“Demons, there are demons?”
Brandon tilted her head and brushed his lips over hers. “Yes, there are demons. And I feel they are misjudged. I would call a demon a sin-eater. They take away your sins. They also have mates like us. They even come to our aid.” He rubbed his hands up and down her back.
“You keep saying I’m protected because I’m a mate. What is this mate thing?”
“It is this.” He took possession of her lips, pulling her closer to his hard naked body. Jezebel didn’t resist. She moaned and melted into him. Jezebel’s arms came around his neck, and she held him to her. Feeling he’d made his point and knowing if he continued he’d never finish telling her everything, he broke his mouth from hers.
“That, what just happened, is the mate bond. Mates are irresistible to each other. They are the other half of their souls. They make shifters stronger. Mates are the one person whom the animal and human can love. That they can have children with. The only person who can tame the savage beast. Who can make both the human and animal happy. The one person in the whole universe who is made for them and the shifter for the mate. They are special.” Brandon cupped Jezebel’s face. “Jezebel, you are my mate. I knew from the moment I laid eyes on you.” He took a deep breath in. “You smell divine. Like a jasmine.” Brandon trailed his fingers down to rest over his mate mark. “I should have waited and wooed you, but I couldn’t hold back. When I made love to you I bit you, mate-marking you.” Brandon stroked her neck, and she shivered at his soft touch on his mark. “You were—are—so beautiful. I didn’t want to be pushy like Savron is with Sasha, but when I’m around you all my possessive instincts come out, and jealousy flares. You are mine. You will always be mine. The mate bond is more than marriage. There is no such thing as divorce. You are stuck with me. In the shifter world you are now Jezebel Pride.” Brandon licked her lips and nibbled on her lip.
Jezebel gasped and pushed at his chest. “What do you mean you mated me? That I am Jezebel Pride?” She touched her neck. “Will I become a shifter now? Oh God, what have you done to me?” She scrambled off his lap.
Fuck, this wasn’t going how he imagined, not that anything since meeting Jezebel had. “I mated you. It makes you in shifter eyes … you would call it a wife.”
Jezebel’s mouth opened then closed and opened again. Jezebel stared at him for a moment like he’d sprouted another head. Then all of a sudden she started laughing. “Oh this is so funny. Here I have been telling myself to get everything I can from you because not only are you a gorgeous Pride, but you’re way out of my league. I thought you’d get sick of me and I’d be nursing a broken heart in a couple of weeks, but it would all be worth it because I’d have been with a Pride man. I messaged you to tell you I was going to spend the whole weekend with my friends because I was already getting way too attached to you.” She giggled. “Do you know how many woman wish they were in the position I’m in right now? I bet it is a lot. My God, I have dreamed of being with one of you since I started being a teenager.” Jezebel’s shoulders slumped. “What am I going to do now? I haven’t even finished school? What about college? I was only going to go to the local one, but do I still go? Or do I stay at home and be this mate you say I am? I always thought I would get married one day. You know, have the white dress and the whole big charade. I won’t have that now. I won’t even get to know if you like me just because of the mate thing. I would like to have been on dates and known that someone could fall in love with me, for me. I wanted it all.”
Brandon felt like a douche. His heart broke as Jezebel sobbed and wiped tears from her cheek.
“Will I turn into a shifter?”
Brandon gathered Jezebel to him. He felt terrible. He could say he loved her, but right now he knew she wouldn’t believe him. He wanted to say it when he was sure and he knew it would mean something to her. “The mating doesn’t turn you into a shifter. It does give you some gifts, like you will be stronger, heal quicker, never get sick or catch diseases, and you’ll live longer.”
Jezebel nodded. “Is that it?”
He debated if he should tell her he wanted, no, needed, her to move in with him. “I would like you to move in here with me. I want you to give this a chance. I will show you that being mated is a good thing.”
Jezebel sighed. “Give me some time.” She closed her eyes. “I need sleep. I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep, but I need it. Let me sleep.”