5. Silver
5
SILVER
“ N o.” The word is more an exhalation than a whisper. It’s almost like he doesn’t want to say it.
Fucking hell . How am I supposed to interpret that response?
“If you don’t want to bond to me, I understand. You can still stay here.” That’s what I should have said at the very beginning. I’m already fucking this up.
“It doesn’t matter what I want,” he repeats. “I’m not a raccoon shifter. I don’t get to choose who I end up with.”
I walk over and sit in the chair next to him. I hate the way his back straightens at my close proximity, his body always on the alert. When we were younger, I desperately hoped that being with me would make him less afraid of the world. I guess Daryl fucked that up along with everything else.
“I’m trying to give you a choice here,” I say.
He lowers his gaze to his hands. “No, you’re trying to give me your choice.”
“What do you mean?”
He takes in a deep breath. “Well, raccoon shifters are the luckiest people in the world.”
“I wouldn’t say that. People hate us.”
Lucas gives me a sad smile. “Because they’re jealous, Silver. You get to bond to anyone you want. It doesn’t matter what shifter species or secondary gender. You can choose anyone—love anyone. Do you have any idea how precious that choice is? Most of us are stuck with whoever Fate chooses for us.” He says the last few words like they’re a prison sentence. Maybe for him they are.
“You don’t have to be stuck with Daryl. If I put my paws on you?—”
“Then you’d be stuck with me,” he says. “Don’t you see? I’d get to have a choice, but you wouldn’t. You’d be saddled with an omega who has swollen feet, stretch marks, and three pups on the way. That isn’t fair.”
Is that all he thinks he is? Stretch marks and swollen feet? I don’t know whether to feel sad or angry. Here Lucas is, six months pregnant, and instead of being cherished and cared for by his alpha, he’s on the run and believes he’s worthless.
If I was a violent man, Daryl would be in a world of hurt right now.
“Look at me,” I say.
He raises his gaze to meet mine.
“I think you’re beautiful.”
He turns away from me again.
“Lucas,” I say. This time I cup his jaw and tilt his face in my direction. “Raccoon shifters have big litters. Stretch marks come with the territory. If you were carrying my kits, I would kiss every part of your skin that stretched to make space for them.”
His eyes well with tears. “Daryl doesn’t feel that way.”
“Then Daryl is wrong.”
He leans into my hand, just like he did last night, so desperate for affection that he’s accepting it from an alpha he doesn’t feel worthy of. I hate this. I want to ignore everything he’s saying right now and just put my paws on him already. It’s clear that he’s miserable with Daryl. But the last thing Lucas needs is another alpha pushing him around.
How could I give him a choice without giving him my choice, as he put it?
“Maybe we could do a trial run,” I suggest.
Lucas furrows his brows in confusion.
“You still have three months before the pups come, right? What if we pretended to be mates for the next month or so? Just to see how it feels.”
That would solve everything. We’d have time to get to know each other again. I could pamper Lucas the way he deserves during his pregnancy and shower him with the physical affection he craves. Then maybe he would understand how deep my feelings are for him.
“What do you mean pretend?” Lucas asks. “Like some kind of role play?”
“No. We could just interact like we would if I put my paws on you. Not as a role play, but a real trial.”
He shies away from my hand. “That would still be you giving me your choice, just slower.”
“No, it wouldn’t. I want you, Lucas.”
He shakes his head. “You couldn’t?—”
“Stop telling me what I’m supposed to want. Why don’t you call Link and ask him how hung up on you I still am.” I pull my phone out of my back pocket and hand it out to him. “Or call my omega mom and ask her how much she misses you. My family is my world. You know that better than anybody. And they absolutely adore you. Even Coin likes you, and he doesn’t like anyone. But that doesn’t matter, right? Because you have stretch marks? How shallow do you think I am?”
I feel bad for my outburst the second the words are all out. I’m usually careful to not blow up in front of Lucas. But my anger doesn’t startle him. He considers me for a long beat, the wheels obviously turning in his head.
“Then this isn’t just a charity project for you,” he says carefully.
“No, of course not.”
He wrings his hands together nervously. If this was back in high school, I’d hold those hands in mine and help him calm down, but I’m not sure he still wants that.
“If we did this trial run, and you lost interest, could I go stay with your moms?” he asks. “Just until I have a job? I won’t tell them anything about what we’ve done together.”
If I lost interest? Jesus . Does he think I have the attention span of a toddler?
“Of course you can. Anyone in my family would take you in. You know that. But I’m serious about this, Lucas.”
He takes in a shaky breath. “Okay. How exactly would it work? Would I sleep in your bed?”
“Yes. I mean, if you want to. You don’t have to if that’s too much.”
He swallows hard. “Is it too much for you?”
I shake my head.
“Would we kiss or… do other things?” he asks.
“If you want to.”
He scrunches his shoulders together. “You wouldn’t want to, right? I’m pregnant?—”
“I definitely want to,” I say.
Lucas’s cheeks turn a bright shade of pink. It reminds me of the times we made love back in high school. His face and chest always flushed after he orgasmed. He was so beautiful like that. Whether we were curled up in the back seat of Coin’s car or lying on a copse of wildflowers in the prairie near the trailer park, I always loved looking at him in the afterglow when he was all pink and sated. That was when he was at his calmest—when all the stressors of the world melted away.
“Just give me a month,” I beg. “If either of us don’t want to move forward after that, I swear I’ll back off.”
Lucas bites his lip, still uncertain. Am I pushing something on him that he doesn’t want? But why would he melt into my touch if he didn’t want me? That has to mean something, doesn’t it?
Mom was right about one thing: I don’t know Lucas like I used to.