Page 13 of A Hutch for Hoover

“I’ll throw these in the dishwasher and take you home.” He picked up my plate when the last of our food was in our bellies.

I attempted to school my face in reaction and failed miserably.

“What’s wrong?”

“There’s nothing wrong, exactly. It’s just my place is—it’s not like this.”

“That’s okay,” he said, appearing confused. “I wasn’t bringing you to shoot a layout for a house-decorating magazine.”

Did he think my place was going to be similar to the people’s homes I marketed my products to? If he did, he was going to be sorely disappointed.

“What I mean is, when I came here to this city, nothing about the move had been my plan. I was slated to be alpha of my fluffle. And ‘slated’ isn’t even the word. I was raised to be alpha. My father is alpha. His father was alpha.”

I grabbed the back of my neck.

“What I’m trying to say is this.” I pointed to my ears. “The accident that gave me these is the reason I had to leave. It was that or force my brother to challenge me. So I guess what I’m saying is….” Gods, why was this so hard?

My mate reached out and held my hand.

“I’m just starting over. And because I’m alpha, I should be in a better position to have a mate than I am.”

He came over to my side of the table, squatted, and hugged me close, holding me there for a long time, breaking the hug only long enough to tell me that I was exactly the alpha he needed. And he didn’t care what kind of place I lived in, as long as I was safe.

That helped. A lot. From anyone else, it would’ve sounded like a big old pile of bullshit. But from him, I believed every single word. He didn’t care that I wasn’t rich or that my ears were crap or that I worked sorting people’s garbage. I was his mate and that was all that mattered.

I helped him get the few dishes done then he drove me home. I planned to pop out of the vehicle and call it good. He wasn’t having that, insisting he drop me at the door to make sure I was safe.

My nerves were oddly settled as I led him upstairs to my place.

“This is where my friend Rustle lives. He’s the one who thought Animals was a good idea tonight.”

“I owe him one.” My mate squeezed my hand. “A lot of ones.”

“I do too.” For a great many reasons. He had been exactly the friend I had needed when he walked into my life. I wasn’t sure if me getting mated would change our friendship. I really hoped not.

I unlocked the door.

“Fair warning. The tour will take place completely from your first step in the door.”

Objectively, the place was horrible. You could see a gap in the window where it had settled. There were cracks in the ceiling. The overhead light didn’t work. The floors were the crappiest laminate ever made, warped and worn away in spots. There were two cabinet doors completely missing in the kitchen, and the counter was stained in multiple places and at a slant that had pens rolling off it.

But his eyes didn’t fall on any of that. Instead, they went to the projects I had in different states of completion.

“Whoa. I didn’t know you were an artist. I mean, I knew you were selling home decor, but…wow!”

“I don’t know if you would call this art, exactly, but I do like to take broken things and make them beautiful again.”

“Nope,” he said then smacked a kiss to my cheek. “You are an artist. Tell me about all of these.”

I showed him the completed pieces I had waiting to be sold and shipped, telling him the inspiration for each and then moving on to the ones in process. He listened to every word I spoke as if I was telling him ancient secrets or, at a bare minimum, some really good office tea. It wasn’t at all what I’d expected when he offered to take me home; it was a million times better.

Grant wasn’t paying attention to me because I was the future alpha and not because I was his mate and he was supposed to. No. He wanted to know all about what I loved, and I’d never felt more seen or heard by anyone, not even Dirk, before.

Chapter Twelve

Grant

Everything changed that night at Animals. I’d been so busy with my smoothie aspirations, I hadn’t even considered having a mate until recently, but when my mate’s scent hit my nose for the first time, nothing else mattered but him. But us.

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