“I would never want you to feel that way,” Dash said taking a step closer. “It’s the last thing I would ever want, or to make you feel.”

  She gave a weak smile.

  “I think our pasts have both fucked us up a bit in the present,” she said.

  “You’re telling me,” Dash laughed, and he was relieved when Amelia laughed too.

  “But that doesn’t excuse you just blanking me and shutting me out for the past few days,” she said. “After our conversation, I expected you to call.”

  “I know,” he said with gritted teeth and a look of apprehension. “And again, this is my fault… I hurled my cell at the wall after you called me on Friday night, and it smashed completely.”

  She gave him a disapproving look.

  “I only got a replacement today… but I didn’t want to have this conversation over the phone… and over the weekend, I didn’t want to come looking for you in case you didn’t want to see me. You were pretty mad.”

  “I was,” she smirked.

  “I’ve been miserable,” he admitted. “And I’ve thought about nothing but making it right with you.”

  She breathed out and he wanted to go to her. He wanted to hold her in his arms and reassure her that they would never be in this position again, that he was sorry, and that he wanted her to believe in him the way he believed in her.

  “Amelia,” Dash said as he took hold of her by the shoulders gently and looked at her dead in the eye. “I never want to be apart from you again. You have made me so insanely happy since you walked into my life, and Nora’s. I love you Amelia. And I want you to know how much it not only takes for me to say that, but also that I am surer of it than anything I have ever known.”

  She smiled and he saw his fire in her eyes reflecting back into his. Touching her skin again, and holding her, was making him feel complete, and when he leaned in and kissed her she didn’t resist, she opened her arms to him and wrapped them around his neck, letting him come to her and show her how much he did love her.”

  “I love you too,” she breathed as their lips broke apart. “And I’ve been so down the past few days, so depressed at thinking we may never just be us again, that I even thought about leaving Misty Vale and never coming back.”

  “I’m so glad you didn’t,” he said as he traced his finger down the side of her face and brushed away a loose strand of hair. “Because I would have been lost without you.”

  He kissed her again and they held each other tightly.

  Dash was so happy she had forgiven him, that she had explained her pain too, and that they were on track to make things right. But he still knew there was one more thing he had to do.

  “Give me a moment,” he said as he held up his finger and smiled. “There’s something I want to show you.”

  Amelia looked at him with intrigue as he reached into his pocket and pulled out his cellphone. He pressed dial on a number and waited.

  “Striker,” he said, and Amelia seemed to furrow her brow as if this had not what she had been expecting. “I need you to do me a favor, could you come over to the house and sit here for a couple of hours? There’s something I need to do.”

  When Striker arrived from his own home two doors down, Amelia looked even more confused as Dash took her hand in his and led her toward the back doors of the kitchen that led out into the garden.

  They stood in the cold night air, the stars above them vast and heavy, their little lights twinkling and the moon bright and sharp in a perfect crescent sitting proudly above the pines.

  “What are we doing?” she asked breathlessly, as if the cold were getting to her.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “You won’t feel it in a minute.”

  She half laughed and shrugged as if she was going to roll with it and then Dash looked back over his shoulder and into the kitchen.

  “Striker will sit for as long as we need and keep an eye on Nora,” he said. “Because there’s something you need to see…”

  Chapter 17

  Amelia’s nerves were starting to get the better of her as she stood out in the garden with Dash, her heart and mind racing at what may be about to happen.

  She gripped his hand and he squeezed it reassuringly as they began to walk away from the house and out into the pine forest. They walked and walked, and the trees were so dense and thick that the sky above them seemed to disappear every few moments, until they finally reached a clearing, and it came back fully into view. Amelia looked around, and she could tell that this place was somewhere that Dash came often. It was a perfect circle in the center of the forest, somewhere completely shut off from the outside world. On either side of them there wasn’t anything to be seen except the trees and the forest, and above them there was only sky.

  “What is this place?” she asked. “It’s lovely.”

  She could see that in the very center there was a circle of stones and the remnants of a fire that had long burned out, but the ash that was present did suggest it had maybe been alight even just days before. She saw big logs, trunks of fallen trees, had been arranged around the stone circle, as if maybe they had been used as seating, but they were so big and as they moved toward them she ran her hands along them and felt the soft bark.

  “This is somewhere my pack and I come,” he said. “We come here to shift.”

  “To shift?” she looked up at him and felt her heart beat a little harder.

  Dash nodded and squeezed her hand again. She could tell that he didn’t want her to be nervous, but at the same time, that was going to be almost impossible. She was still getting her head around all of this, and even though she could feel the dragon within him, and she felt the power and energy flow through her, she was also unsure of what would happen when she actually saw Dash turn into this majestic beast. It was both exciting and terrifying, but she knew that she had to experience to know him fully. She had to see how it happened, what it did to him, how she felt with the dragon before she could give herself to Dash properly and let him claim her for the rest of time.

  “Okay,” she whispered. “I’m ready.”

  He hadn’t had to ask her, and she didn’t want to talk about the subject for a long time. She wanted to throw herself in headfirst and see what was about to happen.

  “Are you sure?” Dash asked.

  “Very,” she smiled and nodded with reassurance for him. “I want and need to know this side of you.”

  Dash nodded too and then he slowly dropped her hand as he stepped back and moved into the center of the clearing so he was as far from Amelia as he could be without getting too close to the trees. She found herself stepping back and moving to the other side of one of the fallen logs. She was afraid, but she was also at peace with the whole thing. She had to see him now, she had to understand him and the inner workings of his world.

  Dash had been right, the cold in the clearing seemed to be nonexistent, as if it had dragon energy all over and around in. The ground even seemed to feel warm and her skin was no longer cold. She looked ahead and found Dash’s eyes. She stared into them deeply as she watched him slowly removing his clothes. He kicked off his boots, then his jeans, before he pulled his sweater, then t-shirt off over his head and stood there looking like an absolute god. The moonlight seemed to light up the tattoo on his chest, one of a great dragon, and it made her swoon. His muscles were so taught, and he was so powerful, that as he stood there almost completely naked, she bit her lip and tried not to let her lust for him overpower her.

  Suddenly, the air around them seemed to change and it took her by surprise. She stepped back instinctively and gasped as she saw Dash’s whole frame begin to move and warp. She heard the screams and roars escape from his lips before he began to change. His arms and legs grew longer, his whole body almost tripled in size before his skin split open and scales came in its place. A dragon began to form before her very eyes, and Amelia’s mouth sagged open as once the dragon was fully there it began to edge closer and closer to the tips of the trees as its size increased again.

  “My God,” she gasped.

  She could feel Dash’s heat and as the dragon looked down at her she saw his eyes there, he was still inside, and it made her nerves quieten slightly.

  The dragon lowered its head, and she took a nervous step closer. He was so big and powerful, and as she reached out and stroked its scales she jumped back slightly as she felt the heat pulsing away beneath the scales.

  “Wow,” she said with a smile as she looked into his eyes.

  The dragon nudged her slightly and at first, she didn’t know what he meant, but when she realized he wanted her to try and climb up onto his back she almost couldn’t believe it.

  “You want me to climb on?” she asked.

  The dragon nudged her toward the log with its long nose and she climbed up onto that first before she reached out and heaved herself up onto the scales and held on tight.

  “Oh my,” she whispered.

  She didn’t know what was going to happen, but when the dragon pushed off the ground and launched them both into the air, she closed her eyes tight and barely dared breathe. She didn’t know how she wasn’t falling off, but something inside of her just knew exactly how and where to hold onto him, and as she gained the nerves to open her eyes and look, she saw that they were soaring over the mountains of Misty Vale and it was like no other view she had ever seen.

  “This is amazing,” she tried to call to him, but she was unsure whether he had heard because of the wind whipping past them as Dash gained speed.

  She gripped onto him tightly, and as they swooped through the night sky it felt as if she could reach out and touch the stars. The little lights of the town below only made her feel warmer inside, and as they began to descend back down toward the clearing, Amelia had never felt so exhilarated before. It truly had been the most incredible experience.

  The dragon touched down onto the warm ground, his scales exuding even more heat. Amelia felt it radiating into her hands, and her whole body felt hot, as if she were absorbing the dragon’s energy. She waited for him to move over toward the log and when she managed to swing her legs over and slip down onto it, she turned and looked back into his eyes.

  “That was truly incredible Dash,” she said as she rested her head against the dragon’s nose. “Thank you.”

  The dragon paused for a moment before he moved backwards, and she braced herself for what was about to come. She saw his shoulders heaving, its enormous belly moving in and out quickly as if it were gearing up to do a tremendous roar. When it came she covered her ears and closed her eyes for a split second, before she opened them again to see the dragon spurt fire into the stone circle in the center of the forest and it caught light in just the right place, making the whole clearing appear in red and orange glows.

  She smiled and watched in awe, as within a few moments the dragons frame began to shake and shrink. The scales gave way to skin and slowly but surely Dash began to take shape again before her very eyes.

  She was breathless and panting, and when he had fully transformed back into his human self, they ran to each other and she let herself be wrapped up in his red-hot embrace. His skin was on fire, but it didn’t faze her, his skin was so hot it should have made her flinch, but she had the dragon’s energy inside of her now too, she had taken it into herself and now she could hold him and feel the immense power coming from way deep inside of him.

  She looked at his tattoo properly, and the flames of the fire in the stone circle seemed to catch on the outline of it and made it glimmer and shine, as if it were alive with magical ink.

  “This,” she said as she reached up and traced her finger around the outline. “It’s you?”

  Dash nodded, still breathless himself from his transformation but with a fire and lust in his eyes that Amelia knew would not be tamed. She felt it too, her whole body was turned on and desperate for him. Her nipples were hard, her pussy was wet, and she bit her lip as she wrapped her arms around his neck and let him lift her up so that her legs were wrapped around his waist.

  He walked with her across the cleaning, out of the path of the dragon fire and toward a more secluded spot where there were pine branches laying across the soft, moist earth. When he lay her down and kneeled back, she looked up at him in all his glory, at the glimmering ink on his chest, alive with fire, at the flames in his eyes and the heat coming from his body. This man was everything. He was so strong and powerful, so frightening, and everything she had never knew she needed.

  She lay back and offered herself to him. There had never been a moment more perfect than this, and she knew that there was no going back. Amelia wanted Dash to claim her. She wanted to be with him for the rest of time as his one true and fated mate. She wanted him to love and protect her, she wanted to experience it all.

  He took hold of her leg with his big, hot hands and moved up to her waist where he began to slowly unbutton her jeans. She lay there, completely at his mercy, as he slid them down her thighs, over her knees and off the end of her feet. When he reached for her top it came off quickly, then her bra with a swift snap. She gasped and smiled, her eyes alive with his energy, and when he slipped his fingers into the corners of her panties and yanked them down, she moaned with pleasure.

  She had thought about this moment so many times. She knew how skilled he was in the bedroom, he had shown her night after night when he had pleasured her, but she had never yet felt him. Never taken his immense power… and now the time had come.

  He was so hard, so big and engorged. And when he came toward her and put his weight on her she held her breath as she prepared for him to enter her. He raised her leg slightly, gripping her thigh with his hand, while with his other he guided himself into her, just a little at first, which almost tipped her over the edge, but then his full length, which made her entire body quiver with pleasure.

  She threw her head back, her whole body bucking and shuddering as he thrust into her slowly over and over again. Dash pinned her down into the soft, pure earth, his tensed thighs guiding hers open even deeper, letting him reach places she didn’t even know were there.

  She looked up into his eyes as he bore down on her, and she ran her hands through his hair, they were so locked in on each other, that when they both began to come at the exact same time, she felt something even deeper transfer between them. A fire and an energy that could not be compared to anything else. Something so powerful and raw that it made them both scream aloud with sheer delight. Her orgasm tore through her as he spilled his seed, and the fire in both of their eyes ignited and continued to burn. The heat was overpowering, and when Dash finally collapsed on top of her, Amelia was so exhausted and quivering, she could barely make sense of what had just happened.

  She tried to open her eyes, but she was seeing stars and fire, a warm sensation was spreading through her veins, overpowering her, and making her feel more alive than ever. More so than the first night in Dash’s bed. She knew she had a piece of him inside of her forever. He had given her some of his power, she had been claimed by the dragon.

  “Amelia,” he panted as he held onto her and ran his hands through her hair, staring deep into her eyes before he kissed her longingly and lovingly.

  “That was…” she couldn’t even find the words.

  He smiled and kissed her again.

  When they found that they could rise to their feet, Dash held her hand as they collected their clothes, dressed each other, and began to walk back to the house hand in hand. Amelia felt as if she were seeing the world differently, as if she were experiencing life for the first time. Magic was present in the forest, she felt it. She could sense the change in the air, the mystical creatures hiding in the shadows. And she knew that she had found the place that she was supposed to be, somewhere she could be herself and grow with her man by her side.

  When they reached Dash’s home and went inside Striker took one look at them and seemed to know what happened. He smiled and crossed the room and embraced his brother, before he did the same with Amelia and looked at her, the fire in both their eyes catching each other’s. She hadn’t been able to see it before with Striker and Zane, but now she had been claimed it appeared that she would be able to see it now in all other dragons, to help her recognize their kind. And it felt amazing.

  “Welcome to the family, Amelia,” Striker said with a knowing smile before he wished them goodnight and left them to enjoy each other again.

  Up in bed, Amelia and Dash held each other, looking deep into each other’s eyes, the fire roaring gently in the background, the stars of the heavens and the moon shining in through the French doors, and she had never felt more happy or content than this.

  “I’m yours Dash,” she whispered. “Forever.”

  He smiled and nodded, them both knowing that something life changing had happened between them in the forest, deep in the mountains of Misty Vale.

  They had given themselves to each other. And now they were both home.

  Chapter 18

  Four Weeks Later

  The school bell rang right on time, and as Amelia waited underneath the beautiful red and orange of the old maple tree she smiled as she realized fall had well and truly come to Misty Vale.

  The colors were so rich and intense, she was sure she had never believed that such beauty could truly exist, and yet here she was, experiencing it firsthand.

  When the doors to school opened and Nora came running down the steps, Amelia raised her hand to wave as Nora’s little eyes searched for her to find her in the crowd.

  When she bounded over, Amelia scooped her up and gave her a big cuddle and a kiss on the cheek.

  “Hey little lady,” she beamed and said in her best British accent. “And how was your day dear?”

  Nora burst out laughing and nuzzled into her again before Amelia set her down on the ground. She grinned up at her and held onto her hand.

  “It was wonderful thank you Mary Poppins,” she said with a laugh. “Today we learned all about volcanos… and oh my goodness, they are so cool! Have you ever seen one?”