Freakshow

Chapter Twenty Nine

"Did you find anything new?" Cairo asked me later that evening, kissing me on the cheek.

I was still reading and researching online, finding even more information about the supposed cult of Brigid that had sprung up in Western Europe sometime in the Stone Age.

There were carved idols depicting what appeared to be a goddess of beasts, but these beasts were carved as half men, half animal. The goddess of shifters more accurately, now that I knew what I was looking at in the ancient record.

"Some things, but I still don't know what the hell I'm doing with all this...well, magic that I seem to possess," I told him.

He sat down next to me on my bed, it was covered with scattered papers and books everywhere, but he managed to find a spot anyways. "I'm sure you'll be able to unravel this thread," he told me and rubbed my back with his huge hand.

I moaned and leaned back against him, feeling the heat from his body soaking into my aching muscles. Now that I knew what he was, I could sense the differences in his body. The heat, the higher temperature, but also the coiled tension I sensed right under the surface. He felt feral on some level, and it excited me. It made every cell in my body vibrate when he was near.

"So, what did Mila mean by mate? Or bond?" I asked suddenly, needing to know, needing information now like I needed air.

Cairo had the decency to look mildly embarrassed. "Mating is obvious, sexual intercourse between two shifters, or a shifter and another gifted individual."

"So I count as gifted?"

"Definitely. More than gifted, magicked. Most gifted are clairvoyants, or they read tarot, standard kind of stuff. You're on a completely different level, babe."

"That's nice to know," I said with a grin. "Now what about the bonding thing?"

"Bonding," he said, pulling me into his arms, ignoring the drifting papers and books that scattered as I slid across the bed. "Now bonding is completely different. I think you sense it, every time we're together. Has anyone ever made you feel like this?"

"God, no," I breathed out slowly, "not even close."

"Same with me," he said, "I've had fun, but it always felt incomplete somehow. With you, it all fits. We fit. We make sense."

"Are you telling me you weren't a virgin?" I asked with a laugh.

"About as much as you," he winked. I rolled my eyes and gave him a little shove. He laughed and wrapped his arms around me tighter. "It doesn't bother me, you know."

"I know, me neither." And it didn't, that was the craziest thing about being with Cai. Nothing else mattered, everything I'd done until the moment we'd met had just been leading up to finding him. "What did she mean about fully bonding?" I continued.

"Fully bonded is when we perform a ritual and are recognized by the pack leader. It's like a wedding, only it completes the life bonding event."

"We'd need your father's blessing?"

"Kind of," he said with his mouth set in a grim line, "we could make do with the support of the pack. Community recognition, I suppose."

"You suppose?" I asked. "Are you certain?"

"Nothing is certain where you are involved," he replied and wrapped his arms tighter around me. "Nothing except how much I love you, and how much I want to fuck you," he added.

He dipped his head and bit my neck, and sent a thrill through my body. I smiled, sighed and said, "I believe that."

He stopped in mid motion, tilted his head and listened.