He’d yammered on about me needing to absorb everything I’d learned and I should do it alone withoutany interference from him. I’d assumed the word “interference” referred to what was in his pants and Isowanted to be interfered with. But Roscoe refused. I’d sighed and begged and finally stomped up the stairs with a hard cock and my briefs coated in slick, leaving him to sleep on the sofa.
I didn’t sleep much because he was downstairs and probably had his feet dangling over the edge of the couch. Whenever I closed my eyes, I recalled his lips on mine and how his hunger matched my own, which was why I couldn’t understand why he refused to have sex.
But as I lay in the dark and the storm raged outside, I ran my mind over reindeer shifters existing and living on my land and one in particular who might share my bed. I longed to know more about shifters and their connection to the land, but uppermost in my mind was my relationship with Roscoe.
Was my intense attraction to him just me being lonely and lusting after the handsome man who would soon be making his home over the hill? I could run ideas in my head all day but until I spoke to him, there was no moving forward.
I pattered downstairs and watched as he moved around the kitchen as if he belonged there. He was wearing an old T-shirt of mine and his briefs and he had no right to look so sexy.
“Morning.”
His face lit up which did things to my heart. “Hey. I hope you don't mind that I made breakfast.”
“Let me think. I come downstairs to a ready-made meal that I didn’t have to cook and you’re asking me if I mind?”
“Something like that.” He offered me coffee and the aroma told me it was better than what I made, though with Erik’s tutelage mine had improved from tasting like dishwater to almost drinkable.
His fingers grazed mine as he handed me the mug. I was drinking him in and his body reacted as mine did with a small jolt, his eyes darkening. Did he and his reindeer come with their own electric current?
Roscoe placed a tray of toast, jam, bacon, eggs, and mushrooms on the coffee table and we sat on the couch with our thighs touching. To avoid blurting out something I shouldn’t, I grabbed a strip of crunchy bacon and bit into it. Yum. The salty flavor flooded my mouth and for a second it took my mind off Roscoe beside me.
I swallowed and sipped the coffee. So much better than mine.
“About last night.” A flush spread over my cheeks. In the grey morning light, I worried that my memory was faulty and Roscoe hadn’t lusted over me as I remembered. “I don't usually kiss men I barely know and offerthem my bed.”
Roscoe pushed hair off my brow and goosebumps gallivanted over my skin. “I’m glad you don’t. I’d be jealous if you did.”
“You would?” That had to be good, though I didn’t usually rate jealousy as a positive trait.
“There are things I need to tell you,” he said. “About what's happening between us.”
“Okay.” Now instead of thinking we’d get naked after breakfast or during, I was wary. The part of my head that absorbed new and exciting information was closed and not accepting any details until further notice.
Roscoe ran his tongue around his lips and I almost jumped on his lap and demanded his dick. “When shifters find their mates?—”
“Mates?” Now instead of lust and desire filling my head and turning up the heat, I was confused.
“For a shifter, a mate is the person you’re supposed to spend the rest of your life with.” He placed a hand over his chest. “They’re your fate or destiny. Our kind don’t just fall in love, we bond. Everything inside us, from our heart to our pinky and our little toe, recognizes that person as ours.”
“Your little toe is telling you I’m your mate?” That was all I had because my mind was fuzzy and full of cotton balls. “You think I’m the one according to your smallest toe?”
He grinned but it became more of a grimace. “I don't think it.”
Well, that was a let down and now I was more confuzzled than seconds ago.
“Iknowyou are.”
Oh. Gulp!
“From the moment we were in your office that first day, your scent told me you were my fated. Since then, my head, heart, and everything in between has told me to claim you.”
Whoa. Back the F up. Claim me? That wasn’t happening. And besides, we just met. Sex? Yes. Anything else? No, we had to slow down. Damn, he’d been telling me that and I wanted the opposite.
“I don’t want to be claimed.”
He placed my hand on his cheek. Despite a voice inside me saying I wasn’t an object to be owned, this felt right. My body responded when he was near and I longed for him when he wasn’t close.
But claimed? No way.
