Free Mate of Her Heart by R. E. Butler

fingers played across the material.
    “No,” she hissed, her eyes darkening.
    “Tell me why.”
    “Because I might scratch you.”
    He shrugged and looked at his bandaged arms.  Scars from her?  Not a problem.  “I’ll live.”
    “I might bite you.”
    “I like your fangs.”  It was true.  The first time he’d ever seen her get upset and her fangs came out, he thought they were cool.  And sexy.
    She sat up slowly and released the sheet.  It pooled at her waist, revealing her large, firm breasts which were tipped with tight, hard nipples.
    “If you make love to me, Luke,” she whispered, “I’m going to let you come inside me.  If that happens, then I might become pregnant.  But you will definitely become my mate.”
    Clarity washed through him.  He reached for her hands and she grasped his.  “If it were easy to mate with a human then we would have done this earlier, right?”
    She nodded.
    “You’ll lose your pack if you mate with me, because I’m human.”
    She blinked and tears slipped over her cheeks.  “Everything.  I’ll lose everything.  The pack will shun me and Acksel will be forced to mark me so that no other pack will want me.  And my dad will have to turn his back on me and pretend that I’m dead even though I’m not.  We’ll have to leave town.  You can’t buy the bar because Acksel will forbid the pack from going there and there’s not enough human business to keep it afloat.  You won’t be able to see your grandma unless she comes to visit us.  My dad will never know his grandkids-” her voice choked off and he hugged her tightly in spite of the ache in his arms.
    He didn’t want her to lose her family.  “I’m a selfish prick,” he said, sighing as he pressed his face into her neck.  “I didn’t know what mating with me would mean to you or your family.  I’ll help you with your heat and not come inside you, and then I’ll walk away so you don’t have to choose between me and your family.”
    It might kill him, but he wanted her to be happy, and he knew she’d be happiest with her family.
    She reared back like he had struck her.  “No!”
    Now he was confused.
    “No, what?”
    She shook her head almost violently.  “I want you to be my mate.  There isn’t anyone else that I want in the world besides you.  My wolf wants you.  She won’t accept any other males.”
    His heart rejoiced to hear that she wanted him to be her mate.  But mating with him came at a terrible cost to her.  “But your family?  Your pack?”
    “It’ll be painful, but I can’t spend the rest of my life being miserable because of a stupid wolf law that says we can’t mate outside of our own kind.  My dad will be sad but he’ll understand.  He’ll want me to be happy, even if I have to leave.  And he and I will figure out a way to stay in touch, I just know it.”  She took a deep breath.  “I just wanted time to talk to you about everything.”
    He brushed her hair away from her face as he thought about what she was saying.  “You wanted to go through the heat alone so we could talk things out for the next year?  And then what?”
    He was mildly amused by her plan.  That was so Eveny.  She liked to have all her ducks in a row before she did anything.  That she would want to have time to prepare him for the consequences of their mating told him how much she cared for him.
    “Then we’d be ready.”
    “I love you, Ev.  I’ve loved you since we were kids.  If you want my help, I swear on my life that I won’t come inside you.  When you’re through the cycle, we can talk.”  He leaned forward and kissed her forehead.  “I don’t need the year to think, sweetheart.  I know I can’t shift.  I know I’m only human.  But if you’ll have me, I’ll be the best mate to you.  I’ll never regret anything that happened to see you be mine forever.”
    Her voice trembled as she stared at him.  “You want to be mine?”
    “I’ve always been