My heart sped up, and the unsettled, jumpy feeling intensified. Maybe I had attachment issues or something. I’d latched onto Jesse, and now I couldn’t stand to be apart from him. Yeah, that sounded like the kind of healthy shit I was known for. With a muttered curse, I grabbed the empty beer bottles from the table and went to the kitchen.
Jesse stood at the counter facing away from me, the muscles in his back flexing under his T-shirt as he scooped ice cream from a carton.
I stopped in the doorway, my gaze settling on the polished island with a row of sleek barstools that bore more than a passing resemblance to the one at his house in Hale Valley. Memories of being bent over it—my dick aching and the sweet scent of apples in my nose—rushed me.
“You’re not very good at following directions,” Jesse said without turning around.
I jerked my attention from the island as my body flushed hot with old and new desire. “Which directions?” I asked, my voice emerging somewhere between gruff and breathless.
“I told you to stay in the dining room.” He turned, ice cream bowls in hand, and nodded toward the island. “Sit.”
“Your favorite word tonight,” I said, pulling out a barstool.
A smile touched his lips as he placed a bowl in front of me. “Is it so hard to let someone take care of you?”
I opened my mouth—then shut it. “No,” I said after a second. When he raised a brow, I sighed. “Maybe.”
“It’s okay. You’re cute when you’re surly.” He took up position on the other side of the island, then thrust his chin toward my bowl. “Eat. You need the fat and sugar.”
“If you’re about to tell me you’re a nutritionist or something, I might actually scream.”
He laughed softly as he dipped his spoon into his ice cream. “I’m not. I told you all my jobs.”
“That’s a relief, I guess.” I shoved a bite of ice cream into my mouth. It was the good kind: smooth and dense like the gelato I used to get when my dad took me to his company’s headquarters in Times Square. The first spoonful had me clawing the bowl closer to my chest as rich, premium chocolate melted on my tongue.
But my brain wasn’t quite finished reliving the island. As Jesse continued eating, I imagined him behind me, his long fingers tipping his spoonjust soto send a trail of cold, sticky dessert down the crack of my ass. It would be cold. Shocking. I’d probably jump and squirm, only to grunt when he held me down and followed the ice cream’s path with his tongue. Maybe he’d press the curved part of the spoon against my hole, delivering another cold, wicked shock.
“Damn, Caleb.”
Jesse’s voice yanked me from the fantasy. He stared at me across the island, his eyes bright gold and his chest rising and falling more rapidly than necessary for someone standing still.
Slowly, he lowered his spoon to his bowl. “Those are some wicked thoughts.”
My stomach dropped. “Can you read minds?”
“No,” he said quickly. “Only feelings—and only yours.” He tapped his chest. “Any powerful emotion registers in our bond. You’ll be able to feel mine eventually. Right now, I’m strong enough to shield myself, but it won’t always be that way.”
Wait. He’d been hiding from me? Although, why wouldn’t he? Mate or no, who wanted another person having 24/7 access to their emotions? But it was yet another reminder of how little I knew of the world I’d been thrust into. Curiosity swamped me, questions coming hard and fast.
“What do you mean when you say it won’t always be that way?” I asked. “We’ll feel each other’s emotions all the time?”
“Yes, if they’re really intense.”
“What if they’re not intense? Like if some asshole cuts me off in traffic and I’m irritated.”
He smiled. “You’ll learn how to block that kind of stuff from coming through. The mate bond is about give and take. You’ll get stronger, but so will our connection. You can think of it like a river flowing between us. Over time, the riverbed will get wider. The water will flow faster, but we’ll have more space to spread out. It won’t feel so concentrated.”
“Was it like that with you and Philippe?” Right away, I wanted to apologize—to claw back the words before they could hurt him. Because he seemed…wounded when he spoke of the man who’d turned him. On the other hand, hadn’t I just resolved to learn about his past? Didn’t Ideserveto know? Maybe Jesse didn’t want his emotions flowing unchecked into my mind. Fine. That was reasonable. But there was a difference between lettingsomeone into your head and giving them basic information about the experiences that had shaped them as a person.
Jesse looked down at his half-finished ice cream. He was quiet for a minute, and I almost told him to forget I’d asked, but then he lifted his head. “Not exactly. Philippe and I were never mated. But he was my sire, and a very dominant wolf. Sometimes, his commands felt like more than just words.”
My curiosity tugged harder. Jesse had called himself an “ignorant farm kid.” He’d described Philippe as a nobleman. A French count—centuries older and sophisticated. That wasn’t a power imbalance. It was more like a power continental divide. Jesse wasn’t an ignorant farm kid anymore.Someonehad introduced him to paddles and cock cages.
“How was it between you?” I asked. “Was he into…?” I trailed off as I mentally fumbled through words I only knew from porn. None of that felt remotely close to what Jesse and I did together.
Was he your Dom?No. Something about that phrasing was too clinical. Cartoonish, maybe.
Was he your master?Ugh. Better to just drop it.
