Page 30 of Runaway Wolf
“You think I’m pretty?” she murmured, only half-way teasing.
“Yeah. I like you.” His tone. The gruff, whispered words that rang full of truth—naked, gritty truth—made her want to throw herself at him.
“I like you too.”
“Yeah?”
She nodded. “So much.”
With his left hand, he cupped the side of her injured neck. “I’m sorry I let you get hurt.”
“It wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anyone’s fault but Rhett.”
“Sometimes I think I should leave you alone. Not like you so much.”
“Why?”
“The new law. We have to keep secret or I’d be asking you to put your life on the line for me.”
“There has to be some way to fight it. If Roe v. Wade can be overturned, anything can.”
“Until then, I want you safe. I don’t know how Noah’s going to keep sane when Penny has to go through it. But you and I? We can take it slow. People will think you’re just hanging out with your sister.”
“Unless the Blackmoors file a charge claiming I’m more.”
He froze. “Fuck. Cait, I didn’t think of that.”
“Let’s not worry about it. It hasn’t happened. Let’s just get to know each other and see what comes, okay?”
He nodded.
“What was everyone talking about as far as covering up my mark?”
“I’m the only one strong enough to lay my scent over someone else’s mark without wanting to bite. But none of them realize… you’re my kryptonite, Caitlin. You’re the one person my wolf wouldn’t hesitate to bite, no matter how much I beg him not to. He doesn’t even understand the danger, since we were born, not bitten. All he knows is he wants you to be ours.”
“Whoa,” she breathed. “It’s way too soon—”
“I know. The man in me knows humans need more time. The wolf doesn’t understand and doesn’t care. He functions on instinct and his own needs.”
She twined her fingers with his because she just couldn’t keep from touching him. “One day at a time, okay? I have three weeks here. We’ll see what happens after that.”
He nodded and then, he leaned down and kissed her lips. It was a gentle peck, soft and sweet, and it left her aching for more.
With her free hand, she reached up and skimmed the line of his jaw, feeling the sharpness of his jawbone, the scruff of his shadow growing in. His eyes were the shade of his wolf and he stared intently at her. He was so masculine, so sexy. She didn’t think she’d ever come across a more beautiful male specimen in her life.
“I want to stay the night,” he said. “We don’t have to sleep together. I just want to make sure you’re safe. After what happened, I need this.”
“Maybe I’d be okay with you sleeping in my bed.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah,” she agreed softly.
And that gorgeous man, he twined his fingers with hers and held her hand the whole drive home. She couldn’t help the smile that wouldn’t go away, the one that lingered when she peeked over at him. It was a comfortable silence between them—she didn’t think she’d ever had this before. Not at home with her parents, if they were together, it was definitely a tense silence if there was no conversation. If she was one on one with either her mother or her father, they took the silence as an opportunity to… well, groom her. Though in the past, she would have called it coaching. Teaching. Schooling.
Friends? Nope. Never a moment without chatter.
Dates? No, there was always music to fill the quiet. Conversations to get to know each other… or, her family’s position. Come to think of it, had any man ever dated her because he just wanted to know her?
