“You—”
They both stopped, and Emory felt dull fingernails dig into his back. He wanted desperately to look into those swirling blue eyes again, but he also wanted to hold this man in his arms for the rest of eternity.
Some part of his conscious brain was trying to tell him something.
Strike that; it was more like screaming at him, but it might as well have been in a different language because Emory wasn’t listening. He ran his hands down the other man’s back, noting the soft muscles of his shoulders and the curve of his spine.
This man was perfect. Every single thing about him, from his smell to his height to the individual cells that made up his body, was perfect.
Emory wanted this man. He wanted him in his arms, in his bed, by his side at every tedious work event and stressful family dinner. He wanted to sink his teeth into him right here in this airport and never let him go.
“I think…you might be my…my mate,” the man whispered, and everything stilled.
Emory’s lion went silent, his mind stopped spinning, and his canines retracted back into his gums.
Mate. Fated mate.
Chapter Three
Cameron
Oh, hell.
Was this seriously happening? Had he really missed his flight home only to stumble, quite literally, into his fated mate?
Given that he was very much still wrapped up in this stranger’s arms, Cameron guessed that this was, in fact, really happening.
That is, unless he had fallen asleep in one of the uncomfortable airport seats. Or maybe he had actually made it on the flight after all and was now suspended somewhere over the middle of the country in a flying metal death trap, napping against some unsuspecting flyer, imagining the most sturdy arms, the most ideal combination of soft and hard chest, the most delicious smell?—
“I think…you might be right. At least my inner alpha sure thinks you are,” the man said.
Cameron pulled back just enough to look up into the man’s eyes. They were a warm brown, similar to the Autumn Festival decorations hung up around the terminal. There was somethingearthy and powerful lurking beneath the surface. This man was absolutely an alpha. Cameron couldn’t always tell—partly because he was a sea shifter who had little use for scenting, but also because an omega's sense of smell was much weaker than an alpha’s. This man, though… The only way Cameron could describe it was that he smelled like power. Like expensive leather and a spicy musk. There was no doubt in Cameron’s mind that he was an alpha.
“You’re…mine?” Cameron asked.
Heat ripped across his cheeks at the bold question. Of course this man wasn’this. He sounded as creepy as that aquarium man, thinking he had some kind of claim over a total stranger just because fate, the crafty bitch, said so.
In Cameron’s mind’s eye, his omega held a tentacle up in the air, noting quite unhelpfully that there was no way this man would fit in an aquarium.
The man chuckled, a warm noise that started in his stomach and fluttered against Cameron’s chest where they were pressed together. For a moment, he was afraid he had said his thoughts out loud because even he could admit they were a bit unhinged. Seriously, who met their fated mate and thought about putting them in an aquarium?
He tried to release the man, but his arms tightened around Cameron’s lower back. The feeling was akin to putting on his favorite jacket at the start of winter, comfortable and familiar. The way the man’s breath caught, Cameron wondered if he felt it, too.
They stared at each other for a quiet moment, and then the man released him, taking a small step back.
“I’m so sorry. I have no idea what came over me...aside from meeting my fated mate at the airport.”
The man’s face turned pink the way a painter would paint a blush. It started at one side and slowly brushed from the apple ofone cheek to the other. It brought out endearing hints of auburn in the blonde five o’clock shadow dusting his jaw and upper lip.
Cameron craned his head back to fully take in the man, from his tousled blonde bun, down the front of his rumpled dress shirt, to his once neatly pressed slacks and shiny oxfords. Cameron had never really had a type, aside from male and alpha, but this man was checking a lot of boxes he hadn’t known he had. He appeared strong, yet not overly built, like he didn’t spend every night at the gym, but perhaps did some running on the weekends. He was conventionally handsome with an added hint of something else. Power? Authority?
A sudden, horrifying thought struck him. Did the man even live here? They were meeting in an international airport, after all.
“Are you here on business?” Cameron asked, trying and failing to keep the panic from his voice.
What on earth was Cameron going to do if his fated mate lived somewhere like Singapore or Antarctica? If someone had asked him that this morning, he would have shrugged and said, “Guess fate got it wrong, huh?” Right now, he couldn’t imagine never seeing this man again. His octopus actually trembled at the thought.
“I am attempting to go on business, but my flight was canceled, and I’m struggling to book a new one.” The man gestured at the line in front of them. His eyebrows lowered, and the corners of his mouth pulled down until he looked almost as anxious as Cameron felt. “And you? Please tell me you’re from the area, or at least within a hundred miles or so?”
