CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Scarlett
It was time to talk but I didn’t want to stop kissing him. I’d never felt so alive before and it was hard to break away from him and take a step back. Breathlessly, I gazed up at him, still holding onto his arms to keep me up on weakened legs.
Knowing we were mates was one thing, but touching him and making that connection with him was something so different.
I’d felt attracted to him before but now it was so much more. I cared about him in a way I’d never felt before. It wasn’t an instant love but I wanted to be with him and protect him and I knew he felt the same; it was written in his eyes.
“We need to talk,” I insisted, trying to get my heart to slow down, but standing so close to him just made me want to shut up and keep kissing him. I released my hold on his arms and stepped back.
“Yes… we need to talk,” he agreed, remaining where he was.
I needed to sit down so I took a seat on the comfortable sofa.
“Where do we start?” I asked as I clasped my hands together. This whole experience was so weird. It wasn’t just like I was a girl who liked a guy and we kinda dated to see where it would lead. No, we were mates and we were destined to be together. We had to sit down and figure out what that meant, or at least I did.
I gazed at him as he took a step closer to me. We both knew this conversation wasn’t going to be easy.
“How about we start with why you slapped me?” he asked as he cocked his head slightly to the side.
The answer was going to anger him. I knew he wasn’t going to be happy that I’d hidden the fact that I knew he was my mate from him. I took a deep breath and released it.
“I was jealous,” I admitted as I held his gaze. His self-assured smile widened.
“Jealous?” he asked. He was so enjoying this.
I narrowed my eyes.
“I didn’t want some other girl with her hands all over my mate,”
The smirk disappeared and his forehead creased.
“You knew I was your mate? How?” he asked in a calm voice. It was way too calm, if you asked me. I kept watching him, waiting for him to explode with anger, but he remained calm. Then I noticed his hands had tightened at his sides. He wasn’t calm at all.
I stood up and showed him the birthmark on my hip. He walked over to me and his fingers traced over the two teardrops.
“You saw mine when you came to my room to get pain pills,” he murmured more to himself than to me. I sat back down on the sofa as he took a step backward.
It was like the silence before the storm.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” he asked as he crossed his arms. His voice remained calm, but I could see the hurt in his eyes.
“I wanted a chance to get used to the idea,” I explained. He might not like the answer, but it was the truth.
“How long were you planning on keeping it to yourself?” he asked softly as his jaw tensed.
“A couple of days,” I answered.
“Why a couple of days?” he questioned, looking a little perplexed.
“Blake saw it. He told me I had two days to tell you and if I didn’t, he would.”
“Blake knew you were my mate!” he exploded. The storm had hit.
“He saw my birthmark,” I tried to explain as I stood up, but I didn’t take a step closer to him. He was furious. Normally, I didn’t feel intimated by him, but it was hard to hold my ground when I could feel the anger emanating from him.
“He saw your birthmark,” he repeated in a deadly tone as I watched him try and control the anger flowing through him. “How did he see it?”
He closed his eyes for a moment; it was like he was convinced the answer was going to upset him even more. I gave him a confused look and then I realized why he’d asked the question.
“He saw it yesterday morning when I was reaching for cereal,” I explained to him, a bit of exasperation creeping into my voice. Trust him to jump to the conclusion that Blake and I’d been getting better acquainted, and that’s how he saw it.
I was the virgin, he was the alpha of a pack with all the girls falling left, right and center for him. And he had the audacity to get angry because he thought I was fooling around with Blake?
“So you and he didn’t…” he said, unable to say the words. His anger began to disappear as he realized he’d overreacted.
“No, I’m not like you,” I stated as I crossed my arms and glared at him.
“How are you not like me?” he asked, not sure what I was getting at.
“Not even an hour ago you were getting mauled by another girl,” I said, trying to contain the jealously that I felt as I remembered how he’d enjoyed the attention. “And if I hadn’t slapped you, you’d probably be screwing her already.”
“I thought you had a thing for Blake,” he tried to explain as he held the back of his neck. “You spent most of yesterday treating me like a leper.”
“I don’t have thing for Blake, I was just trying to make sure I didn’t touch you by mistake.”
He was silent for a few moments and then he let out a sigh.
“Let’s forget about what happened before. All that matters is that we found each other,” he said.
“Fine,” I agreed as I nodded. “As long as I don’t have to worry about your conquests coming out of the woodwork.”
“I’m not going to lie to you, Scar, there have been plenty before, but now there is only you,” he softly declared.
I wanted to stay angry with him, but it was difficult when he was so damn sweet. And I couldn’t help the flutter inside my stomach when he called me Scar. There was something intimate about the way he said it that did crazy things to me.
“It’s hard for me to think you’ve been with other guys, but there is nothing I can do about it,” he said. Little did he know I had an empty past when it came to boys; I’d never had a boyfriend. I’d been kissed before, but that had been the sum total of my experience.
One moment of silence turned into another as I contemplated what I was going to tell him.
“Have you had… many?” He asked the question he didn’t really want the answer to. Hell no! There was no way I was going to tell him there hadn’t been anybody. He didn’t get to have the clear mind of knowing that he would be my first when I knew for a fact that I wasn’t his. He’d probably had so many that he couldn’t even count them.
I hated the fact that when a girl slept around everyone called her a slut, but if a guy did the same thing he was called a stud. It was so unfair.
He would find out the truth when we mated but until then I would allow him to think that there had been others. If I had to think about all the previous girls he’d screwed, I’d occupy his mind with my imaginary guys. Fair was fair.
“A few,” I lied.
His fists tightened and then he released them. He didn’t like that one bit. Welcome to my club. I didn’t like to think about all the girls he’d entertained before me.
He paced for a little while before he turned to face me.
“I know this whole werewolf thing is new to you and most people in your shoes would be freaking out,” he began to say. I knew where this conversation was headed.
“And if your life wasn’t in serious danger at the moment, I’d give you the time to get used to all of it, but I can’t.”
I pressed my lips together as he sat down beside me and took my hands in his. I knew he was going to insist I join his pack and mate with him so he’d be able to protect me better.
I knew he was doing it because he cared about me and wanted to keep me safe; I understood that, but there were just some things I wouldn’t be forced into and I had to stand my ground.
“I want you to join my pack,” he said as he watched me for a reaction.
It wasn’t a surprise. I waited for him to continue.
“It will help me keep you safe. Like Blake explained to you, if you join my pack we will be able to communicate via the mind-link,” he explained calmly, still holding my hands in his.
I could read in his eyes that he was expecting me to fight him on it. Before we’d connected as mates I would have fought him on it but now I understood his need to protect me because I felt that need for him as well. Above all else, I wanted to keep him safe.
Just the thought of something happening to him nearly had me hyperventilating.
“Okay,” I said with a nod to emphasize I was agreeing to it. His mouth dropped open slightly in shock. Yeah, he hadn’t seen that coming.
“I kinda expected you to fight me on that,” he told me as he flashed a lethal smile that should come with a warning, like ‘panties will melt’. I had an urge to reach for his face and press his lips to mine. The constant urge to touch him and have him touch me was very distracting.
“I understand you want to protect me, I really do and that’s why I’m not going to fight you on this,” I explained. I squeezed his hands in mine.
I wondered if he realized my wording meant that although I wasn’t going to fight him on this, I was going to stand my ground on some other things. I’d conceded on this point and I hoped he’d be able to concede on the other ones I wasn’t going to back down on.
“I’ll miss the fact that you won’t smell of wild daisies anymore,” he murmured to me as he tucked a piece of hair behind my ear. He leaned closer and took a deep breath and sighed as he released it. He liked the way I smelled and I couldn’t stop the flutter in my stomach at the thought.
I loved the smell of fresh rain, so I didn’t mind.
“So is joining your pack going to hurt?” I asked as I looked nervously at him.
It just seemed like everything that was connected to the werewolf thing had to hurt: the biting to mate, and the first few shifts when I started shifting into a werewolf.
Was it too much to hope that it wouldn’t hurt?
“A little,” he answered, taking my hand gently into his. He opened my hand and my palm faced upward. “We make a small cut on your hand and I do the same on mine. Once we mix the blood, you become a member of my pack.”
“Can this be done with just any member of your pack?” I asked.
“No, only I can allow a new member into the pack.”
It made logical sense.
“Even you becoming a part of my pack will not be enough to keep you safe. We will need to mate,” he told me. I let out a sigh.
Here comes the fight.
“No,” I said as I pulled my hands from his. “I can’t, at least not yet.”
His jaw tightened and I could see the anger start to build inside of him. Although I understood his reason behind wanting to mate with me, it was something I wasn’t ready to do just yet. I’d join his pack, but I wouldn’t mate with him.
Because of my little lie, he wouldn’t realize that it was inexperience that made me hesitate to do that with him. And although he was my mate and I cared for him, I wasn’t going to take that step yet. I didn’t even know him that well.
I had no idea how long it would take for me to decide I was ready. It might be a week or two.
“You’re making it difficult to protect you!” he began to argue in a raised voice, but I held my hand up to him, signaling him to stop talking. He took a deep breath to calm his anger, but it didn’t seem to be working.
“Put yourself in my shoes for a moment,” I explained to him as I stood up. “I haven’t had a lot of time to get used to the fact that I’m a werewolf and now my life is going in an entirely different direction to what I’d originally planned.”
He watched me pace back and forth in front of him.
“I’m not saying I never want to mate with you,” I assured him. “I just need time to get to know you a little bit and get used to the idea.”
It was my own fault my jealousy had put me in this predicament. I couldn’t tell him the truth that I was a virgin and I’d never done anything more than kiss a guy. We were mates and destined to be together, but I was scared that his experience would make me feel inept.
What if I wasn’t any good at it? I was always strong and confident, but how could I be confident in something I’d never done? Besides, I’d held onto my virginity for a while and I wasn’t going to just give it up after only knowing him a few days.
I heard him let out a frustrated sigh as he stood up and faced me.
“You’re my mate and I have to do everything within my power to keep you safe, do you understand that?” he said angrily.
I nodded my head at him. No matter what reasoning he came up with to try to persuade me, nothing was going to change my mind. I wouldn’t be forced into taking a step I wasn’t ready for.
“Yes, I do understand that, but I’m still not going to do it,” I said, putting my foot down.
“I’ll never be able to forgive myself if something happens to you, you know that,” he said desperately. I could see the fear in his eyes.
“Answer a question for me,” I said as I stepped closer to him. I wanted to reach out and hold him to ease his fear, but I couldn’t, so I kept my arms at my sides. Besides, if I touched him it would distract us.
“Even if we mated, something could still happen to me?” I asked softly as my eyes held his.
He remained silent.
“Mating with you doesn’t guarantee that nothing will happen to me,” I repeated, watching his face for his reaction.
“No… but it will help,” he finally answered, realizing where I was headed with all of this. I’d made my point. A few minutes of silence and I felt his anger begin to ease.
“Fine,” he relented as he reached for me.
I smiled at him as I allowed him to pull me close.
“But if you won’t mate with me, then I’ll need to be with you all the time to protect you. It means I’ll share your room and I’ll drive you to school and back. You can’t go anywhere after school without me.”
Geez, he’s not kidding! He was really going into over-protective mode now. The only thing that made me a little apprehensive was the fact that he was going to share a room with me, but I was happy I’d won this round.
“Okay.”
This whole talk had gone a lot more smoothly than I’d anticipated, but I was glad we hadn’t been at each other’s throats and somehow we’d both compromised.
Now that that was sorted, we could go back to kissing. He pulled me closer and I raised my hand to brush across his cheek.
“I might snore,” I teased him as he leaned forward and his lips were nearly touching mine.
“I can live with that,” he said as he smiled.
His lips touched mine so gently that I felt a tingle run through my body. I wasn’t sure if it was part of the whole mate thing or if it was my body’s reaction to his.
I groaned as his lips moved against mine and my hands snaked around his neck, pulling him closer to me. I opened my mouth and his tongue swept inside and danced with mine. The flutter in my stomach intensified.
By the time he broke free, I was breathless and so aware of his body against mine.
“So when are we going to do the blood thing for me to join your pack?” I asked, feeling a little nervous about it.
“When we get back to my house,” he answered.
Soon, I would be a part of his pack.