I wasn’t exactly keeping my interest in healers from my mate. If he’d asked me how I felt about what my aunt did as a healer, I’d have told him and how it had me second-guessing some of my past decisions. But I also wasn’t planning to talk to him about it yet, mostly because I couldn’t really piece together my own thoughts.
If it kept nagging at me this way after the baby came, I’d discuss it with him, and depending on how that conversation went, talk to my aunt about it. Until then, I planned to just let it simmer there in the back of my mind. Pregnancy wasn’t the ideal time to be making any major career moves.
Most days, I was able to leave it there as background noise. But days like today, when my mate and I were outside running around in our fur, it was hard to. We both loved to shift together, but this was a scheduled shift—one we planned to help his wolf and that had my brain going a mile a minute. At least it had, until my mate’s wolf took off in our favorite game of hunter and prey. Today I was the hunter.
As I tracked Ax’s scent, I noticed little things he did along the way that told me his wolf was happier than I’d ever seen. He wasn’t just running and hiding and covering his tracks. No, he was leading me to some of our favorite places… the tree that I loved because it reminded me of the one that grew outside our dorm in college, the berry bush I promised him would have the sweetest blackberries come spring, and the pine tree where we collected some huge pine cones to make ornaments for gifts at work. He made sure to hit every single place that I’d pointed out to him as a human for being special to me. All but one, thatwas, which told my fox exactly what he needed to know. His final location in this round.
With that knowledge in place, I changed my tactic. Instead of tracking him, I took a hard right and bolted. He was going to be down at the boulder, the one that was oddly comfortable for sitting on on a warm summer’s day, the one where I’d read countless books, the one that was the furthest away from my current spot. I ran and ran and ran, covering up my tracks as I got close, using every trick I knew, and then hiding behind it and waiting for him to come.
I was there only two minutes when I heard his paws slamming into the cold ground. He wasn’t being careful. He thought I was long behind him. I bided my time until he was close enough to pounce on, and I jumped, landing on his back before he suspected I was there.
He fell over, rolled onto his back, submitting instantly and then licking my face.
Now it was my turn to be prey. I wasn’t going to be so easy on him. No predictability here. I licked his ear and then took off like a shot.
Unlike my mate, I was pretty adept at climbing trees, far more than a natural-born fox would be. As soon as I thought I was far enough away from him, I climbed up a trunk and jumped from one tree to another, going back the way I’d come, hoping he’d assume I was going forward. And he did. I watched as he went out of sight before coming down and circling back toward the house.
I was under no illusion that I was already winning this round. I highly suspected he was letting me win. The first one I won,fair and square. My guess was he’d never make that mistake in strategy again.
This time was different, he was letting me win. His wolf wasn’t this easily tricked. And the question was, why?
When I got to the porch where our clothes sat, I kept my fur and waited for him. I waited and waited. It wasn’t until the back door opened that I realized I’d been totally duped.
I shifted and asked, “When did you go in there?”
“Probably about three minutes before you sat on the porch.” He smirked. Yep. I called it. He played me, and I wasn’t even mad at it.
“And why didn’t you let me know?”
“Because your clever fox won, and as such, you deserve a reward.”
I crossed over to him, a shiver running through me as the cold wind lapped at my skin. “And what is my prize?”
“I ran you a bath.”
It sounded heavenly.
“You really do love me, don’t you?” I pressed my hand against his chest, wanting to feel his warmth.
“Of course, I do. But I love me, too.” He winked.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He pulled me inside, and I pushed the door closed behind me.
“Well, I won the second round.” He puffed his chest out, and I had to bite back a chuckle.
“And what do you win, sexy mate of mine?” I had a feeling I was going to like where this was heading.
“Obviously, a bath with my omega.”
He took my hand and led me to the bathroom. I climbed into the hot water, settled in, and he joined me, sitting across from me so we could see each other. “We need a bigger tub,” he said.
We both fit in it, and there was plenty of room lengthwise for that, but the water didn’t go very deep. Deeper would definitely be nice on cool days like this.
“Sounds like a plan to me. We could put it on the must list for our next house, or we could keep this place and just put in a new tub.”
I’d said it as a random comment, not a to-do list item, but my mate was ready for action. Gods, he was the best mate.
