Desiree Holt - Caught in the Middle

Hayden shrugged. “I didn’t think you would mind.”

“Well, I do!” He looked across to Jasmine as he realised his voice was getting louder again.

Hayden tilted his head on the side. “Why?” He genuinely seemed curious.

“Because I’m not bloody well gay!” Stafford snapped.

Hayden looked more confused than ever by the declaration. Stafford studied the werewolf. He really didn’t seem to understand why he was pissed off with him.

Stafford took a deep breath and tried to think rationally. “Not all men like having sex with other men,” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with it if a guy happens to like other guys, but I don’t. I only like women. Understand?”

Hayden blinked at him. “We weren’t having sex.”

“You were licking my cock,” Stafford pointed out as patiently as he could.

“Your cock still smelled like Jasmine,” Hayden offered in explanation.

Stafford tried to follow the logic. “And you were attracted to her scent?”

“I couldn’t sleep when you still smelt like her.”

Bizarre though it was, Stafford found himself doing his very best to follow the other man’s logic. “Doesn’t she smell like me anyway?”

Hayden shook his head. “She smells like me now.”

Stafford looked across at her.

“You picked to go first,” Hayden reminded him, as if he believed Stafford had any reason to regret that.

Stafford tried to look at the situation from the werewolf’s point of view. “That’s why you were willing to wait, so you would be the last man to put his scent on her?”

Hayden nodded.

Stafford ran a hand through his hair again. Hayden’s messy blond mop was sticking up in all directions. Some stupid part of him wanted to reach out and put the other man’s hair into some sort of order, but he resisted that temptation.

“For the rest of the night,” Stafford said. “You don’t do anything unless I specifically give you my permission.” He decided not to point out that would happen around about the same time the devil started building snowmen.

Hayden nodded. “Okay.”

Stafford echoed the gesture. “And you don’t do anything, anything at all,” he stressed, “when I’m asleep.”

Hayden nodded again. He seemed to understand the situation.

Stafford looked at Jasmine, still somehow sleeping soundly through the whole thing. “Neither of us will mention this incident to Jasmine.”

“Why not?” Hayden asked. “It’s wrong to keep secrets from other members of the pack.”

“Because… it will only confuse matters,” Stafford said. It would make it far harder for him to implement the plans he had for Jasmine and himself in the future if she got the idea that he was gay into her head.

“You don’t think she would like me licking you?”

“I don’t know,” Stafford said. “And I don’t particularly care. We are not telling her.”

Hayden tilted his head on the side in that funny way he had which always seemed to indicate he was thinking. “Okay.”

“Right,” Stafford said. “Now, go back to your side of the bed. Go back to sleep.”

Hayden nodded, calmly enough.

Stafford cautiously lay back down on his side of the bed. As Hayden moved back onto the other side of Jasmine, Stafford placed his hand on the pillow above Jasmine’s head. It wasn’t exactly comfortable to sleep with his arm stretched out to accommodate the handcuffs, but it was a damn sight better than having Hayden on his side of the bed with him-especially if the guy couldn’t keep his tongue, or any other part of his body, to himself while he was asleep.

The vampire shook his head and stared up at the shadowy outline of the ceiling. Running their conversation over in his head, he wasn’t sure exactly what the hell Hayden had thought he’d been doing.

Stafford sighed quietly to himself and tried to find a comfortable position on the bed. Really, it only went to prove what he had always expected, werewolves were just weird.

“We’re ordering breakfast.”

Stafford blinked his eyes open. His first thought on hearing Hayden’s voice was to pull away from the hand resting on his cheek. God only knew what the damn pup was up to now-or what he intended to lap up for breakfast.

He stopped himself from brushing the hand away just in time, realising it was Jasmine’s and not the wolf’s. He smiled up at her. “Good morning.”

She offered him a shy smile as she took her hand away. “Good morning, sir.”

She looked behind her, to where Hayden was sitting on the bed, reading from the hotel menu.

“I didn’t know werewolves could read,” Stafford observed as he sat up.

“And I didn’t know vampires could sleep so damn long. I thought you’d never wake up,” Hayden shot back at him.

Stafford looked, blurry eyed, at his watch. “It’s seven am.”

“He’s been awake since dawn, sir,” Jasmine told him, with something like amused affection in her voice.

Stafford rolled his eyes. “Bloody dogs.”

“Do you eat real food?” Hayden asked him.

“Yes,” Stafford told him. “Real food, not kibble.”

“Kibble?”

“It’s a food people feed pet dogs, sir,” Jasmine explained when Stafford didn’t bother.

Hayden shook his head. “No kibble,” he said. “Steak. And chicken. And bacon.”

“I hope for your sake you’re not a vegetarian,” Stafford muttered under his breath.

Jasmine smiled at him and shook her head.

“What do you want?” Hayden asked her.

“I’ll eat whatever you choose to give me, sir.”

Hayden frowned. “We don’t know what you like to eat.”

Stafford took the menu from the wolf and glanced down the various options. “What do you usually eat for breakfast?” he rephrased, wondering if that would get them a real answer.

“Whatever my master chooses to give me, sir.”

Stafford glanced at her. “Have you been told not to give us any information?”

“The council think it is for the best if you two make the decisions as you both see fit, sir,” she offered.

“And you get caught in the middle?” Stafford asked.

She smiled. “And I submit to whatever my masters desire, sir.”

There was something about her tone of voice which made him wonder if she was just following the council’s orders or if rules like that were part of her whole life. Either way, it would have to change once she was properly under his protection. A submissive was one thing, he had no interest in owning a slave.

“May I go and freshen up before breakfast, sir?” she asked, glancing toward the en suite.

Stafford nodded. “Of course, you don’t need anyone’s permission to go to the bathroom.”

He pushed down his annoyance as she looked to Hayden to confirm his order.

The werewolf nodded. “You don’t need my permission either,” he agreed, frowning his lack of understanding.

Jasmine nodded and offered a small smile to each of them before she left the room. She looked happier today than she had when they first met her, there was a lightness in her manner which made him sure she didn’t regret anything any of them had done the night before.

When the door closed behind her, Hayden looked across to him. “What do humans normally eat?” he asked.

“I don’t normally eat with humans,” Stafford said. Humans were for blood and sex, not socialising, but somehow, the statement he would have said without hesitation at any other time, stuck in his throat while thoughts of Jasmine were still fresh in his mind. Not willing to confess complete ignorance, Stafford looked at the menu and guessed. “It’s a human hotel. She probably eats something from the breakfast menu.”

Hayden took the menu back from him and looked it over. “We’ll get one of everything then.”