Chapter Nineteen-Ryan
I was vibrating with anticipation.
Not just a little jittery.
Not a bit of nervous energy.
Full-body, bone-deep, animal-on-the-edge vibrating.
I’d barely slept all week, too keyed up thinking about her. Donny Andrews. The Witch. The woman who haunted my dreams and tied my Bear up in knots with a single glance.
And now? I was finally going to feel her hands on me.
Not the way I wanted—yet—but I’d take what I could get.
A haircut. That’s all this was supposed to be.
So why the hell did I feel like I was about to walk into a claiming ceremony?
I pulled up to Hair Now, Gone Tomorrow, my jeans sticking a little too tight to my thighs because someone had baked three trays of cinnamon knots at 3AM to burn off tension.
Someone with paws.
Someone with feelings.
Someone who’d ripped the firehouse back door off its hinges earlier today because the idea of this haircut had me so wired I accidentally Shifted when I caught her scent on the breeze.
“Better run off some of that energy, bro,” Conrad had said. “No worries, I’ll fix the door.”
Yeah. Sure.
Fat lot of good that did.
Now I was here. At her salon.
Standing just outside the front door, doing deep breathing like a damn yoga Bear and trying not to embarrass myself by knocking over a newspaper stand with my tail.
I inhaled.
Donny’s scent hit me like a sucker punch to the solar plexus—wildflower honey and vanilla and magic—and beneath it, need.
Her need.
It curled around me like silk and fire. I could scent her magic on the air—agitated, spicy, flirtatious.
Her desire was pulsing through this place like it had soaked into the floors and mirrors.
She was aroused. Whether she admitted it or not.
She wanted me.
And my Bear? The beast was roaring with approval.
I pushed open the door, and her voice hit me first.
Sharp, exasperated, full of sass.
Goddess, I could listen to her yell at her assistant all day.
Then I saw her.
My Donny.
She was wearing something different now. But that made sense since before she’d been soaked.
Honestly, if I had to think about her walking around all day in wet clothes, I’d lose my mind.
Right now she had on black leggings, a smock with paint splatter-like streaks of pastel magic across the chest, and her new honey blonde hair was floating behind her like a flag waving in the wind before a battle.
Her cheeks were flushed, magic glittering gold on her fingertips.
Her hips swayed even when she wasn’t moving.
Her lips were pursed in concentration.
She was chaos.
Beauty.
Fire and honey—my Honey—all rolled into one bite-sized Witch bomb.
And she smelled like she missed me.
Not that she’d say that.
Not that I’d push for that admission.
Not yet anyway.
"Hey, Donny," I said, my voice a little too deep, a little too rough.
Her eyes met mine, and something flared there—surprise, hesitation, then heat.
She recovered fast though, waving me toward the chair like I was just another walk-in off the street and not her fated mate.
But she knew it. Deep down in her Witchy soul she fucking knew exactly who I was to her.
Some banter and the sexiest shampoo session later, she was nudging me to a different chair.
Lumbering oaf that I was, it took me a minute. But can you blame me? I mean, she was so close.
“Let’s go, Smokey the Bear. Sit down right here,” she said, like she hadn’t been thinking dirty thoughts about me two seconds ago.
I obeyed. Mostly because I’d follow that voice anywhere.
She spun the chair, so I was facing away from the mirror, and ran her fingers through my too long hair.
I exhaled through my nose and resisted the urge to grab her wrist and kiss her palm.
She didn’t know how much that touch meant to me.
How hard I’d waited to feel it.
Then she lifted a lock and snipped.
A slow grin spread across my face.
Nice try, sweetheart.
“You trying to scare me?” I asked, glancing up. “Because it’s not gonna work. I already said I trust you.”
Her fingers stilled for half a second. Then resumed.
“Oh, so you asked around about me?” she shot back, trying for casual, but I heard the hitch in her breath.
“Maybe I did,” I murmured. “Why? You care what I do?”
She didn’t answer. Not with words.
Just pressed closer, like it was an accident.
Like she didn’t realize her hip was nestled between my thighs.
Like she didn’t feel the way I throbbed for her.
Like she wasn’t deliberately brushing her body against mine with every pass of the scissors.
My Bear rumbled.
Not loud.
Not threatening.
Just there—a low, constant sound that said, she’s ours.
That said mine.
That said, don’t fuck this up.
And she, she was sniffing me.
The moment her nose brushed my neck, I nearly lost it.
I had to close my eyes.
Had to dig my claws into the chair’s armrests—not physically, but in my mind.
Because if I touched her now, I’d be begging.
Dropping to my knees in front of her and offering everything I was.
Instead, I stayed still.
Let her sniff me like I was her own personal cinnamon-scented sex candle.
And gods, the way her breath caught?
It was the best damned moment of my life.
She moved between my legs like it was natural.
I held her waist and didn’t move a single inch more.
She needed to come to me.
To choose me.
And every second her magic brushed mine?
Every time her fingers trailed through my hair?
It chipped away at my restraint.
I let her trim and buzz and tease.
I let her run her fingers over my scalp and tug gently.
I let her get as close as she wanted, because I was done hiding what I felt.
My arousal was thick in the air now.
My Shifter scent wrapped around her like a cocoon.
I didn’t force it.
I didn’t push.
I simply let her feel it.
Let her decide if she wanted to breathe me in.
And the way her lips parted? The way her breathing hitched? The way her thighs pressed tighter?
She wanted to.
Oh, I fucking knew she wanted me.
And it was the single hottest moment of my life.
By the time she reached for the razor, I was half feral.
Her touch was reverent, careful, slow.
She shaved me with the same grace a priestess might use to tend to a sacred blade.
When she whispered beautiful—thinking I didn’t hear—I almost dropped the mask.
"You have no idea," I replied, voice raw.
Her gaze clashed with mine, and it was full of confusion, hope, longing, lust.
She was already mine.
She just didn’t know it yet.
So I waited. I stayed still. I didn’t rush in like I wanted to—was desperate to.
“It’s your choice, Honey,” I whispered when she finally raised her big, beautiful eyes to mine.
Because when Donatella Andrews finally fell into my arms? I wasn’t letting go.
Mine.