Chapter 4
She wants me. I can smell it. That sweet, pungent scent burning between her legs, abundant and creamy, just for me.
I lick my lips, deciding it’s best I not make her privvy to my heightened sense of smell, and my ability to scent out a mate’s arousal. She’s already white as a sheet and trembling.
Tugging the blanket around her more tightly, Esther blinks up at me with wide, blue eyes, looking tiny in my oversized wooden chair.
“I hate to ask you for a favor, since we hardly know one another,” I begin, setting down a mug of hot tea as I join her at the table.
Once I carried her inside, and wrapped her up, I snuck away to put clothes on, despite the fact she definitely took in the sight of me naked.
Still, the next time I’m naked around Esther Basquette, it’s going to be because she wants it, not because I can’t control myself.
She watches me sit, gathering my own mug in my hands. “No one knows?” she guesses astutely, which earns her a nod from me.
“Right. No one knows. So if you could keep it to yourself…” I start, realizing that she’s most definitely going to tell her sister, at the very least. “Or, make sure your sister doesn’t tell…
” I let the sentence hang, because I don’t want to explain what’s at stake. Not unless she makes me go there.
She takes a sip of her tea, chamomile with honey and fresh squeezed orange, which is better than lemon in my opinion.
“This is good,” she says, blowing on the surface, causing it to ripple.
In the tea moving surface, I see her face and mine, a reflection of sorts.
We’re smiling and happy, white ears perched on her head as I nuzzle into her, kissing her cheek and neck.
The image disappears, and my stomach clenches as I caution a glance at her.
“Thanks. I thought you’d like it.” Lie. I knew she’d like it, because her scent tells me everything I need to know.
What she likes to drink and eat, when she’s hot and bothered, when she’s aching and needs me, when she’s hurt or alone…
now that Esther is here in Carrot Creek, I’m fully aware of all of her needs.
Esther watches me closely, still sipping her tea, and I realize I owe her the complete truth. Not because I shifted in her arms but because she will be mine one day, and we need to be honest with each other for it to work.
“So Esther, the cat’s out of the bag. I’m a were-bunny.”
She blinks. “Am I dreaming?”
I shake my head. “No, were-real,” I reply, smiling, but maybe it’s too soon to joke.
Another slow blink. “I thought that was just something in romance novels.”
I smile, fighting the way my thigh bounces beneath the table, my body grappling with the urge to hop. After years of being single, finally, my mate is here and the urge to bounce around in glee is overwhelming.
She reaches out, bracing her hand on my knee, putting a gentle end to the bouncing, smiling softly.
“Sorry,” I say, “I’m just… really excited to have you here, even under the strange circumstances,” I admit.
Her eyes drop to my lap for a half second before coming to my eyes again, and a pretty pink spreads through the apples of her cheeks.
I look down to find that I am excited in more ways than one.
Usually, taking care of this is my priority, but now with Esther here, in the flesh, my heart is so happy, I temporarily forgot my dick is very pleased, too.
I drag a dish towel off the counter nearby, and place it in my lap, shielding my erection despite the fact I already have pants on. “Sorry.”
She smiles. “It’s… I don’t know what’s going on. Am I on drugs? Did all the chocolate get to my head and this is just some fever dream amalgamation of fantasies?” Esther shakes her head, absolutely rattled by the series of events unfolding at her feet.
I clear my throat, and tell a story I haven’t told in quite some time. “My family is from Carrot Creek, we came here years ago to celebrate Easter. This place was perfect, because of all the carrot fields. Enough to feed our bunnies for generations to come.”
She nods her head, still with me.
“Carrot Creek has been a great place for were-bunnies to hide in plain sight, you know? So that’s why I’m here. Although, I’m not doing a great job of hiding if you saw me shift. But you’re the first one. The only one that I know of,” I admit.
“Has any of your family members been spotted shifting? Where are their cottages?” she asks astutely.
“I’m the last one left. My brothers and sisters all married their mates, and left me behind.”
“Where did they go?” she asks, inquisitive.
Letting out a long breath, I start naming off cities, knowing there’s no way I can name them all. After all, my parents went at it like… well, you know. I’ve got eighteen siblings. “Minnetonka, Hayward, Easton, Corpus Christi, Soulsbyville—” Esther stops me.
“Why didn’t they stay here after they… found their mates?” she asks, and I’m both surprised and excited to see she’s invested in this, in me.
“To start a new life, somewhere else.”
She blinks at me, looking a little sad. “Do you miss them?”
I nod. “Of course. You miss Chelsey all the time, don’t you?”
Tipping her head to the side, she studies me for a minute.
“Yeah, I do.” A beat passes, and I think she’s going to gaslight herself into thinking this whole thing is a dream because, I admit, this is unusual.
But then she asks another question, and I think instead of fighting it, she’s accepting of all of this.
“When you find your mate, will you want to move away, too?”
“My mate likes Carrot Creek, and being here would be a new start for her,” I explain, knowing what’s in her heart.
That’s not a special power, I simply saw the adoration blooming in her irises when she first laid eyes on her sister’s cottage, when she took in the expansive valleys and colorful florals.
She loves it here, but she thinks because she isn’t in love yet, that she can’t live here.
I’ll show her she’s wrong.
“Is that right?” she asks, smirking. “Well, whoever your mate is, she’s a better woman than me. I don’t think I could be cooped up in this small town my whole life.”
I drum my fingers on the table, and smile at her. “You’re beautiful.” I can’t seem to keep the compliment inside me a moment longer.
The compliment seems to have the opposite effect, and Esther shifts in her seat, a frown pressing down on her features. “You said I’m the only one who saw you shift.” She shakes her head. “How is that possible?”
My cheeks flame. “I shift on full-moon’s. That’s non-negotiable, even if I can’t see the moon and the moon can’t see me.”
She peers out the cottage window into the forlorn sky. “No full moon tonight.”
Face still burning, I nod. “I know. I also shift on Easter.”
She nods. “Makes sense, being a bunny-friendly holiday and all.”
I nod. “Yeah.”
She prods. “When else? Because it’s not a full moon and it’s not Easter.”
I lick my lips, studying her cupid’s bow, and the fullness of her pout, imagining the velvet soft feel of her kiss. “The only other time were-bunnies shift are when they’re near their mate, and ready to breed.”
We stare at one another, blinking slowly as I wait for her to understand.
“My sister?” she offers weakly, the truth resting in her eyes as the flush on her cheeks spreads down her throat, curving along her collarbone.
I shake my head. “I’ve lived next to your sister for years. She’s not my mate. Trust me.”
Her swallow is audible, and her nerves are visible, lining her eyes, worry etched into her forehead. “You’re saying… I’m your mate?”
I nod my head slowly, but it doesn’t matter how slow or fast I move. The news I’m delivering to her is pretty hard to believe. It’s going to take some time, but I’m prepared. I know I have Esther here until the Eggstravaganza.
“I’m just a girl,” she says, the words wobbly and endearing.
Boldly, I reach across the table and cup her cheek in my palm, trying to infuse the awkward moment with tenderness.
But it abruptly backfires when my nose begins to burn and swell, and in the place of my human one, my bunny nose appears.
Snatching my hand back, I rush to the window and push it open, bracing my hands on the sill.
Dunking my head into nippy night air, I take a deep breath in, trying to calm my racing heart and burning loins.
My mate is here, and my bunny urges are more overwhelming than they’ve ever been. I need to mate her, I need to make her mine or else these random shifts won’t stop. And more than that, I need to mate her mine because that’s our fate.
Esther Basquette belongs to me.
The air douses my desires, because shock can pretty much kill even the biggest flare up of need.
Closing my window, I duck back inside and return to my seat, finding Esther wide-eyed, cheeks red.
“You were—you were gonna shift?” she questions, ducking her head beneath the table to check my feet.
She points at my nose, returning to human form.
“Your bunny nose is going, well, now it’s gone. ”
I shrug. “I’ve never been around my mate before. I didn’t know that contact would start the shift. It’s different for every were-bunny and their mate. My brother Peep would burst into tears when his mate was around.”
She smiles, and so do I.
“But… I won’t touch you again,” I tell her, leaving out the part that as soon as she accepts me as her mate, I can stay in whichever form she pleases, or whichever form I please. Until then, I’m at her mercy.
After blinking at me for a quiet moment, Esther erupts into laughter, soft and buoyant, then gets to her feet.
She pulls open cupboards and looks beneath magazines, digs through my trash and even tears towels from my linen closet.
I let her, because all of my brothers and sisters told me that if my mate is a human, there will be an adjustment period.
“Where is it?” she seethes, the laughter all gone, replaced by frustrated anger. She’s so beautiful to me that as the veins bulge in her neck and sweat glistens on her forehead, my cock thickens, excited by this side of her.
I cross my legs and stay tucked beneath the table, because if I stand, she’ll see how hard I am for her.
The whole were-bunny thing is already hard enough to digest, but knowing that I actively want inside of her and will lose myself there?
That once she accepts me I will be utterly obsessed with her, tethered to her for eternity, my sole goal to please her and breed her?
That’s a secret for another day.
“What are you looking for?” I ask her cautiously, keeping my voice even so as to not further upset her.
“Cameras,” she breathes, nostrils flaring. God, she smells so good when she’s angry. The arousal burgeoning between her thighs smells like the sweetest, most delicious dessert, but her anger.
Holy shit her anger.
Hot and beautiful, like crackling embers, a roaring campfire, toasted treats and whispers in the night. Her anger rolls off of her in waves, her fiery scent washing over me, leaving me throbbing and on the brink of a big mess.
I clear my throat as I battle my desire, my mind suddenly acutely aware of the fact that after all these years, my mate is finally here.
Jack Hopper will not die a lone were-bunny fated to being a single guy.
“There are no cameras. This isn’t a joke,” I tell her calmly. “You’re seeing me with your own eyes, Esther. You know this is real. You’re just scared.”
She stands straighter, and I find her resolve sexy, too. Then again, everything Esther does will arouse me. She’s my mate, after all. “I am not.”
I nod. “You are. And that’s okay.”
She folds her arms over her chest, defiant. “Okay, genius. What am I scared of?”
I volley my head, working through the list in my mind.
“Well, you’re scared of me a little, because of my size and the fact that I can turn into a large bunny at any time.
Though as you’re listening to me recount this, your fears are lessening by the moment because you know, deep down, I’m safe and harmless,” I start, studying her features to see that I am indeed, on base.
“And you’re scared of what it means if I’m right—which I am,” I interject before continuing.
“You’re scared to see how people react to you knowing that you love a were-bunny.
You’re nervous to know how I make love, because you want me, you just don’t know how to want me, and what to expect. And you like knowing what to expect.”
She doesn’t nod her head, and she doesn’t verbally agree. But her sharp body language softens, shoulders sloping, face growing tender.
“Let me prove to you that you’re my mate,” I ask of her, not wanting to wake to find she’s fled in the middle of the night. “And in return, I’ll help you prepare for the Eggstravaganza so that your sister can rest.”
I outstretch my hand. “Do we have a deal? You give me two weeks to prove to you that we’re mates, and at the end of the two weeks if you don’t think any of this is real, I’ll never mention it again, and in the meantime, I’ll help you with anything you need. I’m at your disposal.”
She reaches out, and our palms kiss. The heat and friction of her touch sends off fireworks in my belly, and the tops of my feet grow itchy as white hair slowly appears. I yank my hand back and shake my head. “Let me walk you back. I could use the fresh air. But… we have a deal?”
She watches whiskers sprout from my face, her eyes wide. “We have a deal.”