Page 39 of Plus-Size Bullied Mate

Freed from the frustration that had built up in me over time, it’s like I can breathe again with it out of my system.

But the reality of it is so much bigger than that, even if I don’t have it in me to look too closely at it here and now.

I just crossed the line I never meant to approach, and now, I can’t take it back.

Chapter 14 - Hunter

I wake before Tessa does, which has been the case ever since our retreat began.

My body pulls me out of sleep at some unreasonable hour regardless of when I went down, and I spend a while staring up at the ceiling until I decide I’ve had enough, but this morning is a little different.

Now, I’m fully aware of her next to me in a way I wasn’t before. While the innate connection we had always drawn me to her, now it’s like a piece of her is in my chest, and it’s finely tuned to her wavelength.

In a way, it almost feels unearned for me as I let the reality of it settle in.

Everything about this situation has changed now, and I should’ve seen it coming after being forced to spend this time in such close quarters.

I knew what intimacy would do to it. Theoretically, anyway.

But the theory didn’t prepare me for lying wide awake at five in the morning, feeling the bond like a second heartbeat, and feeling her in it. I can sense her presence and emotions with a clarity that makes all my years of deliberate distance feel both logically sound and completely absurd, as if I were just delaying the inevitable.

I turn my head and look at her.

Tessa’s sleeping on her side, facing away, and even while unconscious, she manages to maintain the border between us. Her breathing is slow, and like this, her thoughts are suspended by sleep, smoothing out the tension she carries in her jaw when she’s conscious.

Looking at her longer than necessary, I know she would scold me if she were awake, which only makes this moment feel even more substantial to me.

Before, I told myself I’d wait. I planned to be patient and considerate of everything she’s been working through. I meant to let her come to it in her own time, on her own terms, as one of the few things in this situation she could actually choose. But then she had been right there in the dark and the steam, and she’d looked at me and kissed me back. Immediately, the plan folded in on itself with a completeness that I’m still struggling to understand.

But in all honesty, it’s not complicated at all.

I’ve spent most of my life trying to pretend I never felt anything for her, but with the opportunity to be near her falling into my lap, and the ceremony that officially bound us together, I couldn’t push it away anymore. I especially can’t now.

I claimed her completely, even if I should’ve waited, and for that, I’m not sorry.

It’s impossible to be when I can feel this heightened link between us, even in sleep.

Still, I know nothing is explicitly fixed, and I have a long way to go before I can ever accomplish that, but I get up before I do something counterproductive, like waking her up just to confirm she’s still here, and still mine.

Later in the day, Tessa is quiet on the drive back, which shouldn’t be a surprise.

She’s containing herself and giving me nothing to work with, just like before, but there’s a new layer to it now. There are too many things she needs to work through at once, and I can feel the edges of it through the bond, but I can’t read the specifics.

I don’t push. Rather, I drive, watching the elevation drop through the windshield while silence keeps us company.

She looks out the passenger window the whole way, and at one point, she shifts in her seat, and I think she might say something. She doesn’t.

So I keep my eyes on the road and try to ignore the way the cold front coming from her slowly eats away at me.

When we get back to the house, Tessa moves through the front and up the stairs, doing so deliberately before she disappears into the guest room before I even have the bags fully inside. It doesn’t necessarily feel like she’s retreating, but she vanishes anyway, making herself unavailable to me.

Even so, the bond knows exactly where she is, and with her safe under my roof again, I know there’s nothing I can do for now but wait.

I go to the kitchen to busy myself with whatever I can and try to decide if what I’m feeling is normal frustration or the ache of wanting something that’s just out of reach.

Probably both, just like it always has been.

I won’t pretend like I expected her to open up to me the moment we completed the bond, but I at least thought she might feel more willing to try. I’m starting to see that it was more wishful thinking on my behalf.