Her heart ached at the thought of him suffering. She looked around until she spotted the bathroom, scrounging for the needed supplies.

  She cleaned up the blood and tended his wounds with quick efficiency, trying to ignore the bare, muscled flesh beneath her hands.

  When she realized she was dreamily caressing his already clean chest with the washcloth, she forced herself to step back. She tucked him under the light cotton sheet before heading out of the room so he could rest.

  Feeling dirty and utterly exhausted, she decided to jump in the shower before exploring. She let her mind go blank as the hot water pelted her skin. She didn’t pay attention to the tears of release mixed with the droplets of water on her face, the chilled trembling in her limbs brought on by the shocking events this day had wrought. By the time she emerged, an hour had passed and she had started to feel human again.

  She found a large, masculine robe hanging against the bathroom door, sliding into it before she peeked in on Damon, who still appeared to be sound asleep. She stared for long moments, contenting herself with watching his chest rise and fall slowly.

  He was alive.

  She walked up beside him, brushing a strand of silky, dark hair off his forehead lovingly before heading downstairs for a little light snooping. She was astounded by what she found.

  This was a house straight out of her fondest daydreams, with high-beamed ceilings and a bright, airy feel.

  The décor, distinctly masculine, was all dark woods and leather furniture, with simple lines and not a lot of clutter. There were rough-hewn bookshelves against the far wall, full to bursting with paperback novels, hardcovers and magazines.

  The focal point of the room was the massive fireplace, with a stained driftwood mantle, a gigantic flat screen television moonlighting as the only artwork above it. She even spied an X-box on the floor, shoved against the wall. Yep, definitely a man’s retreat. But a beautiful one.

  She walked through the large, open kitchen. The industrial-size stainless steel appliances and latest in cooking gadgetry led her to believe that whoever lived here truly enjoyed cooking. But it was the floor-to-ceiling windows taking up the entire front of the house that she loved the most. She was drawn to them. The scene they revealed to her was shocking.

  Stepping through the glass door, she walked toward the edge of the wide, wooden deck. Beyond her was the landscape of her visions, where she had met and spoken with Danu.

  She saw the stream in the distance, the emerald field and fairy mound, looked up at the too exquisite to be real blue of the sky. She was actually here at the house she had wondered about in her dreams!

  Looking around, almost expecting to see the ethereal blonde woman striding toward her, she pinched her arm beneath the thick terry of the robe. She was awake, which could only mean that Myrddin had flashed them to—

  “Welcome to Ireland, Meru. Welcome to my home.”

  She turned at the sound of his husky voice, her heart in her throat as she gazed at Damon. All the love she felt for him, all that they’d been through over the past few days, the fact that he had almost died…all merged into a single driving need in her mind. She had to touch him.

  Black eyes blazed as he opened his arms at her unspoken plea, lifting her up as she flung herself against him. Her hands sifted eagerly through his hair, legs wrapped tight around his waist as if afraid he might let her go.

  Damon groaned at the feel of her finally back in his arms where she belonged. He took her mouth in a kiss filled with all the urgent passion and adoration inside him.

  When he’d woken to find himself alone in his own bed, for one groggily insane moment he’d imagined it had all been a dream. The prophecy, the Cup, Meru’s abduction. Everything.

  His soul had nearly wept at the idea that he hadn’t found his mate after all, hadn’t gotten a chance to know her, to taste her lips, the sweet honey of her sex. To thank her for the wholeness she had brought into his life.

  Less than a heartbeat later, he’d woken enough to become aware of her evocative and achingly familiar scent as it wrapped around his Lycan soul. She was here!

  He took the stairs in a single, joy-filled leap, heedless of his unclothed state. He’d found her looking in awe at the scenery around her. He’d owned this land forever. Its isolation, not to mention the helpful spell of hiding Finn had cloaked it with, had made it the perfect home base for the men. No tourist could see it, no Dark could penetrate it and it was within sight of the doorway to the Tuatha’s Realm…and the North Portal.

  Seeing Meru standing there, her dark curls shifting in the light summer breeze, the scent of lavender from the field beyond reminiscent of her own natural fragrance, Damon thought he might have actually built this home for her. For his mate. As if some part of him knew he would find her.

  He’d looked at her, standing there in nothing but his robe, and knew he had to make her his in truth. Nyc’s words, as well as the advice of Raj and Hawk, burned worriedly into his brain. After all that had happened with Nimue and the Sauros, he knew that the only way to ensure her continued safety was to mark her and join her life to his.

  She’d come into his embrace and his body had tightened with desire, the wolf inside baying in lustful agreement with his plan. Both sides of his nature focusing as one on the small, curvaceous armful he now held.

  He felt her wet, naked pussy pressed against his bare flesh through the opening of the robe, robbing him of breath and hardening his already stiff cock to a near painful level of need. Gods, he needed her now.

  He turned to bring her inside, possessively determined to see her surrounded by his things, on his bed. Meru’s face nuzzled his neck as he entered the living room, licking the salted cord of his neck, sucking the lobe of his ear in her hot little mouth.

  The soft fur rug in front of the fireplace caught Damon’s eye. His bed or his rug? As she squirmed against him, the loose robe opening at her movements, pressing the soft, full globes of her breast against his chest, rubbing the tight points of her nipples over his burning skin, he decided they’d traveled far enough.

  He had been planning on romancing her, telling her how he felt. He wanted to explain the mating ritual to her in caring detail, answer all her questions. The heat that always flared up between them, however, roared to life with a vengeance as he laid her down, quickly stripping her of his robe and kneeling between her creamy thighs. The scent of her need hit him with the force of a hurricane, her excited whimpers as he licked one taut, juicy nipple nearly driving him mad with desire.

  She arched sharply at the feel of his mouth opening wide around her breast, as if he were trying to suck her down and swallow her whole. He nibbled, he laved, sucking her pebbled peak hard against the roof of his mouth. Ravenous sounds emerged from his throat as his mouth traveled across her chest to the breast he’d been neglecting, offering equal treatment.

  Crying out, she gripped his shoulders, her fingernails cutting into his flesh. She felt each pull of his mouth send fiery bursts of need to her core, her molten juices soaking the lips of her sex at the sensation. She ran her hands over every part of him she could reach, bending her knees and wrapping her legs around his waist, desperate to feel him fully against her.

  “More,” she sobbed. “Please, Damon. I need you. I need you now.”

  He growled low against her breast, pressing his hips against hers. His cock pulsed against her swollen clit as he took her hands in his, pressing them flat against the floor. Damon raised his head and looked into her eyes, his own a brilliant black, burning with ferocious intent.

  The hard edge of desire on his face softened slightly, replaced by a look of such indescribable wonder that her heart fluttered at the sight. He swallowed, his long lashes shielding his expression for a moment.

  “Love you, Meru.” His voice lowered as he lifted his eyes to hers. “I love you. Mate.”

  She gasped, and then whispered softly, “I love you too, Damon. My mate.”

  It was as if sunlight had broken through the darkness. That was the only way she could describe the expression that erupted on his face at her words. She knew his joy was a match for hers. That he was her match in every way.

  His gaze heated once more as he felt the tiny, inadvertent thrusts of her hips against his, her body still tingling with need. He smiled a devil’s grin, made all the more dangerous and sexy by his sharp, lengthening canines.

  The tip of his weeping cock nudged her pussy, causing her to moan and arch more fully against him. The feel of his skin against hers was indescribable. Heavenly.

  Damon slid through her dewy sex, coating his shaft with her juices, the erotic sensation causing her to thrash and writhe against him.

  He teased them both without mercy, thrusting slowly between her trembling thighs, lightly pressing against her before sliding away, causing her pussy to spasm in aching need; longing for him to fill her. She jerked against his hold on her hands. She wanted to touch him, needed to touch him.

  She looked into his blackened eyes, her own moist with desire, and he groaned, as if the feelings had suddenly become too much for him as well. He released her struggling hands, only to raise his body away from hers, flipping her over to land on her hands and knees before him.

  She leaned down on her elbows, parting her thighs wide and wiggling her hips slightly in invitation. The swollen folds of her sopping sex lay open to his heated gaze, begging him to take what was his.

  “Are you trying to tempt me to lose control? Are you being a ‘bad girl’ again?”

  The memory of the first time he’d called her that and the delicious punishment he’d inflicted made her shiver. His broad palms cupped the silken globes, stilling her movements in a warning that felt more like a caress, and she smiled.

  “I can take whatever you dish out,” she gasped bravely, her body instinctively pushing into his hands.

  He chuckled as she felt his thick fingers slipping through her arousal, soaking the digits as he growled hungrily. “So sweet, baby. I want to cover myself in your honey. Drink it down and swim in your sweet juices.” She sobbed out a moan, her hips arching instinctively higher at his carnal words.

  Damon covered her body with his own, his cock jerking against her as his words grated harsh with need in her ear. “I need to fuck you, Meru. To love you. To make you mine in everyway. I can’t lose you again. Will you let me, baby?”

  Anything. Meru nodded, trying to entice him to take her, but he just held her tighter. “Do you know what that means to a Lycan, Meru? Do you know what I’ll want to do? What I’ll have to do?”

  In answer, she raised one arm from the floor, pulled her hair back over one shoulder with a shaking hand and tilted her neck invitingly.

  The torc glimmered in the soft light and Damon’s large frame trembled against her as he stared in awe at the trust her action implied. The trust she had given him from the first. His heart burst with love for this amazing woman. His woman. His Meru.

  His jaw clenched with restraint as he entered her, her drenched pussy clenching around him like a tight, gripping fist. He pressed his lips against her neck, growling uncontrollably against her as he thrust deep into her silken heat, unable to go slow.

  She cried out as she felt her tissues stretch around him, trying to accommodate his massive length. She felt his tongue lapping at her pale skin, laving sensuously as he filled her with each powerful thrust of his cock.

  She felt him expanding inside of her, the body around her growing larger as the wolf came to the fore. The animal sounds of rapture coming from Damon caused Meru to moan with desire, soaking them both with her arousal as she greedily tilted her hips, pulling him deeper with every downward glide.

  My Lycan, she thought with a joyous whimper as she buried her face into the soft fur of the rug beneath her. With each pounding drive of his hips, she felt the veins and ridges of his engorged shaft as he filled her to bursting, molding and reshaping her with his need.

  Harder and faster, the room filled with the sounds of their heated coupling and pleasured groans. She rose up on her elbows to push back against him, crying out his name as she joined him stroke for stroke.

  His clawed hands left her hips, lowering to cover hers on the floor in a show of gentle domination. He growled softly once more against her neck as his hips slammed relentlessly against her own. It was primal, earthy and elemental. She loved it. She loved him. He groaned her name in a garbled, guttural voice, his fangs grazing the curve of her shoulder.

  She came in a strong volcanic blast just as she felt the quick, painfully erotic lunge of his teeth piercing her neck. He roared against her, his open mouth sucking hard as he swelled impossibly inside her, causing her to erupt once more as he pumped stream, after endless stream of cum into her quivering flesh.

  He gripped her tightly to him, holding her up when she would have collapsed on the floor. He tongued her neck, healing the wound and savoring her taste.

  She could feel him, still hard despite his recent climax, still pumping slowly inside her. Dazed, she looked at him over her shoulder and raised one eyebrow in question. Damon merely smiled and lifted himself off her back.

  He pressed one gentle, but firm, hand between her shoulder blades, and her body began to tingle with renewed arousal as she allowed him to position her body into a pose of helpless supplication, her hips high in the air, thighs spread, torso pressed flat against the rug.

  Continuing to thrust slow and steady inside her, his fingers slid around her hip to gently press her pulsing clit, slipping in their mingled juices until his fingers were coated with it.

  Meru, whose eyes had been closed, her mind focused on his tender caresses, jerked in surprise as one blunt, wet finger pressed firmly between her cheeks, circling the pink rosette teasingly before slowly sliding into her ass.

  She must have made a noise. “I told you, baby. I told you I wanted to fuck you here. So tight. Such a sweet, tight ass. It’s gonna feel so good, Meru, I promise.”

  She was in no shape to argue. To be honest, she’d never been so turned on in her entire life. Just the thought of sharing something so intimate, so forbidden, with this man had her pushing her hips backward, the unused muscles stretching to accommodate him as he added a second finger to the first.

  She could feel him everywhere. His cock as it thrust deep into her womb, his thick fingers pushing deeper, stretching her anus. It was shocking, the feeling of fullness. She moaned and laid her forehead weakly against the soft fur of the rug, trying to breathe through the sensations. It felt indescribably wicked. “Damon, oh, it feels so good.”

  Her back arched at the indescribable fullness. Pain, yes, as the thick head of his cock breached the tight ring of muscles, but pleasure as well. A pleasure so intense it shot up her spine, an electric zap that caused her body to flush and tremble in reaction. She bit her lip and tasted blood.

  “So tight. So tight around my cock. Ah gods, Meru.”

  He roared as her muscles flexed around the steel of his cock and she thought she could actually sense the moment he lost his vaunted control, his hips rocking against hers with a near-bruising force as he finally let go.

  When she felt his teeth clamp onto her shoulder once more, claiming her in the most elemental, primal way, she cried out in ecstasy. She bucked backward against him, driving him deeper still as she shattered in a thousand pieces. It was devastating. It was wonderful.

  She saw black spots dance before her eyes moments before she heard him calling her name as he emptied himself once more inside her, collapsing next to her as if he too had been devastated by the experience.

  She allowed herself to spread into an exhausted heap on the floor, wondering when the shaking would stop, when she felt herself being unceremoniously flipped over.

  “Meru. Are you all right?”

  She felt his hand on her face and realized her cheeks were soaked with tears. She smiled weakly and nodded. He looked carefully into her eyes, the worried look in his own fading and a smile tugging at his lips at whatever he found there. He studied the wound on her neck, already closing from the healing ministrations of his tongue, and let out an inward whoop of joyous relief.

  All the fears about control were banished now. He had been overwhelmed with sensation, the wolf reveling in her blood, drinking it down greedily. But even the instincts of the wolf, ever protective of his mate, would only allow him to take so much. He had joined them together in the most unbreakable bond of his kind. They were mated. Their souls and minds merged.

  Mate, he thought possessively.

  “You better not forget it, either.” The voice rose up from a cloud of curls as she slumped, boneless in his arms. His eyebrows rose and he cuddled her closer, seeing her sated smile and chuckling softly.

  Can you hear me, Meru?

  “Of course I can hear you. You’ve stolen my muscle coordination, not my hearing.”

  Open your eyes, baby.

  She slowly did as he requested, blinking in surprise when he repeated his question. “Umm…your lips didn’t move.”

  You are my mate. We can communicate mentally now.

  “Finn talked to me telepathically.”

  His eyes narrowed. Don’t think about other men at a time like this.

  She giggled, pulling him down for a long leisurely kiss. You’re so sensitive. Why on earth would I think about that Faerie when I have such a big, strong, lusty wolf as my mate?

  I love you, baby.

  She knew.

  * * * * *

  Three weeks later…

  Meru sat on the deck of her new home, her smiling gaze fixed on the picturesque view that surrounded her. Ireland felt like coming home. She didn’t miss Houston at all. Everything and everyone she loved was right here. Including her family.

  The silver eyed Archon had arrived within hours of their mating, interrupting a very sexy, very naked cooking lesson. After she’d dressed and the color in her cheeks had faded, Myrddin had told them that everyone was fine and that they would arrive after giving them a few days alone to recover. She rolled her eyes, imagining the scene clearly, impressed that Myrddin had been able to get her aunt and Sheridan to agree to the wait.

 

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