“Your father is threatening to arrive at Sanctuary,” Merinus said then. “I need to know, Mica, if he arrives, will you be able to suppress your own anger, or any emotions that would upset him, long enough to reassure him and keep him from feeling the need to take you from Navarro at the moment? We both know how dangerous that could be.”
Oh yes, she knew exactly how male Breeds could be where their mates were concerned. She’d seen it for years; each time one mated, the possessiveness, the dominance and the pure overprotectiveness.
They were more overprotective than her father.
Mica turned her head away before shaking it slowly. “You need to convince Dad to stay away,” she stated as she turned back to the other woman. “I don’t know if I can deal with his overprotectiveness as well as Navarro’s at the moment.”
And he was overprotective. So much so that Mica often felt smothered in his presence. Growing up around him had been almost impossible. If he could, he would have kept her a child for the rest of her life.
She wouldn’t have had her first lover, let alone a chance to allow a Breed to actually mate her, if her father had had his way. And if he arrived here and had to face Navarro sleeping in her bed without the benefit of marriage, then he was likely to do something stupid. As Merinus feared, there was a very high chance he would indeed attempt to force her back to the ranch, or to Haven.
It wasn’t that he didn’t love her. It wasn’t that he didn’t want her to be an adult.
He wanted her to marry a man he believed to be the kind of man she needed. He wanted her to settle down in a nice little house and have babies and be bored out of her mind.
He didn’t consider a Breed acceptable, and not because he disliked them, not because he was prejudiced. But because he knew the danger that came with being a Breed’s mate.
“Mica, I can help you.”
She paused at the kitchen doorway before turning back to Merinus. “Have you found a cure for mating heat?”
“You know we haven’t,” Merinus said softly. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t help you through this. I’m always here, Mica. All you have to do is tell me what you need. I’m your advocate here.”
“Until a cure is found to mating heat or male dominance, then I’m screwed, and we both know it,” she said bitterly.
“And is mating heat so abominable?” Merinus asked. “Is Navarro such an unworthy mate, or lover?”
“He would have been a perfect lover,” Mica answered truthfully. “But I wasn’t looking for a mate, Merinus. I wasn’t looking to confine myself to Sanctuary or Haven for a man that doesn’t even love me. One that doesn’t even want me but for mating heat.”
With those words she left the kitchen, unwilling to hear any more arguments for mating heat or Breeds as mates. She sure as hell didn’t want to see the acknowledgment in Merinus’s eyes that she was right.
The only reason Navarro would stay with her now was because of the heat, not because he was willing to fall in love with her. Not because he wanted to love her. But because of some biological reaction. Because something had matched in their hormones, their pheromones or some other bodily element that now bound them together.
She rather doubted though that it was as Cassie had always claimed, that their bodies knew what their hearts weren’t yet willing to accept.
She couldn’t accept that excuse, despite the arguments Cassie had to back up her theory. The fact that all Breed mates, all pairings had ended up being perfectly matched. That they loved. That they were devoted partners. That not once in all the years that mating heat and mates had been recorded had nature ever created a less than perfect couple.
There was always a first time for everything. And mating heat didn’t release the couple. It created a sexual pleasure that became addictive, as Mica understood it. An addict would never betray the addiction, especially if it was approved by the surgeon general, she thought sarcastically. And mating heat was definitely approved by both the Breeds as well as the humans who were aware of it. A much higher endorsement than the surgeon general’s, Cassie had once told her with a laugh.
Moving to the front entrance, Mica dragged a heavy jacket from inside the nearby closet and pulled it on quickly before leaving the house. She expected at any minute for the Breed watching silently to stop her, or for Merinus to come from the kitchen and call her back, which would have the guard moving to stop her.
Fortunately neither of them seemed to care, and Mica wasn’t in the mood to be told no.
Wrapping the overly large quilted jacket around her, Mica ducked her head against the chilly wind whipping from the mountains.
Sanctuary was one of the most beautiful places she had ever seen in her life, summer or winter. The old, heavy pine trees looked even more gorgeous at this time than at any other.
They were laden with a heavy covering of snow from the night before, which glistened in the cold air, and pine needles lying on the ground beneath them cushioned Mica’s footsteps, while the silence that surrounded her seemed almost eerie.
Sanctuary always seemed to have an otherworldly feel to it, but now even more so.
As though the world itself was awaiting the moment that the warmth of spring would finally show its face and melt the cold around it.
“You shouldn’t run off like that, not someone letting someone know where you’re heading and when you’ll be back.”
Mica swung around at the sound of Navarro’s dark voice, glaring back at him at the reminder that there was no way to hide in this damned place. There was especially no way to hide from him now.
“Reporting my possible activities wasn’t high on my list of priorities.”
“It should have been.” There was something about the look on his face, the set of his expression, that had her watching him warily.
She knew Breeds, and she knew this one wasn’t pleased.
“Fine, the next time I’ll sign out like a good little girl before I leave the house. Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to enjoy a little peace and quiet for a change.” Her gaze flicked back toward the estate house in silent invitation.
She didn’t want him around her right now. She needed a chance to clear her head rather than giving her body a chance to grow even hotter. And it was. As though simply having him around her was enough to make her pussy begin weeping in arousal and her heart begin racing in excitement.
She needed him.
She wanted him, but that was really nothing unusual, she had been wanting him for years now, but she hadn’t wanted him like this. Forced. Bound to her by a hormonal reaction he couldn’t control any more than she could.
She pulled the jacket tighter around her as she felt her body sensitizing further, nerve endings and erogenous zones growing in interest by the second.
“Trade me jackets.” He shrugged the leather jacket he wore from his shoulders, revealing a black silk shirt tucked into well-worn jeans.
Jeans that were filled out exceptionally well by the heavy erection beneath them.
Flames suddenly licked over her skin as she concentrated on the jacket he was holding out to her and tightened her fingers on the one she was wearing.
“I like the one I’m wearing just fine.” She’d seen Merinus wear this one before, earlier in the fall when she had been there with Cassie for a weekend.
“As much as I like Callan, I don’t like the scent of him on my mate,” he suddenly growled.
Mica rolled her eyes, lips parting, teeth clenching in irritation, but she jerked the jacket off, barely feeling the chill in the air as she extended it to him.
But rather than taking the jacket he extended to her, she stalked away instead, heading back to the house and hopefully as far away from him as possible. And as quickly as possible. She would absolutely love it if she could get far enough away, fast enough, that the heat building in her body would simply evaporate.