She gaped at him. “You called him? How did you even know his number? And what do you mean ‘he promised’?” Oh hell, what had he done?

Nick shrugged, his gaze on the TV. “I got his number the same way I got yours—I have contacts in the right places. Admittedly, he wasn’t so cooperative to begin with. Cried poverty and talked about selling the house, but when I mentioned that his bank balance didn’t quite back that up and just how important you are to me, he had a change of attitude.”

“You know his bank balance?” She was beginning to think Nick could find out just about anything about anyone. He simply shrugged again, like it was nothing. “I suppose you threatened him too.” He looked suitably offended.

“I didn’t need to. He was spooked enough knowing I had access to his personal information—including the little detail of him having an affair with his sister-in-law.”

She could only gape again. Then she shook her head, groaning. “You scare me sometimes.”

He rubbed his hand up and down her thigh. “You never have to fear me. You’re the one person who’ll never be harmed by me, no matter what.”

She believed that. A week ago, she wouldn’t have believed a single word he said about anything at all. But now, she did. That told her he was getting under her skin. And that was dangerous. But how could he not? The fact was that, whether she liked it or not, it was hard not to like having him around. He made her life easier by doing the littlest things, and he tried his best to take care of her despite her grumbles and protests. No one had ever done that before. No one had ever been so completely focused on her. Not even her parents.

“Now that you’re feeling better, I’ll get out of your way.” The last thing Nick wanted to do was leave, but he wasn’t going to stay unless she asked him to. He didn’t want her thinking that everything he’d done for her today had been in an effort to earn an invitation to stay. He’d done it because he wanted to. But as he wasn’t as well behaved as she’d like, he didn’t resist the temptation to plant a kiss on her tempting mouth. “If you need me for anything, you know where I am.” He had only taken two steps when he heard her voice behind him.

“Nick…thanks…for helping,” she awkwardly said. He flashed her a sexy smile that made her wolf shiver, and then he left…and Shaya found herself wanting to call him back. Yep, he was under her skin all right—under a lot deeper than she’d thought. Crap.

CHAPTER EIGHT

After three weeks of Nick doing his best to immerse himself in her life, Shaya was about ready to cry…because it was working. To her dismay, he was utterly consistent in everything he said and did. Each morning, he would be waiting at his car with a coffee and an offer of a ride, which she had given up on refusing. Each day at work, a gift and a text message would arrive that brought a smile to her face and made her want to laugh. Every lunch hour, he came to take her to lunch wherever she wanted to go. At the end of each day, he was there to collect her from work with a meal he’d cooked for her. And every Sunday, he helped her with grocery shopping and offered to do any jobs around the house.

Although he touched her often and teased her with the things he’d like to do to her, he never pushed for more, never took advantage of the arousal that was coming close to ruling her body. That same arousal was responsible for the dreams she had every night. There was nothing vanilla about them. The one she’d had the previous night had been particularly hot. Not only was she na**d on her back in bed with her hands bound above her head, but she had a butt plug up her ass and Nick was f**king in and out of her hard and deep. She blamed Kent and all his “I bet Nick’s just as dominant in the bedroom” comments. That and Nick’s constant teasing.

As such, when he walked into the salon at midday looking so freaking hot it wasn’t fair, she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to snap at him or jump on him. She went with the first. “I told you this morning that I wouldn’t be able to make lunch today—Fridays are always busy here.”

“I know,” said Nick soothingly, smiling. Her snippiness never bothered him. “I brought you something—I wanted to make sure you didn’t miss lunch altogether because you were busy.” Not only did the female eat like a bird, picking at everything, but Nick knew she occasionally missed meals, and he’d be damned if he let her neglect herself like that. It particularly wasn’t good for shifter metabolism.

Shaya might have rejected the bag he held out to her if the Subway sandwich didn’t smell so unbelievably good. Begrudgingly she took it, silently cursing him for once again being nice and trying to take care of her. He did that a lot. Of course Kent thought it was unbelievably sweet, as did her regular clients, who had all met Nick at least once by this point and thought he was fabulous—in fact, the client in front of her was at that moment greeting him and talking with him about the freaking weather.

Finally, Nick turned back to Shaya and gestured at the sandwich. “Make sure you eat it.” In a voice so quiet only shifter hearing would pick it up, he added, “If I find out you haven’t, I’ll spank your ass.”

Perching a hand on her hip, she gaped at him. Just as quietly, she asked, “Who do you think you are, bossing me around and threatening to spank my ass?”

“I’m the person who owns that ass, baby. And I don’t like it when you’re not taking care of it.” With that, he planted a brief kiss on her cheek and left.

Shaya, still gaping, looked at Kent, who was working at his station beside hers and would have easily heard Nick with his shifter hearing. “Can you believe that guy?” Kent simply shot her another look of disapproval. Why? Because she had accepted the offer of a date for tonight from a client she’d had that morning, who was new in town. Ordinarily, she wouldn’t date a client, but she’d made an exception here. She could lie to herself all she wanted about why she was going—she could say it was because she didn’t want Nick, or she could say it was because she had a huge thing for her date, but the truth was that she was testing Nick.

He was fast becoming important to her. She couldn’t help being comforted by his presence and confidence. He made both her and her wolf feel safe, cosseted, and protected. For too long, she’d felt alone. Even before the whole Nick extravaganza, that loneliness had been there…like a cold draft in her chest. When he was around her, when his scent was filling her senses and he was touching her, that loneliness subsided.

He had made himself a part of her everyday life to the extent that if he left again, it would have a huge impact on her—an impact she wasn’t sure she could bear. If that was going to happen, she would rather he did it sooner instead of later. If one thing could succeed in making him give up, it was her going on a date with another guy. If he still didn’t give up…well, there would be no denying that he deserved a chance. It was a huge gamble, and it could blow up in her face, but she needed to know how committed he was to sticking around before she even properly considered giving him a chance.

After her client left, Shaya was cleaning her station when she again heard that frustrating noise. “Will you stop growling at me,” she whispered abrasively to Kent.

“What you’re doing is wrong, Shaya, and you know it.”

“I need to know if he’ll leave again.”

“No, you want to punish him.”

Okay, a part of her did want him to hurt as she had, but she was starting to think that he had been hurting as much as she had all this time. “If I can’t trust him not to leave, we can’t move forward. You know about my history with Mason—trusting is really hard for me. Considering Nick, my own mate, abandoned me once, I’d say it’s not all that surprising for me to be so hesitant.”

Kent’s face softened. “I know. But Shaya, there’s a strong possibility that Nick will kill your date. Do you want that on your conscience?”

“Why do you think I haven’t told him anything about it and don’t plan on doing so until after the date? I’ll send him a text to say that I’m going to your place after work.”

Kent gaped. “Why am I being dragged into this?”

She rolled her eyes. “Stop being a Nancy. He won’t know that you knew anything about the date because I won’t tell him.”

He gave her a petulant look. “Is there no other way of testing Nick?”

“Testing Nick for what?” asked a new voice. Paisley.

Groaning inwardly, Shaya shot her a sweet smile. “Nothing.”

“I have to say, I’m surprised he’s interested in you. I mean, I look at him…and then I look at you…and it just doesn’t make sense.”

“Paisley,” cautioned Kent.

“I’m not being insulting.” For once, it seemed that Paisley wasn’t being intentionally offensive. She appeared genuinely confused. “He’s clearly a very dominant guy—I’d be surprised if he doesn’t enjoy the D/s lifestyle. Someone like you, Shaya, well…I just can’t see you being able to cope with Nick as he is. You’re like the watered-down version of what he’d want—too testy and defiant, not to mention inexperienced. You…you’d be better with a guy who’s practical, sensible, sensitive, and gentle and all that stuff. Maybe a librarian or someone like that.”

“A librarian?”

“You know…someone safe and timid.” Paisley shrugged. “Now Nick, well, he’s far from that. I can’t imagine that you have experience with guys like him. And you might be sort of pretty, and you may have gotten his attention, but seriously, you can’t honestly think you’ll be able to keep it.”

Actually, Shaya didn’t think she could. And that was also a huge problem in all this. She had discovered over the past three weeks that it wasn’t just her distrustfulness that held her back. It was her insecurities. She couldn’t help wondering if he would one day regret that she was his mate due to her submissive status. Most alphas preferred females whose strength matched their own. Shaya knew she had the inner strength to match his, but was that enough for him, or would he prefer someone like Amber?

Amber…Now that was a female she despised. The healer had been a big, fat pain in the padded ass since she arrived. The amount of times she had “coincidentally” turned up wherever Shaya and Nick were was truly unreal. Of course she always made a point of hugging him or touching him in some way, touching him with a familiarity that was way too intimate.

Then there were the times she turned up at Nick’s motor home—oh yeah, Shaya had noticed and watched carefully from her window. He never let Amber inside, always kept her on the doorstep as they briefly chatted. Whenever Shaya had asked Nick about it later, he’d told her that Amber liked to keep him updated on what was happening with Roni, but she got the feeling there was more to it.

Amber wasn’t mean to Shaya. No, she was something much worse—sickly sweet and friendly, and if Shaya hadn’t seen the occasional flash of jealousy and contempt in Amber’s eyes, she might have bought the act. Shaya would have preferred bitchiness, because then she could have said a few choice words to the female and insisted that she stay away from Nick. But while Amber was being friendly, Shaya would simply look unreasonable, mean, and even irrational if she began mouthing off at the healer…and maybe that was why Amber did it. This way, she got to be around Nick more.

When Paisley returned to the reception desk to answer the phone, Kent said, “Well, if you’re set on going on this date, you can at least tell me about him.”

“His name’s Simon. He’s a web designer.”

“Sounds boring.”

“All you’ve heard is his name and occupation.”

“Exactly. Already he sounds boring. Now, if he was a tall, ash-blond alpha male with an inner wolf—”

“Kent,” she groaned.

“Fine. So where are you going on this date?”

“We’re going to the Moroccan restaurant near your place.”

One of his brows lifted. “Oooh, maybe I’ll pop in then.”

“No. You’ll grill him like he’s being interrogated for a murder charge.”

“Yes, for your own good. For all you know, he could be a murderer. An ax murderer, even. There could be bodies hidden under his patio.”

She growled, “You’re a pain in my ass.”

He continued to be a pain in her ass all day—dedicated it to poking fun at a guy he hadn’t even met, calling him dull and wimpy as well as possibly homicidal. But she still made him give her a ride to the restaurant after work. She had changed clothes in the salon, ready for her date. Of course Kent wished her luck, despite his disapproval, but as he drove away from the restaurant, there was a strange glint in his eyes that she hadn’t liked—guilt, maybe?

Shrugging off the matter, she entered the restaurant to find that Simon was already there. He had politeness down to a tee—helping her remove her coat, pulling out her chair, letting her order first. Yes, this could work.

Nick was watching TV with Bruce when his cell phone rang. Derren. “Yup?”

“We have a situation. And you’re not going to like it.”

Instantly Nick was on his feet. There hadn’t been any panic in Derren’s tone, but there was anger there. “What is it?”

“I followed Shaya to make sure she got to Kent’s place safely, like you asked.” There was a short pause. “On the upside, none of the Nazi’s guys or the extremists are on her tail.”