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His head spun. He clutched her in his arms, holding her as they both trembled, exhausted and still euphoric.
As he backed up, lifting himself on his arms, Bethany was still panting, and her arms released his neck only reluctantly.
On her shoulder, an intricate, shaded tattoo of a golden dragon was impressed into her skin.
Math looked down at his chest.
On his rounded pec, a matching dragon—the mirror-image of hers, though darker—marked him.
These were the markings of a mated dragon pair.
When Bethany opened her eyes and stared at him, still breathing heavily, her eyes were the vast darkness of space, glittering with a thousand stars rushing inward.
She had transformed into a dragonmate.
“Bethany—” Horror filled him that he’d forced the mating on her. “Did you want this?”
She blinked sleepily at him, and a smile slowly spread over her face. “Oh, heck,yeah.That wasincredible.I haven’tever—”
“No.” He touched the dragon marking on his chest, which still sparked with magic. “We’ve mated.”
“Oh, yeah. I know.” She curled her arms near her head and stretched.
The horror of it filled his voice. “Did Iforceit on you?”
She stretched her arms over her head. “Of course not.”
“I mean, I know you consented to the sex, but we’ve mated.” He gestured to his marking again. “There’s no going back now. We’re married. Even more than just being married, we’remated.”
“Yeah,” Bethany said.
Math relaxed a bit. Forcing any woman to do anything, even if he had been out of his head with pain, wasn’t part of him.
He rolled off her, luxuriating in the absolute lack of burning agony in his body. He drew a deep breath that didn’t hurt and sighed hard. “You’re okay with it? I didn’t force you?”
“No.Do you feel forced?”
“Of course not. I’ve wanted to form a mating bond with you for weeks. I didn’t know what I was feeling. I thought it was that you were great, and I liked you, and I wanted to be around you and give you precious metals and diamonds to wear. And touch your skin and your hair. And feed you chocolate cake. And make you smile. And spend every waking minute with you. And never let you out of my sight or my bed or my arms. And then to give you some more diamonds.”
Her grin was like cool sunshine on a cold day with no burning at all. “And that didn’t tip you off, huh?”
He shrugged. “My dragon isn’t the talkative type.”
“Are any dragons the talkative type?” she asked.
“Not really,” Math said. “I don’t think they have a language so much as needs, wants, and the hunger to fly and mate. They need regular exercise.”
“Sounds like a dog.” She rolled closer to him. “We had dogs while I was growing up. Mostly black Labs and golden retrievers.”
“Not exactly,” Math said. “A dragon is more demanding, and they need attention when they want it. They’re finicky about the people or other dragons they’re around. If they don’t like someone, you might as well give them up. If they do like someone, well,” he gestured between the two of them, “it’s hard to keep him off of them.”
Bethany laughed. “So, your dragon is a cat.”
Math considered it. “He likes to play with his food before he eats it, so there might be something to that.”
“Are we going to have to eat live goats for supper or something?”
“Oh, no. He eats dragon kibble most of the time, and he can catch his own snacks.”
