“The kind who wants you to decide whether you want to stay in Cedar Glen forever without me muddying the waters with my amazing sexual prowess.”
Her heart skipped a beat. “And if I don’t?”
Derrick chuckled. “I’ll call you crazy and find a cuter witch.”
“Better be careful, Farm Boy. You did hear about where I come from, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, yeah. Baddest-ass familiar in the land, right?” Derrick pulled her toward the door, grabbing a jacket from a hook that had managed to stay standing and wrapping it around her.
Zipping the jacket, she giggled. “That’s right, and don’t you forget it. Don’t make me cast a spell on you, buddy.”
Derrick wiggled his eyebrows as he pulled her out the door and helped her over the huge gaps in the floor. “I think that’s already happened, Pussycat.”
As she followed Derrick along the hall, down several flights of stairs and out of her prison, hope swelled in her. The rise of it was strange, new, and warm.
So warm.
Chapter Eighteen
Martine walked hand and hand with Derrick, pushing their way through the snow after an incredible dinner with their family, both of them trying to behave as though neither were in any rush to leave and get back to Derrick’s.
The moon, high in the velvety black of the sky, shone with buttery brilliance.
It was death-sex night.
And both of them had promised to relish tonight. To savor each moment as a reminder of how hard they’d fought to get here.
Until they hit Derrick’s steps and he pulled her close, brushing his cold lips against hers for a kiss. One of many they’d shared over the course of the past week. Usually—okay, almost always—it turned into a hot make-out session where one of them had to remind the other they were still getting to know each other, and they’d made a deal.
Their bodies were plenty acquainted. It had been time for their minds to become acquainted.
Derrick had stuck to the deal. He’d sent her texts that did indeed make her smile, so wide and so girlishly, she had to hide her face from anyone else who happened to be in the room.
In those texts, he’d invite her out to dinner or for a picnic lunch in the barn he and Max used to play in when they were children. They talked for hours over wine and the grilled brie-and-tomato sandwiches she made. They played pool at his bar. Sometimes with Morris and sometimes with Max and JC.
They laughed—so much, her stomach hurt. She shared her fears about leaving Manhattan behind. About her father and what he would do if he ever found out where Dianna was.
And Derrick soothed her, promised her as they walked the fields or shifted and took a midnight run that no one would ever harm her or her mother. That no matter what it took, he’d always be there, always keep her safe.
The more time they spent together, the more Martine became aware that Derrick had become a part of her life—a part of it she looked forward to, enjoyed, needed in order to complete her life package.
She wanted this man who everyone called impatient but she called adorable. She wanted to try forever on—slowly, carefully…but if she’d never been sure of anything else, she was sure she wanted to see Derrick every day. Hear his voice. Hold his hand while they watched TV.
Fall deeper in love with…
Then there was her mother, still broken but determined to reconnect with Martine. They sat up at Faith’s into the wee hours of the morning just talking or watching old black-and-white movies together, finding each other again with an ease she didn’t consider at all alarming. Rather, she’d found comfort in her mother’s cinnamon-scented presence, in her hand as she guided Martine and this craft she possessed but had never used.
Some of it was exhilarating, and some of it was damn scary, but she was absorbing it like a sponge because she was learning to appreciate her gift instead of hate it, and when the time came that she was given her mark, she’d be worthy.
Dianna and Faith had forged a friendship, too, while they baked cookies or made dinner, laughed about how Escobar had taken the news that he was now a mere mortal, took long walks in town, found common ground in their desire to see their children happy and healthy.
All of that had led up to this night. One Martine had waited for like she was waiting for her first prom date.
The full moon and the mate.
“So, here we are,” Derrick said, husky and low against her ear, brushing her hair away from it to nibble on the lobe.
She snuggled into him, curving her hands over his waist. “It’s death-sex-or-die night,” she teased, melting against him when he molded her lower body to his.
“Which brings me to my question.”