Accidental Surrogate for Alpha

spread two out before the fire and then gesture towards them, another blanket tucked under my arm. “Better,” he concedes, standing up for a moment and then sitting gracefully

down in the middle of the blankets, pulling me down into his lap as he does so. “Much better, clever little doctor mate.”

I take a moment to place my hands on Roger’s face for a second, looking seriously at him before bringing my mouth to his and kissing him, letting myself sink into it, hoping – quite desperately that he knows just how – much I love him.

Because we fight, and we tease – But god, god how I love this man. All of him every arrogant, swaggering, adorable, sweet bit of him –

Roger’s arms tighten around me as he kisses me back, taking deep breaths as he does so like he’s finally home, like he’s been waiting to do this all day. And I smile, thinking that…perhaps he knows, a little bit. Even if we don’t have a mating bond that we can both feel, that we can pass messages along, like Ella and Sinclair do.

I break the kiss after a few moments, resting my head against his chest as he keeps his arms wrapped tight around me. And we’re quiet for a little bit, staring at the fire, just…happy to be here with each other. Happy to have this quiet moment.

“Roger,” I say quietly, thinking back on Ella’s conversation we had earlier.

“Hmm?” he says, inviting me to ask whatever question is floating through my mind.

“Do you think I’m your mate?”

“Um,” he says, laughing a little, ” Yeah, Cora,” he says, as if it’s a stupid question, “I think we’ve made that pretty clear – ”

“No,” I say, turning to look up at him a little, to let him know that I’m serious. “Do you think I’m your…your mate mate. Like…fated mate. Instead of chosen.”

“Oh,” he says, his eyebrows raising a little. Then he grins at me and laughs. ” Wait, you seriously don’t know?”

I frown at him, confused – I hadn’t known there was something to know.” What are you talking about?”

“You didn’t feel it?” he says, turning his head and watching me curiously.” That day out in the forest, in the rain, outside the motel?”

My frown deepens as I start to get frustrated. “Feel what?” I ask.

He laughs then, a real laugh, a big one that shakes his whole frame. “Cora,” he says, looking back at me with a gentle smile. “You’re my mate. Truly. Fated, done deal. I’ve suspected it for a while for a long time, even though… well, I also denied it for a long time, because I didn’t think my mate could be a human. But I knew for absolute sure that day when you ran like an idiot out of the motel – ”

“Hey!” I protest, slapping his chest, “I was really upset!”

“I know,” he murmurs, nudging me with his nose. “But you were also being really dumb. Anyway I knew for sure, because that’s when it snapped into place. You and me, Cora? We’re end game. At least, on my side. But,” he considers me again, putting his thoughts together. “It should have snapped in for you at the same moment. You didn’t feel it?”

“No,” I sigh, disappointed. “I didn’t feel…anything ‘snap.””

“Well, then mine will have to be enough for both of us,” he says easily, drawing me close and starting to lay kisses across my cheek, my jaw, down my neck.

But I’m still disappointed and jealous. It just feels unfair sometimes – the rest of my family gets to feel these intense emotions and I’m missing out on them.

“I almost laid you down and fucked you right there in the forest, Cora” Roger growls softly in my ear, distracting me. “It was very…intense. It was a nightmare, having to carry you all the way back to bed -”

“We would have drowned,” I laugh, pulling back a little so I can see his beautiful face, wrinkling my nose at him.

“I probably would have died happy and said it was worth it,” he murmurs, shrugging.

“Well, that would have been disappointing,” I scold. “Trading decades of sex for one very damp experience? I’m starting to doubt your judgment here, Roger.”

“Hmm,” he considers, tightening his arms and pulling me close against him, one of his hands tracing down the length of my spine. “Maybe we need to experiment. Maybe the rain really was the problem, but the experience in the forest…”

I glance around at our whereabouts and start to laugh, seeing where he’s going with this as Roger leans me back, trying to lay me out before the fire.

“Roger!” I hiss, glancing towards the RV. “Seriously, they’re right in there! They’ll see!”

“Oh come on,” he growls, pulling the third blanket over us to give us a little privacy. “No one’s watching -”

“Have you met Ella!? Of course she is!”

Roger laughs, shaking his head as he lowers me to the ground and lays the length of his body next to me, curving his shoulders over top of my chest so that he can lower his face until his lips are so close to mine I can feel his breath against me.

“I’m not thinking about Ella right now,” Roger says, nudging me with his nose. And then he slides a hand under my shirt, across the skin of my stomach, moving upwards. “And I’d prefer it if you weren’t either…”

I laugh, leaning my head back and giving in to him as Roger kisses my neck. “Let me show you,” he murmurs, “some of the things I wanted to do that day…”

And, taking a deep breath and covering my eyes with one hand – hoping to hell that Ella and Sinclair and Henry have gone to bed – I let him.