20. Blaine
BLAINE
“No, we had something similar but it definitely wasn’t the same.” The tortillas I’d eaten once were nothing like the tacos Henley had made. “The only tortillas I saw back then came in a can and I think you had to fry them before you could eat them?”
My mate frowned and looked down at the remains of the tacos that littered our plates. “That sounds messy.”
What he’d made was also messy, but since I couldn’t cook, I wasn’t going to point that out. “I just saw the end results and heard the complaining about it all, but I think I could do this if you explain things as you go next time?”
Glancing up, my mate seemed to mentally shift gears from what he’d planned on saying because it took him a few seconds to actually talk. “I didn’t even think about showing you what I was doing. Oh. Can you cook?”
“No.” Not in the way he probably meant. “I can heat soup on the stove and I’ve watched you use the microwave enough that I think I can safely use that.”
But considering he randomly made things explode in there on a regular basis, I wasn’t so sure it was safe to begin with.
It used some kind of radiation to heat food.
“Is that a Blaine thing or a cultural thing from…when you were younger?” Henley frowned, clearly not pleased with how that’d come out, but he didn’t get distracted. “I’ve got a stereotypical image of a guy from the fifties but I don’t know how much of that is true and how much is TV nonsense.”
“It’s probably a mix of both?” I wasn’t sure, honestly. “I knew some men who cooked very well and ran restaurants around here, but in my family, the women cooked or someone was hired to do it. I can grill, though.”
Henley didn’t seem to do much of that, which was probably safer for everyone. He’d start with good intentions but then he’d wander off to go research something before dinner was safely off the flames.
“Some things never change.” He grinned, shaking his head. “Once we figure out a plan, how about we go look for some kind of portable grill? I’m not sure what will work best but there are a lot of options.”
Perfect.
“That sounds like I have something else to research.” He wasn’t the only one who could do that. “My list is going to be longer than yours eventually.”
Narrowing his gaze, he tried to look serious but ended up looking like a kid playing pretend. “Am I going to need to keep an eye on your search history? There are ways I can go back and see what you’ve been looking up. You were very focused on the tablet while I was making dinner.”
He didn’t want to play that game.
“Do you really want to know what I was looking up?” Leaning forward and bracing my arms on the table, I couldn’t help imagining how he’d squirm and blush. “I won’t hide what I was curious about. You’re my mate.”
He swallowed hard as his cheeks flushed. “Oh. Um. No, you deserve privacy too.”
“We’ll have to work out what privacy looks like between us, but I have come up with a few questions I need you to answer so we’re both on the same page.” I waited until he nodded to continue. “I need to know your safewords.”
Ha.
His mouth dropped open for a split second before he closed it.
“I know we’re putting off some conversations, but I need to understand those to make sure I understand your limits.
” If he was used to what the internet called BDSM, he was probably going to fall back on using more of the curious terminology without realizing it.
“I also would like to know if you’re still comfortable with me sleeping in the same bed as you. ”
The form I’d been in before was concerning for entirely different reasons, but he needed to have the choice.
Oh, that adorable glare.
“You didn’t seem to need my permission before.” Crossing his arms over his chest, he latched onto the easier emotion. “You were dead set on making sure I wasn’t going anywhere.”
I’d been a wonderful pest and he’d loved it.
“You were my mate.” Taking his hand, I stroked my fingers over his and did my best not to smile as he shivered again. “That form was more focused on my instincts and you smelled very good when I stretched out on top of you.”
Blinking, his frustration deflated and he wiggled bashfully in his seat. “You were…you needed attention.”
“Not every mate would’ve understood that under the circumstances.” Turning his hand over, I ran my fingers over his palm and down to his wrists, gently caressing him. “You were amazingly sensitive to what I needed and you handled a difficult situation incredibly well.”
Taking a bit of a ragged breath, he sat straighter again. “The ranger said we were mates and I already knew you’d claimed me as your friend. It wasn’t hard to fill in the rest.”
He wasn’t giving himself nearly enough credit.
“It could’ve been for a lot of people.” He really couldn’t see how remarkable he was. “You talked through everything you were doing to help me understand what was going on, and being around you so much strengthened our bond and helped the fog to clear.”
He was an amazing mate and one day I’d make sure he understood that.
“You…you needed me.” Latching onto that aspect didn’t surprise me. “The mates I met…they…they were very happy together.”
“We’re going to be that happy together. It’s just going to take time getting to know one another and letting the love we’ll have grow stronger.
” The mix of being human and his background and the information he’d gathered made it hard to understand what kind of questions he had about being mates.
“We were made for each other, but we’re not in a rush to the finish line. I’m enjoying getting to know you more.”
Smiling, he rolled his eyes. “Now that I’m not the only one talking.”
“Personally, I enjoyed having you talk to me, so be nice to my mate.” I was fairly certain I could technically make a joke about punishing him, but he wasn’t ready for that yet. “He’s important to me and he likes sharing his thoughts.”
Swallowing, he licked his lips and nodded slowly. “As long as I don’t think about it too hard, I’m not worried or anything.”
But he couldn’t stop thinking all the time.
Picking up his hand, I slid out of the small booth and stood up. “Don’t see this like we’re dating or that I’ll get frustrated and leave. This is us knowing exactly how the painting will look when we’re done, but we’re carefully working our way there.”
Smiling, he stood and followed me toward the bed. “We’re making happy little trees, huh?”
The painting man.
Henley had turned him on when he’d been explaining some of the shows he’d watched growing up.
“We’re going to make lots of happy little trees while we fill in the rest of the beautiful picture that’s waiting for us, my mate.” Releasing his hand so he wouldn’t feel like he had to follow, I lay down on the bed and relaxed, trying to give him space to make his own decision.
“I would like to hold you while we relax and watch something together.” My mate liked that form of entertainment. “If you consent, I plan on kissing you and touching you over your clothes eventually, but that’s not necessary for me to be happy with our evening.”
Blinking, he tried to look calm but his gaze danced over me and I could feel the way his body wanted to move. Emotions and desires were building quickly but it felt like he was vibrating like my first car. It had too much energy as well, but we needed a different way to help my mate.
“My…my safewords are the stoplight colors. Red means stop completely so we can figure out what went wrong. I’ll generally use it if I’m feeling emotionally or physically unsafe or scared.” He paused, probably to make sure I understood what he was talking about.
It wasn’t something I’d run into before, but it wasn’t confusing. “Yellow means you’d like us to slow down in some way, typically that I would need to back off the intensity of what I’m doing and ask clarifying questions.”
His head jerked in a nod as relief seemed to rush through him. “Green means we can continue even if I’m sending you mixed signals about how I’m feeling or I’m doing something like fighting against you. Depending…depending…”
“Depending on the scene.” Researching with fingers and a fully functioning brain went much faster. “In this situation you might tell me yellow if you wanted more space between us or if I was pushing you too fast.”
“You’re not.” The words jumped out making him blush. “Um, you’re not rushing me too fast. I just…I just don’t know how to talk about this since you’re my mate. You…you matter.”
Strangers didn’t matter but mates did.
“Nothing I’ve sensed from you or that you’ve said makes me uncomfortable or feel negative in any way.
I will admit to being confused at first, but now that I can think clearly, most of it’s easy to process.
” I wasn’t sure how deeply he craved some of the more difficult-to-process parts of it, but nothing he’d shared felt like it would fall into that category.
He might not want to talk about it, but hearing my views on what I’d learned so far didn’t seem to fall outside of his limits. “What you want and…and what you’re comfortable with are important to me.”
“I have no doubt about that at all.” None. “You turned your life upside down to save me.”
The soft almost-whine he let out made it clear how stressed and needy he was. “I just knew I had to help you.”
Because inside he’d known we were mates.
“I’m going to do my best not to overshare since I don’t understand how much people talk about their pasts now.
” It seemed like just yesterday I wouldn’t have talked about it at all, but yesterday felt like a thousand years ago at this point.
“But you’re right to assume I didn’t know anything about this before getting to know you. ”
Nodding, Henley seemed more comfortable with that out in the open. “That’s understandable and…and I won’t be unreasonably jealous about your past.”
It wasn’t like we’d ever run into anyone I’d known before.
“I want you to let me know if that changes.” I paused, making it clear I needed some kind of response from him, but instead of simply answering, he climbed up on the bed and curled up against me.
Talking was one thing my mate excelled at even if it was to tell me he wasn’t going to talk, so I took that as consent and slowly eased into the topic just in case. “I met a few people who I got close to, but I knew they weren’t my mate.”
It felt like leading them on to go too far with them.
“I didn’t see any point in being intimate with someone who wasn’t meant for me. Not everyone with a potential mate feels the same way, but I always knew I was going to wait for my mate for some things.” That didn’t mean I was a complete idiot, though.
And now that I could use the internet competently, I knew how to fill in any gaps in my knowledge.
“It…it doesn’t seem like you’ve ever thought of that…
that kind of stuff before.” Brows pulling together, he was shifting like he couldn’t decide if he was going to sit straighter or lie down on me.
“I don’t want to push you into something that isn’t in your…
your nature, I guess is the best way to explain it. ”
Ah.
“Some things we’ll do for our partners and hide how we feel.” When his face tightened again, I smiled. “My father doesn’t like beets.”
Oh.
“Um, didn’t like.” Swallowing hard, I gave my mate a small smile when he took my hand and held it against his chest. “They’re one of his least favorite vegetables but my mother loved them. So he ate them on a regular basis.”
Henley leaned over and kissed my cheek. “I don’t want you to eat beets for me.”
“Sometimes I will if it’s a small thing because that’s what we do for people who are important to us, we make little compromises.
But we don’t change who we are fundamentally and we don’t do things that upset us.
” There were probably more specific BDSM words I should’ve used, but I just didn’t know all of the vocabulary yet.
“The things I’ve learned so far don’t upset me.
Some intrigue me and some arouse me. I promise not to just go along with something that I’ve decided falls outside my own limits. ”
Once I figured out what those were.
So far my limits were not doing anything I didn’t know how to do safely or that could actually injure more than just his bottom.
Looking like a deflating balloon, my mate let out a long breath and lay down with his head on my chest. Exhaustion radiated from him and I knew how he felt, so I just stroked his hair and let the repetitive motion soothe me as well.
After a while, he took a deep breath and nuzzled against me.
I’d felt the same motion for days, so I released his hand and wrapped my arms around him, holding him tighter against me.
His pleased sigh made me smile but I waited to hear what he’d been thinking.
“I’ve always been different than the rest of my family and…
and I didn’t want you to see me as weird too. ”
“My mate, your family members are basically serial killers.” I probably should’ve figured out a nicer way to say that, but there really wasn’t one.
“I’m glad you’re nothing like them or I wouldn’t be here with you to hold you and to kiss you and to think about doing very interesting things with you. ”
Letting out a wonderfully dramatic groan, he rolled onto me and buried his face against my chest. “If I talk about sex, can we not talk about my family?”
It might not be a healthy trade but it was understandable.
“Deal.” We’d have to come back to them eventually but I didn’t see any reason to have to poke at that drama. “I want to get to know you, not other people who don’t matter.”
Unless they were coming at me with a weapon.
Yeah, I was going to have questions at some point, but at the moment there were other more pressing topics to talk about.
“I like that I matter to you.” His quiet voice held more emotion than he probably realized. “And I like that you don’t think there’s something…deviant about domination and submission.”
Kissing his head, I ran my hands over his back and as far down as I could reach. “Anything that makes you smell that wonderful can’t be deviant.”
I might not understand all of it, but I understood that much at least.
I also understood that drama-filled groans weren’t always bad things. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t figure out what I like until you were in this form.”
“Okay, I can deal with a little bit of delusion.” It was cute. “And if you’re a good boy for me, I’ll even make up a very convincing story about how I figured it out.”
His long, drawn-out sigh had me fighting back a smile, but his sass was what I loved the most. “Deal. See? I understand what compromise looks like in a relationship.”
“Because my mate is sexy and smart.”
And liked being restrained.
“Ugh, and my mate is smart enough to know when to suggest we start watching Superman so I can pretend we didn’t talk about any of this.”
Delusional and adorable…who knew they’d be such fascinating traits in a mate.