“So’s mine.” To her tiger, Destiny demanded, Why didn’t you say so before?
With an air of injured innocence, her tiger said, I didn’t know before. I told you, I was a cub at heart. You can’t know your mate when you’re a child.
Destiny repeated that, adding, “It was those pills! They didn’t just give me control over my shift. They were stopping my tiger from growing up with me. Mate recognition doesn’t kick in until you’re old enough to do something about it.”
“Mataji didn’t know that would happen, right?”
“No, I’m sure she had no idea. And I did need them at the time. I just should have stopped taking them later, once I was more mature.”
Unexpectedly, Ethan chuckled. “So, you’re saying you literally had an inner child.”
“Smartass.” She poked his arm—not the bitten one. “You must be feeling better.”
“I am.” He was still fever-hot, but not blazing like he’d been before, and his breathing had eased. His eyelids fluttered, then closed. He seemed to force them back open. “Sorry. I’m really tired.”
She stroked his forehead. “Go to sleep. You need it.”
“One thing first.”
He reached up a hand, caught the back of her head, and pulled her down to him. Their lips met in a kiss that was short but felt eternal in the very best way, a kiss of both passion and comfort.
A kiss of love fulfilled at last.
Chapter 13
Ethan
When Ethan awoke, a sense of happiness and wellbeing filled him even before he remembered where he was and what had happened. He drew in a deep breath, and it neither hurt nor left him feeling suffocated. He was neither burning up nor freezing, but pleasantly warm. His head didn’t hurt any more. Best of all, his heart wasn’t filled with loneliness and the bitter knowledge that what he wanted most, he could never have.
He reached out a hand, and felt Destiny’s fingers curl around his.
“Ethan?” she said softly. “You awake?”
He opened his eyes. She was perched on the bed beside him. A shaft of morning sun fell across her face, catching the golden undertones of her skin. Her warm brown eyes were brimming with the same love for him that he felt for her.
Our mate, his tiger purred.
That new inner voice should have felt strange, but it didn’t. Ethan could feel that his tiger was a part of him. He’d never denied the fiercer parts of his self, so having the wildest and most primal aspect of himself given a voice of its own felt natural. And calling Destiny his mate was only putting a name to what Ethan had always known.
He couldn’t believe that they’d known each other for so long and spent so much time together without giving in to their feelings. To their desire. It burned in him like a wildfire, fierce and hot and unstoppable. And when he looked into her eyes, he saw that it burned in her too. How the hell had they both managed to control themselves for two years?
“You are the most stubborn woman on the face of the Earth,” he said.
“Gee, you really know how to give a girl a compliment,” she teased. “And same to you. Well, not the most stubborn woman…”
He sat up, laughing, ready to make some terrible joke about proving his maleness. She was laughing too. But the laughter faded as he put his hands on her shoulders. At that simple touch, the raw sexual heat that had always smoldered within them, banked and repressed and fought with all their might, burst into flames.
He’d meant to take his time and savor the moment. He savored the moment, all right, but the instant he touched her, he knew that neither of them were in the mood for any slow careful lovemaking. It was love, yes, but love like a fever, love like a fire, a love that was wild and fierce and never again to be denied.
He kissed her with the ferocity of two endless years of pent-up passion. She returned it with equal urgency, nipping at his lips as he nipped at hers. Her scent surrounded him, filling his senses and driving him wild. He pulled at her clothes, impatient to touch every inch of her smooth warm skin, to mark it with his own skin, his own scent, to claim her and make her his own.
But her strong soft hands were already inside his pants, stroking his thighs, on his rock-hard erection. His urgent need threatened to flare out of control, and he heard himself growl.
With a teasing purr, she stopped her explorations just long enough to allow him to strip her. He feasted his eyes on her delectably feminine curves, her irresistible scent. All of her.
“My Destiny,” he growled. “Mine.”
“Ethan,” she gasped. “Ethan, oh, Ethan, finally—!”