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CHAPTER1
SEAN
Curaidh Castle
The Highlands, Scotland
Present Day
Groaning, Sean Campbell woke in his bed in the alpha’s chambers, reaching for her, knowing she was gone. Each night for more than two years he had dreamed of her—the long blonde mane, the pale blue eyes the color of the ice that hung from the trees like teardrops, her tall, lithe and voluptuous body naked and warm against his skin. Her eyes would fly open and flash with anger as he covered her body with his own and thrust up into her before she was even awake. He imagined her feminine and pleasured moans as he pounded in and out of her, her nails raking his back in abandoned ecstasy—her body succumbing to its need for his passion and his dominance as he moved inside of her.
Only, it had never happened.
But the reality of his cold bed left him with nothing but his anger and a massive hard-on. Every day since she’d been gone it greeted him as if to mock his failure at securing his mate. Closing his eyes, Sean began to stroke himself, imagining it was her lips that wrapped around him. He could still see her in his mind’s eye. God, she had been magnificent, and he had looked forward to a lifetime of passion and fire. There wasn’t another woman or snow leopard that could compare with her. She was incomparable and she was his—or at least she was supposed to have been. He shook his head, banishing the idea that he might never find her.
Sean fucked his fist instead of her wet heat. He had the same two or three reoccurring fantasies. The one which always brought him to climax the quickest was fantasizing about how he would claim her when he found her. He was determined to find her and drag her back to the Highlands by her long, silky tresses. If she fought him, all the better. He would see her on her knees in their bed as he covered her, her need for him glistening at the mouth of her pussy as he mounted her, driving into her as he took the nape of her neck in a savage, possessive bite, leaving no doubt that she had been claimed.
Fisting himself harder and faster, he imagined her crying out in ecstasy as he grunted and groaned and found his own release. Opening his eyes and seeing his wasted seed pooled on his belly, he wondered if this would be how it was for the rest of his life.
“No,” he growled. Knowing she was his fated mate gave him no choice but to pursue her to the ends of the earth and beyond.
But until he did, he would start each day the same as the one before—waking up with a hard-on, deriving as much pleasure as he could from his own hand, and then taking a cold shower and getting on with the business of being alpha. Sean swore, though, that there would come a day when all of that would change.
Time moved slowly in the Scottish Highlands, more so for the shifter clans than fortheir human counterparts. Clan leadership was still decided along familial lines, but with shifters there was always a chance that someone might challenge for leadership. Challenges were always bloody, and most were deadly. The Campbells had led the Curaidh Snow Leopards for centuries, but the Campbells were an enormous family filled with feuding factions.
The towering mountains, shimmering streams, and majestic plains that surrounded Curaidh Castle were overwhelming in both their beauty and their mysticism. All anyone had to do was arrive at the gates between the two towering stone spires to know they’d arrived at a place of infinite power and splendor.
Winter MacKinnon was his. The fact that she had been missing for more than two years was irrelevant. The gods and destiny had chosen her to be his fated mate, and her father had agreed. The problem he realized, in retrospect, was that Winter had never agreed. She’d come and gone, leaving a gaping hole in his ego and soul. Her fierce independence and strong will matched his own but had caused more than one member of his family to think to challenge him. He had defeated each and every one, and he’d exact his own retribution from his fated mate for leaving him in this state.
She had not been inclined to follow her father’s orders to become the mate to the Alpha of the CuraidhClan. But even though she had not been so inclined, the night before their wedding he had proven to her she was his mate, when he had made her come on his command from his sensual fondling.
“Get away from me,” she’d snarled as he backed her against the wall.
Winter had made her feelings clear on the matter of her becoming his mate, but he didn’t care. From the moment he had inhaled her scent, Sean had known she was his fated mate. The fact that her father would have no choice but to give her up or die made the whole thing just a bit more intense. But that was fine with him; the beautiful Winter was a woman of fire and ice and he meant to make her burn for him.
Although she was tall, he was taller and loomed over her—his massive frame blocking her from being seen by anyone who might enter.
“I’m going to kiss you, Winter. I want a taste of what is mine and will settle for your lips instead of your sex, but after I have claimed you, I will know every part of your body intimately.”
“I don’t want to kiss you, and I sure as hell don’t want to become your mate.”
He chuckled. “I don’t care.”
He lowered his mouth to hers, bringing his hand up under her sweater and sliding it along her soft skin. She bit his lip, stomped on his foot, and tried to bring her knee up into his groin. Only his sharp instincts and ability to move swiftly kept him from being injured.
“Such a naughty kitten,” he purred.
“Fuck you.”
“Not until we are formally bonded, but then hard and often.”
She reached up to claw him, and he grasped both of her wrists, taking off his belt to bind them together before raising them above her head to hold her there. Gods, she was glorious in her anger. He acknowledged to himself that she had a right to be angry, but she would soon find he could be an accommodating and indulgent lover. First, though, she would need to learn to submit to him.
“You’re so beautiful,” he said as he raised her sweater, scrunching it up to reveal a lacy bra, which he unhooked, freeing her breasts.
The sound she had surely intended to be a growl came out more like a moaning mewl as he palmed the revealed flesh and traced her areola with his finger before rolling her nipple between his thumb and forefinger.
He lowered his mouth to hers and began kissing her like a man too long starved for a satisfying meal. She struggled, but only half-heartedly. He could smell her arousal as he slipped his thigh between hers, holding her close and letting her feel his hard length throbbing between them.
