AllFreeNovel
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He ate my food.
I don’t care what the big delta thinks it means. To me, it means something particular.
It means… it means I might have a chance. A small one, sure, but a chance is a chance—and I’ve done way more with less.
Bobby is still ranting and raving. My toes are just about curling against the wooden floor of my cabin, and he’s still complaining about selfish enforcers and betraying relatives.
“If you’re baking again, you can make me some, too,” he says. “I’m your cousin. Family. Until the two of you get your act together, I should come first.”
Maybe. Maybe he’s right. Maybe Duke and I do need to get our act together.
And maybe I should thank Bobby for coming here to tell me because, Luna knows, I’m not so sure Duke ever would… well, not yet, at least.
I hold up my hand.
Pack council or not. Protector of the alpha female or not. Dominant shifter or not… Bobby is my younger cousin. I have some sway. He clicks his fangs together, waiting for me to say something.
That’s why, feeling generous, I wave toward my kitchen. “If you stop talking right now, you can lick the beaters. There’s still some batter in the bowl from this morning, and the piping bag of buttercream should still be fresh. Knock yourself out.”
Bobby yips, then lunges for me, smacking a kiss on my cheek. “Thanks, Trish. You’re the best!”
I’m not. But I’m trying my hardest to be.
* * *
If my wayto even out some of the power imbalance between us is by baking Duke a dozen cupcakes every day, then that’s what I’m going to do. It might not be much—especially since he continues to sleep outside of my cabin, with or without me—but it feels like something to me.
We do this for about three days before he finally eats one in my company. I don’t leave until he tells me what he thinks about, and after he says it was the best cupcake he’s ever had, I can’t help myself. I throw my arms around his side and squeeze as much of him as I can.
Hugging Duke Conlon is like hugging a tree, only softer and infinitely hotter.
Speaking of heat…
This afternoon, I used my baking session as a way to distract myself more than anything. The warmth I felt a couple of days ago hasn’t faded yet. In fact, it’s only grown stronger. Heat pouring off of the oven has me changing my normal clothes for a simple shift dress. Nothing as extravagant as my old collection of sundresses, the shift dress is more like a slip than anything else. No underwear, either, since it’s chafing my skin.
I’m not just overheated. I’m overstimulated. While the cupcakes are baking, I take a cold shower, and bring myself to come twice before the timer goes off. It doesn’t help. In fact, it just makes me realize how… howemptyI feel.
Like everything would be okay if I found something hard and thick and sturdy to shove up inside of my aching pussy.
My freshly washed hands are shaking as I’m icing the cupcakes. Sweat builds at the base of my neck. I scoop my shower-damp hair over my shoulder, wiping it away with my wrist. It doesn’t help, though the contact makes me realize that I don’t just feel hot on the inside.
I’m really burning up.
Talk about denial. It isn’t until I step out onto my porch, clutching my platter of cupcakes like a lifeline and notice that tonight is the night of the Luna that I realize what’s wrong with me.
This is moon fever, and I’m already lost to it.
I guess it makes sense. Mature shifters feel the need to mate—and Luna knows I have—but they can… handle it on their own if there’s no partner for them to choose. If there is, if there’s someone our wolf will accept, the Luna’s pull makes it so that it’s harder to refuse.
And when you go against the Luna’s wishes… she makes you pay with the fever.
There’s only one way I can treat it. Find the male my wolf would welcome and entice him to mate.
Too bad I don’t have any idea how to do that.
It’s supposed to be instinct. Like so much of being a shifter, we do what we feel is right—but that got me in trouble before. Relying on my own wants and desires ruined my life. I’m not about to ruin an innocent male’s, too.
Of course, if I bring these cupcakes to Duke’s on the night of the full moon and one thing leads to another… well, you can’t blame a she-wolf for that, can you?
