A blush crawled up her neck. The scent of her embarrassment filled the room. Shame twisted his gut. He didn’t mean to hurt her. He just wanted the female he’d marked back, the one whose scent made him feel sane.
He ran a hand through his hair and watched Lena wrap her arms tightly around her chest. She blinked back tears. His cats slammed into him, demanding to be released so they could comfort her. He paced the library as he tried to settle them. He hated seeing her upset too.
Hands fisted so he didn’t grab her, he stopped in front of her. “I’m sorry. I’m sure that stuff on your face is expensive but I don’t like how it smells or tastes on you. I like the natural Lena. Not the made-up one.”
Her gaze dropped. She stared at the geometric block pattern of the rug for a long moment. When she glanced back up, her brows scrunched. “Really?”
He grinned hoping to change her mood into something more pleasant. “Yeah. You smell fake with all that crap…I mean, makeup on.”
She narrowed her eyes and those painted lips thinned, not the look he was going for.
“So it’s okay for you to dye your hair but I can’t wear makeup. Is that what you’re saying?”
He shrugged. “I suppose that’s what I’m saying. After you become my mate, you can—”
“Do you know what you are?”
She kicked off the other shoe and stepped closer so only a few inches separated them. “You are a hypocritical, chauvinistic, bigoted…kidnapper,” she yelled, poking at his chest with each word.
He grabbed her wrist. “Don’t bellow at me.”
“Don’t tell me what to do. You might think you own me, but you don’t.”
He bared his fangs at her and hated how her pulse kicked up. It beat wildly against his palm. The first whiff of fear mixed with the horrible makeup stench.
He retracted his canines, licked his lips. “Yes, I do. You’re mine.”
“You can’t own another person, Devin. That’s slavery. Now, let me go.”
He couldn’t. Didn’t she understand that? Well, it was possible she didn’t. She might know about shifters but that didn’t mean she knew what being a shifter’s mate meant—the give and take, the devotion only a true mate could give, a lover to worship her eternally, a friend to comfort and care for her. Maybe if he explained, she’d realize how ridiculous she was being. He couldn’t allow any more miscommunications between them.
“You’re going to be—”
She raised her free hand. “Don’t say it. I am not your mate nor am I your property. I am not your anything.”
He snapped his mouth closed. She was both. Well, she would be as soon as he finished their mating. The look on her face stopped him from admitting the truth. He glanced from her shoulder to her belly and tried to decide which claim would least likely cause more angst.
“I added my scent to your body when I tended your wounds. I can’t let you go until it fades. My cats won’t let me.”
Her eyes widened and the scent of her fear increased. He clenched his jaw. With dilated pupils, rough pants heaving her chest and trembling limbs, she reminded him of a cornered animal. She struggled to free her hand. She’d run if he eased his grip. Panic rose at the thought of Lena leaving him. If she left him, their growing bond would sever. She’d take his sanity away. Spots danced across his vision and dizziness made him sway.
Oh gods, not again. His heart pounded hard against his chest. Darkness spread. The room spun. No, no, no. He couldn’t give in to the blackout. He might accidentally hurt her again. Never.
He tugged her against him, desperate to avoid another episode. Shoving her sticky hair back, he buried his nose at the base of hairline. Her unaltered scent seeped into his lungs, finally calming him.
The peace Lena brought eased the rest of his anger. The rightness washed over him again. My one. My beautiful, stubborn female. He tugged her closer as he considered what to say to fix the mess his comments caused. At the moment, he regretted not spending more time with humans. Lena didn’t act like any of the shifter females he knew.
Once their souls were joined, he wouldn’t need her scent to keep him calm. She could wear whatever she wanted. If she was happy, he would be. Until then, he needed to be able to breathe her in.
“I’m sorry if I was rude. I didn’t mean to be but…” he paused and contemplated what to say. He didn’t want to admit how much he needed breathe her signature in. She’d want to know why. Nope. He’d keep that to himself for now. “You’re much prettier without all this stuff.”
She laughed softly and massaged his scalp. “I think you’re the first man who has ever said that to me.”
He smiled against her skin and enjoyed the little shiver of her body in response. “I keep telling you that I’m not a man, baby. You can’t hold me to the same standards. When I hold a female, I want the scent of woman to fill my head, not makeup or hair products. I want to be able to lick her skin and drink in her perfection without man-made enhancements tainting the experience. I want you exactly as your god made you.”
She sighed, her body relaxing into his. “I’m still mad.”
Okay. He wasn’t sure where she was going with that. Mad over what? He’d apologized. But with her fingers stimulating his scalp, he couldn’t find the energy to figure it out. He just knew he wanted to kiss her again. He eased his desperate grip and stepped back.
“Will you please wash off the makeup?”
She nodded. “It seems a shame after spending forty-five minutes getting dressed but I will if you answer one question.”
He tensed, not liking her clipped tone. “What do you want to know?”
“How long will your scent last?”
Well, that was an open-ended question. For those shifters who took possession to the extreme lengths of twining their scent into a human’s body, it often meant the length of the human’s life. With the depth of Lena’s wounds, his claim would likely linger that long. The stench of anger twined with her scent stopped him from admitting the truth.
He shrugged. “A while.”
“Not the answer I was looking for. I want specifics. Are we talking days? Weeks?” He shrugged again. Wide-eyed, she whispered, “Months?”
The despondent look on her face brought a scowl to his. Was the prospect of spending time with him so abhorrent? Because being his mate was an eternity-long commitment. He snapped his teeth together.
“Years, Lena. Okay? Years.”
Her hands trembled as she tucked the strands of her hair behind her ears. “Years?”
“Yes, dammit, years. So you might as well get used to your new role.” He crossed his arms and challenged her to deny him.
She licked her lips. “And what exactly is my new…role?”
“You’ll be my wife. As soon as we get Molly back, we’ll get married.” And finish our mating.
“Married?”
He nodded. “Don’t worry. We can do the whole wedding thing. You know, the dress and church, but I want to make sure no worthless human can think they have a chance of getting between your thighs.” He grinned. “I’ll even get you a ring.”
“A…a ring.” She stumbled backward and flopped onto the leather couch. He waited for her to deny him or yell. She liked to yell. She did neither. Only stared at him. He fisted his hands.
Silence stretched so long he didn’t think she’d say anything else but she finally asked, “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Absolutely. Now go wash that stuff off. You promised.”
Her gaze traveled over him slowly. Appreciating the body she’d soon own? He liked that idea too. Once he finished their mating, he wouldn’t take another lover. Hell, he couldn’t now. Lena was it. The only one he wanted. There’d never be another.
She swallowed hard and stood. “Okay. I keep my promises, Devin. Don’t ever forget that.”
She walked away without a second glance.
Her tone made him wary. He followed her, expecting her to run. She didn’t. She pulled out a pair
of cutoffs and another sleeveless turtleneck—black this time—and headed to the bathroom.
He grabbed the door before she closed it. She didn’t look at him, merely sighed.
“Don’t put any stuff in your hair either. Just the coconut shampoo. I like that.”
Her back stiffened. “Got it. Coconut shampoo and unscented soap. Be out in a jiffy.”
He grinned. “Perfect. I’ll order us some pizzas for lunch.”
He waited a few minutes more, enjoying the sounds of her moving around the bathroom but his stomach growled. He left Lena to her bath and went in search of a phone book.
Chapter Eleven
Lena clenched her hands so hard she left half-moon circles in her palm. She forced her fingers to relax before she drew blood. Devin would smell it and come barreling in here. If he did, she’d likely hurl the stupid coconut shampoo bottle at his head for being such a pompous ass. She didn’t normally consider herself a violent person. But right now? Hurting the man prowling around her house sounded like a great idea. Except, he had the phone Gwen was supposed to text.
Why hadn’t she? Worry for her sisters mixed with the frustration already churning her gut in the aftermath of Devin’s ridiculous marriage proposal.
Marriage. What a load of crock. He might as well call it slavery. He didn’t own her. Nobody did. She was her own person, dammit!
Hell…he hadn’t even asked her. He’d just informed her of her new position without any thought of what she wanted.
Twice she’d walked this road. She refused to make the same mistakes a third time, especially with Devin. Doing so would destroy her. Despite everything he’d done to her, she’d deluded herself into thinking he was different.
He wasn’t. He was just another controlling shifter.
With the hot water beating on her back, she went over her plan. After hearing about Megan, she’d intended to take Devin up on his offer. He was right. Running wasn’t a long-term solution. After today’s little incident, she realized what a horrible choice that’d be. He might claim they respected their women. It was a lie.
Females were just objects, something to possess, not cherish. Molly had gone through too much in her short life to suffer in another unhealthy environment. No way was she handing them her precious sister.
That left only one choice, the one she’d been avoiding. She’d have to involve Vader, the wolf shifter who’d rescued Molly from the horrible medical facility where she’d been tortured and experimented on like a lab rat.
Dammit, she didn’t want to go to an ex-lover and ask for help. She avoided him as much as possible, which was hard since he worked with her dad and spent nearly all his free time at her parent’s house doting on Gwen. The man had showered Lena with attention, fucked her, then turned into a control freak.
Exactly as Devin had. She snapped her teeth together. No, she was not going there.
Even if she hadn’t been involved with Vader, he was still a liaison for the shifter Council. He’d sworn to uphold their dictates. And the one that hinged on Molly scared her.
If, for any reason, Molly slipped into a recessive state, she was to be admitted into the confinement center for evaluation. No questions. No hesitation.
Because of what had been done to her, she was a walking time bomb…or so the great, wise shifter elders claimed. Lena had scoffed at their ridiculous concern. After she’d sat Molly down and talked to her like an adult, Molly had turned into the perfect child.
Lena had worried she’d scar Molly at first with the blunt facts of her fate if she didn’t meet the shifter’s expectations, but Lena had seen the annoyance on Molly’s face when people talked her in the sing-song voice the counselors recommended they use on her. It had worked and Lena had never thought that her happy, smiling sister would slip into a lapse until she’d seen the deadened look in Molly’s eyes when she’d left with Gwen.
From what she’d heard, few people ever left the evaluation centers alive. The problem with abused shifters was that not only did the person need counseling, so did their animals. Healing both man and beast proved damn near impossible. Their inner spirits didn’t respond to traditional methods of counseling and nobody had been able to find the magic trigger that calmed them. So the abused victims—like Molly—faced a lifetime of confinement or death if they couldn’t keep their animals under control. Neither option was acceptable.
Lena had no other choice. She’d have to strike a deal with Vader, get his promise to help them. Dammit, he’d use it as a reason to get back in her bed. She didn’t want to deal with his forms of persuasion either, but at least she knew Vader didn’t really want her.
But if he thought to double-cross her? She’d find a way to kill him even if she had to tie him up and chop off his head. No one threatened her family. A bitter laugh crawled up her throat. Maybe she was a violent person after all. The thought didn’t bother her, not if it kept those who belonged to her safe.
She stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around her body. The humid room smelled of coconut and cocoa butter, her favorite scents next to evergreen and moss. She inhaled, luxuriated in the soothing fragrance. The tension in her limbs eased. She let out a shaky breath. Another inhale and the fragrant reminders of the beach filled her lungs. Everything would be fine. She had a plan. Next to a detailed list, a mental strategy was the next best thing.
And her first checkbox—dupe the dictatorial shifter—brought a smile to her lips.
She reached for the bottle of gel and fisted her hands before grabbing it. Sixty dollars she’d spent on the all-natural product. It was homemade. She had to order it from a woman in Pennsylvania. There was a waiting list to get her stuff for goodness sake. And he called it crap.
She swept her hand across the counter, knocked everything into the waste bin. Palms pressed to the sink, she hung her head and took several calming breaths.
He was not worth it. Who cared what the stubborn man wanted? She knelt and retrieved several tubes of lipstick, squeezed them in her hands. Unclenching her fingers, she dropped them back into the can. No. Now was not the time to pick a fight. She had to play his game, make him think she was trying to please him.
She reached for the comb and drew it through her wet hair. He would soon realize his mistake in ordering a Burnett around. If there was one thing she’d learned from her stepdad, it was to always compartmentalize her emotions. As a Shifter Affairs agent, he’d had to be able to lock away the bad stuff or else it would have crushed him. After her breakup with Rick, he’d pulled her out of her depression and taught her to do the same. It was the reason she’d been able to get over the blow Vader had delivered when he’d asked if she minded if he made Gwen his lover too.
She’d use the same tactics to get over Devin. Everything would be fine. She just had to get away from him. Being near him messed with her mind. And her heart.
A heavy fist pounded on the bathroom door.
“We got your sister’s text but it doesn’t make sense. It’s just a bunch of letters,” Devin announced through the closed door.
She smiled. Showtime.
“That’s because it’s in code. Let me finish up and I’ll come decipher it.”
And set the next stage of her plan in motion, one that didn’t involve marrying or mating a selfish man.
She yanked clothes on and stepped out of the bathroom. Her heart skipped a beat at the sight that met her. Devin was stretched out on her bed looking decadently sexy. His head was pillowed on the back of one hand while the other gripped the bed’s headboard. The edges of a button-down shirt hung off his shoulders, displaying washboard abs and heavily muscled pecs. One leg was bent, the fabric of his jeans stretched tautly over tree-trunk-sized thighs. The snap of his faded denims was open and the bulge angled to the side promised paradise. Her sex wept in greedy hunger for the ecstasy he’d dish out.
He’s a shifter who claims to own you. You are not attracted to him. He thinks you’re an object, not a person. The speech didn’t help.
Within one heartbeat and the next, she went from angry to wondering how quickly she could get her clothes off. She steadied herself against the doorjamb and tried to breathe through the surge of lust turning her legs into jelly.
Devin made a hungry sound low in his throat. The muscles in his neck strained as he gripped the headboard hard enough to make the wood groan. Releasing the solid oak before it snapped, he sat up. His mouth-watering abs bunched with the move. Delicious. She licked her lips, already anticipating his taste. Her fingers itched with the desire to map the ridges of his stomach on her downward journey to uncover that piece of heaven she knew was hidden there.
“That’s better, baby. Gods, you’re beautiful.”
Her cheeks warmed. She quickly dropped her gaze before she did something she’d regret, like fling herself at him. “Umm, thanks. I put a little lotion on. It’s cocoa butter. I think you’ll like it.”
And why did she care? She was running as soon as she could.
The bed squeaked. She didn’t look at him. Her willpower wasn’t the greatest at the moment. It wouldn’t take much to convince her to tumble onto the mattress with him and get lost in each other.
His bare feet came into view. With one long finger, he tipped her chin up and claimed her lips, slipping inside as if he had the right to make love to her mouth. His tongue twined with hers in a rolling thrust that was as invasive as sex. A rough sound of pleasure spilled into her. She greedily swallowed it, eager for anything she could get. She slipped her fingers into his hair and held him close.
He licked her lips, another pleased groan crawling from his throat. “Taste good.”
He tilted his head to delve deeper. Her knees gave out. She never met the floor. The arm banded around her waist held her up as if her weight meant nothing to him. He slid his hand down to cup one butt cheek and massaged the flesh before he lifted her. She wrapped her legs around his waist and gave herself up to the decadent kiss, needing this as much as he did. This was their goodbye kiss. She wanted him to miss her, maybe remember her taste and yearn.
Beautiful Mistake: 2 (Royal Pride) Page 15
