He didn’t realize what he’d done, kissing her wrist, until he was outside in the snow to untie the tree. He stood stock still and frowned at the ropes, tracking back through each moment they’d spent together inside. He felt bad about the ropes scratching her and leaving marks on her wrists. The bear didn’t like that at all, but he could make his peace with it since they’d both gotten home in one piece. Even if that piece was a little bruised.
He adjusted his package and shifted his feet. Thank fuck for fast healing, otherwise he’d probably still be laying in the snow next to his chainsaw, praying for death. Jameson focused on getting the tree inside. Kara could work her magic and calm Noelle the fuck down, then he could figure out how to repair whatever it was between him and his mate. Since Noelle was definitely his mate. He argued with the bear as he dragged the tree toward the loading door, large enough to back a truck up to in order to off-load supplies, and fought the wet, heavy snow with each step.
He didn’t need or want a mate, not really. He didn’t live the kind of life that easily adapted to a mate, particularly one with two kids already. It was just better for them to part ways. The bear had to be wrong about the connection he felt with Noelle. It was just a consequence of having sex for the first time in a long time, and the first time in years that he let a woman sleep all night in his bed. It was just the endorphins and serotonin after a series of unbelievable orgasms. Simple biology, brain chemistry. That was it.
Jameson snorted and shook his head at his own stupidity. He’d seen enough of the relationships between the other bears and their mates to know he was completely fucked. You couldn’t run from your mate. Once it happened, it happened. That was that. And as Sasha had muttered in Russian — assuming his mate, Sunny, wouldn’t overhear or understand — you got the mate you needed, not the one you wanted.
So did he need a prickly, defensive single mother with twin toddlers? What the fuck was the universe trying to tell him with that?
And then, of course, he felt like a total dick. Noelle didn’t deserve him, that was for sure. She deserved a lot better. Someone with a normal job and a good education and a steady paycheck and an actual place to live, instead of bumming a couch from a friend. She needed someone who knew how to be a father to young kids, someone who was prepared to be a father. It was on his list of things to do, but Jameson hadn’t planned on paternal duties for a while. If ever.
It was one thing to have ‘fatherhood’ in the abstract on the ‘it’ll happen one day’ plan, but it was another to have seen — and smelled — the two kids who would rely on him. He wasn’t emotionally stable enough to be around young kids. What if he lost his temper? What if he shifted and scared them? What if they grew up to resent him for not being their biological father? What if he and Noelle had more kids and the twins hated their half-siblings and then he had a house full of angry teenagers?
Jameson stopped and stared out at the snow before closing the loading bay door. He was losing his mind. Legit losing his mind. Noelle achieved what the military and half a dozen wars couldn’t, and sent him over the edge into chaos and madness. He sighed and pushed the cart bearing the Christmas tree toward the main part of the gym. He needed to get his shit together. Obviously something had gone wrong in his brain during the fight or the shift. Obviously. This wasn’t him. He wasn’t like this uncertain sad sack who questioned whether nonexistent children would get along.
He growled with irritation and shoved the cart toward the wall. He wanted to destroy something. He needed to vent that frustration and anger on something else. Preferably something that didn’t require an hour drive to the countryside and a potential fight with hungry wolves to replace. His annoyance grew as he realized that shifting into his bear form and then tearing apart the logs in the backyard wasn’t possible, not with Noelle already freaked out. Seeing him in a berserker rage and shredding massive logs like they were tissue paper probably wouldn’t help her feel comfortable around him.
He whacked a few branches off the tree after he stood it up and braced it in a stand, making sure it was stable and wouldn’t fall on a kid if they got too close. He even remembered to put water on the damn thing so it didn’t dry out and become a fire hazard. How was that for responsible?
He fucked around in the present room for a while, examining the toys yet to be wrapped, then headed back to Owen and Kara’s apartment. He heard the rise and fall of female voices in the stairwell, and figured Kara still tried to explain shit to Noelle. At least Noelle was still there, still in the building. He would have gone after her, if she left. Not to drag her back, but to make sure she got wherever she wanted to go safely.
The realization almost stopped him in his tracks. It was a hell of a thing to worry about another person like that. He’d forgotten, for a second, that she was both his mate and not particularly happy with him. His brain or the bear reveled in the sense of comfort and familiarity that came with knowing Noelle was safe in the building. He tried to shrug it off. She didn’t like him, and with good reason. She wouldn’t want to stay with him, again for very good reasons. Reasons he agreed with, and Kara would no doubt add to.
But that didn’t change how he felt.
It didn’t change how the bear sensed where she was and whether she’d gotten upset and recognized her scent in his room. On his pillow. In the chair by the window where she’d done that mother business, leaving behind traces of her and the babies and milk and… family. Everywhere she went, she left the sense of family and comfort.
Jameson paced inside the apartment as he waited for her to return, since there wasn’t really anywhere for her to stay in the building that wouldn’t leave her contaminated with the flu and chicken pox. He should have volunteered to sleep downstairs in the gym, of course. He should have been a gentleman about it and made sure she was comfortable. But he couldn’t bring himself to voluntarily distance himself even more from Noelle. He’d rather install new locks on her door, so she would feel comfortable sleeping there, than retreat downstairs and wonder about where she was.
He made dinner to distract himself, then made more soup and broth for the sickies upstairs, then called Sasha’s dodgy friends about another grocery run. They remained noncommittal, based on the weather and a forecast that called for the blizzard of the century, which meant he was probably on his own to trudge to and break into a store. That was best done at night, so he spent most of the afternoon sketching out the locations of big chain stores that wouldn’t be affected by a security breach and some missing items. He planned to leave money to pay for everything, of course; he wasn’t a damn thief. But the burden of repairing a broken door and lock, and the potential that someone would follow him without the moral fortitude to pay for the items, would more significantly impact a local mom-and-pop. His philosophy had always been to hit the big guy first.
He was in the middle of evaluating how to divide up the raiding when the apartment door opened and closed. He tensed, back to the door, and didn’t turn. He’d almost expected Owen or Sasha or even Kaiser to come down to kick him out, to send him packing into the blizzard, but it was Noelle. He knew the moment she crossed the threshold and her scent drifted more strongly into the room. She would see him and she would have the choice of whether to talk to him or retreat to her room. He didn’t want to pressure her too soon. He could be patient, when it came to her.
His mate.
Jameson’s head turned to try and shake that thought loose. That had to wait. She’d just learned about shifters. Throwing the whole ‘you’re my soul-mate’ conversation into the mix would freak her out even more than she already was.
Noelle hesitated just inside the door for a long time, like she waited for something. Maybe waiting for him to acknowledge her or fly into a polar bear rage. He took a deep breath and gestured at the covered plates he’d set aside. “I made lunch, if you’re hungry.”
His heart pounded as he waited for her to respond. Would she still talk to him? Did her fear and anger run deep enough that she’d freeze him out with silence and disapproving glares? He didn’t think he could tolerate that. Noelle finally said, “I need some answers.”
Jameson started breathing again. He could deal with questions. He could answer questions for her all day long. “All right. Whatcha got?”
She marched into the kitchen and faced him across the island after getting a beer from the fridge. She pointed the bottle opener at him like she meant to snap his nose off with it. “And you better tell the truth. I’ll be able to tell when you’re lying.”
He had no doubt about that. Some of those mom voodoo senses that manifested when she gave birth, no doubt. He knew better than to lie to a mother, even one that wasn’t his. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
The bear waited in anticipation, their heart thrumming with nerves. Why did it feel like the most pivotal conversation of his life? Why did he stand on the edge of a precipice, knowing Noelle could shove him into the abyss with the wrong word or a dark look?
Maybe he needed a beer, too. Or something much, much stronger.