Page 11 of I Don’t Believe In Fated Mates!

Chapter Six

LANE

Oh, he did not just say that.

My pulse flutters like a bird trapped in a cage. But my mouth, traitorous as always, decides to double down.

"Challenge accepted. Then I'm walking away. And you can keep your smug, muscled, gorgeous, stuck-up, rude, sexy self far, far from me." Oh my God. Oh no. I just said those words. Where is a giant sinkhole when you need one?

And now his smile is stretching so wide.

"Forget everything I just said!" I splutter furiously. "Did you put something in my tea?"

"Sure, sweetheart," he chortles. "The tea. It's the tea making you say those things. Let's go with that."

Sweetheart. The nerve.

I take a step closer, tilting my chin up so I can glare properly. He's standing so close that I can feel the heat radiating off him, smell the mix of pine, smoke, and something darker—something him.

"Just one kiss," I repeat, mostly to remind myself who's in charge here. Spoiler: it's not me.

"If you say so," he agrees with amusement, voice low and rough enough to make my knees consider mutiny.

I rise up on my toes before I can talk myself out of it, grab his stupidly broad shoulders, and press my lips to his.

It's supposed to be quick. Chaste. A tactical strike to prove a point. But the second our mouths touch, every nerve ending in my body lights up like a Christmas tree.

He makes a low sound, deep in his chest—a rumble that I feel more than hear—and his hands slide to my waist. The world tilts. My breath catches. And suddenly, it's not a kiss anymore. It's a claim. It's heat and hunger and home all tangled up in one impossible moment.

I'm supposed to pull away. That was the deal.

Instead, my fingers curl into his hair, and he groans against my mouth, and oh sweet heavenly werewolves, I'm doomed. He tastes sweet and warm, and his lips claim me, his tongue probing and swirling around mine in a silken dance.

When I finally manage to tear myself free, I stumble back, heart hammering, lips tingling, brain approximately three seconds away from blue screen of death.

He's watching me like I just rewired his entire universe. And I probably have.

"Maybe one more," I gasp. "Just to…make sure." Yes, one more kiss, my shameless libido eagerly agrees. One more, that will show him.

I glance at the kitchen table, heat curling through me. "Have you ever been with a woman on this table?"

His eyes darken, and there's a look of feral hunger on his face. "No," he husks. "But I'm about to."

The air between us hums, thick with want and something far deeper. My breath catches as he steps closer, close enough that I can feel his heartbeat against mine.

For a moment, everything else fades away—my fears, the people who hate shifters being with humans, the impossible truth of who we are. It's just him and me, standing in the golden spill of light from the windows.

I should run.

Instead, I reach for him.

His hand cups my face with a reverence that steals my breath, and when his lips find mine, the world tilts. The kiss is slow this time, deep and unhurried, as if he's memorizing every heartbeat, every sigh.

He groans my name against my lips, and for a moment the wolf inside him feels close—so close I can almost feel the low-thrumming thread of its hunger, ancient and overwhelming. But he doesn't let it take over. Instead, he cups my chin in his hands, and when he pulls away, his gaze is so intense it knocks the air right out of my lungs.

"Lane," he says, voice rough as gravel, "Tell me you want me."

His words burn away any last vestige of self-preservation in my nervous system.