Page 11 of Tiger's Little Waif

“Shifters tend to run a little larger than the natural animal.” He grabbed the rest of his clothes in one hand. “Why aren’t you in bed? I wouldn’t have left if I’d known you were not asleep.”

“I woke up and wanted to talk to you, but you weren’t here. I saw your clothes out on the rail, so I thought I’d wait for you.”

He slowly crossed the porch, hoping she wouldn’t run. The last thing he wanted was to hurt her further because she ran from him.

“What did you want to talk about?” he asked, not sure if he should be afraid of her answer or not.

Shaw took a slow deep breath, wincing slightly before she spoke. “I might be crazy since we just met this afternoon, but I’ve decided I do want you to claim me as your mate.”

Chapter Six

Shaw woke alone in the guestroom. Again. It had been a week since she’d arrived in Bratburg. Seven long days since she found out that she was fated to be the mate of a tiger shifter. Seven interminable nights since she’d told Marshall she wanted to be his mate.

Instead of taking her to bed and mating her after her announcement, Marshall escorted her back to the guestroom and tucked her into bed. Since then, she had done little more than sleep, eat, and watch Marshall work in his kitchen. He barely allowed her to follow him from the cabin to the kitchen to the gardens and back again. By the time they returned home each night, she was exhausted and fell into bed to sleep long and deep each night.

That ended today. One way or another, she was determined to move their relationship forward.

“Waif, time to get up,” Marshall said as he knocked twice on the hall door.

Though she had been sitting in the middle of the bed brooding for the last half hour, Shaw did not climb out of bed as she had the previous six mornings. Instead, she laid back and rolled to her side, pulling Gio onto her chest.

She watched the door open, and Marshall leaned his top half into the room. “Waif?”

“I’m not going today, thank you,” she said before rolling to face the other way and pulling the blankets over her head.

She heard Marshall’s steps as he crossed the room. The bed shifted behind her as he sat down at her hip. A hand rubbed up and down her back over the covers before it landed hard and heavy on the side of her ass.

“Ouch!”

“Up and at ‘em, Little girl,” he said as he pulled the covers back, exposing her head and shoulder. “Breakfast for the institute won’t make itself.”

“Don’t care. I just wanna stay here today,” she said, her Little in full control.

Her injuries were healed, the pain was mostly gone, and her bruises were fading. She was tired of doing nothing. She missed baking, missed being productive. She needed to be doing something.

She also felt so horny that long pointy horns should be growing out of the top of her head. She was not sure what Marshall was waiting for, but she was tired of it. It was time to move this relationship past the friends’ stage. They had spent every spare minute talking, and she knew more about him in the past seven days than she knew her ex-husband.

She blinked when Marshall leaned over until only a few inches separated their faces. He did not look happy.

“That’s not happening, Little girl. Now get up before I reach three, or you’ll be getting dressed with a hot, sore bottom. And breakfast will be even later for the entire institute.”

“Oh, all right, but just so you know, I’m not happy,” Shaw grumped as she tossed the covers back and sat up.

“And what is it that you are not happy about, waif?”

Turning to frown at him, Shaw decided she had nothing to lose by being completely honest. “I’m not happy that you won’t let me help you in the kitchen. If you would let me do my job, you wouldn’t have to work so hard and maybe then you’d have enough energy at the end of the day to fuck me and claim me as your mate.”

“No bad language.”

His three-word response, which focused on the curse word and not the entirety of her statement, flipped Shaw from anger to pain. It was becoming more and more obvious that Marshall did not want her as his mate.

So why did he keep her around?

Without another word, Shaw went to the dresser and pulled out clean clothes. She carried them with her to the bathroom and started dressing while she peed. Once dressed, she moved to the sink and, after washing her hands and face, she quickly tamed her hair. All the while, she fought down the tears that filled her eyes and threatened to spill over.

Now ready for the day, she returned to the bedroom and pulled on her socks and shoes. Putting Gio into her bookbag with the books from the institute library, coloring books, and pouch full of pens and crayons she carried to keep herself occupied, Shaw headed to the main part of the cabin.

Marshall was pacing from the kitchen to the front door, and between his prowling strides and his multi-colored hair, she could see his tiger was close to the surface.