Page 68 of Of Magic and Murder

Because, by the time Riordan’s mouth finds the curve where my neck meets my shoulder, I already know what’s going to happen next, though the only speaking we’re doing is a symphony of pants and groans, pleas and promises. I know what he’s going to do. What his instincts must be screaming at him to accomplish.

And, yet, Riordan still pauses.

Even now. With his body buried deep inside of me, my nails digging into the taut muscles on his back as he presses his weight down on me in the bed, he pauses mid-thrust so that he can make sure that I’m one hundred percent with him.

His breathing is ragged against my skin. His entire body is tense, his wolf so close that I can feel the faint scrape of elongated teeth when his lips brush my neck. Before Moonburrow, if I was ever in this situation again, I think I would rather die than sense fangs about to sink into my skin. I believed that I would be tied to that feral, and now that I know bonding only takes when both partners are open to and accepting of that tie, I probably would’ve fought back even harder if another feral attacked me.

But this isn’t a feral kissing me softly while fighting the urge to pull out and slam back into me. This is Riordan. The male that is meant to be my mate, that I finally know has thought of himself as my mate for months, and who will only be my mate if he bites me as the same time as he comes, leaving his mark on my skin and inside my body.

I know he’s close. From the moment he gasped into my mouth, telling me how long he’s been waiting for me… I already understood that our first mating would be something all-consuming and memorable, but it wouldn’t be an evening of leisurely love-making. That can come after, but from the moment Riordan was fully seated, claiming my pussy as soon as I assured him I could take him… I expected him to nut quickly.

Only he’s trying to hold out, and when he shudders my name against my skin, I’m pretty sure I know why.

“Pen…”

“Yes.”

One word. Another affirmative. That’s all he needs. To know that he asked me to choose him and that, at my most vulnerable, I can still find it in me to tell him that I want this… that I want him… Yes, Riordan. Make me your mate.

With one perfectly positioned strike, he does.

This is the worst possible moment to think of my previous lovers, but I can’t help it. I’ve been with male witches who thought they were lotharios who couldn’t find my clit with a locator spell. I’ve been with humans that heard me mutter ‘Goddess’ in disappointment as they came without doing little more to stimulate me than tug on a nipple once or twice and think that I was crying out to my deity in gratitude. I don’t always come during sex, but whether it’s because this is my first time with my new mate or because bonding is that fucking magical, I don’t know.

All I can tell is that I barely notice the pain of being bitten because, right as he penetrates me fully with his fangs, he does the same with his cock. So full of Riordan in every way that counts, the mate bond slams into place so suddenly, I hit the hardest climax I ever have in my life.

That has to be what happened. There’s no other way to describe it. One second Riordan is someone outside of me, someone I love—because I do, and I can have a breakdown about realizing that later—and the next there’s a connection between us so powerful that I can feel him inside of me—and I don’t just mean his dick.

Riordan shudders against me, putting as much of his weight on me as I can handle as he experiences what it’s like to have me on the other side of our newly cemented mate bond.

And that’s not all. Somewhere beneath that, something else snaps. It’s almost nothing compared to the bond, but I’m a cursebreaker. There’s no way I don’t notice it when, after fifteen years, the curse wrapped around Riordan fractures.

I didn’t even realize my eyes had closed as I came down from the high of my own orgasm. I open them just in time to watch the neon green magic break, looking less like smoke and more like cracked glass.

A heartbeat later, the curse shatters completely. Green sparks scatter over his skin and vanish before they can touch the sheets. The twisted magic buried inside his alpha power simply ceases to exist, leaving behind Riordan’s own magic, warm and wild and entirely his.

I smile, squeezing whatever part of him I can reach. His side, I think. Maybe. I keep my hands on Riordan—on my mate—and say giddily, “We did it, Riordan. Your curse… it broke.”

For a moment, he just angles his sweat-slicked face so that he can stare down at me.

I wonder if he’s going to have second thoughts. If he’s going to let doubt come in and convince himself that I only did this because I would do anything to break a curse. If he’s going to⁠—

He closes his eyes and exhales.

The relief that moves through our brand new bond is so enormous that tears sting mine. He presses his forehead to my shoulder, breathing hard, and I hold him while he realizes that, for the first time in fifteen years, the next careless command out of his mouth can’t steal anyone’s free will. More importantly, he lost his curse, but he finally claimed his mate.

Which is why, because he’s still Riordan, curse or no curse, he doesn’t spend long celebrating his own freedom before his attention returns to me.

To his mate.

His mouth brushes the new bite at my shoulder.

I shiver.

He does it again, slower this time, his tongue soothing the angry bloody mark he left behind that, come tomorrow, should be a silver mate mark that tells the entire supe world that I belong to this male.

“Riordan,” I groan.

A low, satisfied sound rumbles through his chest as I cry out his name.