Changed by Fire (Phoenix Rising #6) - Harper Wylde Page 0,122
few times. How did I explain this without scaring her by revealing too much about my nightmares—and the subject of them?
“I’m fucking scared,” I rasped, the last word a hoarse growl. “There are so many pieces of the future that I see… so many paths that all converge and split at variables I don’t understand. What if my vision is a dream and not a prophecy? My mind’s way of protecting me or glazing over the bad shit I see nearly every night. How the fuck do I pull the strings to keep us away from the blood and steer us toward the future where we’re all happy and together? And what if I’ve fucking screwed it all up already?” My hand had found its way into my hair, pulling the strands so hard my scalp hurt, The other hand gestured as I blurted it all out and laid myself flayed at Nix’s feet. “Maybe I missed something and set us on our course already. What if it’s just the best fucking dream?”
“Then we’ll make it come true,” Nix stated so firmly, I knew she’d move mountains and challenge God himself to make it so. My mate was fierce and stubborn, both traits I admired in her. “Sometimes happiness requires sacrifice, but that doesn’t mean we won’t rise from the ashes. Did you consider that maybe the paths aren’t making you choose? That maybe they’re in congruence with each other? Sometimes bad things have to happen to reach the good.” Nix stood and padded toward me, soft on her feet. Her hands snaked up my abdomen to rest on my chest, one palm over my heart. I wrapped my arms around her, cradling her close while my mind railed. Was it possible that what she said was right? Did the vision just happen to end in a bad spot, refusing to show Nix rising from the ground in a burst of renewed flames? It would kill me to watch her die again, but I knew she would come back to me, to us, thanks to the power of her Phoenix.
Nix’s nails dug into my chest as though she wasn’t ever planning on letting me go. And I never wanted her to. “Just look at me and my story. There was so much bad before I found you… all of you are the good in my story. And I want that future, Abra. I want it with a desperation I can’t explain. I’m holding onto it with both hands and I won’t let it go. I love all of you, and I can’t bear the thought that I might lose any of you. I… I want that forever.”
“Does that mean—” My voice was thick, and I tried to clear it before starting back in. “Does that mean you’re thinking about… mating?” I didn’t want to push Nix. She should be able to come to us in her own time and tell us when she was ready to mate, to officially claim us as her men. Bearing our mark was a forever thing, more binding than marriage. Once you made that vow, breaking it was nearly impossible. She’d be sealing herself to us for life, and my Puca and I wanted nothing more. He hopped around my mind, thumping his foot in triumph that Nix had only scooted closer and popped up on her toes to nuzzle her nose against mine as she gazed at me from under her lashes.
“Now that Joshua’s back, I do want that. But I can’t plan my mating when Rini’s planning hers, especially with everything going on with her and Ciarán. But I’m ready. I won’t go into war without having marked you as mine.” Her hands glowed with the heat of her Phoenix, her chocolate eyes shimmering gold with the presence of her alter.
My Puca pushed forward to greet his mate, and I knew my own eyes would be shining neon green.
“That’s the best fucking news I’ve heard in my entire goddamn life,” I growled, bending just enough to haul Nix up by her luscious ass. Did she even know what her skimpy little boy shorts and pretty lace bra did to me?
“I can’t wait to call you mine,” she gasped out between kisses, her hands tangling in my hair as I brought her back to the bed to start worshipping her all over again.
“You are already mine, baby girl.”
I stripped her lingerie from her body, and quickly slid my boxers off my muscular thighs, before