Page 23 of Planet Wolf

Was I hungry? “No. I don’t think so. I sometimes don’t notice, but I ate dinner tonight. I’m not particularly hungry.”

They all nodded. “We didn’t do a good job keeping you fed. I imagine there will be plenty of things you can eat here.” Alfie held up my watch. “I’ll be back later, after I’ve dived into this.”

Jadon kissed my cheek and took a deep breath against my neck. “Good night, Esther. I’ve dreamed of this. I know we all have. The things that concern you tonight might not tomorrow or the next day. Time tends to handle a lot of pain. Now that we’re all together, things will sort themselves out.”

I believed him. In that second, I did. My anxiety would likely rush back, but in that moment, Jadon could have told me the sky was green, and I would’ve believed him.That must be why he has his role and why they all listen to him.

Carl ended up setting me into a big room in the corner of the house. He stopped to look in various doors when we got to the top of the stairs before he settled on the “right” one. “Stay here, please.” He winked at me. “Going to get your stuff.”

“Why did you pick this one?” I stopped him at the door. “As opposed to any of the other rooms.”

Carl scratched his head. “I liked this one strategically. If I had to protect it, this would be the easiest room for us to get you out, either via the stairs or through the window. We’re further from the street if we go out the window, so I like the idea of escaping with you out the back door. Don’t get me wrong, I would first kill any intruders, but in the case of a siege…”

I held up my hand. “There won’t be a siege to get me. I’m not very important.”

“You are the most important female—woman—that has ever been born,” he disagreed. He invaded my space then, kissing me hard. Our lips danced together. I remembered the way he kissed from the woods. Carl hadn’t cared at the time, and he obviously had no problem with kissing me right now, either, although Alfie hadn’t liked it then. As suddenly as he started kissing me, he stopped, breathing in my neck in the way that the guys seemed to like to do. “I’m going to kiss you all night or until you fall asleep against me. When you wake up, I’ll be there to do it again. Kiss and fucking kiss you.”

I caught my breath. “We didn’t even talk about you sleeping in here. I just went along with it. I’m not a person who just goes along with things.”

His smile was slow. “We can discuss it, if you want, but you know you’ve missed us next to you in bed. Not that we ever really had a bed. Just the ground. But we’ve missed you and thought about this. About the way you’d feel on some soft, sweet smelling sheets. You’re such a silent sleeper. You don’t make a sound. I want to be pressed right against you all night, so I can hear the inhales and exhales. Feel your heartbeat.”

My pulse sped up at the thought. “Yes.” My voice was low, almost scratchy sounding. “I’ve missed you next to me.”

I was answering an earlier question, not what he’d just said. It was like my brain short circuited. I couldn’t think straight, couldn’t think of anything other than how much I wanted him to touch me.

“Good.” His smile was huge. “Stay here a second. I’ll be right back with your things.”

My things?That was right. I’d packed a bag. I walked over to the window. Yes, I needed to breathe and look outside. I could clear my head, if I just…

Carl was back fast, placing the bag on the floor next to the bed before he walked over to me and slid his arms around me from behind. He drew me against him, against his heat. I felt his deep breath move through me like he’d caressed my whole body. I loved how he always seemed to want to breathe me in. It had to be a Wolf thing. What could he scent on me? Someday, I would ask, but right now, I had more important concerns. The thought stirred my brain. When did I start thinking there would be a someday for me? I could never even count on there being a tomorrow.

“What do you smell when you sniff me like that?” I asked him. There I was, back on track. Living for the moment, trying to get things done while I still could.

He didn’t answer right away; instead, he took another breath. My insides were officially hot now. Melting. “I can smell that you’re tired. That you’re happy, albeit a little bit concerned about things. Slightly overwhelmed, and in the middle of all of that is your scent, the one that is purely you. The one that tells me you’re my mate, and that you exist in the world, and that all I need to exist is to be wrapped up in you.”

I turned in his arms. I wasn’t really looking at the sky anymore anyway. I clung to his shirt and avoided his eye contact. So close, it would be too much to say what I had to say if I looked at him. “Makes me worried to hear you say that. I might not be here tomorrow. That’s been a truth for my whole life. I’m not well. The doctors are always skeptical about my future.”

He picked me up, carrying me over to the bed. “Give that stress to Alfie now. He’s very, very smart.”

“I’ve had very smart people look at me before. There aren’t any answers. I can’t stand to think that your entire existence involves whether or not I’ll be here. What if I’m not?”

I let myself look at Carl finally. My Hunter. The one who always showed up with whatever I needed, even before he could understand what I said verbally. “I will not believe that we could lose you so fast after finding you. And I do believe that Alfie can fix it. I’ve seen him do incredible things, and he will never be as motivated as he is right now.”

He tugged on my shirt. “Do you sleep in your clothes, or do you have something different you change into?”

My cheeks got so warm, I had to be bright red. “I change.” I pointed at the bag. “I can do that in the bathroom.”

He leaned down on the bed like he was lazy. It was deceptive. No way would this man ever really let down his guard. He could jump at any time. Although I might like it if he did—right on top of me. I wouldn’t tell him that, though, because it would be too much… somehow. I had no experience with intimacy. I might as well have been five years old again and trying to figure out how to get people who weren’t my cousins to play with me. I’d always been sort of socially stupid.

“Or you could let me watch you get undressed,” he suggested.

He saw me naked at the waterfall, but I’d been too gross to stop and think about decency when I flung my clothes off that day. I scooted off the bed. “I’d really like to. I’m obviously very attracted to you. You can probably even… scent that.” Which was disturbing, if I let myself think about it too much. “But, anyway, I’ve never done anything likethis. I mean, ever. And I’m embarrassed.” He probably could smell that, too, now that I thought of it. That somehow made things even worse. “Borderline scared.”

Carl scooted over toward me and finally rose from the bed. “You can’t know how hot that is, to hear that you have never stripped down in front of anyone before? But I don’t want you scared or embarrassed. This wasn’t some kind of test to see if you’d do it, and there is nothing better than you being honest about how you feel. We don’t lie unless we have no respect for someone. Then we lie so they smell it and know that we don’t.”

I tried to follow his logic, but my thoughts were stuck on the taking off my clothes issue.

He tugged me to him. “What if I took off your clothes for you? Hmm?” I liked how he followed the question with the small noise that moved right through me. “Then you can change into your pajamas, and I’ll get to the kissing you part, which is all I can think about. If that’s too much, we won’t kiss, either. You’re my mate. I have all the time in the world to see you take off your clothes in front of me, so you don’t have to rush if you’re not ready.”

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