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Not the way I’d hoped to be spending my Saturday night.

I’d thought by now I’d be balls deep in a warm woman, not lying here grappling with the idea that I may have found my mate. The very concept sounded wrong to my ears.

I lifted my arm and lay it across my face, covering my eyes with my forearm.

“Damn it all to hell.”

A perfect Fated mate was Ollie’s dream, not mine. And just because we were a perfect pair, didn’t mean we had to share a mate.

It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t how I wanted to spend my life. And surely, Fate understood that?

If I stayed away or even moved out, maybe Ollie and Lexie could just get together and leave me out of it.

The very idea of my brother mating with the woman I wanted turned my insides upside down, but better to deal with some short-term stress, rather than long-term agony.

I wasn’t built for monogamy and fidelity and proved it time and time again.

My sister told me I wasn’t.

Every woman I’d ever dated told me the same thing.

Surely, I didn’t need another woman to tell me what I already knew? I wasn’t built to be a husband. Especially not to a woman as beautiful and special as Lexie. She deserved someone who could be completely faithful and monogamous. Someone who would worship her, body and soul. I couldn’t give her that.

It would be best for both of us if I just left her alone.

Chapter 6

LEXIE

A soft knock on my door roused me from one of the best sleeps of my life. “Come in,” I managed to mumble, though I wasn’t sure yet who I was talking to.

Why was someone knocking...Was it a nurse? Was I in hospital? That would make sense as to why I had been so deeply asleep.

I forced my eyes to open, though they felt weighed down as if by lead.

There was a man standing quietly beside my bed, sporting a soft smile and holding a tray of food. Ollie.