Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 87771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
This gathered group—majority of which were about to transform—had become my family. No need for safe rooms tonight. At least not during the ceremony. Gabe didn’t have any neighbors close by. Once it was over, they would likely all run into the woods to burn off energy until the sun rose.
I had asked Gabe what he wanted to do after we tied the so-called knot. All he told me was to be prepared because the ceremony would need to be consummated. He emphasized the last part of that word. I had other questions to ask him but never got the chance to.
Guess I’d be finding out tonight…
“Thank you all for gathering here tonight,” Darlene said. She held a black leather tome in her hands. I had to have a long explainer about druids and their connection to shifters and nature itself. Apparently they had the power to manipulate plants and could sometimes speak to some animals—wild stuff, but I’d heard (and seen) of wilder.
“Oh, before we start, here.” Gabe pulled an oversized clip-on dark blue tie from his pocket. He handed it to me. “So you can put it on me after I shift.”
“Oh my heart, you’re going to melt me,” Darlene said, a hand to her busty chest. She looked like a cross between Dolly Parton and a witchy girl who made a living selling her spells on Etsy. “Now. Before the shift, let me start by saying I’m honored to be chosen to lead tonight’s ceremony. It is a rare thing to witness fated love and even more so to cement it. Thank you.” She gave us both a deeply earnest smile.
“As for the ceremony,” she continued, craning her head back to look up at the sky. “Let it begin.”
Then, as though she coordinated that moment with the moon itself, the shifts began to happen. Gabe fell to his knees on the hard wood of the deck. So did the rest of the pack around us. I took an involuntary step backward even though I’d seen this happen already.
Like the shifts into their wolf forms, these shifts were concealed by an odd haze in the air. As if I were looking at Gabe through a clouded camera lens. I could make out some details but nothing that would likely make my stomach turn inside out. I had a quick thought about what it would look like photographing this—something I’d have to ask Gabe later.
Only a minute or two passed when the haze lifted and Gabe rose up to his seven-foot something height, his blue eyes looking down at me past his elongated jaws. His lips curled into what could only be described as a smile, even though it revealed canines the size of my fists.
The rest of the pack had also shifted, their clothes ripped to shreds at their feet. Coach Julian watched in quiet awe. He had known that shifters existed but apparently had never actually seen them in their were forms.
Gabe leaned downward. He extended a clawed hand and lifted the tie that was in mine. “Oh, right,” I said, having already forgotten. I reached around Gabe’s thick, furry neck and clipped the tie on. It brought my nose right up against him. He smelled like pine and lemon and sex and love and every god damn good thing there was in this world.
“Great. Now, let us begin. Please, hold your fated mates’ hands.”
I held my hands out and placed them inside of Gabe’s clawed grip. I had big hands but they looked like tiny doll parts in Gabe’s. He closed them around me. I smiled up at him, my heart filling with an indescribable joy.
“Tonight, we are brought together by the weaves and will of destiny, lapped over by the tides of the full moon. Here, in front of us beat two hearts as one, steering two souls as one, tying together two futures as one. A love that transcends barriers is what cements you two together and what will always bond you. Through this life and the next, through turmoil and pain, through joy and celebration.” She turned to look at me. “Elijah Sager, under the binding power of the full moon, do you accept your mate’s bond?”
I looked into Gabe’s blue eyes, recognizing him even under the visage of his were form. “Yes. A hundred percent, I do.”
“And Gabriel Sanderson, under the binding power of the full moon, do you accept your mate’s bond?”
A second of silence elapsed before Gabe tilted his head back and let out a long, drawling howl toward the night sky.
The rest of the pack followed suit. The night filled with the sounds of their howls. It echoed in my bones. I looked down and realized that a glittering white light had begun to swirl around us. It grew brighter, sparkling as it wrapped around Gabe and I. My hands tightened around his furry grip. Although I wasn’t entirely sure what was happening, I also knew I wasn’t scared.