“No, alpha, this is me getting over myself and coming here to apologize. Your fox—despite his sharp little teeth, is adorable, and I’ll take a shifter like you over any man I’ve ever met.”
He went back to work, preparing steaks and baked potatoes, a big green salad. “But I have one question. It was really hard to be apart from you, but I think it was making you sick. Why?”
“Shifter thing. Until the mating bond is completed, we should stay as close together as we can.”
“Or maybe forever.”
Chapter Fifteen
Rain
I surprised myself when I straight out said, “Make me yours, Lux. I want to be yours. Mate me.”
I wasn’t shy or embarrassed. If anything, I was needy and clingy, but I didn’t care. I wanted to be his in all ways.
My body had instinctively known before the rest of me caught up that he was mine. It didn’t matter that we were so very different. Him being a fox and all.
He must have been taken aback by my fox key chain. In hindsight, maybe it was the perfect gift after all, instead of just some way of giving him the message that I appreciated what he’d done for me. Now, here I was being carried to his bed.
He picked me up like I was nothing. I didn’t know how much of his strength had to do with his line of work and how much with the fact that he was a shifter. Whatever, there was something so sexy about a man who could toss you around a room without breaking a sweat. Not that I’d want that, but that kind of power and strength… Yes, please.
“Are you sure? There’s no rush, Rain.”
“Yes,” I said as he sat me on the bed and went to his knees, pulling my socks off. “I’ve never been surer of anything in my life.”
“I need you to be sure.” He sat back on his heels, watching my face. I loved how my consent was so important to him.
“I am so beyond sure.”
He reached for my belt, fidgeting with it, trying to get it open. He was different this time…just as commanding but also more vulnerable. It was a heady combination.
“Hey,” I said, putting my hand on his cheek. “Are you sure?”
Consent went both ways.
“I’ve been sure since the moment I scented you.”
“You hadn’t even seen me yet.”
He’d told me about that day he was at the motel and scented me even though I was already out.
“I didn’t need to see you. My fox recognized my mate—recognized you as mine. I’d been waiting for you all my life.”
“Why do you look so nervous?”
“Because… I don’t know how to explain this. It’s not nerves. It’s… I’m so excited that my body’s not doing everything I tell it to. Opening your belt shouldn’t be this difficult.”
“Want me to help you, alpha mine?” I didn’t care how we got naked, as long as we did.
“Say that again,” he whispered.
“Want me to help you?”
“No, the other part.”
“Alpha mine.”
“You. Are. Perfect.”
