“Do you believe everything they told us about the mating?” Carys chewed worriedly on her bottom lip once she and Gideon were finally alone together and both naked in his bedroom. “It all sounds a bit…violent, to me.” She gave a shake of her head as she rested against his chest. “Biting me on the back of the neck while you—you—when we’re making love so that your saliva and my blood mix together, binding the two of us as mates and increasing this sexual desire that is already almost unbearable. That there’s a barb on your—your cock, that latches on inside me as we make love over and over again, filling me with your seed.” Dylan had offered to give her an injection to prevent an immediate pregnancy, but both Carys and Gideon had refused. “It all sounds very…primal.”
Gideon raised his head to look at her. “Didn’t seeing us all as dragon already tell you that’s exactly what we are?” he teased.
The sight of the nine Pendragon brothers shifting into very tall and large dragons, their scales all the color of the men’s eyes, had been pure magic, and had literally taken Carys’s breath away.
The discussion they’d had afterward regarding the mating, with input from the ladies this time, had sounded daunting rather than magical.
Although, all the human female mates looked more than happy with their dragon shifter lovers.
Carys didn’t even want to think of how Cristina coped with having two dragon shifter mates.
Gideon—now that Carys had seen him as dragon, alongside his brothers, she knew he would always be Gideon to her—cupped the side of her face as he looked at her intently. “We can delay the mating if you need more time. My brothers and their wives said we have a little under three weeks before the need to mate becomes imperative.”
At which time, the two of them would die if the mating wasn’t complete.
But Carys didn’t want to delay the mating, had no doubt that Gideon and the love they shared was her future.
She currently felt as if she had a swarm of bees beneath her skin, itching and stinging her. Her breasts felt so swollen, they were spilling over the top of her bra, the nipples as hard as pebbles. Between her thighs was so wet, her panties were soaked through. Her clit pulsed. And there was an ache in her channel needing to be filled.
She swallowed before answering him. “No. I want to become yours now. To mate with you.”
Our mate, Gideon’s dragon purred.
Shifting into dragon a short time ago had banished any doubts Gideon might have had as to who and what he was, along with the knowledge he belonged here in Wales with his brothers and his mate.
Carys.
Brave and beautiful Carys.
The woman he adored.
Loved.
Worshipped.
Would cherish for the rest of their long lives together.
“I’ll try to be gentle,” he promised again, hoping their interrupted lovemaking earlier would ensure this wasn’t too uncomfortable for Carys.
She chuckled as she moved up to lean on her elbow. “I can’t promise the same! I literally feel as if I’ll go up in flames if you don’t soon make love to me.”
Gideon chuckled at her honesty. “I feel the same way about you.”
“Then make love to me now, Gideon,” she invited huskily. “Please make love to me. Mate me. Make me yours for eternity.”
That invitation was all Gideon needed to sweep Carys up in his arms as he claimed her lips, her love, and her body for his own.
By the time Gideon gripped her hips steady as he knelt behind her and bit her nape, Carys was too lost in the euphoria of having Gideon’s cock back inside her, stretching her, claiming her, to notice the slight sting of the mating bite.
“Harder,” she encouraged, her hands tightly gripping the headboard as she pushed back into the thrust of Gideon’s cock buried deep inside her. “Harder, Gideon. Please. I need it harder!” She gave a deep groan at the feel of something—Gideon’s barb?—latching onto the bundle of nerves inside her.
She climaxed instantly.
Then again.
And again.
Until she lost count of those increasingly intense releases.
“I love you.” Gideon held her hips as he thrust harder and deeper still. “You’re mine, Carys! Always mine.”
Our forever mate, his dragon purred in agreement.
Christmas Day two days later was like no other in the history of Pendragon Castle. All nine of the brothers still living, their fated mates, and children, all gathered about the Christmas tree in the entrance hall that evening to give thanks for the blessings bestowed upon them.
Grigor and Gayle and their son.
Nathaniel and Chloe and their son and daughter.
Deryk and Izzy and their daughter.
Aeran, Rhys, and Cristina and their twin sons.
Dylan and Holly with their daughter.
Garrett and Billie with baby Harry.
Bryn and Tegan and their daughter.
Goddess willing, by next year, Gideon and Carys might have their own son or daughter.
Gideon raised his glass of champagne. “To family and home!”
It was a sentiment every single brother and every mate seconded by raising and drinking from their own glass of champagne.
Gideon turned to Carys. “To our forever love,” he murmured against Carys’s lips.
“Forever,” she agreed.