Page 39 of Protected By Her Mate

I take her hand where it rests on the table. “There are no leagues between us, Charlie. Just you and me.”

She sucks in a breath. “How is it that you’ve never been on a date before, yet you always know the most romantic thing to say in any given moment?”

I remember back to last night, when we were alone in her room and I mentioned her dead husband. Yeah, not always so smooth.

The moment is broken when Sophia arrives with glasses of traditional ouzo and another basket filled with steaming calamari and a bowl of tzatziki.

Charlie sighs after her first bite of tzatziki smothered squid, her gaze joyful with culinary contentment, which is how she catches me completely off guard when she asks, “Did you and Edie have a sexual relationship?”

It’s like an invisible force punches me in the gut and it takes a moment before I can formulate an answer. I should have read her mind, but I was trying to be respectful of her autonomy while on our date. And now she can read my mind too, if inadvertently, so I can’t lie.

“Yes, I’ve had sex with Edie.”

Chapter 15

5-0

LENNOX

“We first partnered here in New York when I was hired by Allan Pinkerton to track down a rogue wolf shifter who was killing humans.”

Charlie gasps as she recognizes the Pinkerton name.

“Our target was Edie’s mate. When we found him, he refused to surrender and I was forced to kill him. Edie ran off and our paths didn’t cross again for 20 years. Not until I was back in New York, investigating a series of shifter disappearances.”

“I can’t get over the breadth of your experience.” Charlie’s eyes are uncertain as they lift to meet mine. “It makes me feel a little out of my element.”

I shouldn’t be telling her this much about myself, should maybe just stick to the facts so I don’t freak her out about my age.

“No, don’t do that,” she murmurs in response to my thought. “I want to know everything about you, even the things that freak me out. I’ll get over it. Tell me your story and don’t leave out any details.”

She’s the most resilient human I’ve met in my long life, though after meeting her family, I suspect it is not an uncommon trait among the Lopez clan.

“When I returned, Edie was still based in Manhattan, though she was no longer working for the Pinkerton agency. She was a Private Detective investigating the disappearances for a wealthy client. Edie had information I needed.”

“It must’ve been hard for her coming face-to-face with you again,” Charlie says sympathetically, sipping her ouzo as Sophia whisks away our appetizer plates.

“She was angry,” I agree. “Seeing me was a shock for her. She believed we had an unspoken agreement to stay on separate continents, though I didn’t know, of course. At first, she refused to see me, refused to share information, but as our investigations continued to cross paths, she was forced to see the sense in working together.”

Charlie frowns. “That seems odd for a woman who hated you enough to want you on a different continent.”

“I didn’t question her change of heart.”

“Go on.” Charlie moves her glass out of the way as Sophia sets several plates on the table. My mouth waters at dishes piled high with rice pilaf, beef stifado, lamb souvlaki, chickpeas and vegetables, goat yiouvetsi, and a spanakopita. Andrea has truly outdone himself for the occasion and I ask Sophia to thank him.

Turning my focus back to the conversation as Charlie tucks into the food, I continue, “It took us a few months to discover an underground sweat shop using kidnapped shifters as slave labour. They chose smaller shifters, ones that were less able to defend themselves. They used shifters because we heal faster and can survive longer without food.”

“That’s horrible!” Charlie exclaims, her face twisting in disgust. “I hope you arrested the whole lot of them. What happened after the investigation was finished?”

I shrug, not wanting to discuss the rest, but knowing it’s best if I tell her everything. “I was walking Edie home one evening and she invited me in for a drink. I don’t normally socialize outside of work, but….”

“But you felt guilty for killing her mate.”

I nod at Charlie’s accurate assessment. “We had a few drinks, talked about what it was like to work among the humans. Then she kissed me. I tried to stop her, but she started crying. Told me she was lonely. That she’d been lonely for a long time. I felt the same. It can be difficult to live a long life and have little contact with other people.”

Charlie’s compassion reaches me across the table even before her hand finds mine, squeezing. “You comforted each other.”

I nod. “I knew it was a mistake right away. I could feel her loathing for me. Could feel the anger simmering below the surface. She knew it was a mistake too. Kicked me out after, screamed at me to never touch her again.”

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