“You- you called me your mate. Did you mean it?” Zara asked. She was looking him right in the eye and it gave him the same thrill it had given him before. After four years of her dropping her gaze from his, looking her right in the eye felt so intensely intimate.
Her words made him go still, though. She’d been so clear that she never wanted a mate. That she wanted to be alone. Peaceful. Independent. He’d completely understood her reasoning when she’d explained it to him. After all those years tethered to Dalyer, he supposed nobody would want to be linked to another again. But it had deeply thrilled him when she’d said it moments ago. Called him her mate. And more than thrilling, it had just felt right. It had felt like the truth.
“I meant it.” He ran a finger over her collarbone. Her skin was like flower petals laid over glass. She was a work of art. “But that doesn’t mean anything unless you meant it.”
A color worked its way over her skin. She was blushing. He assumed because she was remembering the things she’d just done and said while she was fucking his brains out.
She turned and faced him. He felt like his world tipped with whatever she said next. “I never felt like I’d ever want that. A mate.” She drew her hands through her hair and let out a frustrated breath. She stared at the ceiling like she could find the answers there. “But. I guess I don’t know. It all felt clearer a moment ago.”
He tipped up on an elbow and studied her face. “You mean that it was clearer when I was inside you.”
She blushed further, flushing up to the roots of her hair. She bit her lip and nodded.
“Then I guess I’m gonna have to try and clear some things up for you.” Solar scooped her up and laid her across his stomach. His cock was sandwiched between them as he smoothed a hand over her ass. Finding her wet core from the back, Solar teased her with his fingers.
Zara gasped and stiffened, smashing her breasts into his chest as she buried her face in the crook of his neck. Her hips made tiny fucking motions and he grinned into the sweltering air of the hut. She was a goner. He circled her clit with his middle finger, teasing her into pleasure, while two other fingers plunged into her and circled her channel.
Fuck, she was tight. He deserved a medal for lasting as long as he had before. He could feel her tightening and rising and when she tensed and broke, screaming into his skin, he felt her release almost like it was his own. But he wasn’t done with her. He rolled her off of him so that she lay on her belly on the cot.
Laying over top of her, Solar nudged her legs apart. He let a lot of his weight rest on her. Something in all of his fantasies he’d never really imagined doing. But she was so much stronger than he’d ever known. Her slim body was vibrating with tensile strength. Her coloring, her soft hair, her delicate build, all of it gave the illusion of fragility. But touching her, finally touching her, showed him exactly how much she could handle.
Solar grabbed her hands and pinned her to the mattress as she pushed back at him with her ass. He groaned into her hair and reared back, pressing himself into her.
Zara’s body went tight like a flash of lightning at his intrusion and her hands gripped his. He held still, letting her get used to the new position. But then she was rearing up, pushing against him and coming to her knees under him. Solar ground himself into her as he reared up behind her, his hands on her hips.
“Is it clear again, Zara?” he ground out. “Am I your mate?”
“Yes,” she groaned into the mattress, her words muffled against it as he pushed and pushed and pushed into her.
“That’s right,” he said through clenched teeth. “You’re my mate. And I’m yours. You’re mine.”
He planted a hand on her back and really started to ride her. The sound of skin on skin echoed through the hut. Solar reached down to the place they were joined and used his hand to work her clit. And suddenly Zara was tightening underneath him, her pussy clenching around his cock like a vise.
He wasn’t going to be able to last much longer. “You’re mine,” he said again as he pumped into her. Zara looked over her shoulder, panting and staring him right in the eye.
“You’re mine too, Solar,” she said. And he came. Looking into her eyes and thrusting into her so deep he was losing himself. And losing himself in their pledge to one another. They were mated.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“But they’re all gonna know!” Zara insisted, tugging at Solar’s hand and digging her feet into the soft jungle floor.
“Gonna know what?” Solar stopped and turned to face her. His eyes sliced into hers, the way they always did. But she refused to look away.