Page 19 of Knot My Secret Santa

I knocked on the wood of the coffee table just in case.

With some wine, we settled down to dinner in his living room. I glanced around as I munched on some moussaka. His whole apartment was clean, minimalist, and entirely too bare. “You don’t have any Christmas decorations up. Not even a tree. My family’s the exact opposite. Every inch of our homes are decorated for the holidays.”

“I’m not big on the holidays.” He shrugged as he sipped his wine, watching me. “I usually just go on vacation with friends.”

I remembered that he didn’t have any family, and I didn’t want to make him feel bad. “Traveling sounds like fun. What sorts of places have you gone?”

Nathaniel told me about all the exotic cities around the world he’d visited. He spoke three languages and had been to every continent, except Antarctica, but that was a trip he wanted to do one year. I felt like such a small town girl next to this posh world traveler. What did he see in me?

“You could do up that whole wall there with photos from the cities you’ve been to. It would make for a beautiful collage and remind you of all those gorgeous tropical places while it’s cold and snowy here.” As much as I loved designing houses, I also loved to decorate. He could do so much with this apartment, but it looked like he didn’t even live in it.

Nathaniel forked a piece of baklava onto a plate and held out a bite to me. “I don’t spend much time here. I’m at the office most often and then I’m out. I’m not really a homebody.”

I leaned forward and took the proffered bite. Light and flaky and oh so incredibly sweet. Yet though my sweet tooth was being indulged, my heart felt heavier. I loved to be home. Either alone in my tiny house or with my family. I did go out and I would love to travel, but there was truly no place like home. I didn’t know whether or not to feel sad for him that he didn’t have that happy home base to come back to after his travels. More so, it made me realize again how different we were.

“Mm, so good.” I let him feed me another bite.

“They make the best baklava in the state.” Nathaniel grinned and took a bite himself.

I savored the dessert, marveling at how at ease he seemed. This was not my boss who had a glare of steel. His gray eyes had softened, without a hint of flint in them. I didn’t know what to do about this situation. Should I stop it here? Or did I spend the night with him and enjoy his attention while it lasted?

Fiddling with the belt of the robe, I blew out a long breath. I needed to know why he was doing this. Even if it was just a kindness, I had to know. “What are we doing here, Nathaniel?”

He raised his brows, a smile teasing at his lips as he licked up some pastry crumbs. “Having dessert, it seems.”

Don’t get distracted by his hotness!“No, I mean, you and I. We shouldn’t… Where is this going to take us?”

Nathaniel looked down at the plate and carefully cut another bite of baklava. “Does it need to take us anywhere?”

My throat and chest tightened. So was it just a spur of the moment thing? Maybe I would have seen that if I wasn’t in heat. “I’ve never done anything casual in my life.”

He sighed and set down the dessert before reaching to take my hand. “What we have between us… I don’t know what it is. I find it so hard to think of anything else around you. Yet we know why this is happening.” He lightly caressed the side of my thumb. “You’re in heat, and I’m a compatible Alpha. I want nothing else than to ease your pain, to make sure you’re safe and taken care of.”

Nathaniel was so much more than a compatible Alpha. He was a caring and gentle man, but he was also my boss. That last fact should have me far away from here, but I wanted to stay. I didn’t know what to do, and I swallowed back the threatening tears. “So once I’m done with my heat….”

“I don’t know.” He lifted my hand and kissed the back of it.

Fuck this whole situation! Slowly, I extracted my hand from his and wiped my eyes. I needed him to be sure about it. One way or another, I had to know. “That’s not good enough.”

Nathaniel shifted on the couch and drew me to him, rubbing my back. “I’m sorry, but I won’t lie to you. Right here, right now, I want to make you happy, to take care of your every need. And I want you to let me do it without all the worries about what will happen next.”

I was a planner. I didn’t just do something, especially like this, without thinking about where it would take me. Pressed to his chest, hearing his heart thumping, I could be so happy. The question was: would I let myself be?

“You will stay here at the apartment with me. I’ll take care of everything. The second you feel any aches, you’ll call me whether I be at work or in the other room. Though I’ll do my best to be here the whole time with you.”

This bare apartment? No, no. I straightened and sat back. “I’m not staying here. I have work. I have other obligations. It’s the holiday season, and I’m really busy. I won’t put my life on hold because I’m in heat.”

His brows furrowed. “It’s only going to get worse. You’ll only—”

I shook my head. He might be my boss at work, but he wasn’t the boss of my life. “I realize that, but I won’t hide myself away.”

“You could barely walk this afternoon. You would have frozen out there in the streets.” Nathaniel’s tone grew more gruff, and I folded my arms. I refused to let him order me around.

“No, I wouldn’t have.” I heard my own voice rise and tugged it back down. He was only trying to take care of me. Despite everything else, he wanted to help me, and I needed to keep that in mind. “I am thankful you came along. I would have gone home and ridden out the pain.”

“You shouldn’t have to endure that,” he huffed.

I didn’t want to have to suffer through it either. “What I want to be clear is that you aren’t obligated to take care of me. No matter what your Alpha brain is demanding of you, I trust you’re smart enough to think above it.”

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