Page 142 of The Wolf King's Mate

He nodded. “We know that not everyone is out to get us at this point. It’s been a long time. We’re not necessarily afraid of eating out, or with the pack. But it will never feel entirely comfortable.”

I swallowed a lump of emotion in my throat. “I get it. I’ll make you grilled cheese any time you want. And cereal. And quesadillas. To be honest, I’m a terrible cook. Maybe you can try to teach me or something. My mom showed me a little beforeheat hit, but afterward… well, she was mourning. Just trying to survive. We all were.”

“What happened right afterward?”

“It’s all kind of a blur. Fletcher needed to leave for his sanity. Our parents needed him to leave for theirs, too. His wolf and Silas’s nearly killed each other a few times. Our dad took him to the Creek Pack, where our birth dad and adopted dad both used to live. They took Fletcher in, under the impression he was our adopted dad’s by blood.”

I continued, “Dad claimed we were a year younger than we were, and no one batted an eye. Fletcher found a place there, and worked through things. We didn’t talk much, for a few months. It was hard to be alone, but I was so terrified of heat that I barely left my room. We had been homeschooled before everything happened, so our lessons stopped. Silas couldn’t stand to be in the same room with me. The only time we managed it was heat.”

“You lost your family.”

I nodded.

“You and I are the same, in that way,” he said.

Maybe we were.

Enzo slipped an arm around my back and pulled me to the edge of the countertop, wrapping his arms around me for a hug. Mine went around him too, and I hugged him back.

Tightly.

He’d shared something with me that I doubted he had ever told anyone else before. That was big, especially for a man as independent as he was.

“Thank you for talking to me,” I whispered.

“Thank you for listening. And talking to me too.”

I nodded.

He kissed the top of my head. “We’ve got a cake to bake and some frosting to whip up, Princess.”

“Are you ever going to stop calling me that?”

“Probably not.”

I sighed, and he chuckled.

Things felt different when we got back to making the cake, and I resumed the world’s easiest job.

Everything felt safer.

More… intimate.

When his hand brushed my arm as he teased me, his touch lingered.

When I sassed him, our eyes caught, and our gazes held just a little too long.

When he dipped a finger in the frosting and lifted it to my lips, I sucked.

When he kissed me afterward, his hands cradling my face while the taste of sugar was on both of our tongues, I let myself wonder what it would feel like to love Enzo, and to be loved by him.

The more I thought about it, the better it sounded.

When our cakewas done and frosted, Enzo made me wait in the kitchen while he stepped into the other room. I picked up my phone to look at the time.

5:02 PM.

We were meeting for cake in the Savage brothers’ shared living room (AKA the lounge) precisely two minutes ago. Because the brothers’ wolves were all territorial, they’d built their own hangout space. It had a kitchen, a table, a big couch, and a TV. I’d never seen it, but Enzo had described it to me while we were getting the cake ready.

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