Indeed.
His mouth found mine, the kiss open and deep, a clash of tongues and teeth. He lay me down on the pillows, and I locked my legs around his back, careful of the wings.
Though I stopped caring as he nudged at my entrance. And paused.
“Play later,” I snarled into his mouth.
Rhys laughed in a way that skittered along my bones, and slid in. And in. And in.
I could hardly breathe, hardly think beyond where our bodies were joined. He stilled inside me, letting me adjust, and I opened my eyes to find him staring down at me. “Say it again,” he murmured.
I knew what he meant.
“You’re mine,” I breathed.
Rhys pulled out slightly and thrust back in slow. So torturously slow.
“You’re mine,” I gasped out.
Again, he pulled out, then thrust in.
“You’re mine.”
Again—faster, deeper this time.
I felt it then, the bond between us, like an unbreakable chain, like an undimmable ray of light.
With each pounding stroke, the bond glowed clearer and brighter and stronger. “You’re mine,” I whispered, dragging my hands through his hair, down his back, across his wings.
My friend through many dangers.
My lover who had healed my broken and weary soul.
My mate who had waited for me against all hope, despite all odds.
I moved my hips in time with his. He kissed me over and over, and both of our faces turned damp. Every inch of me burned and tightened, and my control slipped entirely as he whispered, “I love you.”
Release tore through my body, and he pounded into me, hard and fast, drawing out my pleasure until I felt and saw and smelled that bond between us, until our scents merged, and I was his and he was mine, and we were the beginning and middle and end. We were a song that had been sung from the very first ember of light in the world.
Rhys roared as he came, slamming in to the hilt. Outside, the mountains trembled, the remaining snow rushing from them in a cascade of glittering white, only to be swallowed up by the waiting night below.
Silence fell, interrupted only by our panting breaths.
I took his paint-smeared face between my own colorful hands and made him look at me.
His eyes were radiant like the stars I’d painted once, long ago.
And I smiled at Rhys as I let that mating bond shine clear and luminous between us.
I don’t know how long we lay there, lazily touching each other, as if we might indeed have all the time in the world.
“I think I fell in love with you,” Rhys murmured, stroking a finger down my arm, “the moment I realized you were cleaving those bones to make a trap for the Middengard Wyrm. Or maybe the moment you flipped me off for mocking you. It reminded me so much of Cassian. For the first time in decades, I wanted to laugh.”
“You fell in love with me,” I said flatly, “because I reminded you of your friend?”
He flicked my nose. “I fell in love with you, smartass, because you were one of us—because you weren’t afraid of me, and you decided to end your spectacular victory by throwing that piece of bone at Amarantha like a javelin. I felt Cassian’s spirit beside me in that moment, and could have sworn I heard him say, ‘If you don’t marry her, you stupid prick, I will.’ ”
I huffed a laugh, sliding my paint-covered hand over his tattooed chest. Paint—right.
We were both covered in it. So was the bed.
Rhys followed my eyes and gave me a grin that was positively wicked. “How convenient that the bathtub is large enough for two.”
My blood heated, and I rose from the bed only to have him move faster—scooping me up in his arms. He was splattered with paint, his hair crusted with it, and his poor, beautiful wings … Those were my handprints on them. Naked, he carried me into the bath, where the water was already running, the magic of this cabin acting on our behalf.
He strode down the steps into the water, his hiss of pleasure a brush of air against my ear. And I might have moaned a little myself when the hot water hit me as he sat us both down in the tub.
A basket of soaps and oils appeared along the stone rim, and I pushed off him to sink further beneath the surface. The steam wafted between us, and Rhys picked up a bar of that pine tar–smelling soap and handed it to me, then passed a washrag. “Someone, it seems, got my wings dirty.”
My face heated, but my gut tightened. Illyrian males and their wings—so sensitive.
I twirled my finger to motion him to turn around. He obeyed, spreading those magnificent wings enough for me to find the paint stains. Carefully, so carefully, I soaped up the washcloth and began wiping the red and blue and purple away.
The candlelight danced over his countless, faint scars—nearly invisible save for harder bits of membrane. He shuddered with each pass, hands braced on the lip of the tub. I peeked over his shoulder to see the evidence of that sensitivity, and said, “At least the rumors about wingspan correlating with the size of other parts were right.”
His back muscles tensed as he choked out a laugh. “Such a dirty, wicked mouth.”
