Her Mortal Mate

Chapter Twenty Six: Taking The Initiative

Adam

When we finally made our appearance it was late morning, and we walked into a kitchen full of smirking werewolves. Glancing around there was only one other woman, Briar.

Why were wolves predominantly male? And were all of them single!? Seriously! It made me very self conscious being around so many tall and ruggedly handsome guys. It just reminded me of everything I lacked and couldn’t give Jadea.

It was silly of me, to think these things. She had never before made me feel bad about my body. On the contrary, she worshipped it. All I was saying was that it was hard being around such male beauty and not compare myself to them.

I’d have to ask her sometime about this predicament of male werewolves being a thing, though. Perhaps there was a logical explanation? Perhaps there was a very good biological reason? Or maybe packs usually grouped themselves into male and female packs? Was Jadea’s mixed group unusual?

I was having a hard time looking any of them in the eye after Jadea’s and my little foray in the bathroom. It hadn’t been quiet in the least and I knew—even without their immortal hearing abilities—they’d heard everything. As much as I would love to try and say it had been Jadea making all the noise, it hadn’t been her.

I’d enjoyed our time immensely and, honestly hadn’t wanted to leave the tub. However, I knew the next time we had sexy bath time, I wanted an empty house. So there weren’t witnesses to my very vocal enjoyment.

“Was someone making Mac-n-cheese this morning?” Garret’s voice broke the silence as he strutted on into the kitchen, aiming a knowing wink my way and I could feel the blush starting up my neck. I dropped my gaze, trying to breathe through the embarrassment before someone else noticed.

“No,” Derrick smirked. And there were several chuckles.

“Damn! I sure as heck thought I’d heard it! I was looking forward to having some! I wonder what I could have heard instead?” His gaze penetrated Jadea’s, but I was the one who turned bright red. Jadea was as calm, cool and collected as usual.

“Ya’ll are just jealous cause you don’t have someone to make Mac-n-cheese with,” she snapped back, a smirk of her own playing across her face. As she stepped away from my side, she threw a wink over her shoulder at me.

“Oohhhh daym!”

“Shots fired!”

“Now that just ain’t right,” a different voice spoke from behind me and I started, not anticipating someone being there. There were two entrances into the kitchen, one from the living room and one from the hallway leading to all of the bedrooms. I was standing just in front of the latter.

I quickly stepped out of the way and had to crank my head back to stare up at the rather tall, imposing figure. He had black hair and caramel brown eyes. He looked like one of those picture perfect men you found posing sexily in calendars. This was the guy who’d brought food last night.

“Lance!” I heard the shift in Jadea’s tone. It was more affectionate and just different. And jealousy and my insecurities once again flared up and sank it’s vicious claws into my chest. However, she didn’t go to him as I’d expected her to. Instead, she wove her arm through mine and planted a kiss on my cheek. Her bright smile was aimed at me first and my overbearing emotions calmed. “This is my mate,” she introduced giddily. “Adam. Adam, this is Lance. He is a childhood friend of mine.”

Childhood friend? Hmm…

As my gaze traveled over him, I heard his full belly laughter as I sized him up. “Adam! It’s nice to meet you,” he held out a hand and I took it, surprised he didn’t crush my hand as I’d expected from someone trying to prove their dominance. The way he was acting almost seemed to indicate we were equals. “I don’t envy you one bit. This ones a handful,” he whispered conspiratorially as an aside to me, but obviously Jadea heard him. She smacked his shoulder playfully. For some reason, his actions put me at ease. “Ow!” He flinched jokingly. “Feisty!”

“Garret!” Jadea called out.

“Yes?”

“Where are the rental keys?”

He extracted them from his pocket and launched them at Jadea. I hadn’t been able to follow their path, but she caught them nonetheless. “Thanks.”

“Where are you going?” He asked, his playful mood shifting to a more serious note.

“On a date,” she smiled softly, taking my hand.

For some reason, the room suddenly became charged and I had to wonder if they were all telepathically arguing. Especially when some of them shot glares at each other.

“Why am I being left out of this conversation?” I snapped, unable to keep my silence.

“Out of habit,” Garret fairly growled.

Because I was a human.

“We were debating if it was safe to go out after what happened,” Jadea explained rather calmly, even though I heard the annoyance in her tone.

“I’m just saying you shouldn’t go out without having someone watch your back,” Garret quickly explained. “You’re going to be distracted. And right now isn’t the best of times to let your guard down.”

As Jadea was gearing up to argue, I intervened. “I agree.” Everyone’s gaze turned on me and I shifted a little nervously at being the center of attention. Taking a deep breath and ensuring I had my big boy pants on, I looked Jadea in the eye. “We are going to be distracting each other. While you may know what to look out for, if danger does happen to sneak up, I don’t know what the signs are. While you can spot it and possibly prevent an attack, I can’t. And that will leave us vulnerable.” Jadea nodded after a moment of silent contemplation. “Garret, what were you proposing?” I asked, taking the initiative. Something I didn’t do often, but felt it was necessary in the moment.

“I was proposing,” Lance spoke up pointedly and I turned to him, “that Briar and Derrick go with you guys.” In his gaze I saw the amusement but I didn’t understand why me being outspoken and having an opinion was so significant. “Not necessarily to make it a double date. Both of you can sit at separate tables if you go to dinner, and you can sit on completely different sides of a movie theater, but with a second set of eyes, and a little more force, it will be less likely you will get targeted. And if you are, you’ll have back up.”

“I’m ok with that,” I told Jadea, hopefully ending the conversation. It would be safer with more wolves there.

The silence that stretched between everyone had me wondering if I’d done something wrong. However, Jadea’s pack all looked quite amused and so did Lance. What had I done? My gaze shifted to Jadea and I saw her trying to hide a smirk. They must have all been telepathically talking again. But, from the looks of it, they must have been teasing her.

“Ok,” she relented, turning to Briar and Derrick. “We leave in twenty.”