I was just f**king well done.

His mate needed him. Her body shook with grief and sadness that welled out of her like a spring. Like it would never stop. The half creature stood and nosed her. She pushed him away, gently, but away.

The half creature frowned, a tear slipping from his eye. He was hurting for her too. The wolf hopped off the bed and nosed the half creature, directing him to the door. Sniffling, tears streaking down his furred face, he reluctantly opened the door and then closed it behind him.

The wolf went back to her, his mate, and jammed his nose into her face, licking her tears away. She tried to push him away too, but he persisted, forcing her to acknowledge him.

Her arms finally slipped around his neck.

“Liam, I need you, please … please don’t leave me here alone.” Her words were broken with her pain, broken with her fears.

A sharp stab ripped up through his guts and a memory of what he had been floated to the surface. A man. He’d been a man. That was what she needed. The wolf whined and backed away.

She needed him to be both. The wolf to protect her body. The man to protect her heart and her soul.

He shook his head, whined again. But that would mean going back, that would mean giving up his freedom. It would mean trusting the man in him to be strong enough … .

His eyes never left her, the shake of her body; the soft sobs escaping her lips. Swallowing hard, the wolf knew that this was the moment.

He was either her mate in truth or he had to leave her, and let her find another who could be all she needed.

I couldn’t stop the tears. Maybe that was a good thing; maybe I needed to let it out, like Blaz had said.

O’Shea had licked my face, tried to get me to stop, but he couldn’t understand that this was why I hadn’t wanted to let loose, to let the grief overtake me. That I was afraid of the pain, and would rather have my body broken and bleeding than my heart.

Distantly, I knew that perhaps this was more than just the grief and the pain, this was a type of shock, the things I’d seen I couldn’t un-see … gods, why did it have to be Berget? I’d sworn an oath to Faris that I would kill the Child Empress. An oath that I couldn’t break, I’d sworn it on the blood of the lost and I suspected that if I didn’t fulfill the oath, something very bad would happen.

O’Shea let out a low, pain-filled groan. I rolled over, expecting to see him, the wolf him, flat out on the floor.

Not the man him. The O’Shea I’d first known, crouched, his knees bent, his dark hair hanging long, brushing his broad shoulders. He tipped his head up, his pale, silvery golden eyes the same as the wolf’s, no longer the deep dark eyes he’d been born with. He didn’t quite have a beard, but it was close.

We stared at each other, shock rippling through me.

Liam. I didn’t realize I’d said his name until his arms were around me, pinning me to his chest.

“I’m here. I’m here.”

I sobbed into his shoulder, clung to him and didn’t care how needy I might seem. For once, I couldn’t be the strong one. For once, I had someone to hold me.

“How? I don’t understand … .”

He pulled back a little, his one hand stroking the side of my face, tucking my hair behind my ears. “I don’t know. You needed me. I think that was enough.”

“I needed you long before now.”

“But you never said it. I think … I needed to know that I wasn’t just another one of your wards, someone who needed you—I needed to know that you needed me too. My wolf needed you to want him as an equal, not a dependent.”

I leaned my forehead against his, let my hands trace his body, up over his shoulders, his neck and the sides of his face. I could hardly believe this was real, that this moment wasn’t a dream, that I would wake from and be left staring at a wolf, and not a man sleeping beside me.

With my eyes closed, I was more than a little afraid to open them again, to see that my fears had been brought to life.

“Liam, don’t do that again, don’t disappear,” I whispered, reveling in the way his hands stroked my back, slid down to my waist and then worked their way up to my shoulders. Gods, I had missed him.

“Only if you don’t call me O’Shea anymore. Just Liam from now on.” He gave me a soft grin, and I hiccupped back another sob, fighting of the building emotions in my chest.

His lips found mine, and at first it was a soft kiss, a sweet, gently soothing kiss. His lips pressed against mine, moved to my cheek, kissed away the last vestiges of my tears. But that wasn’t what I wanted or needed. I needed him to be with me, really with me, to claim me for what I was to him.

My tongue darted out, dipped into his mouth, and I pressed myself against him. A low rumble rolled out of him and he kissed me back, wild and fiercer than I remembered. But right. This was right.

A moment of understanding hit me. We’d been waiting for each other all along, waiting for this moment of rightness. That was why he’d not been able to let Berget’s case go. Why I couldn’t just kill him even when there had been moments I could have, why I’d tried to help him when his eyes had been opened to the supernatural. Why even the mere thought of losing him completely had made me more than a little bit crazy. Why I’d chosen him over Berget. And would choose him over Berget again if I had to. With Liam, there was no choice, he would always come first.

He tore at my clothes, ripping them off me, t-shirt tearing like tissue paper. I helped him, shimmying out of my jeans, feeling my panties rip as he jerked them off my hips. His lips made a trail of fire from my mouth to my neck, lower to my aching br**sts, lower yet to the juncture of my thighs. I arched into him, reaching up to grab the bed frame as he mouthed me. Not just pleasure, that was too mild a word. Between us, there was a connection, a bond of understanding that had nothing to do with forcing a bond on each other as Faris would do. Or even what had happened with Blaz.

Liam was with me because he wanted to be, and I was with him because there was no one else who understood me and loved me the way he did.

Another rumble slipped out of him, the vibration snaking through my core and tipping me over the edge of pleasure.

I couldn’t stop the noises I made; didn’t care who heard them.

Until the door opened.

“Rylee, are you all right?” Pamela’s voice ended in a squeak, and then Liam was flung off me and slammed into the wall.

“Shit, Pamela. Stop!” I yelped, grabbing the sheets and wrapping them around me.

“He was hurting you … I heard you scream. Where’s O’Shea, he’s supposed to be protecting you?” She had her hands up, ready to thump Liam again.

I glanced over my shoulder, expecting to see a very pissed off werewolf. Nope. He was laughing. Bent over at the waist, laughing so hard his shoulders shook.

“Please tell me you don’t want kids.” He managed to spit out.

Apparently I made a face, because Pamela shot a glare at me. “Who is this?” And then her eyes widened and she took a good look at him, his dark hair and pale gold eyes.

“Is this O’Shea?” She stumbled back, her face going bright red right up to her hair line.

“Liam, meet Pamela; Pamela, meet Liam. Now get out.” I shoved her out the door, locking it behind her.

There was a distant pattering of feet, no doubt to run off and tell everyone what she’d seen. Good grief, how much had she seen?

Liam’s arms came up around from behind me, his body fitting against mine. “Well, I suppose it could have been worse.”

“Yeah, how so?”

“Could have been Milly walking in on us. She would have asked to stay and join in.”

He nipped my shoulder and I spun to stare at him, shocked he would make light of what had happened with Milly. Laughing, he scooped me up and then tossed—yes tossed—me onto the bed. “I do believe we were interrupted, and just as I was getting to the good part.”

I lay there on the bed, staring up at him, gratitude and love flowing over me. I had him back, and this time there would be no letting go of him. This time, there would be no separating us, not for anything. Or anyone.

He slid on top of me, his hands and lips, tongue and teeth re-learning my every curve. I groaned, unable to stop touching him. I grabbed his ass and pulled him into me, gasping at the thickness of him as we rocked together.

“Rylee, this isn’t a race,” he murmured into my ear.

“I don’t feel you slowing down.”

He chuckled, and then kissed me, as I slid my legs around his hips, locking my ankles together, riding the sweet rhythm that pulsed between us. More than the physical connection, there was something more, something I hadn’t ever had. An understanding, a completion of my heart and where it belonged. With him, with Liam.

“Rylee,” he whispered my name, nothing else, just my name and the tears started up again. I couldn’t stop them, no more than I could earlier, but this time, it wasn’t the pain of loss, but the bittersweet knowledge that the rest of my life would be like this. Stolen moments of love, laughter and life fitting in the tight spots between the death, pain and loss. This was my future, not prophecies, not fate. Liam, this moment and all that it represented was everything I never knew I even wanted, and yet now I had.

Within all the darkness of my life, I had found the brilliant spot of light that pushed away the shadows. Even if just for a moment of two.

He kissed my tears away. “Let it out, you’ve got to let it out. That much I’ve learned. Holding it in will only make you crazy.”

So I cried and we made love, spending the night in each other’s arms. Not speaking much, except to speak words of love, just living. Breathing.

Healing.

I woke up in the early hours, well before dawn, before any light crept in through the big window. A nightmare, intense and lingering stealing any rest I had managed. Berget, Berget haunted my mind, an abscess of pain that at some point would need to be purged. Anxiety hummed along my synapses, and a sheen of sweat coated my lower back. I rolled to my side, sheets sliding down over my bare hip, baring my overheated skin to the cool air.