Maybe this was okay. Or maybe not. She'd cried after he signed his feelings to her, but he didn't know what that meant. Human women cried about everything, and he had no idea whether those were happy or sad tears. God, he couldn't do this. He couldn't make her happy, so why was he even trying?
Emma turned on the shower in the bathroom, and Dustin paced again. He ran his hands through his hair out of a nervous habit and bit back a growl. He hadn't said that to anyone. Well, technically he still hadn't said I love you out loud to anyone, but this one counted. He'd built it up in his head so much over the last couple days, from the second he figured out what this devoted feeling was in his gut. Emma was his, and he wanted to make her happy, like she made him happy.
Off-key notes drifted from the bathroom, and he stopped his pacing to listen to her sing. She sounded happy. Maybe Emma didn't need flowers when he made big statements. Let's bite her.
"Shut the fuck up, wolf," he muttered.
Quietly, he padded to the bathroom door so he could hear her better over the running shower. She was singing so softly he couldn't make out the words-they all slurred together. Her hearing aids were still in the charger. A smile stretched Dustin's face and felt so good. She'd said it back. He'd been studying American Sign Language relentlessly any hour he spent away from her, but he was only comfortable with the simple alphabet right now. He would learn it all though. It would just take time. And practice. Emma had been having problems with her aids lately. She fiddled with them too much, and they needed to be re-charged all the time. Maybe he should buy her better ones. Were there better ones? He would have to research this.
She was still singing. God, he loved her voice. Because she gave it to him. She would never sing like this if she knew anyone else was in the room, but for him? She couldn't hear herself, but she was still humming. That must mean something, right? That he made her extra happy? Extra comfortable? Dustin's grin got so big it made his face ache.
Dustin pressed his shoulder blades against the door and leaned his head back, closed his eyes to memorize the tone of her voice. There was a fluttering sound that was ruining the moment, though. Dustin opened his eyes and glared at the desk against the wall. Emma's journal was open, and the top page was lifting in the vent breeze.
Dustin was pulled to it like a bug to a light. He'd thought about this journal so much. Obsessed about it, really. He'd wanted to see her thoughts so badly, and here it was, open, calling to him, tempting him. A good man would've closed it and let it be, but Dustin was a werewolf, and his moral compass was a little bent, so he murmured, "Oops," and flipped it open to the middle.
He read the neat handwriting, a few lines of a song. It was a ballad, a lonely one. Dark. Hmm. Dustin locked his arm against the table and turned the page to the next song. After reading that one, he flipped through two more until he came to a drawing of a panther. It was Winter. She was lying in the shadows of a group of white pines, head turned to the side looking straight at him. The drawing was in black ink, but the eyes were colored gold. Damn. Emma was really good at sketching-a true creative, clearly.
There was another song about wanting more. Dustin liked music as much as the next person, but these were clearly written for other people. To sell maybe, he didn't know, but most of the lyrics didn't match what he'd seen of Emma. She was good. The choruses were catchy, and he wished he could hear them with music. Guitar maybe, like the old scratched-up one that sat on a stand in the corner.
But as he continued to flip through, he lingered on the drawings most. After Winter's Panther, there were angel wings, like his tattoos, and then a set of eyes, one green, one blue. Dustin's heart froze in his chest. At the bottom, she'd written, Who are you?
Next was a drawing of his black-furred wolf with his teeth bared. That was what he had probably looked like when he and Kane had almost gone to blows at the trailer park. Fucker had forced a Change that hurt so bad. The next was of him in the woods, face turned up at the moon, lips pursed in a howl. It was a dark drawing, done in some medium other than ink. When he smudged the corner, the black strokes smeared. He sniffed his finger. Charcoal or something close.
The next few pages were songs, hopeful ones. Love ballads, as if her entire mood had changed. One talked about seeing the real side of a person. But the next was about a man with too many secrets. Dustin swallowed hard and turned the page. It was a picture of him in his human form, striding from the woods, naked, eyes glowing blue and green, face looking intense. He was reaching out. This must've been how she saw him the night he'd Changed in the woods, but had come back to her, needing to touch her to settle the wolf inside of him. At the bottom, she had written, I know you're still good.
The next song was about falling for a man who was too good for her.
Shit.
He didn't want to trick her into thinking he was more than a monster. Here he was sent to betray the Blackwing dragons. And now, if he did what Axton and Jace demanded, he would betray her, too. He wasn't better than her, no. Dustin wasn't worthy of a woman like Emma.
He could never bite her, never give into the urging of his wolf. Love didn't work like that, and he couldn't allow himself to take her chance to sing away, or to tether her to a man who would drag her down into the shadows with him.
Maybe it was a good thing she would turn vamp on him. Then she would be strong and able to defend herself from the trouble that followed him. Maybe then, they would be on the same level, and she could handle his demons. Emma the human was too, vulnerable, easily injured. Emma the vampire, though … She would be a force to be reckoned with. He fucking hated vamps, but he would still love Emma when she Turned.
And she would finally be able to sing all these songs she'd written.
"What are you doing?" Emma asked from the open doorway of the bathroom.
He didn't jump. Dustin wasn't startled because he'd heard the door open. "Reading your journal," he answered.
She looked upset, but he didn't give her the chance to filet him. He blurred to her and wrapped her up in his arms, rocked her gently side to side. "I get it now, about you wanting to be a vampire."
Emma froze against him, but softened in seconds and slid her hands up his back. "So you aren't mad about it anymore? You won't try to talk me out of it?"
Dustin shook his head.
"Will you stop being my friend if I'm a vampire?" she asked.
The worry in her voice ripped his guts out. Emma eased back, and her forest green eyes were so earnest and full of hope.
"We're past that, Shortcake. Vampire, human, or werepickle, I'll still be your friend. I'll be more if you let me."
"What are you saying?"
Dustin leaned forward and kissed her lips, softly like she deserved. As he eased away, he murmured, "We're not pretend anymore. Not to me."
She looked mushy and made a high-pitched sound that made him hunch at the pain it caused to his ears.
"Sorry," she said softer, placing her hands over his ears like that would fix it.
He laughed and pulled them away, kissed both of her palms and jerked his head toward the door. "I have surprises for you."
"What surprises?"
A home cooked meal prepared by him. He'd listened when she told him she was tired of fast food. Telling her would ruin the surprise, though, and for the first time in his life, he cared about stuff like that. "You'll see."
"What should I wear to see these surprises?"
He plucked the tucked end of her towel and let the fabric slip to the ground. God, her body was beautiful. "Nothing is good."
"No one would appreciate that but you," she said, still too loud as she gathered the towel back to cover herself. She was so fucking cute when she giggled to herself like this.
And also she was dead wrong. Any red-blooded, heterosexual male would be tripping over his own boner to see Emma naked. She had the perfect curves, full tits, hourglass shape, grab-able ass, and a confidence that made her so damn attractive.
And her skin was so soft he wanted to bite it. We should.
Dustin shook his head hard to punish the wolf for such thoughts, cupped her cheeks, and lifted her gaze to his lips. "I'm gonna go load up the car. Come out when you're dressed." He smirked. "Or not dressed, whatever."
Emma shocked him when she suddenly went to her tiptoes and threw her arms around his neck. She rubbed her cheek against his like a happy feline and sighed. On a whim, he lifted her up until she wrapped her legs around him and sat on the bed with her on his lap. And there they sat, rocking back and forth gently, as he stroked her wet hair and hugged her close.