Page 69 of Fake It ’Til You Mate It

Max bends his head close. “Mine,” he says quietly, the word more vow than claim.

“Yours,” I whisper. “But you’re mine, too.”

He laughs low in his throat before kissing me under the full moon, surrounded by our pack. His family is here. Mine… isn’t. That was on purpose. I love Max and I want to spend the rest of my life with him. Once my mother knows I’m marked and mated and bonded, she’ll understand that I was never going to end up with an opossum.

Dad won’t care as long as I’m happy.

And Grandma Jean… well, as long as I keep Dough You Believe in Magic running—which I definitely plan on continuing to do like I have been since we solved the murders—she’ll be just as ticked as Dad.

For now, though, I need to get to the whole ‘marked and mated and bonded’ part.

I already have my mating mark. Max couldn’t wait. He meant it when he implied that he would never let me go. He’s right. He’s a good male. If I really wanted to leave him, he’d be heartbroken, but he’d let me go if it’s what I wanted. The first time we mated, he honestly convinced myself that he would never get the chance to do it again.

Of course, we night be a wolf and an opossum, but we’ve been going at it like bunnies in the time since we solved the murders. Our second time, Max scraped his fangs over the curve of my shoulder, leaving a pair of thin lines that scabbed over immediately. I kept them, and the look on Max’s face when he saw that I kept them on purpose… I didn’t have to tell him that I chose him and accepted him as my make. Anytime he trailed his fingers along the thin white scars, he has all the proof he needs right now.

Well, except for a finalized bond between us…

Leaving our packmates to celebrate in the woods, Max takes my hand, guiding me back to the Alpha cabin. It’s only been a couple of weeks, but in the short time since I’ve moved here—protective custody becoming permanent custody real quick—it’s stopped being Max’s territory and started to become ours.

For the most part, Gus has officially defected to Riordan’s side. He sleeps on the Beta’s desk in the sheriff’s station these days when he isn’t coming to the bakery with me, tiny paws resting on Riordan’s notebook. Riordan swears he’s only keeping him company while I’m working to satisfy all the new customers who want to meet the Alpha’s mate, but I’m pretty sure he’s been bribing him with watermelon.

It’s fine. Max and I have had plenty of other distractions.

Our mating dance was unique. Most shifters recognize their mate and, almost immediately, finalize their bond. Not us. My whole ‘fake it ‘til you mate it’ plan coupled with Riordan’s accidental order might’ve given us a slow start, but we’ve more than made up for it since then. Nowadays, we’re in the early honeymoon phase of long-lived mating. If Gus would prefer to stay with the very single Riordan over listening to me and Max mate most nights.

Ever since the night he claimed me in front of the pack, we’ve shared his room. He goes to the sheriff’s office every morning unless he’s needed in the den; I open the bakery at dawn. But every night, this cabin is ours.

The bakery is mine. The room above it? I’ve emptied it of everything I brought with me from Glenville. For now, it’s just extra space. I’m hoping to hire an assistant at the bakery, maybe offer them the room as part of their salary. If not that, there’s always Ashton.

I’m sure my cousin would jump for an excuse to get out of Onancock if Aunt Tessa is treating him anything like my Mom treats me. Who knows? Moonburrow could use another Morgan.

But not tonight.

Tonight is for Max and me, for the night where we pledge ourselves to each other with the Luna our only witness.

Max stands by the window, shirt gone, slacks gone, moonlight sliding over his skin. I look him over, trying to figure out where I’m going to leave my mark on him tonight.

He turns toward me, eyes burning like molten lava. “You ready, Killer?”

The nickname hits softer now. A promise that he’ll do whatever he can to see me alive… jeez, I fucking love him.

I move toward the bed. I wore a light pink slip of a dress to our Claiming Ceremony. I’d traded my sweater and jeans and boots for it after dessert because a) it was pretty, and b) I got it for ten bucks. “Almost.”

He quirks an eyebrow. “Almost?”

“Sit down, Max.”

My powerful Alpha mate has a secret kink. He loves it when I tell him what to do in the bedroom. I guess, when he’s spent his whole adult life as a dominant wolf shifter, he got used to always being in control. Giving it to me, letting me tell him what to do in the privacy of our mating bed… nothing gets him hot faster.

In fact, he groans as he sinks down on the bed, beautiful and naked and mine.

I don’t undress. Not yet. I lower myself between his thighs, stroking his cock absently as I bite the corner of my mouth in deep concentration.

His eyes just about roll to the back of his head. “What… unh… what are you doing? Because I’m primed to explode, Honey, and this is our mating night. I’m not exploding anywhere but in my mate.”

“I know,” I say simply, punctuating my statement with a twist of my wrist. He grits his teeth. I grin angelically. “I’m just trying to figure out where I’m going to mark you tonight. Any suggestions?”

“Anywhere,” he pants out. “I want all of Moonburrow to know that I’m yours.”