Chapter Twenty-Two
Ryan
As soon as I feel the regret emanating from Maya, I know I’ve fucked up. I took it too far, way too fucking soon. Shit.
“Kitten,” I say sternly. “What’s going on?”
“I… I shouldn’t have done that,” she chokes out. “That was so… so… unethical. I… I…” Then she falls apart completely, letting out heaving sobs that have my wolf raging to escape so he can annihilate the threat to our mate.
Fuck. I’m the threat to my mate. Reality hits like a claw slicing into my gut. She really doesn’t know it’s me. I had hoped she was letting herself enjoy me, telling herself she wasn’t sure. But she really doesn’t know.
“Hey, hey, this is my fault. I’m so sorry, Kitten,” I say, scooping her up and cradling her in my arms. I smooth her hair back from her face and hold her tight, pressing kisses to her forehead and reassuring her.
Promising her I won’t ever say anything.
It was only a first name in a city of nearly a million people.
She didn’t break confidentiality. Not really.
I can’t tell her that it’s me. That she didn’t reveal anything sensitive because she was talking to me about me. Fates, I want to. More than anything.
But she’s not ready to hear it.
She would hate me.
And I can’t lose her. Fuck. The high of hearing her say she was thinking about me earlier has well and truly evaporated. I thought she knew. That this was her way of telling me. Because she should know. She should understand what we are to each other. My scent should be unquestionable.
The pull of the mate bond should be undeniable.
But I’ll figure out the why later. For now, my only priority is fixing this. Making Maya okay again. I tell her how beautiful she is. How strongly I feel for her already. How amazing she is. How I know she’s a professional and that she’s great at her job.
“But you don’t want to tell me anything about yourself,” she says, sniffling. “How good a therapist am I if I can’t get you talking? If you’re the one reading me instead of the other way around?”
“Because you’re not my therapist,” I tell her, leaning back against the headboard with her still cradled in my arms. “It’s not your job to look after me. I want to look after you.”
“So, what am I to you?”
“You’re my submissive, and I’m your Dom. For now. It’s my job to anticipate your needs. You need to be able to trust me to remain in control, and I need to trust you to use your safe word if I’m taking it too far.”
“You want to be my Dom? Officially?” she asks, and the sharp inhale of breath lets me know that she’s hoping for an affirmative answer. Like it could ever be in question.
“Does my kitten need a collar to know who she belongs to?”
She captures her bottom lip under her teeth diverting her gaze like she’s afraid to be open about how much she craves me. Maybe she doesn’t understand the bond, doesn’t understand how both of us feel exactly the same. “That’s up to you, Sir.”
“Yes, it is,” I say, staring into her eyes, even though she can’t see mine. “It’s my job to know what you need and give it to you. For right now, you need pampering, and that’s what’s going to happen. I’m going to run you a bath and then cook dinner while you relax.”
“Thank you. That sounds really good.”
The relief in her voice has my wolf preening. “You do know that it’s not just about the sex, right? I want more from you. I want everything from you. And I’m going to share myself with you. When we’re both ready. I promise.”
I kiss her forehead before pulling the bottom of my mask back into place and covering my jaw again.
Maya’s eyes drift shut as she lets out a little sigh.
It’s my favorite sound I’ve ever heard. Even better than her moans of pleasure.
Even better than hearing her say my name as she came all over my cock.
Because it’s vulnerable and real. So damn real.
She is so genuine. She wants to be everything to everyone. She needs me to look after her. Needs someone to take off all the pressure. I want to tell her the truth. I don’t want to hide anything from her. But I’m so damn afraid of losing her.
“I’ll be right back,” I say, climbing out of the bed to go run a bath.
I pour some of Maya’s vanilla bubble bath into the tub and swirl it around in the water.
When it’s nearly full, I go back to the bedroom and collect my mate in my arms, depositing her softly on her feet on the bathmat.
I take in her naked body—soft and athletic at the same time—her soft breasts and her bare pussy.
Then I hold out my hand to assist her with climbing into the bath.
She smiles softly at me as she submerges herself in the foam, and even though I said I would go make dinner, I sink down onto the ground beside her, still holding her hand.
It’s so hard to drag myself away from her.
All I want is to tear off this stupid fucking mask, both literally and figuratively.
“I’ll make dinner in a little while,” I promise her, not wanting her to think I won’t follow through on the plan but I’m not ready to be away from her yet. “First, talk to me. Tell me about you.”
Her eyes are closed when she responds, relaxed and unafraid to share with me. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything,” I say. “I want to know everything. What are your hopes and dreams? What’s your favorite color? What were you afraid of as a kid?”
“Well, I don’t have a favorite color because I’m not an eight-year-old,” she replies, and I splash her with bath water for her sass.
She lets out a laugh that’s light and melodic, and I melt.
I’m giving her the dominant side of me when I wear this mask.
But I want to give her so much more. And I want to do it as me. The real me.
“Hopes and dreams,” she says before humming.
“I went to therapy when I was a kid. It helped me work through… a lot of things I used to struggle with, so that’s why I wanted to do that for others.
I wanted to help people. Make a difference, you know?
The only other thing I ever really wanted was to have a family because I’m adopted.
Don’t get me wrong, my family is amazing.
My sister is my best friend, and my parents have always been wonderful to me.
They always made it so clear how much they wanted me and how loved I was.
But I’ve always stood out. I always wanted to have someone who looked like me. ”
She’s adopted. Fates, this must be why she’s confused. She wasn’t raised among our kind. It still doesn’t make sense why she’s not listening to her animal’s instincts, but it’s starting to give me a better picture.
Fuck, what must it have been like for her when she started hearing her cat’s voice?
Or when she shifted for the first time? Every shift hurts.
Bones break and elongate before reforming—noses turning to snouts, claws ripping through skin, tails pushing out where nothing was before.
And the first shift is the longest and most painful.
We don’t know how to lean into the process to make it happen quicker.
But at least I knew what to expect. I knew it would get easier, and I had my parents with me.
I can still remember Dad’s steady voice guiding me through the transition.
The reassurance and certainty that everything would be okay.
I want to be able to do that for my own pups.
And that thought brings me back to Maya’s last sentence.
“You want to have kids?”
“I did,” she says, pulling her knees up and wrapping her arms around them. She looks away, as if she can’t bear to see me and continue to talk at the same time. “More than anything. But it’s not on the cards for me. I’m infertile. I can’t have children.”
My stomach drops out. And I’ve been telling her how much I want to have a family. But the choice between the potential of pups and the real possibility of Maya is no choice at all. It would always be Maya.
“Then we won’t have kids.”
Her eyes snap back to me, and her body moves so sharply the water sloshes in the tub. “You don’t want to have children?”
“I want you,” I tell her, my voice firm and certain. “Nothing else matters as much as you do. Nothing could make me not want you. If you can’t have them, then we don’t have them. As long as I have you, I don’t need anything else.”
A solitary tear slips from Maya’s eye, and I squeeze her hand before bringing it to my lips.
“You’re more than enough. You’re all I need.”
“Just like that?” she asks while arching one of her eyebrows. “It’s hard to believe you when I don’t know anything about you.”
“You know more than you think. You’re just not ready for that conversation yet.”
Her face scrunches up for just a moment, her brows drawing together before her face relaxes again.
She doesn’t ask any more questions. I’m not sure why.
Maybe because she trusts me to tell her.
Trusts me to control the situation. Or perhaps part of her knows but doesn’t want to admit it.
Not even to herself. Because then she would need to admit to wanting her patient so badly. Goddess, I hope it’s because she knows.
I don’t want to lie to her.
But I’ll do whatever is necessary to make sure I have her.