Chapter 6 #2
Okay, so she must have been half-drunk on the moon too, because she turned her head and kissed the palm of his hand.
Which—uh? What was that? “What—” She stopped, cleared her throat.
“Where’s there, exactly, and what’s in it that’s supposed to make anything clearer?
Because I’m telling you, man, between being confused and horny, which you can probably already tell so let’s not pretend, I can barely keep my wits together. ”
He chuckled. It was strangled and growly, but it was a chuckle. “There’s a clearing, nothing more than that. But we can sit, and I can explain. All of it.”
“Sounds pretty, and not altogether comforting, but okay.”
And it ended up really being pretty.
The clearing appeared as if the forest had opened its hand to gift them with it—a wide circle of new grass washed in the first soft darkness, the sky above it enormous and ready for the stars.
Rex unslung his backpack and crouched down, pulling out a blue blanket, absurdly fluffy.
He shook it out with a snap and laid it over the grass.
Zoe sat. He sat beside her. The trees stood quietly at the edges.
He didn’t speak right away, and she didn’t push. What he was about to tell her was, obviously, not easy, and she respected his need for time.
Finally, he turned to her and said, “How do you prefer it?”
That stopped her cold. She blinked once. Twice. “See, your question can go in a lot of different directions. It could mean how I want my drink, assuming you packed something, which would make you very organized and extremely attentive. Or it could go in a much, much dirtier way.”
He straight-out growled. Wiped a hand down his face, his gaze fixing, rather desperately, to the dark trees, then back to her. “The explanation. Do you want the long version, or straight to the point?”
“I feel like I’ve been waiting for answers since the first second I saw you, so put me out of my misery. Straight to the point, and then I’ll ask questions. I’m sure I’ll have plenty.”
He gave a curt nod. Stood. Paced a little.
Sat again. Then went completely still and stared at her for a long stretch of seconds, not moving, not even breathing.
If he was having some kind of episode, she had absolutely no way of carrying him back to the car.
There was barely any reception this deep in the forest, though 911 was supposed to work even without—
“I think you’re my fated mate.”
Oh.
Okay.
Alright.
So she was the one who was going to need medical attention after all, which actually made everything easier since he could carry her, no problem. With a body like that, he could carry her all the way to the hospital, where the good doctors could restart her heart.
“Moonbeam?”
The gentleness in his voice pulled her back. And also—Moonbeam? How unbearably sweet was that? He’d said it once before, but now, in that voice, after what he’d just told her... She was supposed to, what, function? “Yeah,” she managed. “I’m, um, processing.”
“I know. Take all the time you need. I’m not used to explaining this, but you can ask me every—”
“Is that why I’m so attracted—no, make that obsessed—with you?”
He nodded.
She nodded. Then: “So the pull I feel toward you, that’s the bond? That’s not me choosing anything, that’s just... the universe deciding?”
He shook his head and took her hands in his. “There’s always a choice, Zoe. Always. We can leave right now, and that would be it.”
He said it evenly, but she saw what it cost him. “But we’d always be connected somehow. Even if we walked away.”
"The bond can be–” He swallowed. “Broken."
“It can?”
“Yes. I’d need to work out the specifics. As the Alpha, I’m the only one who can do it, and I’m not sure how it would be for me, but yes. The bond can be broken.”
“Even this early?”
“I’m not entirely certain, but there must be a way. Nothing is stronger than free will.”
“Then why? Why make me feel like this for you at all, if I can just walk away?”
He stroked her cheek with so much tenderness it made her eyes sting. “The bond is the universe telling us we could be two parts of the same whole. But it’s not a cage.” His thumb traced her jaw. “It shows us the door. We still have to choose to walk through it.”
She turned the explanation over in her head. “So it’s not an imperative. It’s more like... a very strong suggestion from the universe.”
“That’s a very good way to put it, yes.”
She shifted to face him completely and crossed her legs, pulling a strand of grass to have something for her hands to do other than reach for him. “I'm not entirely surprised.”
Rex growl-scoffed. “You were surprised enough, Moonbeam.”
“I was surprised because I didn’t expect to have my suspicions confirmed, not because I hadn’t had them.”
“You suspected?”
“Well, yeah. I’ve been thinking about peeling the clothes off of you since the first second of seeing you close, and while you are entirely too hot for your own good, my reaction was way out of proportion. And when I’m with you, I feel...” She searched for the word. “Safe.”
“Home,” he offered.
“Yes. Which is weird, because I’ve never felt displaced. I’ve always known where I belonged. But with you, it’s different.” She shrugged, a little helplessly. “I couldn’t make myself believe it, though, because I’m human.”
“So is Callie. And a few other mates in the pack. It’s not unheard of.”
“I guess.” She pulled her knees up and hugged them, letting the chaos of it settle over her.
The thoughts versus the feelings and the terrifyingly inconvenient enormity of it all.
“So now what? What am I supposed to do with this? I’ve known you for five minutes, Rex.
Five minutes. I don’t know your coffee order.
I don’t even know if you drink coffee. I know you eat beef because we had one dinner together.
One.” She stood because sitting felt impossible.
“The terrifying part isn’t that I don’t feel it.
The terrifying part is that I do. So hard.
” She put her fists on her hips. “I’m a rational person.
I make lists. I think things through. And here I am, not wanting to.
” Defeated, she plopped back down, half on the blanket, half on the grass.
“What if I'm not ready to want what the bond wants me to want? To accept it?” She really disliked how small her voice sounded right now. “Is it okay that I’m terrified? Because I feel like I’m supposed to be more. .. sure.”
He sighed, then took her wrist and slowly, gently, pulled.
She went to him. Of course she did. It didn’t matter that he was the reason for her very reasonable freak out; he was still where it was safe to have said freak out.
When he settled her on his lap and wrapped his arms around her, her shoulders dropped about three inches immediately.
“You’re not supposed to be anything.” He kissed her hair, started stroking her back in long, steady passes.
“We can take as much time as we need. Hell, we can stop seeing each other entirely if that’s what feels right for you. ”
“Thinking about not seeing you again makes me want to puke.”
“Let’s not do that, then,” he said, and the relief in his voice was so thick it made her sigh. “We can just... date, I guess. Get to know each other.”
“Platonically?”
“Platonically.”
He did not love the idea, that much was obvious, but he would stand behind it if she asked, which only made her swoony on top of everything else. “You’re a living thirst trap, Rex. I don’t know if I trust myself enough to promise I’ll stick to that.”
“Honesty for honesty: if you’re the one who starts it, I don’t know if I trust myself enough to promise I’ll stop it.”
“Gotta love honesty.”
“Then you might want to know that being... intimate—” he tensed for a moment, took a small breath, “—is what triggers the bond. Fully.”
“Oh.” Well, there went that route. “Wait. Is that why you brought me out here tonight? To... consummate the bond?”
He almost laughed. Almost. “Of course not. I brought you here because I wanted you here, with me, on a full moon. We could spend the whole night with me in wolf form and you just sitting here, and it would be more than I’ve ever dreamed.
” His arms tightened slightly around her.
“You and me? That will always, always, be your call.”