Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 113406 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 454(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113406 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 454(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Chuckling to himself, he headed into the kitchen. To his surprise, she jumped onto the top of the fridge and settled there like it was a favorite spot. He blinked. “All right.” Under her watchful eye, he drank coffee and ate a bagel. No amount of coaxing made her join him at the table—she apparently really liked being up high.
Done with his breakfast, he put the dishware in the sink. “Are you ever going to come down?”
With what could only be described as a “Lord give me strength” look, similar to the one his grandmother used to flash him, she pushed to her feet. Damn, he loved this cat. She leaped onto the dining chair, as graceful as any gymnast. Bones cracked and snapped as she shifted, and soon Madisyn sat in her place—naked and smiling.
“I am totally gone for your cat,” he admitted.
Madisyn chuckled. “She kind of likes you too.”
“Just kind of?”
“For my cat, that’s undying devotion.” Madisyn had been sincerely surprised by how fast the feline accepted his touch. She hadn’t even tried chasing him away from her private space. The cat barked at freaking ants if they got near her precious rockery.
He crossed to her just as she stood and did a long catlike stretch. “You snuck out of bed,” he playfully accused.
“There was no sneaking. You just didn’t wake up.”
“Hmm.” Snaking his arms around her, he pulled her flush against him, stroking all that petal-soft skin. “You’re not at the shelter today?”
“I don’t do Fridays, Saturdays, or Sundays, since I work at the club on weekends.”
“Speaking of weekends . . . Did Shaya invite you to the barbecue we’re having on Sunday?” He almost smiled at the way her nose wrinkled. He knew, of course, that his Alpha had invited her, just as he knew from Shaya that Madisyn had replied with a noncommittal sound. His mate wasn’t dumb. She knew they were throwing it for her. And he sensed that while part of her was grateful they were so welcoming, another part of her felt pressured by it. He hadn’t yet managed to coax her to his lodge for that same reason. She worried his pack would read too much into it and believe she was ready to move there.
“Can’t go,” she said. “Gonna be busy working on my domino tower.”
His mouth twitched. “Domino tower. Right. Well, you got three days to build your imaginary tower. I’m sure that’s enough.”
“I also have a pasta sculpture to build.”
His smile widened. “No one will start hinting at a mating ceremony, I promise. It’s not some sort of setup. They’re not all planning to pounce on you with questions, bully you to accept my claim, or work on making you move there using reverse psychology.”
Her brow creased. “Isn’t that where you make your therapist break down and sob awhile?”
He tilted his head. “You had a therapist?”
“Dawn has one come to the shelter every Thursday. She sent me to see him when I wouldn’t stop setting fires.”
“And you made him cry?”
“Not on purpose.” It wasn’t her fault that it creeped him out when she sang “There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly.” Over and over. In a dreary voice. Cackling whenever she said the word “die.”
“Well, my pack mates aren’t going to subject you to any kind of interrogation or intervention. It’s just a barbecue. And I’ve already made Shaya promise she won’t ask you to shift just so she can meet your cat.” He gave Madisyn a pitiful look. “Please come. For me.”
She sighed. “I’ll think about it.”
“Good enough. Missed you this morning.”
She curled her arms around his neck. “Did you?”
“Yes. I don’t like you not being there when I wake up.” He kissed her, licking into her mouth, groaning as her taste sank into him. “I like opening my eyes to find you lying right there.”
She snorted. “You like morning sex.”
“That too.” Tucking her hair around her ear, he said, “For the first month or so after I lost my family, waking up in the mornings was the best part of my day.”
Having lost her own parents, Madisyn understood. “Because for those few seconds that you didn’t remember what had happened to them, everything was fine.”
He nodded. “Then it would all come flooding back, and the rage would be right behind it. When it finally sank in that they were gone, I didn’t have those few seconds of contentment anymore. I’d lost them. I’d wake with a dull feeling in the pit of my stomach. I still do. But then I open my eyes, I see you, and it goes away.” He caught her face in his hands. “Until it properly sinks into my brain that I’ve found you, I’ll keep on waking up with that dull feeling in my stomach. So yeah, I like to find you right there when I wake up.”