“But why? What would I do anyway?”
“Visiting the Mayor springs to mind.”
“But I couldn't hurt him, not as a spirit, could I?”
“Don't be so sure. I think your physical wolf can materialise anywhere it wants to.”
“Oh no, no, no... I'm getting real bad vibes now. Oh God... I need to be alone. Just for a while. Okay?” Maddy left his room with her head in her hands.
A moment later he followed. He opened the door and went in her room, sitting beside her as she lay on her bed, watching her for a moment.
“I want to be here for you. Don't push me away when things get tough. We'll see it through together, understood?” he told her firmly, with a stern and solemn expression.
She sat up and moved towards him, settling herself across his lap.
“But I feel such a burden,” she revealed.
“You are never going to be a burden to me. Don't say things like that. I'll whip your pretty ass if you even so much as think it again,” he replied harshly, gripping her shoulders a little roughly in demonstration.
“God, I love you. I really do, especially when you get all masterful and insistent with me,” she murmured, her eyes caressing his face, and finishing up with the sweetest hot little kiss on the side his mouth.
He clasped her to him tightly, ruffling her hair, and kissing the top of her head. He would solve this curse for her somehow. He'd do anything for her. But first, he needed to do something important. Something that not so long ago he never imagined he'd want to do. He needed the binding permanency more than ever. He took her hand and led her away, back to his room.
“Come with me, honey.”
He closed the door and locked it. He wasn't going to be interrupted. Not even if the ranch burned to ashes around him. This was their moment.
“Wait there,” he said, going into the bathroom and returning with a towel which he placed on the pillow.
“What's that for?” she asked with curious eyes.
“It's for us, you'll see.”
“Come here, baby, let's get those clothes off.”
He undressed them both, and they feasted their eyes upon each other. She slipped into his waiting arms with a sigh.
“I can't get enough of you. I wish we could do this all day, and all night, especially the full moon ones,” she said, nuzzling his neck.
“You don't know what I have in mind yet,” he teased, his lips curling into a smile as they brushed across hers.
“I can hazard a guess, and I'm so up for it.”
He laughed at her eagerness. “Well I have to admit, sex might come into it.”
“I'm so pleased to hear it!”
“But there's something else I want to do first.”
“There is?”
“Come and sit on my lap, and I'll tell you.” He sat down, holding her hands, pulling her down and drawing her close to him.
“Oh I see, it's a little game, is it?” She smiled sexily as she sat astride his lap, rubbing herself very suggestively against his aroused cock.
“Hey, not too much of that. I want to be able to think straight for a minute.”
“Well I don't. I don't want to think at all, not ever again. It's too miserable and sickening and painful and ...”
“Maddy, please. Listen. Just for a minute or two,” he said, interrupting her, holding her writhing hips still.
“Oh alright, then. A cuddle and a listen it is.” She looped her arms around his neck and snuggled close and became still.
“I nearly gave in there... You're so irresistible, you know.”
“Awww, so are you. Now come on... what's so important...?”
“I've been debating with myself over and over, is it too soon to ask you this? And if it is, don't worry, we can wait a while,” he assured her, tipping her face up to his with his fingers.
“Go on... Ask me, please....” she appealed, her chest heaving suddenly as she realised where this was leading and what he was going to say. Her eyes blazed into his passionately. And those eyes of hers were so beautiful. He just had to kiss them first.
His heart soared with confidence as he cleared his throat and began.
“Maddy, I love you and want you for my mate. If you want me, mark me, and mark me hard.”
“Do I want you? Oh Aden, I've never wanted anything so much in my whole life. I want to do it right now. This second.”
“Then bite me with all the love you have for me,” he urged, his heart pumping like mad in his chest, his breathing rocketing off somewhere in wild anticipation. “Use your wolf fangs and bite me here, on the shoulder,” he gestured. “Mark me Maddy. I want to feel this baby. You've got to draw blood.”
She shifted into her wolf form in a flash and bit him fast and hard, with all the love she had. He jerked silently, gritting his teeth and stifling his moan of pain. She salved the wound, licking it with her tongue, as the blood flowed freely from the deep puncture marks. Then just as effortlessly, she shifted back into her human form, and dabbed at the remaining blood with the towel.