Page 67 of Kringle and the Kraken

“It’s too late to ask how this works isn’t it?”

“Yep.” Levi popped thePand held both of my hands, staring lovingly into my eyes. “I promise this won’t hurt at all.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

LEVI

My hearts beattriple time as I looked into Kris’s dark eyes. When we’d met weeks ago, part of my soul had recognized Kris as mine, but I never thought I’d end up here, in this moment, about to take a mate and poised to lead a haven town.

It was everything I’d been running from, but it had caught up with me anyway, and now, I didn’t want to run.

I wanted to stand with Kris by my side.

Reaching deep into my core where my magic lived, I isolated a piece of it. My tentacles lifted from my arms and twined themselves around Kris’s wrists. I could feel his pulse under my suckers, and it made me smile. Concentrating on the ball of magic I’d separated, I focused on pushing it out from my core and through the tentacle that rested on Kris’s chest.

Kris’s eyes tracked the ball of blue light as it moved through my body, and his eyes met mine as I pushed it out and into him. He gasped as a shudder rolled through his body as the light settled inside him, the glow dimming as it became part of who Kris was, as he became my mate.

In the next heartbeat magic rushed up through the ley line. I felt it fill me up, the feel of the magic reminding me of what it felt like to live in Baleen, to be home. Sounds of wonder poured fromthe crowd, from monsters and humans alike, and I knew I wasn’t the only one experiencing the rush.

As quickly as it had started, it stopped, and my focus returned to Kris, but instead of dark eyes meeting mine, they were glowing a crystalline blue, and the voice that spilled from his mouth wasn’t his.

“Levi Ethan Shoal, son of Leomar, son of Lochlan, son of Levan, son of Lathonis a descendent of one of my first kraken children, your bloodline was chosen to lead this haven town where my children from the depths of the sea live in harmony with the children of the earth. It is an honor and privilege to oversee this balance and not an agreement to be entered into lightly. Will you become the leviathan and protect this town and all its people?”

I didn’t even need to think about my answer. “I will.”

“Then so it is done.” The magic surged again, and I felt it rearrange my cells into something different, something stronger, something more powerful than I’d thought I could ever be. I could feel the other haven towns along the oceanic ley line, my father’s magic familiar among the others. I could also sense the borders of the town, the magic protecting us now bright and strong. Wraiths would no longer be able to penetrate the boundaries, and if they tried, I would know about it. When I opened my eyes, they immediately fell on Kris, who was staring at me with wonder, his eyes back to the beautiful brown I loved.

“You’re glowing.” He caressed my cheek with gentle fingers.

A glance down at my tentacles proved he was right. A faint violet-blue glow was emanating from my skin.

“Don’t worry. It will fade,” Tidewell said. “But look.” The ley line orb was glowing the same bluish-purple hue, the color bright and steady.

“You did it, Levi. You fixed the magic and saved the town. I’m so damn proud of you.” My mate pulled me in tight, his lipslanding on mine as everyone cheered and snow started to fall like we were in one of the holiday movies I’d come to love.

Hours later,my mate and I finally stumbled through his front door. We’d spent the time after our public mating drinking Mary Kate’s hot cocoa and eating Clara’s shortbread cookies and fielding well wishes and congratulations from nearly every single person in town. Some folks had left early, forgoing the festivities, which was fine. The truth we’d revealed was a lot to process, and some people were going to take longer to adjust to the realities of life in a haven town than others. And that was okay. On the whole, everything had gone better than I could have anticipated, given everything Delmar and his family had done over the past century to sow discontent. There would be growing pains as we moved forward, but I had hope for the future of Lifeboat.

The second the door closed behind us, Kris had me backed against the wall, his lips on mine as his hand slipped under my coat and shoved it off my shoulders. My own hand mirrored Kris’s, sliding under his coat and pushing it off as we both struggled out of more of our clothes while trying to keep our mouths and bodies connected.

The same electricity that had sparked between us the first time we touched still pulsed between us now, but there was something deeper and more meaningful in the current now. It was almost like kissing and touching Kris completed a circuit that lit me up from the inside out, and when I stumbled taking off one of my boots and had to pull away from Kris for a second, I saw the same was true for him.

Literally.

The blue ball of my magic that I’d pushed into him was glowing and pulsating with the beat of his heart. I could see it under the bare skin of his chest. Knowing a piece of me was actually inside him made me feral, and an inhuman growl slid from my throat. Kris’s eyes that were already almost all pupil, blown wide with desire, turned even darker.

“I love it when you get all growly.” His lips crashed back into mine, and he pushed a hand under my waistband and used his grip on the denim to haul me flush against him as his deft fingers popped the button on my jeans and slid the zipper down. My bare chest pressed against his, and his hand came up to rest over my hearts, which were racing in my chest.

Kris’s mouth stilled, and he rested his forehead on mine as he stared down at his hand.

“I have three hearts, love, and they’re all beating for you. Only for you.” Maybe the line was cheesy, but it was one hundred percent true, and Kris’s mouth connected with mine again, his tongue pushing past my lips, deepening the kiss and making my tentacles fully lift from my body to tangle in my mate’s hair and slip under his pants and wrap completely around his body, lifting him off the ground as I moved us deeper into the house.

Kris didn’t pull away from me or protest, he just kept kissing me, one of his hands finding one of my nipples, running his thumb over and over it until I felt every touch in my core while his other hand grabbed my ass and kept our bodies pressed tightly together. By the time we reached his bedroom and I threw Kris down on the bed and stripped off the rest of his clothes, my cock was hard and aching, and so was Kris’s. As I tossed his jeans and boxers somewhere behind me, I watched a pearly drop of precum appear at the tip of his cock, and my mouth watered, dying for a taste.

The second my lips closed around him, Kris’s hips arched off the bed, and his hands slid into my hair. My tentacles werestill wrapped around him, and I felt them move so they could massage his nipples and slide between his legs to tease over his hole.

“Fuck, Levi. That feels so good.”

With his cock deep in my throat, all I could do was moan, and I felt the vibration rumble through him as his hips bucked and he slid even deeper into my mouth. If I had a gag reflex, I would have been choking on Kris’s cock, but I didn’t, so I swallowed around him, the muscles in my throat working the head of his cock as one of my tentacles wrapped around the base, coiling and uncoiling in time with the rhythm I’d set with my mouth.

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