Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 91636 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91636 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
“Thank you,” I say. “That’s nice. You two have been nice to me.”
“There are expectations for being our mate,” Tailor says. “We’ll all have our individual requirements, of course, but you may as well hear mine first. I expect my mate to be a lady. What level of education do you have, Kita?”
“I went to school once,” I tell him, taking some joy in annoying him. The question is pretentious, and he’s not going to like the answer.
“Once?”
“Okay, twice.”
He gives me a long, assessing look. “You don’t want to tell me about yourself,” he says.
“Not really. You’re a stranger, and I don’t feel like I have to explain myself to you. I prefer Damon’s approach.”
Tailor smirks a little. “Well, you’re obviously intelligent, even if not traditionally educated. It’s important, because you will be raising our babies one of these days, and children get intelligence from their mother.”
“What do they get from their fathers?”
“Safety. Security. Sometimes they get to chase a ball.”
He sips his drink, and I realize that’s something of a joke. He is funny, in a dry, contained sort of way.
“None of you three seem to fit together,” I say. “You’re all so very different. How did you all end up in a port like this?”
“Well, Conroy needed help, and the two of us are helpful.”
“You don’t want to be known either,” I say shrewdly.
“Well, past histories don’t always paint us in the best of lights, do they?”
I’d say Conroy and Tailor are in their late thirties. Tailor might be a bit older than Conroy. Damon is probably late twenties. I’m the youngest of this group by quite a way, and I’m not ready to settle down and forget my mission, even if they are my mates.
I play along, though. I make polite conversation for the evening, and ensure that I don’t sound like I am a flight risk. I tell Tailor that I’ve left my pack in the Southern Isles, and I’m hoping to make a life for myself here in the lower North. The Southern Isles are well known for being rougher than the North, less well off, more vampire infested. A lot of people make their way North, to big cities like Eclipse.
“I’m tired,” I say. “Where am I going to sleep tonight?”
I look around, but Damon isn’t here anymore. That’s odd. I wonder where he went. To do something useful, maybe. He seems like the one who does all the grunt work. He lets Tailor feel refined for not having to get his hands dirty, and Conroy feel powerful for doing the work that Conroy thinks is beneath him.
“You can sleep with me,” he says. “I won’t take advantage of you, I want you to heal up a little before you and I lie together. And I’m going to keep Conroy off you, big beast. He can’t have sole access to you, no matter how much he might like the idea.”
“I’m… I’ve never shared a bed,” I say. “Maybe you can sleep in the bed, and I can sleep at the end of it?”
“Like a dog? No, Kita. You are going to sleep with me like my mate.”
“But…”
I play shy and overwrought. I cover my face with my hands. “I know this seems silly,” I say. “But I… I don’t know…”
He gives me a piercing look, one that feels like it is going right through me. I am afraid for a moment that he somehow knows what I have been up to. Maybe Damon told him my secret, or maybe it’s just written all over me somehow.
“You are a wild thing, and you are trapped, and you hate it,” he says. “You are afraid of me, and you are looking for little escapes. Come to bed, and let me show you how to enjoy being a mate.”
“No.”
“Maybe Conroy’s approach is better for you after all,” he says. “Maybe you need to be made to do what you should do.”
“I can’t sleep in bed with anybody else. Let me sleep at the end of your bed, please. You’re so…” I make a face that sort of implies I am not worthy to sleep in the bed with him. “Fancy.”
“Fancy?” He laughs, but it tickles his ego, and that is all I need to do in order to get the leniency I want. “Alright. Sleep however you are comfortable. If you want to come and get closer in the night, I would not object, but I won’t force you into the bed.”
“Thank you, sir,” I say, throwing in the sir because he seems like the sort of guy who likes that sort of thing. I curl up at the foot of his bed, lying sideways. I fit quite well, actually. I’m not particularly tall, and I have always felt much more secure snuggled up rather than stretched out. Tailor comes and puts a pillow under my head, which I accept.