Hide and Seek Read Online Free PDF Page B

doors were, almost at a run. He worried Josephine would disappear before he could grab her. His legs halted as he saw her, even more beautiful than he remembered. Her shoulder-length auburn hair glowed with the inner reddish-brown color of a delicious flame.
    He loved her hair, had spent hours staring and brushing it when they had spent quiet evenings after intense lovemaking. As she heard his approach, she had turned to him, and he felt his breath freeze when he stared into that lovely, heart-shaped face. The green eyes he had dreamt about for months were sadder, lonelier than he remembered. He desperately wanted to bring that mischievous sparkle back into them that he knew could be present.
    And then he felt his mouth gape as he saw her huge belly and much fuller breasts.
    Oh my Lord, she’s pregnant! Largely pregnant. Is it…?
    He left the incredibly masculine and possessive thought of Mine untouched. He didn’t want to get his hopes up. After six cold, lonely months of contemplation he half-reasoned she had to be his True Mate.
    It would certainly explain a few things, like how he could never, no matter how busy or stressed, get her out of his mind. How he dreamed about her almost nightly. How he loved her scent…and a million other things. Sure, he could have picked up some nameless woman and fucked her raw to try and sate his craving for Josie, but why hurt the poor girl by kicking her out of his bed as soon as he was done? Even the thought of fucking some other woman left a bitter taste in his mouth. He only wanted his Josephine.
    Stepping forward, closing the distance between them, he dropped the bags of food on the floor and rested one hand gently, yet possessively over her rounded stomach. Feeling the tiny movements of life, sensing the spirit encased in her womb, he mentally confirmed that she was indeed pregnant. Needing desperately to know if the child was his, he scented her deeply.
    Almost drowning in her beloved scent, that one he had craved like a drug in these last barren months, he allowed himself to wallow in the flowery, feminine smell that was uniquely Josephine. He concentrated his senses on the baby, scented himself and Josephine mingled in their baby.
    He felt his heart lighten and nearly explode with happiness. Josephine was having his baby, their baby. She had to be his True Mate, as no other woman alive could bear his children. For a split second, William blushed, imagining what his brothers, Artemais in particular, would have to say to him.
    “You didn’t recognize your True Mate? After sleeping with her for two straight weeks and impregnating her? Let’s go back over these lessons I taught you twenty-odd years ago…”
    Even knowing the verbal and likely not-so-verbal abuse he was likely to cop in the very near future, William still felt as though all his birthdays had come at once. He felt that giant piece of him that had been missing with her absence click back into place.
    Now she was his.
    He could claim her, mate with her, do all the things he had fantasized about in the dark of night over the last six months. He felt elated, and surrounded his essence around his little child. As he searched, he frowned for a moment, confused. There was another scent, almost identical, yet somehow…
    “Twins?!!”
    It took him a moment to realize that in his shock and joy he had spoken aloud. William felt his mind spin dizzyingly. He looked back down to Josephine, and the surprise flaring in her eyes.
    He dropped his hand and took a step back. Hearing plastic bags rustle, he realized he had dropped his Chinese, now threatening to leak all over the carpet, and he hadn’t even been aware of it. Hastily scrambling to collect the bags, smiling as sweetly as possible at Mrs. Peterson, he tried to herd Josephine and her un-looked-at friend into his apartment without making any more mess with the now-useless Chinese.
    “Thank you so very much, dear Mrs. Peterson, for looking after my fiancée and her