Page 47 of Blade

Weird guy hadn’t talked much about mates…maybe they didn’t have them on Mars?

Blaine paused before closing his mouth and simply nodding.

“Thank you.” I wasn’t sure about his limits but he’d spent a lot of time over the past few days licking my face. That made me think a hug should be fine at the very least. “If murder kitty can lick my face, can I hug my mate?”

Something on my face or in my tone made him chuckle, so I shrugged. “That’s going to sound weird for a while. I just started getting used to the idea of my mate being murder kitty and well…you look human and you’re hotter than I expected.”

Rolling his eyes seemed to help him forget how anxious he was. “I told you I was attractive.”

“At least half of men who say that don’t understand how they actually look.” Men were weirder in very different ways than women. “I met this guy one time who thought he was the sexiest man ever put on this earth because he said he had sexy feet. Feet.”

It’d been a weird first and only date.

I didn’t mind the feet thing but I couldn’t handle his overall level of delusion. Those feet of his had been a knobby mess.

Blaine’s lips tightened to keep himself from laughing. “Mates don’t lie, remember?”

“Is it really lying if you’ve convinced yourself it’s true?” I needed to add that to my list of questions. “We’ll come back to that.”

I had others that we needed to address first.

“So…about that hug thing…what are your limits on physically interacting with your mate in this situation? You know, meeting in this form for the first time.” His very broad, muscular form. “I’m trying not to make assumptions about that.”

But it was getting harder and harder to keep my hands to myself, and I couldn’t decide if that was an impulse control issue or the mate bond.

Yep, I had questions and they just kept coming.

CHAPTER 16

BLAINE

Out of all thethings tilting me off balance, my mate was not one of them. “I approve of any and all forms of physical contact with my mate.”

Just releasing his hand and opening my arms had him pressing himself against me and wrapping his arms around my back. “You see…I’ve known him for quite a while now and we’ve spent a lot of time in his bed already.”

Giggling, he pressed his face into my shoulder. “That doesn’t count.”

“I beg to differ.” It definitely counted. “I’ve cuddled you and kissed you and slept next to you for days now. It’s positively scandalous.”

At least it would’ve been before the world had gone insane.

“I’m afraid to tease you about that because I don’t know how it will come across.” Still sounding like he wanted to laugh again, his hands stroked my back as he tried to cuddle closer. “That wholenow you have to marry mejoke hits a bit different with that mate word running around.”

“You don’t want to give me ideas, my mate.” I knew he wasn’t ready for them, he made that very clear, but he was still putting fantasies in my head he wasn’t ready for. “I’ve spent days gettingto know you, so I’m about a week ahead of you in relationship time.”

Scoffing to cover the laugh he tried to hide, he shook his head against me. “Nope. I’ve fed you and we’ve watched movies and shows together. I even know how cute you are about comics and stuff like that. We’re even.”

“I don’t know about that.” Kissing his head with human lips for the first time, I was glad it was still familiar. His scent was softer in this form and holding him felt different than lying on him, but he was still my Henley. “You’ve been trying to hide things from me.”

His squeak said he was at least guessing what I was talking about. “You’re…that’s…ugh.”

Chuckling at his drama in this form had him poking my side. “I knew you were laughing at me.”

“Because you’re my mate and very cute sometimes.” I was going to spend the rest of this life and the next being grateful for our bond. I don’t know what I would’ve done if I’d hurt him while under the influence of the spell. “Even when I could hardly think there was a bond between us.”

“I wasn’t imagining it?” He sighed as I shook my head. “I felt a bit nuts if I’m being honest.”

“Because you were talking to a monster.” There was no other word for what the magic had done to me even if people seemed to use the word casually these days. “You trusted your instincts and knew there was something important going on.”