TEMPORARY MATES PERMANENT CRAVINGS novel Chapter 59

Fifty-Nine

Lisa

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Time blurred together until I could no longer tell when night ended and morning began. I lost count of how many times Cameron and I had sex, how many times I begged him to fill me, and how many times his knot locked us together. The only thing that existed was the relentless need and the way he answered it over and over until my body finally began to settle.

Four days passed like that, nothing but sex, sleep, food, and more sex. When the fever finally broke for good, exhaustion settled deep into my bones and the emotional crash followed almost immediately.

I needed reassurance. I wanted Cameron to hold me and tell me I mattered, that the last four days meant something beyond heat and biology.

Instead, he began pulling away.

“You should be pregnant,” he said. “I released inside you during your most fertife window multiple times. If you’re not pregnant after this, then something is genuinely wrong.”

“You don’t have to be cruel about it,” I said quietly. 1

He turned toward me. “I’m not being cruel. I’m being truthful.”

Cameron stood and reached for his clothes. “This was necessary. Now it’s done and I need to return to Evangeline.”

“Of course.”

I wrapped the sheet around myself and sat up.

“Why did you go into rut when I went into heat?”

Cameron stopped, his shirt half-buttoned. “I don’t know.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“I don’t understand it either. I’ve been trying to figure it out since it started. It happened, we dealt with it, and hopefully it worked to our advantage.”

Our advantage.

Like the last four days had been a strategy instead of the most intense intimacy I had ever experienced.

“Are you going to tell Evangeline about this?”

“No. She doesn’t need to know.”

“So we pretend it never happened?”

“We acknowledge that it happened because of biology and move forward,” he said while finishing his shirt. ” That’s all we can do.”

I sat there wrapped in a sheet that still smelled like him and tried to hold myself together.

“I’m going to miss your scent,” I said before I could stop myself.

The words sounded pathetic even to me.

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Titty Note

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Cameron looked at me with surprise.

“During your rut you smelled different,” I continued. “Like ozone and pine and burnt amber. It was overwhelming.”

“Lisa-”

“It made me want to submit,” I admitted, heat rising to my face. “Just the scent made me aroused. It made me want to… give in. Why does my body react to you like that? We’re not mates.”

Cameron stayed silent for a long moment before walking back to the bed and sitting beside me.

“You smell incredible too,” he said quietly. “During your heat it was stronger. Sweeter. It pulled me in like nothing else. My thoughts kept returning to you.”

“But we’re not mates.” 1

“No.” Cameron rubbed his hand through his hair. “Maybe it’s biology. We’ve been sleeping together regularly. Your heat triggered a reaction because my body recognizes you as compatible.”

“Simple biology.”

“Lisa-”

He stopped speaking.

I looked at him and understood before he said the words.

“If Evangeline wasn’t here, would you still say this means nothing?”

The room went quiet.

Cameron’s hands tightened in the sheets and he didn’t answer.

He moved closer instead and pulled me into his arms.

“At the end of the day we have to be realistic,” he said into my hair.

“Realistic,” I repeated.

“I know this goes beyond ordinary sex. I enjoy being with you. The chemistry between us is undeniable. What happened during your heat was intense, more intense than anything I’ve experienced before.”

Hope sparked inside my chest. 1

“But Evangeline is my mate,” Cameron continued. “There is a bond there. Whether it’s functioning the way it should or not, she is the one chosen for me. That has to matter.”

The hope died just as quickly.

“So we pretend everything is fine,” I said.

“What else can we do?” he asked. “Tell me the alternative.”

I didn’t have one.

He was mated. I was contracted. We were both trapped in something neither of us had planned.

“I want to leave for a few days,” I said finally. “Maybe a week. I need to see my mom and clear my head.”

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Cameron went still. “Why now?”

“Because I need space. I need to get away from you and from all of this for a little while.”

“Lisa, that’s not a good idea-”

“I’m not asking permission. I’m telling you in advance. I’ll be gone a week and then I’ll come back so we can continue the arrangement.”

“What if you’re pregnant?” he asked. “What if the heat worked and you’re carrying my child right now? You can’ just leave.”

“If I’m pregnant, a week away won’t change that.” I held his gaze. “Unless you think I’m going to run away and never come back.”

“Are you?”

The question was quiet.

For the first time I realized he was actually afraid of that possibility.

“No,” I said. “I signed a contract. I keep my word. I just need time, Cameron.”

He studied me for a long moment before nodding slowly.

“I’ll think about it.”

“That’s not a yes.”

“It’s not a no.” He stood and distance returned between us. “If I agree, you go with security and you check in every day.”

“Fine.”

Cameron reached the door and stopped.

“For what it’s worth,” he said without turning around, “if Evangeline wasn’t in the picture, this would mean everything. You would mean everything.”

Then he left.

I sat alone in the room that still smelled like sweat and sex, clutching the sheet against my chest while exhaustion rolled through me.

The post-heat crash hit hard. My muscles ached and my body felt drained despite the food and water. Hunger returned almost immediately.

I forced myself out of bed and grabbed the tray Franklin had left outside the door earlier. I ate everything on it and still felt empty.

The emptiness had nothing to do with food.

I wanted someone to hold me and tell me I was more than a womb meant to carry a child.

The emotional fallout hurt more than the physical exhaustion.

During heat everything had felt simple. My body knew what it wanted and demanded it without shame.

Now shame crept back in.

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I had begged Cameron to breed me, to make me pregnant, to claim me. I had said things I would never normally say. He had answered with the same intensity, promising to fill me and give me a child.

Now those words felt hollow.

Heat talk.

Biology talking, not real feelings.

I curled into the nest of pillows and blankets and let the emotions wash over me.

Humiliation.

Hurt.

Loneliness.

Four days of constant sex during my most fertile window. If I wasn’t pregnant after that, something truly was wrong with me.

If I was pregnant, this arrangement would end soon.

I would carry Cameron’s child, give birth, hand the baby to him and Evangeline, and walk away.

Back to Creek Keepers with money, silence, and the memory of four days that had felt dangerously close to love.

Even though it wasn’t.

Even though it could never be.

I closed my eyes and tried to sleep, but all I could feel was the memory of Cameron’s hands on my skin and the echo of his voice telling me that if Evangeline were not in the picture, I would mean everything.

And I knew I had fallen in love with a man who would never be mine.

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