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I moved slowly, taking a breath before speaking. “I’m ‘treating you differently’ as you say, because you’renotjust ‘any other woman,’ Kinsley. You’re my mate.”
She sucked in a breath and lifted her knees up to cover herself. “Oh.”
Yeah.Oh.
I hadn’t expected those words to leave my mouth, but it was the truth, and I didn’t want to lie to her.
Shit.If I were being honest, I didn’t even want to keep her at a distance. Everything about her called to me. Bond or not, there was something powerful about Kinsley. She was confident in herself. She wasn’t afraid to say what was on her mind. She had a strength inside her very few others did. One that I couldn’t wait to see flourish.
I walked back to her and gripped her chin. “I’ll be right back, and then we’re going to talk.”
She nodded, and my inner wolf hummed in approval.
This woman was ours.
Chapter16
KINSLEY
Well, fuck. I hadn’t expected to wake up to a raging Grayson or to be ravaged by him in the next second. Though, neither of those things was bad.
I might have enjoyed pissing him off, but that didn’t mean my feelings for him weren’t growing. The attraction had been instant, but the deeper emotions—those weren’t something I’d be able to ignore forever.
More importantly, I didn’t think they’d been fabricated merely because of the bond I knew we shared. Grayson was slowly showing me that he was more than a hunter of people. That he cared more than he liked to admit. That he would do anything to protect those he deemed innocent.
Hell, even his demon side didn’t deter me. I knew there was something darker festering inside him, but Grayson was in control. That much, I felt confident about.
And the way he made me feel? I removed my already loose ponytail and let my head drop back onto the mattress. There were so many emotions filtering through me that I didn’t yet understand, but more than what Grayson elicited from me, there was something about this place that was different.
Something about Fire and Fluorite felt familiar, as if I should have known more about the House than I did.
A stirring moved through me, and I got up from the bed to get dressed before Grayson came back. Presumably, he was in the bathroom taking care ofhisbusiness. I would have done that for him, but I’d seen the fire in his eyes and known there’d been no point in arguing with him.
As much as I enjoyed our banter, I couldn’t deny I was eager for him to come back so we could talk. We’d only been around each other a few days, but we were due for some open communication.
That was at least one thing I didn’t normally have a problem with outside of trying to make friends. Then again, I’d never had a boyfriend…or mate. Hopefully, I wasn’t about to freeze up on him.
I got dressed and waited for him on the bed. Within ten minutes, Grayson was back in the bedroom, and the dark-green flames I enjoyed in those cognac eyes of his were no longer present.
His hair was wet and falling over his forehead, making me want to run my fingers through the ebony strands.
“Good shower?” I asked.
“Could have been better.” He sat next to me on the bed, leaving about a foot of space between us. “How are you feeling?”
Chuckling, I twisted until I was facing him. “That’s a bit of a loaded question, don’t you think?”
He shrugged. “Not really.”
“How about we start with you?” I countered since he rarely opened up. “How areyou?”
Grayson surprised me by reaching for my hand, his eyes staring down at our intertwining fingers. “I’m glad I couldn’t kill you.”
I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to feel about that statement, so I stayed quiet, thankful when he continued.
“You know that I was murderous when I thought you’d taken the lives of children, but you don’t know why.” He paused to take a deep breath. “I had a little sister. Her name was Addie, and she was ten when her life was pointlessly taken by demons from my past.”
Fuck. I’d just thought he had a soft spot in his heart like any normal being would for kids. I didn’t consider the situation had been personal for him.
