A Mate for Lu - Amy Bellows Page 0,21
of lingerie in those bags.
“That’s too much,” I say. “I only modeled the one pair of underwear.”
He rolls his eyes. “Which you wouldn’t allow me to give to you, even though I couldn’t sell it anymore.”
“I just modeled for you as a favor to a friend.”
He scans my body, then puts a light blue corset in the second bag. “Then think of this as a favor to a friend too. My store is doing great. I can afford to give some merchandise away.” He holds up both bags. “Now take me to your car. Your arms are full of toddler, and I need the exercise.”
“Thank you, Ansel. You’re like my lingerie fairy godmother or something.”
He laughs. “That is the best job title I’ve ever heard in my life. I’m getting a nametag made.”
Accepting the bags of lingerie feels a little like accepting that I could have this brand new life blossoming before me, with the perfect mate, the perfect job, and the confidence to wear whatever I want.
And why not? I have a lingerie fairy godmother in fabulous white heels.
Anything is possible.
13
Sam
Lu is mine.
It seems impossible and inevitable at the same time. He reacted to my pebble in all the right ways, but I can’t believe the Eternal Ice gave me a second mate. My fathers always told me the Eternal Ice didn’t have mercy for people who couldn’t follow the rules.
The entire morning I’m distracted. Every chore I do reminds me of Lu. When I do the dishes, I think of the food he made for me and my children. When I clean the mirror in the bathroom, I inspect myself and wonder if he’d prefer for me to let my facial hair grow. A lot of polar bear shifters have beards. When I help Jesse with their homework, we end up solving a word problem involving bananas, and that leads me down a mental tangent that is completely inappropriate while sitting at the dining room table with my kid.
But I can’t help it. The first time I was with Lu, the guilt consumed the joy and pleasure of our connection. This time, I’ll get to make love to him without any regrets. I’ll get to run my hands all over his body and kiss him until both our mouths are raw. I’ll get to show him just how lucky I feel to be with him.
I spend half of the day on cloud nine until I pull up the article about polar bear shifter mating rituals that I sent to Lu. I simply wanted to double-check what I wrote, but the article reminds me of how different sex is perceived by polar bear shifters. They are notoriously experimental in the bedroom. Kink is common. Experience is considered an asset. Sex isn’t just a way to become emotionally intimate with someone, it’s a way to explore pleasure.
I have no experience with anything but the most vanilla sex, and my new mate will probably want more than that.
The rest of the day I furtively Google topics I’ve never researched before on my phone, while helping the kids pack for their grandpas’ house. Every question I ask just leads to more questions. It’s an endless rabbit hole.
How do you give a man oral sex?
How do you know when a man wants you to tie him up?
Are sex swings safe for men over two hundred pounds?
What do I do if my partner wants to call me Daddy, and I lose my erection because my children call me that?
And then I find out about golden showers, and Googling seems pointless. I can do all of the research I want, but unless I sit down with Lu and talk about what he wants and expects, I’m just going to freak myself out.
He isn’t going to ask to pee on me, is he? And if he really wants that, could I tolerate it?
I’m not sure I could.
By the time I drop off the kids at my fathers’ house around seven, I’m more anxious than excited. What do I have to offer Lu anyway? We can’t be open about our relationship. We can’t live together. And even though I thought my sex life with Allen was satisfying, my knowledge of sex is extremely limited.
I locate the fish-sharing tray I used for my Pebble Gifting Season in the storage room of the basement and load it into the car. I don’t know why I’m even bringing it. The idea of fish-sharing with Lu seemed comforting before—a way to