Page 70 of Shifted Desire

I stare back at her. “Do you?”

She swallows hard, looking away.

I grip her chin and force her to meet my gaze. “Samantha.”

“What?” she asks with feigned dismissiveness.

“You know that you’re not only good for sex, right? That I’d want you working for me even if we never had sex. That I…”

It’s a struggle to push away all the soft feelings for her I definitely shouldn’t admit. Like how fucking smart and funny and amazing I think she is. How I feel more alive than I have in decades when she’s around, and not just because of the sex, but because she’s special and for some weird reason seems to like spending time with me.

“That you what?” The bite is gone from her tone, a flicker of dangerous hope there that I shouldn’t feed. But gods, when I hesitate and her expression starts to shutter like it did last night, I can’t keep the words in.

“That I like being around you. That if I had my way, you would’ve come home with me last night so I could spend more time with you.”

“So you could fuck me.”

I roll my eyes, which earns the slightest hint of a smile in return. “Yes, we would’ve fucked, but that’s not what I’m saying.”

She narrows her eyes at me. “Then what are you saying?”

Fuck. Fuck, this isn’t good. Alarm bells are ringing in my head, but they can’t drown out the instinct in me telling me I need to soothe Samantha. Soothe my mate.

Because that’s what she is. Even if I can never have her like that, my wolf knows what she is. The one I crave more than anything.

Werewolves don’t have fated mates like some other monsters, but we have people that call to us. People with some combination of pheromones and personality traits and appeal that make our wolves howl with the need to claim them. It’s not destiny, and it’s not undeniable, but the instinct still exists. And, par for the course of my fucked-up life, that instinct is honed in squarely on the last woman it should.

I swallow my panic and smile. “I’m saying, come over tonight and have dinner with me.”

She smiles, something genuine and surprised flickering in her gaze before she hides it behind wariness. “Is dinner code for eating me out?”

“If you want it to be. But it can also just be actual dinner.”

There’s a long pause, and I wonder if she’s going to say no. If she were smarter than me, she would. Someone needs to shut this down, and clearly it’s not going to be me.

“Alright.”

I blink, fighting to hide my surprise. “Alright?”

She snorts. “If you want to give me dinner in exchange for fucking, I’ll go along with it.”

I let out an exasperated sigh, and she laughs. “I’m kidding. I know that’s not what you meant. It’d be okay if it were, though.”

“It’s not,” I say, far too adamantly for a man who is supposed to be using her for sex and not getting attached.

She smiles, and my stomach does a happy little flip at how beautiful the genuine expression looks on her. “Okay.”

There’s another long, weighted silence where we both seem to be mentally assessing the other. Waiting for the other person to come to their senses and pump the brakes. But neither of us does.

She grabs the coffee-stained papers with a flourish, then goes up on her toes and gives me a peck on the cheek. “Let’s do Thai, if that’s okay with your macros.”

“Fuck my macros, you can have whatever you want.” I don’t mean to say it aloud, but I’m glad I do when she laughs and grins at me.

“Whatever I want?”

I don’t hesitate before replying, even knowing it’s a dangerous thing to offer Samantha. “Yes. Anything.”

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