untouched.
“You’re starting to scare me, Ash,” she said.
“Good.” His voice came out hoarse, his chest still burning with the unaccustomed whiskey. “You should be scared of me.”
She gave him an exasperated look. “Not of you, ridiculous man. For you.” She leaned her elbows on her knees, her whole body intently focused on him. “Whatever this secret is, you’ve been keeping it for a long time. And I think it’s been eating you alive.”
Now that the time had come to speak, his throat had closed up. He said nothing.
A little hesitantly, she reached out. He couldn’t bring himself to pull away as she folded her fingers around his. For once, she was the warmer one. Her touch burned like a brand against his cold skin.
“Tell me, Ash,” she whispered.
His time had run out, decades ago. He had been living on stolen grace ever since.
But he couldn’t lie to her any longer.
He forced himself to meet her eyes. Her beautiful, trusting eyes, even now looking at him with nothing but love and openness.
“I need to tell you about your mate,” he said.
Chapter 10
Past
20 years ago…
*My mate.* Rose would never, ever get tired of those words, whether spoken out loud, sent down the telepathic bond, or just in the privacy of her own thoughts. *What’s your waistband size?*
A bemused feeling spread from that warm, eternal glow in her soul. *In truth, I haven’t the faintest idea. Clothes just always…happened.*
Rose flicked through a rack of men’s jeans, pursing her lips in thought. She held up her hands in mid-air, curving them around an imaginary waist. After last night, her body knew the shape of his in intimate detail. The sharp angles of his hips, the hard planes of his flanks, his way his muscles surged in smooth motion as he filled her…
*Need I remind you, I am currently sitting in the car wearing nothing but a sheet,* he growled down the mate bond, sounding rather pained. She sensed him shift position uncomfortably. *And if you keep up that line of thought, I’m going to get arrested for public indecency.*
She giggled. *Serves you right for burning your only pair of pants.*
She gasped as heat ran over her skin, caressing her curves like a phantom hand. *You appeared to have no complaints last night.*
“Stop that,” she hissed out loud, winning a slightly strange look from another shopper. “I’m in a public place.”
A distinctly smug, masculine chuckle echoed in her mind. With a last tweak that made her legs buckle, the sense of warmth withdrew.
Our mate, her swan murmured in contentment.
Grinning like an idiot, Rose selected a pair of jeans. She pushed her shopping cart onward, scanning the shelves. A couple of soft cotton T-shirts, in a deep red that would complement his coloring. She hesitated over sweatshirts, trying to find one that wasn’t covered in crass slogans or over-patriotic stars and stripes, before giving up. He was the Phoenix, after all. He wasn’t going to get cold.
*Boxers or briefs?* she asked him.
He didn’t answer for a moment. She felt a strange stillness from him, as though it was a question of huge import.
*I’ve never had to pick anything for myself before,* he said softly. *I don’t really know how to do it.*
She wrapped wordless comfort around him, and waited.
*Boxers,* he said at last.
*Is that what they gave you?* she asked as she grabbed a couple of packs. *At the warlock base?*
*No.*
She brushed her mind against his, light as the tip of a feather, so that he could feel her silent understanding.
She paid for the shopping, counting out bills from her dwindling supply. She had more in her savings account, but she didn’t want to risk going to a bank if she could possibly avoid it. Neither she nor Blaze thought that the warlocks had any way of identifying her, but better safe than sorry.
Exiting the store, she made her way to the back of the parking lot, where she’d left the car. Blaze opened the door as she approached, still carefully clutching his sheet. His relief shone down the mate bond.
“See?” She gave him a long, lingering kiss before handing him the shopping bag. “Perfectly saf
e. You could have stayed at the motel after all.”
“You’d have come back to find a smoking hole in the ground,” he said wryly, ripping tags off clothes as he spoke. “It was bad enough having to wait outside. I couldn’t stand to be any farther apart from you.”
She kissed him again, curling her hands over his smooth, bare shoulders. “You’ll never have to.”
Once Blaze was decent once more, they set off down the freeway. Rose would have liked to head straight north, but the wildfires were still blocking off the most direct route to the border. She switched on the radio, scanning frequencies for news updates as she drove.
Blaze rode shotgun in silence, his bandaged forearm resting along the open window, the wind ruffling his short brown hair. His dark eyes drank in the sky, the horizon, the ugly strip malls and billboards, all with equal wonder.
“Where are we going?” he asked at last.
“Since you don’t have any sort of identification, our options are a bit limited.” Rose flashed him a sideways glance, something occurring to her. “Do you even have a last name?”
He shook his head, an ironic smile lifting the corner of his mouth. “Officially, I don’t exist. I suppose I must have a birth certificate on file somewhere, but I wouldn’t know where to begin searching for it. I don’t even remember the country where I was born.”
“You have an English accent,” she said, the strangeness of that only just striking her.
His jaw tightened. “Corbin,” he said, and nothing more.
His warlock. The only person who’d talked to him. Of course he’d grow up copying his captor’s speech patterns. And if this Corbin was English, no wonder that he’d fled here to the far side of America. Great Britain was a shifter-ruled country. Rose didn’t know if the Parliament of Shifters was aware of warlocks, but they certainly came down very, very hard on anything that threatened either the secrecy or the wellbeing of shifter citizens.
“Well. We can’t get you a passport, and that means a plane ticket is out,” she said. “I think our best bet is to get as far north as we can, then shift to cross the border. Canada’s a Commonwealth realm—our Queen is still their ceremonial head of state. It’s a shifter-friendly country. We just need to find a British embassy, and we’ll be safe.”