Page 35 of His Protective Bear

“You don’t have to leave,” I said for maybe the twentieth time. “Why do you have to leave?”

“I stayed a whole extra week,” my mate said. “Besides, people are talking. I hear them at the diner. They keep whispering. If they only knew it’s my nose, not my ears, that don’t work.”

I growled, “Let the talk. I don’t care.” Still, I couldn’t help being proud of him. I loved that he could joke about his condition. “You’re my mate. You’re carrying my baby. We should live together.”

Sage walked up and stood between my thighs. He cupped my cheeks. “I’m just going home. It’s not like I’m going to another city. We can still see each other every day.”

“It won’t be the same,” I insisted.

“It’s just a couple of miles away—”

I pulled him onto my lap and took his mouth with mine. I wove our tongues together like the chords of a song. I was the rhythm, and he was my melody. I kissed him until we had to breathe. “It’s still too far.”

Sage chuckled and stood up. When I finally felt him slip from my fingers, he went back to folding his clothes and putting them into his suitcase. And I promptly removed them. I wasn’t ready for him to go. I wanted him here forever. I wanted us to be a proper family. But I also wanted to do it the right way.

“I don’t want you to go, but since you insist,” I sighed. “But I’ll only agree to this nonsense if you go out on a date with me Friday night, then you come back over to spend the weekend.” It was Wednesday evening, so my mate would only be gone for two nights. So I had two nights to get things in motion.

Sage smiled. “If I say yes, will you give me back all the clothes you’ve been sneaking out of my suitcase?”

I pretended to think about it, “I feel like I should negotiate more than a weekend for that.”

Sage chuckled, “What did you have in mind?”

“Well, a kiss would do nicely for starters.”

Sage leaned in and placed a sweet kiss on my lips. “How was that?”

“I think we can do better than that. Let’s try again,” I teased.

Again, Sage leaned in, this time adding a big pop at the end of the kiss. “Better?”

“Well, that one was too noisy. We have to practice quiet kisses. You know, for the baby.” I placed my big hand on his stomach.

Sage laughed, then said, “You are impossible to please tonight, Hunter.”

“Fine….You can go if you have to. But I’m telling you I’ll be really lonely and might cry myself to sleep.” Sage just shook his head at me with a big smirk on his face.

I did my best to delay Sage leaving as long as possible, but I had to let him get on his way. I didn’t want him driving late, anyway.

I didn’t know what to do with myself after Sage left. I’d lived by myself for years, but suddenly the house felt too big… too empty without my mate.

I could see him in every room, watching TV together, curled up in the den. Sitting at the island and watching him putter around the kitchen made this house feel like home.

Sage was my home, and without him…

“I guess we’re right on time.” I glanced up at the sound of Gabe’s voice, but he wasn’t alone. He had Rhys, Austin, and Graham with him.

“He seems to have the whole moping thing down,” Rhys teased.

“We saw Sage leave, so we thought we’d invite you out for a run,” Austin said.

“Why not,” I sighed. It would kill time before I had to get into our bed without him. I knew I was whining but now that I’d experienced what it was like to have him here all the time, I wasn’t ready to go back to the way it was. I was going to ask his parent’s for his hand in marriage and mating. Make it official once and for all so my mate never had a second of doubt that his place was with me.

We went outside and stripped out of our clothes, and I let my bear come forward. Both my beast and I couldn’t wait to bring our mate home once and for all.

Chapter 17

Sage

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