Finally, someone cleared their throat.
He and Brynne turned to face the sober gazes of the elders.
Baramael spoke for the group. “This is a most unusual request, Ekizael. However, these are most unusual times.” Over the male’s one blue eye, his black brow arched. “And you have fallen in love with a most unusual woman.”
Zael grinned, drawing her close. “Yes, I have.”
A smile tugged at Baramael’s mouth as well. “We owe you a debt for what you did today, Brynne. Not only the four of us, but the entire colony. So, it’s the agreement of this council that it would be our privilege to have you a part of this community.”
“Thank you,” she murmured, humbled by their acceptance. She’d never dreamed she would find that here.
She had never dreamed she’d find the kind of love and passion and contentment that Zael had brought into her life.
His fingers laced with hers as he drew her gaze back to him. “You haven’t given me your answer yet, Brynne. Can you love me enough to stay?” His eyes searched hers, solemn, earnest. “Can you love me enough to be my mate and spend your lifetime here at my side?”
“Can I love you enough?” Joy swamped her. All of the emotion she felt swelling inside her—both her own and Zael’s—was too much for her to contain. It spilled over in the tears that streaked down her cheeks. “Zael, I love you enough for a thousand lifetimes. You are my home and my heart. My everything.”
“Forever,” he murmured, his deep voice rough with feeling too.
As his mouth slanted sweetly over hers, she wrapped her arms around him and surrendered completely to the moment, to the man who was all she would ever need.
All the uncertainty and fear that had lived in her for so long evaporated under the warmth and strength of Zael’s kiss. Of his love.
In his arms, she had no doubts.
She belonged to him—body, blood, heart, and soul.
Irreversibly.
Eternally.
He broke their kiss on a sensual groan. Swiveling his head toward the elders as if in afterthought, he smirked. “If the council will excuse me, I’d like to take my beautiful mate home now.”
He barely gave them a chance to agree.
Brynne laughed as he scooped her up into his arms. His lips brushed her ear as he lowered his voice to a whisper meant for her alone.
“I want to show you my home, love. Our home. And our bed.”
CHAPTER 37
He had never brought a woman into his private home on the island.
As he carried Brynne inside the white stucco cottage on the same high hill where Nethilos had been laid to rest, Zael had never felt a greater sense that he had—at last—arrived where he belonged.
With Brynne as his mate, he would always be home.
“It’s beautiful,” she said as he brought her into the open-air residence with its wide garden terrace that overlooked endless turquoise waters. She sighed in unabashed awe, her dark green eyes lit with wonderment. “Aren’t you going to give me the grand tour?”
“Oh, yes,” he said, his voice rough with desire. “We’ll start the tour in the bedroom.”
“That would be my first choice too.” She smiled, licking her lips in a way that made his blood run hot and arrow straight to his cock. “After the bedroom, then where will you take me?”
He smiled, thinking of all the erotic possibilities. “Everywhere and every way,” he promised with a kiss, already hard and eager to have her beneath him.
A soft evening breeze rolled off the waves below and sifted through the flowering bushes outside the bedroom’s open wall of glass. The air was filled with the fragrance of salt and citrus and sweet sea roses, although it couldn’t compare to the scent of Brynne’s arousal as he laid her on the white cotton sheets of the bed and began to undress her.
He explored her skin with his mouth and hands as he unwrapped her for his hungry eyes. He didn’t think his desire could grow any more intense, but as he watched her transform beneath his fingers and tongue, he knew he would never see anything hotter than Brynne when she was fully Breed. When she was writhing and moaning for him, her body surrendered to him completely.
Solely his.
“You’re mine now,” he told her, stripping out of his clothing and then kissing his way back up her naked body. “Forever, Brynne.”
“Yes.” Her gasp lengthened into a slow, pleasured sigh as he sank into her heat. “Oh God, Zael. I feel you in my blood. I feel your light in me…in my veins, everywhere. It’s so powerful.”
Hearing that made him smile with pure male possessiveness. Knowing that a part of him lived inside her now only made his desire for her spike and deepen, along with his devotion.
“I felt your blood and your light when I fought Elyon too.” She reached up, cupping his face in tender hands. “It centered me, Zael. It kept me sane, even at my worst. I felt your blood and your light in me, and I wasn’t afraid. Not of anything. Not even myself. You do that for me, Zael. You and your blood. And your love.”
The thought that he could bring her comfort or grounding humbled him, honored him more than his words could ever express to her. Brynne’s love was an honor to him, and he looked forward to spending his life proving to her that he could deserve her.
“So long as I draw breath,” he promised her fiercely, “you will never know fear or darkness again. Only love, Brynne. Our love.”
“Yes,” she answered, arching up to meet his deep thrust. “Zael, yes…”
They moved together in a perfect friction, skin on skin, touching, kissing, caressing. Zael couldn’t look away from the emotion he saw in her smoldering gaze. The love he saw there staggered him. It humbled him like nothing ever had before.
He wanted to feel that love inside him.
Through blood and bond.
He wanted it so fiercely, it became a drumming in his veins.
In his heart.
Slowing his tempo, he reached up to stroke her beautiful face. His thumb swept over her parted lips, his eyes rooted on the pretty white points of her fangs.
“I want to feel your blood inside me, love.”
Her soft, indrawn breath seemed uncertain, as if she still didn’t quite believe that he could mean it. Before she had a chance to voice a single doubt, he lifted her chin and held her burning gaze.