“Well,” whispered Lu when her laughter had faded. “Aren’t you a pretty kitty.”

His snout wrinkled, curling back to reveal razor-sharp canines. Lu sensed how dangerous he was in this form, far more dangerous and perhaps less rational than in human form. But she wasn’t afraid of him; she was fascinated. She reached out and tentatively brushed her fingers against his cheek, and oh, what exquisite plush softness, like the finest mink.

His whiskers twitched. The rumble deep in his chest grew louder. His eyes closed, just longer than a blink.

“Is this okay?” Lu slid her fingers along his jaw, rubbing softly, then scratched him behind the ear. He tilted his big head into her hand, allowing it, but slanted her a look she interpreted to mean he wasn’t a household pet, and if she called him kitty again he might be inclined to spray urine on her pillow in retaliation.

She bit her lip to stifle another laugh. “Does the sourpuss need some catnip to improve his mood? A little fresh cream, maybe? How ’bout a nice ball of twine to bat around?”

Magnus leaned forward, then licked her face with his enormous, pink, scratchy tongue.

“Ew! Bad kitty!” she laughed, pushing on his furred chest, but with a flash of light and a ripple of power, the animal was gone and the man was in its place, staring down at her with a look of barely leashed hunger in his eyes, his whole body taut as a bowstring.

Naked, and taut as a bowstring.

In a rasp of a voice, he growled, “You don’t like my tongue?”

Lu thought she’d never heard anything so erotic in her entire life.

She froze. Her hands were flat on his chest, her legs open around his hips. He was breathing hard and so was she, and as they stared into each other’s eyes the moment stretched out and she lost all sense of time or place, up or down, wrong or right. All she knew was that she wanted him. She burned for him. He was everything she’d ever wanted or could ever want, and it no longer mattered what happened in all their tomorrows: She needed to tell him how she felt before it was too late.

For her, this man was home.

“Actually, I love your tongue, Magnus,” she whispered, “and every other thing about you.”

It was like fitting a key into a lock.

He grasped her face in his hands and crushed his mouth to hers, kissing her with desperate abandon. His tongue was invading, demanding she kiss him back. She melted against him, her arms wound up around his shoulders, her hands tightened in his hair to pull him down deeper into her, harder against her body. They fell back against the mattress. He made a noise like an animal’s, deep in his throat, as she arched against him, moving her hands to his hard ass and pulling so the hot, hard length of his erection was between her legs, separated from her aching sex by only a thin strip of fabric.

“Oh God,” Lu moaned as he broke the kiss, shoved up her camisole, palmed her breast, and sucked her hard nipple into his mouth. Tongue and teeth and amazing hot wetness, his mouth went from one breast to the other, greedily sucking, and she moaned once again, loving how wild he was, loving this raw, ragged passion. As he licked her he chanted broken words that meant so sweet and so beautiful and best of all, you’re mine, angel, tell me you’re mine!

“Yes!” she cried as his teeth pressed into her skin, as his mouth ravaged her. “I’m yours! I’ll always be yours!”

Another lock, another key to open it. Her answer drove him past the brink of restraint. He tore off her panties, tore off her camisole, every movement and look primal, his eyes aglow with lust. Something had snapped inside him. Now it was all about taking, claiming, satisfying the dark and awful ache they’d both felt since they’d first laid eyes on each other . . . and for years and years before that.

He licked his way down her body, biting and kissing and growling, until he put one hand flat on her stomach and cupped the other under her bottom. Then he lifted her backside off the mattress and buried his face between her legs.

She arched and cried out in shock and a pleasure so acute she thought she might pass out from it. He was as greedy there as he’d been with her mouth, and soon she was rocking her hips and mewling, her fingers clenched in his hair.

“Magnus,” she gasped. Everything inside her body surged toward a high, sharp peak. “Please, please don’t stop!”

He didn’t. He pushed her legs open wider, slid two fingers inside her, and sucked hard on her swollen clit.

It was like a detonation. A brief moment of brilliant, breathless suspension, and then she was over the edge, free-falling, sobbing and jerking beneath him as an explosion of pleasure rocketed through her body, ripping her apart.

He dragged himself up her body and in one swift motion, buried himself deep inside her.

And it hurt.

Her yelp of pain made him freeze. Breathing raggedly above her, his expression was almost anguished. “What’s wrong?” he panted, searching her face. “What happened?”

Lu closed her eyes and inhaled, willing her body to relax around the huge, hot invasion of his erection. She didn’t think it would be like this. It was never like this in the books she’d read. It was always rose petals, angel choirs, rainbows, and confetti. There was never any mention of pain.

Through gritted teeth, she said, “You’re. Big.”

The tension didn’t leave him. He cradled her face in his hands, forcing her eyes open. “I don’t . . . I thought you were ready . . . you came . . .”

His confusion was obvious, as was his discomfort. His cock twitched deep inside her, and Lu shivered, her fingers digging into his back.

His eyes widened. Then he inhaled and looked down, his head tilted to one side and his brows furrowed together. When he looked back up at her it was with understanding dawning over his face. Understanding and dismay.

“Angel. You’re bleeding,” he whispered.

“Apparently it’s only my dream self that’s a big slut, Magnus. In this plane of reality, my hymen is—was—still intact. Stupid friggin’ thing. I should’ve ridden more horses when I was younger.”

They stared at each other, eye to eye, raggedly breathing. All at once, they both began to laugh.

“I don’t think that works,” he said, gasping with laughter, his head lowered to her shoulder where it rested, hot and heavy and wonderful. He pressed a kiss to her throat, and she ran her hands up his back, which made him shiver.

“Yoga? Super-size tampons?” she giggled. His body shook with laughter. He buried his face into her neck, and Lu was so happy to finally hear him laugh. It was beautiful: rich and warm as sunshine.

“God. This is so not how I pictured this happening,” he groaned. He propped himself up on his elbows to gaze down at her, his eyes filled with light.

“You pictured this? Us being together like this?” Lu reached up and stroked his dark hair away from his forehead.

Like a flipped switch, his lightness disappeared and he grew serious, intense. “Every second of every minute of every day. Always.”

“Gee. It’s a miracle you had time for anything else, you perv,” she teased.

His smile didn’t return. In a quiet voice, Magnus said, “There’s nothing else for me but you. There never has been. There never will be. I know that now.”

Her throat constricted. Her face grew hot. “For me, either,” she whispered. The enormity of it hit her, and her vision wavered as her eyes filled with tears.

Magnus made a move to withdraw, but she clutched at him, wrapping her arms around his back. “No,” she said vehemently. “Don’t. I want to feel you. I want you to . . . finish.”

“Lumina,” he said, his voice breaking, but she shushed him with a flex of her hips.

“Yes,” she said, listening to his groan as he sank deeper inside her. His eyes fluttered closed, his lips parted, so she flexed her hips again, loving the feeling of power that surged through her when his groan turned ragged.