His fingers dug in again, repeating the drool inducing movement.
“Oh my God.” The revenant praise was out of my parted lips before I had a conscious thought, and my eyes hooded, not quite closed but definitely not open either as I enjoyed the way Damien worked his thumbs into muscles I hadn’t even realized were sore.
“Fuck, the sounds you make are sexy as hell.” Ryder’s voice had dropped into a husky tenor, and I forced my eyes open to take him in.
“What’s all this?” I asked, uncertain of the stack of magazines he was holding. What were those for?
“Now… remember you said you love me,” he prefaced, before dropping the entire load into my lap unceremoniously.
“Wedding magazines?” I winced, looking at the poufy white dress the model wore on the first cover. I might want to mate and claim my men before we went into our final battle against the Council—I wanted these men to be mine before we faced our potential deaths—but I wasn’t really into frilly dresses or having an audience for such a sacred and special commitment.
“Well, we don’t have a long time to plan or make arrangements, so many things you’ll find in there won’t be things you need to worry about,” Joshua chimed in as he reappeared and offered me a water bottle. I uncapped it and took a swig, steeling myself to jump into the pages in my lap.
“What are the color coded tabs for?” I questioned with a furrowed brow as I opened to the first page.
“My organizational system. Purple tabs are mine, and the yellow ones are Joshua’s. We each flagged some of our favorite dresses and color palettes for you to look at.” Ryder appeared hopeful, and I pasted on a brave face while Damien did something amazing to the arches of my feet. Flipping through the book, I looked over every page they’d marked. I wondered briefly if I should hide how much I was enjoying the magic Damien was currently working with those talented fingers of his—this would be one hell of a form of bribery in the future if they realized it turned me to literal putty in their hands.
While all the dresses were pretty, there weren’t many that called to me. Several were too glitzy, and others looked plain uncomfortable, too confining and stiff. A number of the ones with sleeves had huge princess skirts that I couldn’t imagine wearing, and there were a few that were much too scant, showing more skin than I could imagine baring in front of my friends and future family.
But then one caught my eye. I froze, my hand tracing over the elegant design. The tulle fell like a cascading waterfall, just full enough and not overly cumbersome on the model. The neckline was a little lower than I would have wanted, but I knew I would have been perfectly happy wearing it. It was one of the only pages that had both sets of sticky notes tabbing it as important. “This one’s nice,” I whispered dreamily.
Damien leaned forward to see what had drawn my full attention. “That’s a beautiful choice.” He gave me a gentle smile, and I let out a breath.
“What about this one?” Joshua flipped to the only other page that sported two sticky notes.
I gasped. It had all the elements I’d loved in the first design with a much better bodice. My Phoenix cooed in my head, ruffling her feathers, equally as enthralled.
“It’s by the same designer. We both thought you would love this one,” Ryder told me gently, obviously not wanting to push me into loving the dress if there was something about it I didn’t like.
“The feathers are so unique and elegant.” The way they hugged the bodice and incorporated an element of who I was, a bird, a phoenix, made me teary. I owed so much to my alter. If it wasn’t for her, I never would have survived my childhood, let alone ended up meeting my guys. She wasn’t a separate entity, but rather a huge part of who I was at my core. We were one and the same, and she surrounded me with the heat of her love and affection just as Ryder, Joshua, and Damien beamed at me when I peeked up from the magazine to take in their happy faces.
“It’s beautiful,” I said while shaking my head. “But we won’t be able to get a dress like this one on such short notice. It’s fun to dream, but the