Page 28 of Seeing Harper

No need.

“I’m glad you’re here now,” Harper said.

Mate.

“We don’t have a mate,” Harper said.

Her Tiger shook her head dismissively, then turned her back on Harper as she moved to the back of her mind.

“Hey!” Harper said, shaking her head at the Tiger’s silence. “Great. Wonderful talk. Thank you!” Harper said.

No speak loud.

“How would I know that? I’m not used to it, you know, since you’ve always ignored me,” Harper snapped.

Her Tiger shut down, tired of interacting already.

“Hey! Tiger!”

No answer at all came from her Tiger.

“And she’s gone,” Harper said as she turned off the water. “Great first talk. Appreciate it. Patient, cohesive relationship we have here between the two of us. You do know we have to work together, right?!” Harper demanded.

Still, there was no reply from her Tiger or sign of her at all.

Sighing in frustration, she dried off, put on her nightgown and brushed her teeth before she went back to her bedroom. As she tucked herself back in bed, her mind turned back to Clay and the ‘maybe’ mate he’d found. She pulled her covers up to her chin, hoping sleep would come soon. She didn’t know why it bothered her so much. She should be happy for him, right? Deciding she didn’t want to think about it anymore, she closed her eyes and let her body relax. But then her eyes popped open. “Midnight! I have to be having pizza at midnight!” She grabbed her phone and set an alarm for midnight, so she and Clay could share a midnight snack.

Chapter 6

At two minutes to midnight, Clay took his pizza out of the air fryer and held it up to his mouth with his right hand, as he bit into the pointed end of the slice, and snapped a picture with his left hand. He chewed his pizza as he pulled up the picture and sent it to Harper.

Harper’s phone pinged, letting her know she’d received a message. She opened her app and laughed when she saw the picture Clay sent. Immediately, she held up her own slice of pizza and snapped a picture of herself. She hit send, finished her slice and went back to bed.

Clay repeatedly checked his messages, hoping Harper would send him a picture in return. It only took a few moments, and he was rewarded. When he opened his messenging app and got a look at the photo she’d sent, his smile immediately fell away as his eyes widened. There was nothing wrong with the picture, in fact it was without a doubt the most beautiful photo he’d ever seen. Harper was standing in her kitchen, holding up a slice of pizza as she held the phone high above her head, the camera aiming down as she smiled happily up at it. Simple enough, but what she didn’t realize was that she got almost her entire body in the shot. Her light auburn hair, her deep blue eyes, the smooth swell of her breast and the tanned skin of her chest and shoulders where the white lace strap of her pale peach-colored nightgown had slipped down off one of her shoulders. The way the light above the stove shone from behind her and illuminated the outline of her body inside the satiny nightgown and the tops of her knees peeking out from beneath the hem of the gown.

“Dear God,” Clay whispered as he sat heavily on one of the chairs at his kitchen table, his eyes glued to the photo she’d sent. “She’s too beautiful to be real,” he said, brushing his fingertips across the photo. Clay quickly saved the photo to his phone, then made a copy excluding her body, leaving only her head and shoulders in the shot, and made it his lock screen. He didn’t want anyone else to see her like that — ever. She was his and despite his laid back demeanor, a wave of possessiveness swept through him. Nobody was ever going to see his mate like that but him. Clay sat at the kitchen table finishing his pizza, while tapping his phone screen to wake it up and show him Harper’s beautiful smile again when his lock screen was displayed. When he was finished he went to his bedroom and lay down, knowing he’d have to get some sleep soon if tomorrow turned out to be the day he wanted it to be.

~~~

“Did you not sleep well, baby? You still look tired. You want another piece of gingerbread?” Libby asked.

Harper pressed her lips together as she pretended to think hard about it and took another long sip of her morning coffee.

“Really?” Libby asked.

Harper laughed. “I’m just kidding. Yes, please.”

Libby cut her another square of the still warm from the oven homemade gingerbread and put two large dollops of homemade sweetened whipped cream on top. “You’re going to make me fat, Mom.”

“You’ll work it off with the horses today, I’m sure. Besides, I made it special for your breakfast. So, eat up.”

“I’d eat this even if I wasn’t going to the Bigsby’s today.”

“It’s your favorite,” Libby said as she smiled indulgently at her daughter.

“It is! What’s going on?” Harper asked.

“What do you mean?”