The Cougar's Bargain (14 page)

He started to stand, but she gripped his shoulder. “Hey, I didn't crack a single joke about the women and chocolate stereotype,” he said.

“But you were thinking it.”

He hadn't been. He'd been too busy wondering if he'd gotten
enough
chocolate. At the bakery, he'd been so indecisive standing in front of those cases. Part of that confusion was due to the wild cat in his head that kept him from thinking straight, and the other part was there being too many scents in the shop. With his inner cat on high alert, he was on sensory overload and almost everything seemed too strong. Even chocolate could smell bad at that level.

He turned his hands over in concession because it was easiest. “Sue me.”

She released his shoulder and stood, crooking her thumbs into her jeans pockets as she approached the box and peered into it. “How did you know it was my birthday? Did your mother tell you?”

He'd actually been the one who'd told his mother. “Nope. We got married in Vegas last night and I saw your birth certificate.”

“Shut up. No we didn't.” She plucked out a cupcake with white frosting and chocolate shavings on top.

“Are you sure? Aren't you feeling a little married? Maybe that's actually wedding cake and not birthday cake.”

“If by feeling married, you mean like an unquestioning sheep who goes along with whatever her husband says because she married too young and doesn't know any better, then no.”

Sean winced. Obviously, he'd kicked a hornet's nest without intending to. Hannah had family issues, but from what he was finding, that was par for the course with stolen mates. The lore had always been that the women should have been easy to convince to stay because they didn't really want to go home.

Ellery had always made Hannah's family out to sound like the epitome of the American dream. They had that white picket fence reality. Respectable dad, stay-at-home mom, and involvement in all the right organizations. Of the three women, Hannah had the most to go back to, but he wondered if
she
perceived it that way. From what he'd overheard of her phone conversation with her parents, he didn't see how that would be possible.

Sighing, he stood and scanned the remaining cupcakes. “Okay, we didn't get married, although if we had, we would have started off on the right foot this morning with the dysfunction, huh? We didn't even sleep in the same room.” He plucked out what he thought was a marble cake cupcake and peeled back the wrapper. Cake was an awful lunch for carnivores, but sometimes, people needed to do irresponsible things. What was good for the mind wasn't always so great for the body. Hannah
obviously
needed a few cupcakes.

“So, did Ellery tell you it was my birthday?”

“Nah, you told me.”

Hannah furrowed her brow. “When?”

“During the walk back from the bar.”

She closed her eyes and let out a long, ragged breath. “I don't remember anything about that.”

“So you don't remember pinky-swearing that if we both made it to thirty-five without getting laid that we'd be each other's firsts?”

She opened her eyes, only to avert her gaze from him and pad across the room the chair in the corner. “I have it on good authority that ship has sailed for you,” she said softly.

For me
.

The cake in his mouth suddenly tasted like so much sandpaper. Swallowing it was a chore. He set down the crumbly remnants and headed to the bathroom for water. He'd never been the kind of man who jumped to conclusions, but words mattered. The order they were said in mattered.
Context
mattered. There was no way he could pretend that what she said didn't have an explosive meaning.

He gulped down about a quart of water from the sink and returned to the room, dragging his sleeve across his wet lips.

“Don't make a big deal out of it, Sean. Okay?” She smoothed the cupcake wrapper against the armrest and carefully folded it so the round edges met. “It's become sort of a challenge to the men at work. They all think they could be the first.”

“There's nothing wrong with saving yourself.”

She shrugged and flicked the wrapper toward the dresser top. It missed, but it didn't matter. It gave her an excuse to fetch it and try again. To fidget. She tried three times before she succeeded, and then she said, “Here's the thing. I'm
not
.”

“Not saving yourself or not interested in sex?” She narrowed her eyes at him, and he put up his hands. “Don't answer that.”

“I'm not shy about it. It's just that I don't think anyone has ever asked me that.”

“Which question?”

“About whether or not I'm
interested
. Most assume it's just a matter of convincing me without considering that perhaps I would never say yes under any circumstances.”

He hoped a lack of interest wasn't the case. He
did
want to touch her—to be intimate with her—and that was kind of a non-negotiable part of being a Cougar mate. They were sensual beings, and touch often made understanding each other easier. People couldn't help but to let down their guards a little during sex, in big ways and small ones. Being with someone without leaving a little something behind was impossible for all except professionals and sociopaths, of which Sean was neither, although his exes might have argued the opposite.

“Are you going to ask me if I'm interested? That's the natural place for this conversation to go.”

Of course he fucking wanted to know, but how could he admit that without her deciding that he was
exactly
what she thought? A user. He raked a hand through his wilted quiff and shifted his weight.
Deflect.
That was how he'd gotten himself out of trouble most times when he was a kid, on the rare occasion anyone was paying him any attention. “Do you
want
me to ask?”

Ball's in your court, blondie.

She stared at him for a long moment, unblinking with lips parted and hands tensed on her lap. Then she nodded slowly.

“Are you interested?”

After all that, he didn't think she was going to answer. She was quiet for so long, staring through him and bobbing her knee.

He regretted asking.
I should have let it drop.
He'd never been good at letting things drop, though. He was an expert at making people respond. He'd had to be persistent because he got ignored otherwise. His persistence drove his brothers nuts, but Hannah wasn't a Foye.

“I'm only telling you this because the animal part of me won't let me suppress the information. That voice in my head says spill it, and I don't see how I'll be able to move on with my day if I don't.”

“I know that feeling.”

She let out a dry laugh. “Yeah, I bet you do. I'll just spit it out, then. It's not a matter of me not being interested, but of me not wanting people in my space enough to explore it. Does that make sense?”

Not a lick.

“I … I don't know.” She walked to the dresser and stared into the cupcake box again. “There's never been anyone I didn't really mind having in my personal space. I have weird anxiety triggers.”

“Seriously?” He hadn't expected to hear her admit such a thing—that she was anxious. Hair-twirling aside, she did a damned good job of faking that she wasn't.

She shrugged and pointed to a cupcake. “Is that a lemon one?”

“Might be. What are your triggers? I'd like to give them a wide berth.”

“Well, you've already pulled one of them just by being an animal.”

“I'm sorry?”

She shook her head and pulled a cupcake with yellow sugar sparkles from the box. “When I was a kid, I went camping with my dad and brothers. They'd left me alone for a while. Thinking back on it, I think they planned it. They were gone so long. They were supposed to have been going to the showers, but two hours passed and they still weren't back. I think they were trying to toughen me up, but they obviously didn't expect bears to enter the campsite while they were gone.”

“Shit, what happened?”

“Fortunately, nothing. They sniffed around and made off with some food. Scared the hell out of me. It wasn't really something I was prepared for, so I didn't know what I could do besides be very still.”

“If they were actual bears, I don't think it would have mattered how still you were.”

“What do you mean?”

“If the bears saw you and didn't freak out, they were probably shifters. Bears do that shit all the time. We ran into a few when we went camping as kids. They knew what we were, but they messed with us anyway just to get a rise out of us.”

“Are you telling me I've been avoiding anything having to do with nature for the past fifteen-plus years because of a harmless shifter encounter?”

“Wait, wait, wait. What the hell were you doing camping with Ellery and Miles?”

“My new therapist thought it was time I confronted the fear. She said that I should get some friends to support me and just go. She gave me a big list of campgrounds.”

“What happened to the old therapist?”

“Nothing. I had a treatment gap.”

“What made you decide to go back?”

“The nightmares about bears came back after a lot of years—worse than they were before—and also other assorted neuroses.”

He sat, laced his fingers together, and narrowed his eyes at her. Maybe he was a skeptic, but it all sounded too pat for him. “How'd you find the new therapist?”

“She was in the insurance directory. Her profile said she helped people recover from past trauma and that she gave people coping strategies for family stress.”

“Was Arches one of the camping sites on that list?”

“Yeah.”

“And selected New Mexican, Coloradan, and Arizonan parks and campgrounds, too, I bet.”

She furrowed her brow. “I think so. Hard to remember.”

Definitely too pat.
“Would she happen to have been an enigmatic little Mexican woman?”

“Yes. Why?”

Put it together, babe. I know you can.

He could tell the exact moment she did, because she growled. “
Lola
.”

“Sneaky goddess, huh?” He couldn't suppress his bark of laughter. “And now we know what got you girls out west. There's no such fucking thing as coincidence.”

“That's got to be a breach of … professional …
something
!”

“For all we know, she's licensed in any number of professions. She's sure as shit old enough to have dabbled here and there.”

“She should have her license revoked.”

“You gonna confront her about it?”

“Hell no. I'm not stupid.”

He laughed. “Didn't think so. We're all just playthings of the Fates, anyway. All you can do is take it the best you can, and hope they'll give you a little lube if they're gonna fuck you hard.”

“I'm not the only one she's been playing games with, though. Don't you feel the need to call her out about certain things?” She pointed to herself and raised an eyebrow.

He shrugged. At first, he'd been plenty disgruntled about having to go out on a mate hunt before he believed he was ready, but his mother always said that people had a tendency to keep pushing things off because they thought they'd never be ready. People thought they weren't ready for kids, but when they'd had one, they always found a way to make do. People weren't ready to transition into different jobs because they feared they lacked the right skills, but once they got in and got their hands dirty, they knew what they needed to do to succeed—what things they needed to learn.

Sometimes, people didn't know what they needed until they were confronted with what they didn't have.

Maybe Sean didn't know for sure what it was Lola thought he needed in a mate, but he could concede he couldn't do any worse. His life was generally aimless. His direction had been instilled in him by others and he'd just gone along with it so people would like him.

Hannah didn't do that. Perhaps she saw that as a bad thing, but he didn't see the harm of taking a page out of her book. Maybe he'd figure out what he was supposed to be doing with his life if he did.

Outside away from the aggressive,
broken
air conditioners in the frigid rooms, Hannah leaned against Sean's bike and copied numbers into her phone. She carefully compared the digits from Sean's phone screen as she dialed. She'd decided that simple sometimes was best, so she was going to call
Los Impostores
at work and see what she could get them to tell her.

When the numbers were all in, Sean sighed and tucked his phone into his pocket.

“Shush. This is a good idea, and you know it.” She hit the
call
button.

“If it were such a good idea, you'd let me tell Mason.”

The line began ringing on the other end. “Mason would tell me not to do it.”

“And what's that tell you?”

“It means he's afraid of innovation.”

“Or that he's cautious.”

“Afraid,” she mouthed.

Sean crossed his eyes and stuffed his phone into his pocket. “You're going to get me into so much trouble. It'll all be my fault. Just like when I was a kid.”

“You should be used to it, then.”

The line clicked on the other end and Hannah straightened up, bracing herself to make the query.

“If you are a new client,” the recording said without preface, “please leave your name and a phone number so that our appointment maker can return your call.”

And then it beeped.

Hannah pulled the phone back from her ear and disconnected without leaving a message.

Sean leaned onto the seat of his motorcycle and raised an eyebrow at her. “Well?”

“It said leave a message.”