8. Rowan
Rowan
“Are you going to talk to me now?” I asked as he licked the plate clean.
Milo’s plump bottom lip stuck out as he pouted, remembering he was mad at me now there was no more pasta to distract him.
“Are you gonna run away again?” he retorted, sounding sulky.
I sighed. “I didn’t ru—”
“You did.”
I frowned. Well, I suppose I hadn’t exactly been subtle about it when I’d stormed out of here earlier. “Okay. You’re right.”
“Don’t you like me?”
My chest ached. “That’s not it, Milo. I like you very much.”
“Then why do you want me to go already?” Milo crossed his arms over his chest as he slumped back in the chair.
“It’s not that I want you to go.”
“Then what?”
“What do you mean ‘Then what?’ You don’t live here, Milo.”
“Why can’t I live here?”
“Because I live here.”
“Yes. With me.”
“You want to live here with me?”
“Yes.”
My mouth opened. Closed. Opened. I really didn’t know what to say to that. “You can’t,” I landed on eventually.
“Why? We’re going to be mates. We need to live together.”
“Mates?” I exclaimed.
Milo rolled his eyes at me again. “That’s what I said.”
“I… but… we’re both… We don’t even know each other.”
“Well, we won’t get to know each other if I go back to the colony.”
I stood up, grabbing the plates from the table and taking them over to the kitchen sink to scrub them clean. Once they were, I switched to cleaning up the rest of the kitchen as well, so I had something other than a pouty selkie to focus on.
Milo’s eyes were heavy on my back as he waited for me to argue with him, but he was so difficult to argue with when what he said and did hardly relied on any form of logic I’d experienced before.
“We aren’t mates, Milo,” I said once the kitchen was scrubbed clean and I felt a little calmer and brave enough to look at him again.
“Not yet.”
“Not at all.”
He stood up with enough force that his chair fell backward and slammed against the floorboards. “Why not?”
“Because. I’m not a selkie.”
“So?”
“So, I think that’s rather important.”
“Well, I don’t. I know you find me attractive. I saw your dick get hard for me.”
Heat rushed to my cheeks. I would never live that down. There was no point in denying it. “That doesn’t mean we should be mates.”
“No, but that’s not the only reason.”
“What are the other reasons?”
“My goddess led me to you.”
His goddess?
“Out in the storm,” Milo continued when I didn’t respond.
“She wanted me to find you. Rather than get to land to find safety, she wanted me to get to you. So it doesn’t have to be right now, and we can get to know each other more before we become mates, but I’m supposed to be here, Rowan.
I can feel it. Like fate. She answered my prayers.
The colony isn’t my destiny anymore. You are. ”
I didn’t believe in fate, or his goddess.
I didn’t believe the words that hit like a battering ram against the icy walls I’d put up around myself.
I couldn’t let him in, because I wasn’t strong enough to let someone new in, only to be left alone again.
And he would leave. Because everyone always left.
“I’m tired, Milo,” I told him. I hadn’t slept at all last night, too focused on the stranger I’d pulled from the sea and making sure he was alright.
“I’m not arguing this with you anymore. So I’m telling you now, we aren’t mates.
Your goddess was mistaken. Now, get whatever you want to keep, and I’m taking you home. ”
His upper lip pulled up in a snarl as he marched over to the hoard he’d collected. “No. I’m not going, and you can’t make me.”
Milo stretched his coat over his back, and a moment later there was a very agitated seal sitting in front of the fireplace.
No. He’d said no. I wasn’t prepared for him to say no and had no idea how I was supposed to proceed.
He’d just decided he lived here now, and unless I was going to remove him by force, there didn’t seem to be much I could do about it.
It was some bizarre case of reverse kidnapping, and I was far too tired to deal with it now.
So be it. He could stay another night, and I’d try to talk to him again once we’d rested. Worst-case scenario, he’d just exist around here for a couple of days until he got bored, and then maybe he’d let me take him home.
Milo let me clean up the house and all the mess he’d made, as long as I didn’t touch the nest he’d built in front of the fire.
I considered having another shower before bed, but I didn’t want to risk a repeat of what had happened this morning. If he’d be staying, I’d install a lock on the bathroom door tomorrow.
Then I found fresh sheets for my bed in the linen closet, seeing as he’d stolen the ones I’d been using, along with the pillows and the rest of the bedding.
He hadn’t touched the towels, so I grabbed a couple, using a folded one as a makeshift pillow, and I dressed in some heavier clothing so I wouldn’t get too cold during the night without a blanket.
Despite being exhausted, sleep was difficult. All I could think about was the selkie in my living room, and the words he’d said. He thought I was his fate. The answer to some prayer. I wasn’t. I was just… me. I’d never be enough for someone like him, and the sooner he moved on, the better.
I wasn’t sure how long had passed when I finally managed to drift off to sleep, but I was woken again as my mattress shifted with a new weight. I kept my eyes closed, pretending I was still asleep.
The familiar weight of my quilt was pulled over me, and a moment later a very hot, naked, and smoke-scented body was slotting in against mine beneath it.
My pulse thundered in my chest.
“Milo,” I mumbled.
“Shhh,” he hushed me, one finger pressed to my lips before he wriggled around a bit more to get comfortable. Then he grabbed my arm and draped it over his stomach. I tried to pull it back but quickly found out just how strong a selkie could be when he refused to let me.
Then he was finally still and content, quickly drifting off to sleep with light snores as evidence.
I knew, without a doubt, that I wouldn’t be able to sleep any more tonight. Not with his body pressed against mine. And not with the amount of heat that radiated off him like he was his own fire.
The heat of him, paired with the quilt and the extra clothing I’d worn to bed, had me sweating, but even in sleep, his grip would tighten over my arm any time I tried to shift away from him.
How was this my life now?