Page 7 of Titan’s Mate

Letting go of her hand, he put the comforter over her and tucked her in as gently as he could, then went to the little kitchen. He thought there were some hot chocolate packets in the cupboard.

And maybe even one of those pop-up rolls of cinnamon buns in the back of the fridge.

Mari began to wake, and immediately tried to go back to sleep.

Because in her sleep she’d been warm, all snuggled up in soft blankets, with a crackling fire nearby and the smell of hot chocolate in the air.

And best of all, cinnamon buns.

That had to be a dream, because she didn’t have any of those things. But she missed them, and she wanted to hang onto the dream of them as long as she could.

So she willed herself back to sleep. Only it wasn’t working—she was waking up, dammit. And now someone was tapping on her shoulder.

Rude.

I want my dream, she whined inside her head.

It is not a dream, her bear told her. It is real. Wake up so we can eat.

Real? Cinnamon buns? Hell, yes. Mari opened her eyes.

And looked straight into a pair of glowing yellow ones.

Belonging to a panther, with his paw raised to give her another tap. Which he could apparently do, despite the fact that he was basically see-thru.

He was a freaking ghost.

Mari gave a little “eep” of surprise before she could stop herself. The ghost looked startled, and then did the cat thing where he quickly sat down and began grooming himself, pretending that’s what he’d been doing all along and that ‘poking the sleeping bear-girl’ thing was a complete misinterpretation of events.

“Are you all right?”

The voice was low and soothing, but it still startled Mari into another “eep” sound, because she hadn’t even noticed Titan sneaking up on her.

She was starting to sound like a baby bird, and not a self-respecting bear shifter. That had to stop.

Although to be fair, who would have thought a giant-sized polar bear shifter could be so sneakable?

She looked up at him—way, way up. He was holding a steaming mug and looking down at her, his silvery eyes concerned.

He was wearing no shirt. He had pants on, though, which was lucky because she could not have handled the peener right now. Well, ‘handle’ was probably the wrong word. Because actually, handling it would be—

“Hello? Are you okay? Can you hear me?”

Shit. He was still talking, and she wasn’t answering. She was too busy admiring all those abs that were kind of right in front of her. Being caught staring was embarrassing, so she said the first thing that came into her head. “Did you know you have a ghost?”

He glanced down at the see-thru panther, who was now sitting on his haunches with his tail neatly curled around his front paws, staring at her. “Yes,” he rumbled. “That’s Nick.” He paused. “He’s a friend.”

The panther looked up at Titan, looked back at Mari, gave a huge yawn, and then walked over and curled up in front of the fireplace.

“I can see that,” she said. “Very friendly.”

Titan shrugged. “He’s a cat. That’s how they are.” He paused, then dropped his voice to a loud whisper. “But he can’t resist the laser pointer. I think he really thinks he can catch the little red dot.” Nick opened his eyes, narrowed them at Titan in an evil cat glare, and closed them again.

Clearly they were friends. Because who else would tease a ghost?

Fully awake now, Mari looked around. In the fireplace behind the ghost, there really was nice crackly fire that warmed the whole cabin. That’s where she was, Mari realized. Titan’s cabin. Curled up in a fluffy comforter on the comfy couch, the smell of hot chocolate and cinnamon buns filling the air.

Dreams really did come true.