“Hey, yourself. You okay?”
“Yes. I know what I have to do now. It might actually be easy.”
She walked over and, not thinking, I patted my thighs. “Come here, omega.”
Her cheeks pinked, but the newness didn’t stop her from sitting in my lap and resting her head against my shoulder. I put one hand on her thigh and the other around her torso and kissedher hair. Her perfuming filled the air around us, filling me with need. Yeah, my girl loved when I kissed her head. “You’re so warm,” she said, nuzzling in closer.
“Comes with the territory but I’m glad you like it.” We hadn’t explicitly talked about the fact that her three alphas were all bear shifters, but I was sure she knew. Millie had probably told her that her mates were also shifters.
We also didn’t live in a time where the term shifters was taboo or reserved for romance novels. People knew about us. We didn’t go around shifting in front of humans, but we were here.
“I do. I’m always cold.”
I made a note to buy her a closet full of cozy clothes but also to keep her close to my warmth as much as possible. I rubbed her spine up and down, and my bear let out a low growl at the way the vertebrae stuck out.
“What was that for? Are you angry?”
Hugging her tighter, I shook my head. “I can count on two hands the number of times I have gotten angry in my life, female. And I try not to get angry at people, only circumstances.”
Her body let go of the tension that came with her question. “I don’t even know what it’s like to live without someone being angry or being in trouble. No matter what I did, I was one word or one misstep away from impending punishment.”
“Not anymore. Not ever again.”
She moved to sit up more and face me. “Then what was the growl for?”
“Because, in my opinion, you are far too thin. Were you not eating properly? Did he…” Rage built inside me at the thought. “Did he not let you eat?”
While she shrugged, her eyes filled with unshed tears. “He let me eat, but what I ate was restricted, not enough. I worked from the time I woke up to the time I went to sleep, and I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t hungry.”
“It’s a good thing we found you. I love to eat, and I’m a damned good cook if I do say so myself. I’m sure you can tell that already.” I patted my belly.
Isabella bit down on her bottom lip, and I watched the motion with all my attention. That lip probably tasted so good. All of her probably tasted like the sweetest honey. “Don’t do that, please. I happen to like the way you look very much.”
I looked down, wishing my body was different. “You don’t have to say that.”
“I mean it, York.” Her gaze flicked to my lips and then back to my eyes. “I-I haven’t kissed anyone in years. I might be bad at it.”
My breathing stopped. “No chance, omega. But you don’t have to prove your attraction. I smell it on you. Your slick. Your perfume. It tells me everything.”
“What if I want to?”
“Then I’m all yours.”
She turned to face me. Her thighs on either side of mine. She lifted up and pressed her lips to mine. My world split in half and then surged back together. Lips so soft. I wrapped my arms around her back and pulled her closer, gifted a sweet whimper in return. The kiss was chaste and shy but it meant everything.
“Definitely not bad at kissing,” I said, placing another one on her lips.
She laid her head on my chest. “Your heart is beating really fast.”
“That’s because I have the most beautiful woman on my lap and she kissed me. A lot of my dreams just came true.”
I was made of cheesiness. Physically and mentally. Who gave a fuck? My omega loved it.
We sat there for a long time until the rumbling of her stomach burst our bubble. “Hungry?” I asked.
“Starving, actually. I was too nervous before to eat, but now…”
“Let’s go get you some lunch.”
