Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 55491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 277(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 277(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
Literally growled. I felt the rumble of it beneath my hands on his chest.
I felt how his dick thickened just before the hot spurts of his cum filled me.
I slumped onto him, and he wrapped his arms around me. I could feel his heart beating. Feel his heat. His strength.
The sounds of the storm came back to me. The howling wind. The rain. A distant roll of thunder.
But the storm was no longer inside me.
I didn’t feel the tears clogging my throat anymore. Or the pressure of trapped fight or flight urges flapping like birds in my chest.
Wes slumped down, so we were settled in bed and threw the covers over us. We were still connected as he kissed the top of my head.
“Better?”
“Much,” I murmured.
“I made hot cocoa when you were in the shower if you still want it.”
My eyes were already closed. “No, I’m good.”
Here in Wes' arms, in his bed, I felt safe.
I felt… railed. I was definitely going to be walking funny tomorrow.
I smiled as I drifted into dreamland.
10
WES
I slid out of bed at dawn before Remy was up and stared down at the sleeping beauty in my bed. Joy’s long blonde hair spilled across my pillow. It, indeed, was like the spun gold of Remy’s fairytales. The color of summer sun. Of chaos and happiness.
She was such a bright presence in my bed. Even asleep, she exuded sunshine.
A contrast to my dark storm clouds. The mechanical functioning of putting one foot in front of the other day after day to get through the days. To keep things stable for my pup.
But last night, Joy had needed me. Our interlude had been…unexpected.
Obviously unplanned.
But fate, it had felt good.
It had felt right.
She was an insatiable lover. Passionate. Inventive. Wild. From the first kiss, I felt like I knew her instinctively. What she needed. What got her hot. What got her off.
Everything she wanted, I craved, too.
Her scent covered my skin now. It was on my sheets. It filled the room.
And, like last night when I first picked her up in her mangled bedroom, I had the strong sense that she smelled…perfect.
I stared at her, but now a little differently.
Wait…fuck!
Was Joy–
Was she my mate?
I ran a hand over my beard. Her?
That couldn’t be. She was human! And everything I wasn’t. We didn’t fit together–at all. I couldn’t have a fated mate who was so… happy.
In my home pack, no one had heard of a fated mate being human. But almost all the guys at Wolf Ranch, except for Rob, had human mates.
Human fated mates.
Not just love matches. But biological mates. The human females had ignited the urge in their wolf mate to mark. Which meant nature intended them to be together.
I was raised to trust my wolf. Trust his instincts. Animals sensed things humans couldn’t.
I taught this to Remy as well.
Was my wolf telling me Joy was my true mate? The one female put on this earth for me?
Was that why we were so in sync last night? How I knew her body?
The hairs on my arms stood up with recognition. A lump formed in my throat at the idea of all that brightness belonging to me.
To Remy, too.
But that thought made me pull back on the reins.
Fuck. Fate had dealt us a tough blow with Remy’s mom being a deadbeat. My little girl’s mother had abandoned her. Every time Remy asked after her, I had to explain that it wasn’t because there was anything wrong with her. It wasn’t that she wasn’t perfect and loveable. No one should have those kinds of doubts and especially not a child. Not my Remy.
This thing with Joy could hurt Remy again. Hurt her even more. If I thought an absent mom was painful for Remy, I imagined her confusion and pain if she thought she was getting a new mommy, and then it didn’t work out.
Joy wasn’t a shifter. She didn’t understand what a mate was. How fate supposedly put us together. That I was to mark her and embed my scent in her to make her mine forever.
She knew none of that.
Fate may have picked Joy for me, but there was no guarantee at all that Joy would pick me–us–back. Especially because I was a package deal.
The light sound of little feet hitting the floor saved me from doing anything stupid like making this into something, like forever. I quickly stepped out of the bedroom and shut the door.
“Hi, Daddy.” Remy emerged from her bedroom with her face slack from sleep and her hair in a massive bird nest.
“Shh.” I held my finger to my lips, speaking in a soft tone I knew my daughter’s sharp ears would still hear. “Joy is sleeping in there.” I pointed at the closed door.
The pleasure on Remy’s face seemed to summarize my feelings about having Joy here. Her eyes lit up, and a giant smile bloomed. “She is?” she whispered back. “She had a sleepover?”