Forcing himself up, he pulled on his pants and zipped them, but left the button undone as he wandered into the kitchen area. Bride liked to eat two pieces of toast with marmalade in the morning.
While the bread toasted, he sliced her grapefruit for her and sprinkled a spoonful of sugar over it, then poured her a glass of orange juice.
He was putting the marmalade on the toast when she came out of the bathroom and stopped to stare at him.
"What?" he asked, puzzled by the deep scowl on her face.
"Is that your breakfast?"
Vane made a face. "Not hardly. I was going to fry some bacon for me."
"Then how did you know I liked to eat that?"
Vane paused as he realized that the man Vane wouldn't know what the wolf Vane knew. Clearing his throat, he shrugged. "I opened the fridge and saw the marmalade and grapefruit. Most people only eat those for breakfast so I figured you wouldn't mind them."
She seemed to accept that as she pulled the towel from her hair and draped it over her chair. "Thank you," she said, placing a kiss on his cheek.
Vane closed his eyes as his body hardened instantly. Without thought, he pulled her into his arms for a much more satisfying kiss. He trailed his lips over to her neck as he opened the front of her robe and pulled her naked body against his.
Bride moaned at the feel of his cool, hard body against hers. She ran her hand over the flexing muscles of his back and felt the scars he had there. His whiskered chin and cheek scraped gently against her skin.
"If you keep this up, I'll never get my store opened."
"Keep it closed and stay with me."
She cradled his head in her hands while his tongue played gently in the hollow of her throat. "I can't."
He pulled back. "I know. I was only hoping." He released her, then tied her robe closed. "Eat your breakfast."
Bride sat down at her small bistro-style table as he returned to the stove to make his bacon. She nibbled on the toast and watched him. "You have serious guts to fry bacon without a shirt on. Aren't you afraid it'll splatter?"
He shrugged. "It doesn't really hurt."
She frowned as she traced the various scars with her gaze. "How did you get so many scars, Vane?"
Vane debated how to answer her. She wasn't ready for the truth—that they were battle scars from four hundred years of being pursued by Arcadians who thought he was a Katagari Slayer. For that matter, they thought any Katagari male was a Slayer. That he had been forced to fight his own pack to keep his brother safe. That some of them were from the she-wolves he'd been with.
Some were from beatings.
"I haven't had an easy life, Bride," he said quietly as he turned the bacon over in the pan. He turned around to look at her. "I've never had anything I didn't have to pay for with blood and bone. Until you."
Bride sat perfectly still as that green gaze held her transfixed. There was something about his open expression that reached out to her. He was laying himself bare to her, she sensed it.
God, it would be so easy to love this man. He asked her for nothing and he was so incredibly giving. This moment felt surreal to her. She'd never known anyone like him.
This is too easy.
That niggling voice in the back of her head reared its ugly head. Nothing was perfect. Nothing was this easy.
There had to be more to him than what she saw. What if there isn't?
What if he really was just as he appeared? She couldn't see any deception. Maybe it was because there wasn't any.
"Thank you for last night, Vane," she said.
He inclined his head to her, then went back to his bacon. He removed it from the pan and placed it on a plate, then turned off her stove and brought his plate to the table.
"You want some?" he asked.
Bride took two crispy strips while he got himself a glass of juice. There was something so intimate about sharing breakfast with him. She didn't know what it was, but in five years of dating Taylor, she'd never experienced a feeling like this. It was wonderful.
She ate quickly, then got up.
"I've got it," Vane said as she reached for her dishes. "You get ready and I'll clean up."
"You really are too good to be true," she said, kissing the top of his head before she darted to her makeshift wardrobe closet.
Vane tried not to watch her dress, but he couldn't stop himself. He was aroused just by seeing her pull on her underwear and dress.
Cocking his head, he realized she never wore pants. She always wore flowing dresses in dark earth tones or black. She slid her feet into a pair of flats and brushed her hair. Then she coiled it into that familiar messy bun.
Vane was enchanted by her actions. There were so many details involved in her morning routine. Such as the way she put on her makeup and then powdered it down. The precise movements it took to put on mascara and lipstick.