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Nick hadn’t expected his night with Lauren to happen in the coterie house, but once the bombs were all found and disabled, Gavin had pulled his top people in to spend the night in the mansion and help with security while he went to Arkansas to take care of Morella.
Nick worked a four-hour shift on patrol in the early evening hours, so he was free to spend the rest of the night with Lauren. His pride had a luxurious suite on the top floor, and he was pretty sure the problem vampire wasn’t going to be an issue for his lionesses again.
Queenie had been handling the problem when he’d arrived back in the warm-up room. Nick had been a shit to her in previous days, but she’d still helped his people. Nick was going to have to do better.
Most of the coterie wasn’t aware of Gavin’s plans for the evening, and even fewer realized just how many people were in residence, or why. If things went to shit and he didn’t come back, there was a plan for how the coterie continued on, though the vampire had managed to somehow keepthattidbit from Lauren.
Lauren had walked him from the dining area back to her room, and now they were standing just inside the door. Nick hated that the silence between them was awkward, but he wasn’t sure how to fix it.
And he had other questions that might make things more awkward, but they had to be asked. He took a breath and said, “So, what happens when he comes back?”
“He offered you the choice of bunking with me or being assigned your own suite. He knows you’re in here. Chill, Nick.”
“That wasn’t what I was asking.”
Lauren looked at him a few seconds and shrugged. “I don’t know. If he’s injured, he’ll probably feed from Queenie or another powerful shapeshifter. If he isn’t, and we’re awake, he’s already said we can sit in on the debrief if we want, and I do.”
“Yeah, so do I. Does he stay in your room with you, usually, or do you stay in his?”
“This is my room. It’s where I sleep when I spend the night.” She shook her head. Furrowed her brows. “He works while I sleep, and he’s dead to the world when I wake and begin my day. You know I’m not living here, right?”
Nick stared at her. He assumed she’d moved in here when he’d kicked her out. “Where have you been staying?”
“On the yacht, at first, and then at Ambrose’s place.”
“I’ve made some assumptions. I’m sorry.” He was screwing this up. “Look, this isn’t my place, and it isn’t yours, either, apparently. We’re both guests, and maybe I’m looking for some rules of engagement that don’t exist, but some general guidelines would be helpful.”
Lauren levitated up and sat in the middle of the king-sized bed. “You’re used to being in charge most of the time, at least when Nathan isn’t around, and you feel out of your element. I’m sorry it’s worked out this way, but I don’t think we have any rules. Gavin always stands in the hallway until I invite him in because he’s trying to make a point that this is my space.”
She straightened her legs. Bent them again, crisscross in front of her. “I know he’s an asshole to most everyone else, and all of vampirekind sees him as one of the monsters that walk amongst them, but…” She sighed. “Okay, so on the one hand, sometimes he tells me stories to purposefully show himself as the monster, but in my personal interactions with him, he’s always gone above and beyond to be gentle and kind.”
Lauren was acknowledging Gavin was a monster, but saying it didn’t matter because she still cares for him. Was that her way of saying she knew Nick has a beast half, and she accepts both parts of him? That had never been a problem with Lauren. From the beginning, she’d acknowledged both sides of his psyche.
“I’ve always appreciated that I don’t have to hide my second nature from you, like I usually do with humans. You’ve been around the wolves, and around my King, enough to understand we kill animals and eat them while the blood is still pumping through their bodies.” It sounded harsher than he intended, but it was the absolute truth. Lauren knew the facts of who he is and loved him anyway.
“Are we to be friends, or friends who fuck, or do you want to see what happens if we explore a relationship?”
And there it was — the question he’d been hiding from, but his Lauren had put it front and center.
“I want to accuse you of…” he wished the steel pieces weren’t covering the windows, so he had an excuse to turn his back on her and look outside. “You’re exploring a relationship with Gavin, and you’ve been clear you don’t intend to stop. Gavin has told me he’s fine with you and I becoming intimate, and even working towards a relationship, but I’m not sure how I feel about it. I want you, but…”
“But if you can’t have me all to yourself, you aren’t interested?”
He shook his head. Yes, that was what his inner cat had been thinking, but Nick was smart enough to understand he couldn’t offer all of himself to Lauren, so he couldn’t demand it of her, either.
“When you say it like that, I realize that isn’t the case at all. I want you in my life in whatever way we can make it work. Doyouthink we can have a relationship while you’re seeing the vampire?”
“I think you’re going to have to put your kitty cat on a leash if he keeps up with the jealousy shit, but if you can convince him he doesn’t have to fuckingownevery female ya’ll fuck, then yeah, I think we can.”
She’d always known him inside and out, but she knew more, now. Probably from the extra input she got from the hawk and the bear. He was decent at controlling scent markers, but the hawk would pick up on tiny visual cues.
Rather than let his inner cat respond and fuck everything up even worse, Nick sent soothing thoughts to his inner beast and told Lauren, “He wants to roar at you, and maybe swat at you without claws. He isn’t happy, but he doesn’t want to actually hurt you, so he’ll probably eventually get on board with it, but yeah, you may have to remind me to stop listening to him, if I forget.”
“I hate that this feels awkward.”
And it was up to Nick to fix it. Lauren didn’t see herself as submissive, but most days, she needed someone else to take control in bed.
So Nick took control.
