“Not for a while, no,” Cooper said. “The best thing to do is calm down and listen to us.”
“Why would I do that? I don’t want to become a member of your weird cult. I just want to go home. Whatever you drugged me with will surely wear off after a while, and then I’ll resume my regularly scheduled life.”
Sharon shook her head as she stepped closer to Cooper. She ached to touch him, but thought better of it. Not to mention she still hadn’t decided if she wanted to punch him or kiss him first. “It won’t wear off.”
“So you admit you drugged me.”
“We didn’t drug you, man.” Cooper spun in a circle in frustration.
“Was it the wine? Did you do something to it? Is that why you bought a second bottle of it? Did you bring it here to reinforce the ritual?” Jackson glanced past Cooper toward the door. “Where is it? Did you forget it in the car?” He chuckled sardonically.
“No one’s drugging you,” Sharon stated in a calmer voice. “It just happens. We can’t help it.”
“We who?” Jackson asked.
“We…shifters. And the ones we’re destined to fall in love with,” Sharon breathed out on a rush. It would take a lot more than that, but it was a start.
A moment of silence reigned long enough for her to catch her breath. She leaned down and tore the bandage off her leg. The wound was almost gone. It would disappear completely in a few more days.
“It heal okay?” Cooper asked.
She knew what he meant. Was there any permanent damage? She smiled. “It’s fine.”
Suddenly his gaze intensified, and he lurched forward and hauled her body against his. He wrapped his arms around her so tightly she couldn’t breathe. When he buried his face in her hair and inhaled slowly, she knew she was home. At least halfway home.
“Can you two at least try to pretend I’m not invisible?” Jackson’s voice was rough. Defeated.
Sharon wiggled free of Cooper’s clutches to face her other mate. “Sorry. We actually haven’t met before.”
Jackson blinked. He turned around to face the kitchen table, grabbed a chair, and lowered himself slowly into it. “Start talking. And don’t leave anything out.”
Chapter Nine
Headway. Cooper took a deep breath and trudged across the room to grab another kitchen chair and sit. He left several inches between himself and Jackson, facing the man at an angle so he could include Sharon.
The woman made it difficult to think. He wished he had the balls to tell her to go put something else on, but he also wanted to see her curves and admire her full tits at the same time. It was a conundrum he hadn’t yet finished wrapping his mind around.
Instead of dealing with it, he forced himself to look away every few seconds. His cock was going to explode.
And he was so far from having sex with her it wasn’t funny. In fact he groaned at the thought of the road he still needed to pave to get under that short skirt and bury his face between her folds.
Why the fuck did Fate find it necessary to match him and Sharon up with a human? Was this Her way of making a joke, perhaps at his expense for being too stubborn to show up in Cambridge for two years?
It was certainly a possibility.
“Start with the leg.” Jackson pointed at Sharon’s calf as he leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms and closing himself off from them. “I guess I only ever saw the blood. I can’t prove it was yours.” He chuckled again in a tone that was so far from funny it made Cooper’s skin crawl.
He hoped when they got through this thing, he never had to hear that sound of distrust coming from Jackson again. He hated it.
“But why? Why the farce? Why lure me off the road to take you down to the lodge if you weren’t even injured? Is that when this started? Did you do something to me that day to make me lose my mind with lusting after you ever since?”
Cooper smiled. He couldn’t help it. At least Jackson acknowledged how he felt toward Sharon. It was a start.
Sharon shot Cooper a glare. “Stop smirking. I’m not done being mad at you.” She pointed a finger at him, and then she put all her strength into twisting a large black leather chair around to face them. When she settled in it, tucking long sexy legs that went on for miles under her, she continued addressing Cooper. “Until I’m over my well-deserved frustration with your stubborn stupidity, I suggest you not piss me the fuck off.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He bit the inside of his cheek to keep from chuckling at this lithe woman with the tiny waist, legs that went on and on, breasts he wanted to wrap his hands around immediately, and wide brown eyes that could bring him to his knees with a glance.