Chapter 6
6
T anner dried off another pint glass, glancing to the back door that led to the stairs to his apartment.
He didn’t need to be working tonight.
It wasn’t busy in the bar by any means, and his bartender Sandra was already on duty.
But Tanner had desperately needed space from a certain pregnant fae before he went and did something very, very stupid.
Tanner had thought he had a hold on his attraction to Bracken.
He’d thought he could handle it.
He’d thought wrong.
Because Bracken was so very beautiful and so very grumpy, and it made Tanner want to do terrible, terrible things to him.
Not to mention Bracken was carrying Tanner’s child, and the larger he grew and the more evident that became, the more something primal in Tanner screamed out, Mine.
All mine.
But he wasn’t.
Not really.
And Tanner had to respect that fact.
Still, keeping his hands off the beautiful omega was a daily battle that Tanner was getting closer and closer to losing.
Hence the space.
It didn’t help that, technically, Tanner’s hands were on Bracken all the time.
Massaging, petting, holding him tightly on the couch.
Bracken required quite a bit of physical touch to keep his orneriness even remotely at bay, and it was both heaven and torture to provide him with it.
It especially didn’t help that Bracken had told Tanner what his aroused pheromones smelled like—spiced honeysuckle—so now Tanner knew that Bracken was aroused quite often.
As in, all the godsdamned time.
And yet he didn’t seem to want Tanner to do anything about it.
No matter how many times Tanner asked if there was anything—anything at all—that he could do to make the fae feel better.
Which left Tanner walking around with an indecent erection about 80 percent of the time.
The other 20 he was asleep.
Tanner wanted Bracken.
Desperately.
He wanted him more than he’d ever wanted anything.
And it was more than just base attraction now.
More than the hope for a second chance.
Ever since that first night of his return, when Bracken had sobbed in Tanner’s arms, something powerful had come over Tanner.
He wanted to be Bracken’s person.
His safe space.
He wanted to always be the man Bracken turned to when he couldn’t stop his tears.
It was fitting, Tanner supposed.
He still remembered a camping trip his family had taken in middle school, one where a bossy girl the next campsite over had taken to ordering him around.
Tanner had been tickled by her brash confidence and complete disregard for his feelings, and he’d complied willingly with all of her demands.
His parents had watched it all and joked over the campfire that the two of them would get married one day.
Tanner had already been pretty sure at that age that his interest lay solely in other boys, so he’d been less certain of their prediction.
But after two months of panting after a fae whose main hobby seemed to be waltzing into a room and demanding Tanner rearrange the furniture that very instant, Tanner was now thinking maybe his parents hadn’t been far off.
He did have a type.
“Just go home.”
Tanner looked up from his glassware.
“Pardon?”
Sandra was leaning against the bar, her muscular arms crossed.
“That’s the fifth time in the last minute you’ve gazed longingly up the stairs.”
“And…?”
Sandra arched a brow.
“And so now it’s time for you to fuck off back to your beautiful fae.”
“I’m working.”
“You don’t need to be.”
Butch spoke up from where he was nursing his beer at a much more sedate pace than his previous visit.
“He angry with you? You break a couch?”
“I didn’t break anything. I—” Tanner trailed off.
I promised I wouldn’t take advantage, but I want to kiss him more than I want to breathe, and I’m worried I’m going to make a liar of myself.
Tanner rubbed at the back of his neck.
He couldn’t say that out loud.
Sandra laughed.
“It’s a trip seeing you so unsure of yourself. Didn’t know it was possible.”
“Yeah, well.” Tanner scowled at her.
“Neither did I.”
Like some sort of cosmic joke from the universe, the back door Tanner had been apparently gazing at so longingly opened to reveal Bracken, skin glowing, eyes blazing, and wearing an indecently short silk robe.
The scent of spiced honeysuckle wafted into the bar.
Was he trying to kill Tanner?
Was that it?
Was this some sort of elaborate murder plot?
If so, it was proving alarmingly effective.
Bracken set his hands on his hips and gave Tanner his haughtiest look yet.
“Barkeep. I require your presence.”
Sandra whistled and nudged Tanner with her elbow.
“If you don’t go, I will.”
Tanner tossed a bar rag in her face.
He swallowed hard and began to follow Bracken up the stairs.
Tanner could just barely make out Butch’s loudly whispered “I don’t think he broke the couch.” And Sandra’s wry “Not yet, at least.”
When they made it to Tanner’s living room, Bracken whirled on Tanner, his hands on his hips once more.
“I am a beautiful fae, am I not?” he asked fiercely.
Tanner blinked.
“Yes. Very.”
Bracken shifted on his feet, glancing down at his belly.
“Even in my…altered state.”
“Especially now.” Tanner gestured to Bracken’s face and form and…
everything.
“You’re glowing. You must know.”
That seemed to bolster Bracken’s confidence.
He straightened to his full height.
“And do I not deserve to have all my needs met?”
Tanner still wasn’t sure what was happening, but he knew the answer.
“Of course you do.”
“Good. Get your cock out.”
Tanner wasn’t thrown off often, but that seemed to do it.
He froze.
Bracken glowered, but Tanner didn’t miss the hurt that flashed across his face.
“You don’t want me?”
“Of course I do.” Tanner rubbed at the back of his neck, confusion making him too honest by half.
“I’d kill to fuck you again.”
Bracken sniffed and gestured to the carpet.
“And yet I see no corpses strewn about the floor.”
“Maybe you should lie down and take a re?—”
Bracken stamped his foot.
“I don’t need to lie down! And I don’t need a bath! Or a massage! Or a godsdamned cuddle! I need to be fucked . Forcefully and frequently. Can you handle that? Can you?”
And it was like a flash of lightning, illuminating every second of the last two months.
Tanner had been so stupid.
Of course Bracken hadn’t asked the question directly before now.
Of course Tanner’s prickly, sensitive fae hadn’t wanted to make himself even more vulnerable by stating his desires out loud, risking an uncomfortable rejection.
It must have gone against his very nature, approaching Tanner that first time.
But he’d been wonderfully brave and done it anyway.
And now Tanner had been keeping his distance, and Bracken thought Tanner might not want him anymore.
Tanner stepped forward, taking Bracken’s lovely face in his hands.
“Yes,” he said firmly.
“I can handle you, Bracken.”
And then he did what he’d been wanting to do for the past two months.
He kissed his beautiful, ornery fae right on his beautiful, ornery mouth.