The Luna's Bodyguard [a mature werewolf romance]

Ch 48: Consummation

OPHELIA
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️

Fallon towered over the bed, the scar slashing through his left brow warping his serious expression into an intimidating scowl.

Here was the black wolf wrapped in the skin of a man; the creature that bit down on my neck the first day we met, grinding my frail, human body into the ground with the sheer force of his weight. The man who was so excruciatingly aware of everything that his mighty hands flinched towards his daggers whenever somebody moved too quickly.

Now we lovingly stripped him of his armour, one buckle at a time, sliding leather and steel over muscles as hard as the plate. When we were alone together, it was a celebration of his strength, but this required strength of an entirely different kind: an emotional vulnerability as both Nate and I whispered small praises against his musky skin, tending to him as the prince he truly was.

Fallon held so still I might have mistaken him for a statue in other lighting. I pressed a gentle kiss against the hard slat of a rib as I shimmied off the holster, placing the daggers neatly on the bedside table — hilts up, so he had the reassurance of a weapon in easy reach.

His eyes softened at my wordless understanding, a finger coming up to trace the new scar — still pink and inflamed — at the base of my throat. He traced the memory, too, testing out the soreness in his own heart.

It was still tender. For both of us.

"This might sound crazy," I began slowly, pulling my hands into my lap. I didn't want anything clouding their judgement, skewing their reaction to what I said next. "But I want this to be all of our wedding night."

"But we only have one set of rings," Fallon said through low rumble.

I sensed, in a heart beat, that it was his only hesitation. I want to do this properly.

How strange, to hear his thoughts echoing — not only in my mind, but in Nate's.

"Then we do this the Old Way," Nate said perfunctorily, undoing his cuff links. "We bind ourselves with blood and teeth and bone."

Plink. Plink. The diamond studs scattered amidst Fallon's daggers.

"Ourselves?" Fallon asked hoarsely.

Nate's answering gaze was sharp as those blades our guard so loved to tout. "Like you said, if we're doing this at all, we should do it properly." Those scorching eyes dropped to the pulse beating madly in Fallon's throat. A drum to war. "It would be a great honour to mark you, Fallon Lathurna. A great pleasure as well."

Something vicious in Fallon rose to the challenge. "You would no longer own me," he warned, cracking his neck. "My claim on you would be just as great."

"I only ever wanted your respect," Nate said, that cruel edge to his expression softening.

"You have it," Fallon said gruffly. "And more."

For the space of a single heartbeat, I felt a twinge of jealousy — a bitter pang that reverberated all the way through my bones. After years of bitter rivalry and power plays, fraught with stolen glances and quiet longing, my men had finally found home in each other.

What place could I possibly have in it?

Nate's imperious gaze cut to me. "I won't have any of that," he chastised me. The unexpected harshness of his tone made my blood sing through my veins as it shot to my core. "He and I might be equals, but we'll always answer to you."