CAROLINE

I was on the floor next to my bathroom cabinet, placing all my toiletries in a box while William packed up my movie collection. He put the box in the pile and came to stand against the bathroom doorframe.

"Can I meet your father?"

I turned quick to him. "My father?"

"Yes. You met my parents. I'd like to meet yours."

"I.. guess that's okay."

"And I'd like to hear his point of view about the fire."

"Oh." I cowered in on myself. "Are you sure? He might not want to talk about that. He never did to me at least."

He shrugged. "I want to. And then what if we go for a night out? You can show me the sights of Seattle."

I grinned. "A date?"

"Of course. May I take my beautiful mate on a date?" He looked adoringly down at me. "I read online about a French bistro downtown that had good reviews. Then maybe a movie or something? What do you say?"

"I say," I answered delicately, "does it have to be that restaurant? Can we do pizza instead?"

He chuckled. "Pizza? Sure. I just thought you might want to do something a little fancier."

Looking back to my drawer and removing more hair items into the box, I moistened my lips nervously. "Rick always took me to fancy places. There's this brick oven pizza shop down by the mall I always wanted to try, but he never wanted to go. He said pizza was commoner's food."

He stepped in the bathroom and squatted down beside me, taking my hand. "Then I most definitely want to go there."

I looked up with a smile. "Really?"

He nodded happily.

Love flew through me. It was like a drug I never wanted to flush from my system. Then I pulled my hand away with a soft giggle and grabbed a hair tie, putting my hair up in a high ponytail. I tilted my head, letting his mark be on full display. Kara told me it was a submission, but I didn't mind.

He leaned forward and let his hand roam over my marks. It brought a shiver up my neck. "So that's a yes?"

"Yes." I smiled at him from under my lashes.

"Maybe we can finish packing up a few more things here, and then go?"

I nodded. "My dad gets home at four. We can go then."

He checked the time on his phone. "That gives us a few more hours. What else do we need to pack?"

We packed up my computer, books, clothes, and pantry food, and deep cleaned what we could, knowing that Catherine and Blake wouldn't want to do it all. The place came furnished, so we didn't need to worry about the heavy furniture items or kitchen necessities. It felt weird to know I would be saying goodbye to the apartment in a day and never returning. And when I closed the door behind William to lock it, I imagined that it was tomorrow, and I would be locking up forever.

Would I cry?

William insisted on driving, even though he didn't know the way, and after a few jabs to his macho-ness, I let him have the keys. He looked so at ease behind the wheel, even through the pouring rain. I wondered if that was his heightened wolf senses. I looked over his handsome frame and smiled to myself feeling a warm tingle sink into my belly.

It felt so natural to be with him, even doing something as mundane as driving or packing a home.

A home?

What was I going to do for a home?

"Will?"

"Yeah?" He looked over and placed his hand on my leg.

I put my hand on his and watched our fingers thread. We'd gotten more touchy in just the last few hours, than I think I'd ever been with Rick and it fascinated my poor human mind. But after our very non-dream escapade this morning, I think I forgot about wanting time to adjust. A smile flowed across my lips.

"Love?"

"Oh sorry." I lost track of my thought. Oops. "Will I stay with you? In that connected room?"

"Well, I'd hope you want to stay with me. We are mates." He tried to hold back a grin and watched traffic, hand still with mine. "But my home isn't next to the room you were in."

"It's not? Where's yours?"

"Ours," he looked to me with a smile that clenched my muscles, and then back to the road. "Ours is on the top floor. We have a home like my parents. Three bed, two bath and very ready to stop being a bachelor pad."

I felt overjoyed as I imagined walking into my own place with William. "It sounds wonderful."

"It will be now," he said pleased.

"If you have a home, why were you in the connected room?"

He chuckled, almost an embarrassed hint in his laughter. "Well, that wing is for guests. Usually from other packs as we don't often have human guests. So, next to your room was Catherine's grandparents. But after you kissed me, I couldn't handle being on another floor. So the next day I made up some bogus excuse about the plumbing and had the receptionist move them to a room on another floor. Sorry about that."

I giggled. "You made Grandma and Grandpa Sinclair move rooms because you wanted to sneak me out?"

He smirked to the road. "Maybe."

"You're funny."

"I didn't mean to sneak you out when I changed them. I just wanted to be closer, be able to hear your heart and breathing at night. Know you were okay. But then at the dance I knew I wanted to talk to you again." He got a little cocky then. "It just so happened that you wanted another dream meeting. I meant to just talk. It was you who ambushed me."

I looked back out the front window and shrugged with a tight smile. I mimicked his, "maybe."

He laughed and then went on to tell me all about his home on the sixth floor the rest of the drive to my father's.