“You think?!”
But despite her outrage, I can feel through our bond that she’s not actually upset. She’s... curious. And still aroused, the knot putting pressure in all the right places.
“It’s not so bad,” I murmur, pressing a kiss to her temple. “Being tied to you.”
“That’s because you’re a fox. This is normal for you.”
“Nothing about this is normal for me. The mating tie only happens when you’re fated. Or if you’re with another fox who’s in heat. I tend to avoid that. Not really in a financial position to be producing little fox cubs.”
Her eyes bulge. “Please tell me this isn’t that.”
“Me impregnating you?”
“Yes!”
I try to think back to my shifter sex ed and come up blank. “We didn’t go too in-depth with interspecies mating at cub school. But maybe we could figure it out—how does this work with cats?”
“I’ve never…you know…with a cat shifter before,” she admits. “They, um, have barbed penises.”
“The fuck?”
“Yeah. That’s why cats scream when they’re mating.”
“That’s barbaric.”
“I don’t know. Kittens are born every day. So it can’t be that bad. Just never seemed fun to me.”
“So what’s the point of the barbs?”
“Similar to your knot, I guess. Stimulates ovulation to increase the chance of pregnancy.”
“Hmm. We might be in trouble then.”
Her eyes widen. “You think?!? Jesus Christ. I don’t want kittens!”
“Technically, they’d be fox-kittens. Or kitten-foxes. Or kittoxes. No. That sucks. What about Foxtens. Hmm. That one kinda sounds like an insult.”
She slaps me on the chest. “Why are you making light of this? We could be in real trouble here!”
“I make light of everything, Tabby. That’s my job.” I reach up to brush her hair back from her face, enjoying the way she swats at my hand with elegant pique and very little force. “Besides, you said yourself you don’t know how this works for crossbreeds. Worst-case scenario, we have a litter of adorable chaos sometime in the future. Best case, we just keep practicing.”
She gives me the most unimpressed look in the world. “That’s not reassuring at all.”
I prop myself up on one elbow, careful not to shift in a way that makes either of us yelp for the third time in two minutes. “Come on. We’re two adult shifters. We can handle a little biology.” I lower my voice, which is difficult given it’s already been reduced to a throat-shredded rasp by the combination of her and the exertion. “Or did you not like it?” I look her in the eye, letting her see everything, even the things I’m not saying.
She blinks. Her tongue darts out, wetting her lower lip, still swollen from my kisses. Her fingers, a little shaky, draw lazy shapes on my chest. “I liked it,” she whispers. “Obviously. I just… I didn’t expect you. This. Us. I don’t know what to do with it.”
I could joke, as is my way. Deflect, dodge, dazzle. But something about the way she says ‘us’ makes my heart ache a little. Instead, I hold her. She fits perfectly, our chests pressed tight, her heartbeat thundering against mine.
“I don’t either,” I admit, a confession so raw it almost tastes bad in my mouth. “But I’m not sorry.”
Tabitha looks up at me, her eyes wide and soft and impossibly green.
She smiles, open and unguarded, then tucks her cheek against my shoulder. “I’m not sorry, either.”
We lie there for a few minutes, breathing together, feeling each other through our bond. It’s intimate in a way I wasn’t prepared for. Not just the physical connection, but the emotional one. Like we’re sharing the same heartbeat.
“Jasper?”
