“I bet she’s a vampire.”
“I bet he’s a lupine.”
Their past flippancy turned her stomach.
Ezra’s face crumpled. He bowed his head. “Okay. Well. I—I wanted you to know. It’s been good getting to know you.”
Did he think…? Oh, he did. Somehow he’d read her revulsion and attributed it to himself. Without thinking Willow reached out, set her hand on his arm, and he looked up, surprise smoothing the crinkles of pain from his face.
“Ezra, I’m sorry. I’m being stupid. It’s just—it doesn’t feel real to me, which I know is completely stupid because it’s your life, it’s who you are, and I’m flaking out on you.”
He stared down at her hand on his arm. “You’re not afraid of me.”
“You’ve given me no reason to be.”
Gently he set his hand over hers. He was so warm, but that made sense now. Lupines had a normal body temperature of 101.6. In fact…that wasn’t the only thing that made sense now.
“Did you make a noise at Keith? Like—not a human noise?” Her face was on fire, and then Ezra gave a slow smirk that set her blood to heating too. She whispered, “You growled at him.”
A rumble filled his chest, quiet, restrained, not the snarl he’d unleashed on Keith…and definitely not a human noise.
“Oh my gosh,” she said. “You’re a lupine.”
“I’m a wolf,” he said.
“Are they different?”
“Lupineis a childish sanitization of my identity created by the vanillas who aren’t comfortable with what I am.”
“Vanilla? That’s what you call—um, regular…plain…?” She couldn’t navigate the language without offending him. She didn’t know how.
“Sorry,” he said. “We typically avoid using the term around humans. It’s not a slur exactly, but…well, my mama would say it’s ‘not quite polite.’”
“I never realized before how clueless I am about…about wolves.”
“It’s not accidental, Willow. If you don’t know anything about me, it’s easy to make you fear me.”
She lowered her hands and looked deep into his eyes, and he looked back, open, vulnerable despite his physical power.
“Who wants me to fear you?”
“Well, that depends on who you ask.” His mouth curved, and his eyes gentled. “I’m still me. I’m a methodical, nerdy, overthinking…” The gentleness faded. “…wolf.”
Willow drew the deepest breath she could. As Ezra had done, she let her chest expand with it, let her willpower and desire fill her up, and when she exhaled she knew exactly what she wanted, at least for tonight.
“Okay,” she said. “I know how to date a nerd. Tell me everything I need to know to date a wolf.”
Eight
WhenWillowsaidtell me everything, she meant it.
Her hunger for information—for data—was nothing less than sexy, but tonight Ezra kept that to himself. Tonight was about answering as many of her questions as he could. Tomorrow he’d talk to Malachi about answering the rest. And about his mate meeting the wolf pack this coming Saturday. No reason to think Malachi would balk at the idea, but the tradition existed for a reason, and Ezra would abide by it.
“Okay, so…” Her lips pursed. “Strength, senses, speed, and your extra voice. Anything else?”
“It’s not an extra voice. I’ve only got one larynx, same as you.”
“Okay, what do you call it?”
