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I grip her hips and flip her in one smooth motion. She lands facing me, chest heaving, lips swollen and glistening from where she’d had my cock in her mouth. My thumb swipes across her bottom lip and catches a stray thread of saliva. Moonlight carves every hard plane of muscle across my torso into sharp relief, and her luminous eyes trace the scar along my ribs before her gaze drops lower. The static in the air thickens, matching the flush spreading down her pale olive skin to cover her collarbones and the space between her breasts.

"Ride me, Rene."

Embracing the moment fully, she sinks down onto my cock in one slow, lingering slide, her chest filling with a long, full breath as she takes me all in. The sheer fullness of the connection stretches her open, fusing us both to the bed. Her head falls back, exposing the pale line of her throat, and the trust in that gesture—offering her most vulnerable point to a hunter—does something irreversible to me. This is pure devotion. What we’re building is a profound, intentional connection rising to its absolute peak—a bond so fierce it leaves no room for doubt. The woman I love is choosing me, stepping fully into a future we build together.

I seal a possessive kiss against her throat, fully claiming her, while my hands cup her breasts. They are full and heavy in my palms, the nipples tight peaks I roll between thumb and forefinger. She gasps, her hips stuttering as she adjusts to the heavy mass of me filling her.

"Harder," her command is a ragged whisper, her fingers digging into the muscles of my shoulders. "Darius, don't be gentle with it."

I obey by squeezing the soft weight of her, tugging at her nipples until she cries out. Her cadence fractures, grinding down against me in a desperate friction. The wet heat sliding along my length threatens to snap my control right then. Driven by pure necessity, she moves, her inner muscles contracting around me during every downward stroke. I watch her come apart—the flutter of her lashes, how her teeth dig into her lower lip to stifle the sound. Keeping her close and connected to me, I cup the back of her neck and claim her lips once more.

"Let me hear you," I command against her mouth, my hips bucking upward to meet her downward slide, maximizing the blunt, punishing impact. "Give me the sound."

The second climax tears through her with a gasping moan against my lips, her voice vibrating directly into my throat. Her inner muscles clamp around me like a vice, pulsing in tight, rhythmic waves that release a loud, ragged groan from my own chest. She shudders violently, her forehead dropping onto my shoulder as the aftershocks roll through her.

Before the tremors even fade, I flip us. The mattress groans as her back hits the sheets, my body caging hers, refusing to let the heat dissipate for even a second. Her legs lock around my waist instantly, heels digging into the dip of my back to drag me right back to the center of her heat.

"Again," she breathes, her eyes blazing in the dark room, wide and consumed by the bond. "Right now."

I drive into her at a relentless tempo that rocks the entire bed. Her body arches under mine, every desperate thrust embedding us into the tangled sheets. Pale moonlight catches the sweat-slick curve of her throat as she twists beneath me, a wild thing caught between surrender and demand. The sound of our skin meeting, the slick friction of our bodies, fills the quiet bedroom.

I sink my teeth into the juncture where neck meets shoulder, locking her to me as I taste the sharp salt and thrumming heat of her skin. She gasps, nails raking down my back. They leave four sharp lines of fire that make my hips snap harder, the sting of her claws only feeding the urgency of the wolf.

"Darius—"

The broken syllable cracks open something primal. My mouth travels lower, sucking a dark bloom over her collarbone as she writhes, the scent of her arousal spiking to a fever pitch. Her heels dig into my back, urging me on, demanding everything I have. Every drag inside her binds us tighter, her muscles fluttering around me. Tension winds up inside her again, her internal heat squeezing tighter and tighter with every hard, driving plunge. Her breathing stutters, then shatters into a cry against my shoulder. The third climax rips through her, electric and violent, her magic sparking against my skin, sending literal jolts of current through my muscles.

Following her over the edge, an archaic sound tears from my chest as I spill deep. Burying my face in her hair, my hips lock against hers, holding the final, deep connection until the last wave subsides. The combined scent of jasmine and her ozone-laced magic sears itself into my lungs, marking the room and the night as ours.

Collapsing beside her, I drag her against me before the tremors even fade. Her back molds to my chest, our legs tangling. My lips find the top of her head, then the shell of her ear. I leave kisses as soft as apologies.

Her breathing evens out against my chest, soft and warm. I trace lazy patterns along her bare shoulder and watch moonlight play across her skin through the window. The wolf relaxes contentedly, finally at peace after weeks of restless tension.

"I meant what I said earlier." The admission leaves my throat thick with a dark roughness. "About finding another way."

She shifts slightly to tilt her head at me. "Darius⁠—"

"No, listen to me," I cup her jaw, thumb brushing across her cheekbone. "For years, all I wanted was revenge. It consumed everything—my choices and my entire fucking existence. I built my life around hunting down the people responsible for destroying my pack."

"That's understandable."

"Maybe, but it nearly cost me you." I place a kiss on her forehead, breathing in the jasmine scent of her hair. "When Gideon appeared in those tunnels, every instinct I had screamed at me to abandon everything and go after him. To finally get the justice I'd been chasing for seven years."

"But you didn't."

"Because you were standing right there, unbroken and unyielding, and I realized something." My fingers thread through her hair, binding us both to this moment. "A body count changes nothing; my pack is still gone, and the hole they left behind remains. My grief is a done deal. But losing you? That's the one thing that would destroy me beyond repair."

Serenity’s breathing stutters, her hand flattening against my sternum where my heart pounds steadily beneath her palm.

"So I'm making you a promise, Rene. Every time I have to choose between hunting down my past and protecting our future, I'm choosing you. Every single time."

Tears gather at the corners of her eyes, threatening to spill. "You don't understand what you're saying. The ritual⁠—"

"I understand perfectly." I roll us slightly so I can meet her gaze directly. "You think sacrificing yourself is the noble choice, the heroic ending to a tragic story. But you're wrong."

"How am I wrong about saving thousands of innocent lives?"

"Because you belong here with me, building something that lasts longer than one sacrifice. You're asking me to live with the knowledge that I had everything I ever wanted right here in my arms, and I let it slip away without a fight."