“I don’t need to kill him yet.”
“I don’t like theyetpart of that,Mav.”
He took my hand, grabbed my coffee cup, and towed me back out of the bathroom. “Too bad.”
I shook my head at his back.
We sat down at the table, with Maverick between me and Timber. The Alpha draped an arm over my shoulders.
When I dared a sideways glance, my eyes widened. Maverick had draped an arm over Timber’s shoulders, too.
Timber was currently giving him a death glare, but not doing anything about what was basically an embrace.
“The weather is beautiful, isn’t it?” Maverick asked, his voice upbeat.
My mom blinked at him.
My dad did too.
Whimsy and Mouse looked at me, their eyebrows raised. I shrugged helplessly. Whatever Maverick was about to do, he was going to do it regardless of anything I said or did.
My mom finally recovered, lifting her chin. “Bloom is going to mate with Timber. She has been since she was eighteen.”
“She’ll be safer, happier, and better off with me,” Maverick said calmly. “I survived and ended the war between our people. I know every way there is to kill a vampire, which means I know every way to protect one.”
“She’s been in love with Timber for eight years,” My mom argued.
“Love was never involved. Bloom is my fated mate, and I’m not walking away from her.”Somehow, Maverick was still calm.
“There are too many unmated male vampires in Vast as it is. She can’t pair up with a werewolf, even if she wants to,” my dad said, as if that was the logical conclusion.
I let out a long breath.
I was going to have to put my big girl panties on and deal with this shit show.
“Enough. All of you.” My voice was so sharp, it caught me off guard too. I stood up, stepping out of the booth. “I am the only one who has any say in who I mate with,ifI choose to mate with anyone at all. Until you accept that, I have shit to do.”
With that, I walked out of the restaurant.
Maverick caught up to me at the entrance, holding the door for me as I stepped out. He whistled behind me. “Damn, Sugar. That was hot.”
I needed food if I was going to work through my emotions about it. “Want to grab something to eat?”
“Always.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
bloom
Maverick textedme a few hours into the afternoon. My coffee cup was empty again, and I was seriously considering going down to the shop in the lobby again instead of making another one myself.
It would take at least ten minutes, though. Probably fifteen or twenty, because the elevator was so freaking slow. I could make one in five, and free time wasn’t something I was currently rolling in, since I was taking the next day off.
Maverick
Want to have dinner together? The food court in the tower has steak tonight, and Nolan’s bugging me about meeting you officially
Me
