“Damn. He’s going to spit in my coffee, isn’t he? I didn’t know you were the most eligible bachelorette in Briar Glenn.”
“I absolutely am not. And even if I was, it doesn’t matter now because I’m with you.”
Atlas pulled into one of the parking spots in front of the Busy Bean. We hopped out of the truck, and when I opened the door to the coffee shop, Brian’s head snapped up.
“Hey, Tegan. What are you—” Brian started, but his voice tapered off the second Atlas stepped inside behind me. “Oh,” he said, staring at Atlas and me.
“Morning, Brian,” Atlas said. He grabbed my hand, twining our fingers together. “I promised Tegan a coffee before we startedour workout this morning. She needed a little energy boost. Didn’t you?”
I could feel the heat rushing from my chest up to my cheeks, because he did not just say that to Brian. “Yep,” I croaked, giving his hand a very aggressive squeeze, which probably didn’t bother him because he was a hulking wolven.
“Uh, cool,” Brian said flatly. “The usual for you, Tegan?”
I nodded. “Please.”
“And I’ll have a double americano. Iced, please,” Atlas added.
Brian aggressively tapped on the tablet in front of him, flipping it around to face us when he had the total.
I went to grab my card from my phone case, but Atlas beat me to it, adding averygenerous tip before tapping his card on the reader.
Was he trying to add insult to injury?
We shuffled to the end of the counter and grabbed our drinks when they were ready.
I chose a table that was as far away from the counter as we could get. “You should have just peed on me in front of him,” I huffed. “Really marked your territory, ya know.”
Atlas sat across from me. “I mean, if that’s what you’re into, I’ll try anything once—” He shrugged.
I almost choked on my coffee. “Atlas.”
He started laughing his head off, and out of the corner of my eye I could see Brian staring daggers at him. I hoped Atlas wasn’t a big fan of coffee, because he was definitely making an enemy here.
“I’m sorry. I just couldn’t help myself,” he said when he finally regained his composure. “Listen,” he said, his expression turning serious. “There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”
“I hope you’re not breaking up with me in a public place rightafter we had sex for the first time,” I joked, trying to ease the knot forming in my stomach. Usually when someone said they needed to talk to you like that, it wasn’t about something good.
He shook his head aggressively, holding out his hands. “Oh my gods, no. It’s nothing like that. It’s just—wolven things.”
“What kind of wolven things?” I asked.
“Do you remember what the moon looked like the night of the wedding?”
“It was some type of crescent, I think? I can’t remember which. It’s been a long time since I took earth science, so you’ll have to cut me some slack.”
“It was a waning crescent, and now it’s almost time for a full moon.”
“Ahhh,” I drawled.
“We won’t be able to hang out that night.”
“Why?”
“Wolven are different under the full moon. It’s just—I don’t know if I can trust some of my baser instincts around you, Tegan. Do you get where I’m going with this?”
“Baser instincts?”
“I don’t think I would ever hurt you, but I don’t want to do anything that makes you scared or uncomfortable.”
