30. Corin

30

Corin

Later that night, when the guests had finally accepted being told goodnight and get out, and Tomás was asleep in his crib, Maya stole Corin away to her bedroom.

“You have a plan?” he asked.

“Not even slightly. But I’m not going to let that stop me this time.” Her face glowed with quiet anticipation as she closed the drapes against the cold night outside. “How can I plan for anything when the world keeps throwing curveballs at me?”

“That doesn’t terrify you?”

“Not anymore. I’ve got something else to be scared of, instead.” She took his hands, staring up at him with such warmth and love that he felt as though the sun was rising in his heart. “I didn’t want to turn my mom’s life upside down, so I never told her about Tomás. She never told me what was happening to her, because she was afraid it would do the same to me. And you didn’t want to hurt me, so you never told me I was your mate. We all keep closing ourselves off, never even making the attempt in case it goes off anything less than perfectly.” She stepped towards him. “You’re so sure your duskfire will hurt me, you’ve never even let it touch me.”

“Hurt is all it does.” His tongue felt thick. Maya’s shining confidence was too much. He couldn’t bear the thought of all that joy crumbling.

She frowned. “We’ve been wrong about everything else so far. Why not risk it?”

“I would risk myself. I would never risk you.”

“Then let me risk myself.”

He shook his head. “Generations of my family can’t have been wrong about this. And even if they were—no other Blackburn has the problem I have. No other Blackburn’s fire burns high when they think of claiming their mate.” His shoulders sagged as he admitted what he should have told her from the start. “There’s something wrong with me, Maya. I’m sorry.”

She lifted her chin, still trusting, but challenging, too. “Show me.”

He let his wings spread. Carefully. Not touching her or anything of hers.

She caught her breath, eyes shining with curiosity and something more as she inspected his duskfire. “Now, the temptation is strong to just plunge my hands in and see what happens, but—”

He reeled back. “No!”

“No,” she agreed. “I wouldn’t do that to you. Let’s do a test.” She raised one hand.

“Maya, if I hurt you—”

“Then I’ll forgive you.” She gave a crooked smile. “And at least we’ll know. Instead of dancing around, assuming the worst, and never finding out for sure.”

Every bad thing his magic had done to this town spun around in his head. The broken window. The Dans sporting the same blackened eyes and limps they had so many times in his memory.

His younger cousins’ stricken faces after they flew in their miserable magic. Every competitor he’d ever threatened with the looming weight of his power behind him.

His grandfather’s words.

Our magic is NEVER a part of the claiming ritual.

This wasn’t going to work.

“Corin.” Maya’s gentle voice pulled him out of his thoughts.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he said helplessly.

“I know. But we can’t let fear of what might happen dictate what we do with our lives. Any more than we already have. I’m your queen. Let me give a few orders. Let’s start with one hand.” She turned it around. “It’s had a few scrapes in its time. Grazed knuckles. I burned my thumb on a hot stove, years ago. But nothing permanent.”

“Those injuries will come back.”

“Sure. And they’ll heal again. That’s why we’re starting our experiment with this hand, not the other one, so I don’t have to explain to you how I managed to sew a line straight through my middle finger in elementary school. Ready?”

He wasn’t ready. But she was. He nodded.

She would see there was nothing good to the duskfire. If this was where it ended between them—perhaps he deserved that.

Lips pressed together, a thin line of concentration between her eyebrows, Maya rested her palm against his shadowy wing and slowly pushed it into the fire.

It was the most intimate thing he’d ever felt. His mate willingly touching a part of him that he’d thought was a weapon—touching it gently, as though she might hurt it, not the other way around.

“It doesn’t hurt,” she breathed.

He swallowed. “How—” he began, and couldn’t get out any other words.

“Have you ever used your power not to threaten, or attack?”

“What other purpose would they have?”

Her eyes lit up. “Wouldn’t it be interesting to find out?”

His wings curled around her, around the warm and smiling perfection of the woman who had haunted his dreams since the day he first saw her. But this wasn’t a dream, or a nightmare.

It was his life. A life that, only a few days ago, he would never have thought possible.

Maya smiled up at him. Her head was wreathed in shadows. Shadowy wings, limned with brilliant green, unfurled from his shoulders and wrapped around her, soft as kisses.

“How is this possible?”

“I have a theory.” She touched his wings again, and he held his breath. “But it requires turning everything you thought you knew about the world upside-down.”

He shook his head. “The duskfire is destruction. Every bad memory, every pain you thought you’d left long behind you…”

“I thought I’d left you long behind me, Corin Blackburn. But here you are. And it’s the most wonderful feeling in the world.”

“I always thought…”

She smiled at him. “If there’s one thing the last few years have taught me, it’s that things aren’t always what we think they are, Mr. Blackburn.”

“So I have found, Miss Flores. But I know one thing is true.” Her eyes filled his soul. “You’re my mate,” he said simply. “And Tomás is your son. I will fight for you both, and cherish you both, as long as my heart beats. The way I should have from the start. And I would be honored to be yours, if you will have me. Your mate. Your husband. Tomás’s father.”

“I already told you I’m yours.”

“Tell me I’m yours, too.”

Her face glowed with happiness. “You’re mine and I’m never letting you go.”

He sighed and buried his face in her hair.

“Tell me again.”

“You’re mine. My dragon.”

They stumbled to the bed and sat together, her in his lap, face to face. His wings surrounded them both. A blanket of purest night, lit through with green light like distant shooting stars.

If he’d ever dreamed of this, it would have been a nightmare.

Even now, his instinct was to flinch away from it. But Maya held him steady.

He laughed unevenly. “It always tried to break free when I thought of you being mine.”

“It didn’t seem to cause you any problems the first time we slept together.”

“I was holding so much of myself back.”

She stared at him, amazed. “That was you holding yourself back?”

“Not physically.” He kissed her, and his wings whispered all over her body, careful and caring. “I wanted to pleasure you, and to claim you the way I should have when we first met. And I did. But it wasn’t all of me. I kept my magic leashed.”

“And now?”

No need to hold back. For the first time, he could give her all of himself.

“This time, you get all of me. And…” he hesitated, and brought her hand to his chest, splaying her fingers out. Wanting her touch. “And I get all of you, as well.”

“Oh. You want a little more give and take, Mr. Blackburn?” Her eyes danced as she cupped him through his pants. God, she did understand. “I recall a sudden retreat last time I tried this…”

“I would be utterly satisfied focusing only on your pleasure.”

“I wouldn’t be.”

She toppled him backwards, straddling him. Her thighs were strong and warm around his hips and his cock strained towards her. She ground herself against him, slowly, then stopped.

“Oh. Whoops.” Her face was alight with mischief. “This is meant to be for you, not for me…”

“This is working for me,” he gasp-growled.

“Good.” She reached between her own legs into his pants and grabbed him. Her grip was so firm and soft at the same time that he was already seeing stars by the time she took him into her mouth.

Time stopped. His magic unfurled like dusk stretching across the sky, and when it touched her she moaned, the sound reverberating into his cock.

“Did that hurt?” He had to check, even through the desperate need burning through his veins.

“No. Never. I promise.” She kissed up the length of his cock, then moved up his body, hands and mouth devouring him.

Bringing her pleasure was one of the great joys of his world, and from the light in her eyes as she looked up at him, she felt the same.

Magic followed her fingers, darting shadows and flickering lights. It traveled up her arms, over her body and he felt it, the duskfire touching her skin, caressing every soft part of her.

Her breath quickened. “Much as I’d like to keep talking,” she said, already losing the fight to sound even slightly unaffected, “I don’t think I can wait any longer.”

They fell on one another like waves crashing in the middle of the ocean, clinging and grasping and devouring. His magic was wild and free, worshipping his mate, his dream woman, his Maya. His light in the darkness. Unhurt by his magic, even as it caressed every inch of her, the night sky a pillow for her glittering star.

He felt everything his magic touched. Tasted every joy on her skin. It was like flying in the shroud of his magic, but instead of misery, he was bathed in pleasure. Wonder. Happiness.

Everything neither of them ever thought they would have.