Chapter 12 #3
The coat is long, black, and expensive enough that Taryn visibly flinches when she sees the tag.
I don’t care. I put it on her myself, smoothing it over her shoulders and adjusting the collar.
It transforms her again. Not just pretty.
Elegant. Untouchable by anyone but me. All fucking mine.
She looks like the kind of woman no man should approach unless he has already made peace with dying.
Taryn looks in the mirror, and this time, she doesn’t immediately criticize herself. She just stares.
“I look…” she trails off.
“Like you should have always been treated better,” I murmur in her ear, making her shiver.
Her eyes meet mine in the mirror. The scent of her emotion shifts. Not arousal this time. Something softer. More fragile. Something that makes me want to rip apart every person who ever made her believe she belonged in a damp basement wearing rags.
“You like it?” I ask.
“I really do.” She nods slowly.
“Then it’s yours,” I insist, rubbing her shoulders.
“But I don’t need something this nice,” she says. “It rarely gets cold around here, especially now.”
“You don’t have to need everything, Taryn. Sometimes you’re allowed to want things,” I assure her quietly.
She looks down, touching the coat. “I don’t really know how.”
“Then I’ll teach you.”
Her lips curve faintly. “By threatening to spank me in boutiques?”
“If necessary,” I chuckle.
“Is that your solution to everything?” she asks, a little playfulness in her eyes. “A spanking?”
“No,” I say, leaning closer to her ear. “Sometimes my solution is my tongue.”
Her breath catches hard enough that I smile. There she is. My mate. Soft and needy and trying so hard to pretend she isn’t thinking about my mouth between her legs.
“Victor,” she whispers.
“I know,” I growl. “Next outfit.”
By the time she tries on jeans, sweaters, skirts, blouses, and a few things she insists are too fancy, I’m half out of my mind. Every version of her does something different to me.
Jeans make me want to bend her over the nearest surface.
Soft sweaters make me want to pull her into my lap and keep her warm.
A green dress makes me think of forests, moonlight, and her naked beneath me in the grass.
A white blouse makes her look too innocent, which only makes the things I want to do to her seem filthier.
And the red dress? The red dress nearly ends the shopping date.
She steps out wearing it, and I stop breathing.
It’s not as short as the black one. Not as soft as the blue one.
But the color does something to her. Makes her auburn hair richer.
Makes her skin glow. Makes her eyes look darker. Fucking stunning.
“Well?” she asks nervously.
I don’t answer immediately. I can’t. My wolf presses against my skin, restless and hungry. I imagine her wearing that dress at my side while every wolf in Silver Pack realizes Mother Fate didn’t forget me after all. She was just hiding my mate behind old magic and human misery.
Taryn shifts her weight. “Bad?”
“No,” I say, my voice rough. “You might as well have wrapped yourself in something that screams dangerous.”
“D-dangerous?” she asks, her voice cracking a little.
“If you wear that, I’m going to fuck you before the night is over,” I say, and it’s no idle threat. I’m already thinking about it.
Her mouth falls open.
“I’m not joking,” I say. “That dress is a promise your body is making to mine.”
“That’s not how dresses work,” she says, looking at me like she’s uncertain.
“That’s how this one works,” I reply.
She looks at herself in the mirror again, and I can tell she likes it. I can also tell she likes what I said, even if she’s trying to pretend she doesn’t. Her scent betrays her. Her thighs betray her. The bond betrays every little tremor she tries to hide.
“I guess we’re getting it then,” she says softly.
“Yes, we are,” I growl.
Her blush returns. I fucking love that blush. I want to see it every day. In every room. In every bed I put her in. I want to see it when she’s shy and when she’s desperate and when she’s trying to act mad because I’ve said something filthy enough to make her wet in public.
I want everything with her. All of her. It settles into my bones like truth.
I haven’t been forgotten. My mate is real, and not just the result of a foolish little girl’s magic.
This is how it’s meant to be. We’re just catching up, because we’ve been denied.
The fate-block kept us apart, but nothing will keep us apart again.
By the time she’s done, there’s a mountain of clothes waiting to be purchased. Taryn looks embarrassed by the size of it, but I hand Jennifer the card before my mate can start arguing.
“All of it,” I say. “And anything else she touched for more than three seconds.”
“Wait, I didn’t want everything,” Taryn gasps.
“Then if you don’t wear it, you can donate it,” I say. “If you touched it long enough to consider it, then we’re taking it home.”
“I was just looking…” Her words trail off.
“Exactly,” I say. “You were looking because you wanted it.”
“It is not the same thing,” she groans.
“It is when I’m paying,” I growl.
She presses her lips together, fighting a smile. “You’re impossible.”
“No, mate. I’m just taking care of you and you’re fighting me on it,” I correct.
“You’re very bossy,” she says.
“That too,” I chuckle.
Jennifer and Susan start ringing everything up, and Taryn drifts closer to me, lowering her voice. “This is too much.”
“No, it isn’t,” I say, looking down at her.
“It feels like too much,” she whispers.
“That’s because you’re used to too little,” I mutter. “Things are different now. You just have to learn to accept that.”
She goes quiet. I hate that I keep hitting those tender places without meaning to, but maybe they need to be hit. Maybe someone needs to keep telling her the truth until she finally believes it.
I cup her jaw and stroke my thumb over her cheek. “You’re my mate. You’ll be cared for. Protected. Fed. Clothed. Fucked until you forget how to feel lonely. That’s not too much. That’s the bare minimum.”
Jennifer and Susan sigh and blush, but my mate doesn’t. Not this time.
“Okay,” she breathes.
That one word is small, but the bond warms between us.
The sales associates finish bagging everything, and I arrange to have most of it delivered to the hotel Saul insisted was the best in Covington. Taryn frowns when she hears the word hotel, but she doesn’t question it until we’re walking back to the SUV.
“Hotel?” she asks.
“I told you I was finding somewhere without mold on the walls,” I remind her.
“I thought you meant later,” she says.
“I meant now,” I say firmly. “You’re not spending another night in that fucking basement. It’s not fit for a pet, much less my mate.”
“What about my stuff?” she asks, some concern in her voice.
“We’ll get whatever you need from the basement,” I say. “The rest can rot down there.”
She looks back toward the street, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth.
I stop beside the SUV and turn her toward me. “What is it?”
“Frank and Melinda will be mad,” she sighs.
“Let them be mad,” I snarl. “They could have done a lot more for you, and they didn’t.”
“They gave me a place to live.” She looks away and I can see the conflict in her eyes.
“And now I’m giving you a better one,” I counter.
“It’s not that simple,” she argues.
“It can be,” I insist.
“For you maybe,” she whispers.
I study her face, then soften my grip on her hips. “No. Not just for me. For you too. You’re allowed to leave places that kept you alive but never let you live.”
Her eyes glisten. Fuck. I didn’t mean to make her cry in the parking lot of an overpriced boutique.
“I don’t know how to do this,” she admits.
“Just… walk away from everything? Melinda might be glad I’m gone, but Frank still needs my help at the diner.
Plus, Shana will be upset with me if I just move out.
She’s the reason I had somewhere to go. I know the basement is bad.
I know that. But Shana tried. Back then, she really did. ”
That softens some of the rage in me. Not all of it.
Never all of it. But enough for me to remember that my mate’s life isn’t as simple as monsters and victims. Some people failed her by inches.
Some by miles. Shana may be one of the few who tried to pull her out before the world shoved her back down.
“If Shana’s your friend, she’ll understand. I’ll make sure everything is squared away with Frank,” I say. “Properly.”
“How?” she asks.
“I have my ways. Don’t worry about it,” I coax. “Just trust me. You’re my mate. I’ll never do anything that isn’t in your best interest.”
She looks up at me. I lean down, brushing my mouth against hers.
It’s supposed to be gentle. Just a taste.
Just enough to reassure her. Then she sighs against my lips, and I can’t resist. I pull her against me and kiss her harder, swallowing the little sound she makes as my hand slides down to the curve of her ass.
She melts into me, fingers gripping my shirt.
The bags crinkle at our feet. Somewhere behind us, Jennifer or Susan gasps from inside the boutique.
Let them watch. Let the whole fucking world watch.
Taryn is mine and she’s everything to me.
I don’t care who knows.