14. Maynard
14
MAYNARD
Our panting punctuated the silence in the room.
Sweat spilled from my chin and landed silently on Rhodes’s skin. Resting my brow on his, I slowed my breathing while my knot kept us together.
But I worried I was too heavy for my human, and holding him tight, I rolled so he was on top. He rested his head on my chest and it rose and fell as I breathed.
“That was…” He didn’t finish the sentence, and for an instant, I worried I wasn’t good enough. He’d had better. Jealousy raged through my veins and my skin reddened.
But Rhodes lifted his head and that shy smile I’d witnessed previously evaporated any resentment. “There are no words to describe our lovemaking.” He bit his bottom lip and glanced downward, avoiding my gaze, before adjusting his head and meeting my eyes.
We lay there, not speaking. I’d never experienced contentment with any omega I’d been with besides him. I’d have dismissed the idea if anyone had told me how being mated changed their outlook on life. But now the sensation was similar to being on a boat, moored just offshore, with gentle waves lapping at the hull. Some might experience seasickness, but not me.
My eyes closed, but Rhodes tapped my lips and my eyes snapped open. My knot still filled him. There was no escaping me or my cock until it deflated.
“Be honest. I feel as though I’m standing in the middle of a seesaw, trying to balance. There’s you who I adore.” He held up a hand. “Yeah, that’s a big commitment after, what… two days.” He pushed hair off his damp brow. “But there are also your brothers who kinda kidnapped me and kept me captive. And there’s the wolf thing.”
I hated that instead of experiencing our blossoming love, he was confused, worried, and upset that he was doing something wrong. He was my mate, though our bond was not complete with me not biting him yet, so we could go our separate ways.
He had a right to know what I did and who I was and also details about my family. If we were going to be together—and my heart would be ripped from my chest if he left me—I had to tell him the truth. But there was so much of it, and it would be a huge whammy!
“My family is part of a larger family.”
“You have aunts, uncles, and cousins aplenty.”
I giggled at him using the word aplenty. It was old-timey and adorable.
“I do, but I am referring to an organization, some might call it a criminal organization.” That wasn’t how we viewed it, but outsiders did.
He drew in a sharp breath. “Like my whacked-out brother… half-brother… brother I rarely acknowledge? That kind of organized crime? I’m pretty sure he mixes with mobsters.”
I winced at the words mobsters. “We don’t blow people up.”
No, you shoot them in the head . My wolf wasn’t pulling any punches.
“Good to know.” He raked his nails over his scalp. “Is there more?”
Oh yeah, a lot. How did I break it to him?
“I’m a hedge fund manager, but I also take out people for a living.”
He quirked a brow and tilted his head. “Like to dinner and the movies? Are you an alpha escort?”
“No.” How I wished I were. That would be easier to explain than the truth. “I take them… not to a place… but their lives. I unalive them.”
Blood drained from his face. “You kill people as part of your job?”
My knot chose that moment to contract, and he pulled away, my semi-hard dick flopping forlornly on my thigh. He paced the room, until he looked down and yanked the comforter off the bed and wrapped it around his hips.
Rhodes reached one side of the room and twirled around, ready to retrace his steps. He almost tripped over the wads of fabric, and I swung my legs off the bed to help, but he growled at me. Not a wolf’s growl but halfway scary.
“Why were you at the wedding?” He stopped and glowered. It wasn’t necessary to tell me he was angry. His brows were drawn together, his mouth was set in a straight line, and his rigid posture sent me a clear message. “And don’t tell me you love witnessing true love, you wanted a free meal, or some other BS.”
“I was on a job.”
He didn’t react, no flicker over the face or tightening of his fists. He stood unmoving, not even blinking.
“I had a contract to kill someone.”
Rhodes’s chest heaved as he resumed his pacing, mumbling to himself about what he’d gotten himself into.
“And did you? Kill someone?”
“No.”
He narrowed his big beautiful brown eyes. “You must be a shit hitman if you didn’t do what you were supposed to.”
There was no answer to that. Yeah, maybe I was, but before I laid eyes on Rhodes, I was at the top of my game.
“Are you going to tell me?” He gripped the comforter as it slid over his hips, exposing the dark curly hair at his crotch.
“If I’m shit? Never used to be.”
A trace of a grin drifted over his lips. “No, not that.” But the smile vanished almost as if he remembered he shouldn’t be amused about me killing or not killing someone. “Who was the hit?” He wobbled his head from side to side. “Pretty sure I know ‘cause he’s brought some bad juju on himself and his family.
“I doubt that.”
“We’re talking about my brother, right? He’s done a lotta sketchy stuff and caused my mom so much grief. And someone tried to blow him up.”
I was struck by the notion that the hit may have been ordered to send a message to Rhodes’s brother and his cronies.
“Not exactly.” Gods damn it. It would be easier to explain the history of shifters to a toddler than this, though a toddler wouldn’t be armed with an adult’s preconceived ideas about fantasy.
“Then who?”
He leaned over the bed, his eyes locked on mine. My belly roiled, and I begged my last meal to stay where it was. I winced at the pain in my stomach as it cramped and the pain abated, rinsed, and repeated.
My mouth was dry, and I longed to chug some water, though I’d only be postponing the agony. But Rhodes picked up on my reluctance—it wasn’t difficult—and he backed off, a hand over his mouth as the comforter puddled around his ankles. I leaped up, wanting to hold him and say how much I loved him, how I couldn’t go through with it because he was my mate.
“Me. You were there for me.”
“And as soon as I saw your face, your scent told me you were my mate. I couldn’t go through with it.”
He slumped to the floor and brought the comforter to his lips. “Did you plant the bomb? Were you hoping I’d be in the car?”
“Gods, no, that had nothing to do with me.”
“Okay.” He pressed a fist into his eye socket. “And mate? What is that? A good friend? You didn’t explain it properly before.”
He sat cross-legged opposite me, though he wouldn’t let me get any closer.
“My kind, the ones with an animal inside them… as I’ve mentioned… we’re called shifters.” This carpet was making my bare butt itch. If Rhodes and I did mate, we would live in my apartment if I could convince him to relocate. “Many of us have a fated mate somewhere on earth, and if we’re lucky enough to meet them, we recognize them instantly by their scent.” Or our beast did and told us.
“You are my one and only. There can never be anyone else for me.” I could have stopped there but had to let him know he had options. “But you can walk away and tell me to piss off. You’re free to do whatever you choose.”
He fiddled with the comforter as it surrounded him, as though he were sitting on a nest, or maybe a throne.
“It’s a lot to take in. The contract, the hit, my brother, a bomb, me, you, a wolf, your batshit-bonkers family.” He rubbed his eyes. “I can’t deal with it all now. So let’s start with the mating.”
I understood why he hadn’t asked for more details about the hit. Out of all the confusing things that had happened, mating was the least problematic.
“You want to mate with me, someone not like you, who has a regular job and an ordinary life.”
“Yes. Very much so.” There was one detail I’d forgotten to add. “Mating is for life. Once I mark you, we are bonded until our last breath.”
He shrugged. “Call me crazy, but I kinda like that idea.”
“But you need to reflect on what being mated to me would mean.” There were other considerations such as how Alpha would react but he’d find out after the fact.
He shoved his bare feet out from the comforter, and I uncrossed my legs. We were sole to sole, and I was begging the universe to make us soul to soul too.
“That I’d be mated to a guy who has a wolf inside him, who can change into said wolf, and who offs people for a living.”
“I have another job. I’m a money person.”
Rhodes rolled his eyes. “Goodie. That makes it so much better that you only kill people part-time.”
“You deserve better than me.” I wasn’t the better option.
“I should run away, call the police, a thousand other things.” He sighed. “But I can’t.” He tapped his heart. “You’re in here, and no antibiotics will cure you, there’s no operation to cut you out, no chemo or radiation. Nothing.”
“Are you describing love?” It was too much to hope and yearn and beg for.
“I guess so. It’s as though a tornado has picked me up from my normal life and dumped me elsewhere.” He wiggled his feet. “But I don’t have any red shoes.”
“Huh?”
Rhodes giggled. “I’ll explain the reference another time.”
“Now what?”
“How do we do the mating thing, because let’s get it done.”