BLIND DATE WITH THE HUMAN HUNTER

Jasper’s table manners surprise me. He places his napkin in his lap and waits for me to be ready to eat before slicing into his steak. I put a piece of meat in my mouth and notice Jasper watching me before he does the same. His eyes widen slightly when the rich taste of beef hits his tongue, and a slow smile forms on his face as he chews and savors the flavor.

His scowl may have had my blood pumping, but his smile warms my heart. “Pretty tasty, huh?” I scoop up more food, and stainless steel utensils clang against my plate.

Jasper rewards me with a tight nod before he forks up a big bite of baked potato drenched in butter, sour cream, and chives. His eyelids fall for a second in what I think is pleasure at the flavor, and I imagine what werewolves usually eat. I wonder if it’s out of necessity instead of an enjoyable experience. I flash to a scene where the two of us are in bed and I’m feeding him waffles with strawberries and cream. The cream and red juice from the berries dribble down his chin, and when it drips to his chest, I lean in to lick… Oh my god, I’m doing it again! I chomp down on a green bean hard enough to make my teeth hurt.

I force myself to focus on a safer subject and begin to wonder about Jasper beyond his sexy exterior. How does an angry werewolf whose physical presence screams “feral” end up being a graceful diner? Even more so, I’m dying to know why he’s not supposed to be a Life Revenge participant.

Jasper stops chewing and watches me with interest. The man is some kind of criminal and someone I shouldn’t fantasize about. I’ve got more important things to do, like find him a mate. Which means I need a new approach. So instead of blushing and dropping my gaze, I stare right back at him as I smile. If he’s not going to talk, neither am I.

I place a bite of potato in my mouth and remove the fork slowly, and I notice Jasper’s chest rise with his deep inhale. He shoves a roll into his mouth, and when he bites down on it, melted butter drizzles onto his lip. He reaches up and swipes it with his thumb. Now I’m the one with a sudden need for oxygen because he sticks his thumb in his mouth to suck it clean.

I stab with my fork, which taps against my plate as I grab what I guess is a green bean, since I’m not willing to drop my gaze first. Nor am I going to back down from his taunting. I wrap my mouth around the end of it and suck it in slowly. Jasper’s upper lip shines with sweat as he clears his throat.

Our interaction is interrupted by a single knock, and Sydney, my assistant, enters. The petite blonde smiles at me. “Can I clear things away for you?”

I don’t say anything because I’m afraid my voice would give me away. I offer a nod in acknowledgement instead. When I reach to clear Jasper’s plate, he grabs it first. He stands and takes mine as well to stack in a neat pile before handing them to Sydney.

“Thank you,” Sydney says. The girl is gorgeous. Her eyes are big and a pale shade of blue, her hair has the perfect amount of wave to be either curly or straight, and she has a model’s full mouth. She flashes Jasper her megawatt smile.

Surprisingly, he’s unaffected, and he doesn’t acknowledge her with more than a brief stare. After she leaves, I retrieve my laptop, and it thuds on the table. “Let’s get back to business.” I pull up the dating application, and I type, keys clicking, as I speak. “Jasper.” I pause to scan the man with my gaze as if he’s a specimen in an experiment. “Six feet six?”

He stares at me without a word.

“O-kay,” I say. “I’m going to put you at two hundred and seventy-five pounds. Green eyes.” I stop typing to ask, “I don’t suppose you’d tell me your level of education, would you?”

Jasper leans back and crosses his arms in response, which only makes his biceps look bigger, and my inner girl sighs in admiration. Who needs a guy with a brain? I could teach him to read in the morning.

“No problem. We can get to that later.” I frown as I read the next question because I’m afraid to find out I’m not Jasper’s type. “Nod or shake your head for the following questions. You like a woman with intelligence.”

Jasper offers a small nod as he stares at me. I keep my face expressionless and stare back.

“Blonde?”

He shakes his head.

“Ah, a brunette man then.”

The strand of hair my stylist cut too short flops down in my face again as if to remind me of its brown color. I squint at Jasper. His eyes flash with a sexual heat that might set me on fire. He scans my body with his hungry gaze before he gives me a quick dip of his chin. I decide to let the lock hang in defiance so he won’t think he got to me. I hide a shiver of desire as I replay my earlier vision of me leaning over a naked Jasper with my hair falling on his chest. I blink to push it away, but apparently I’m so far gone the vision remains.

“Does eye color matter?” I ask.

He shakes his head.

“Do you want feisty or—” Where did these questions come from? My boss, Kevin, isn’t the kind of guy to prank me, and I assume he added the new query to the form for a good reason. “Or submissive?”

When Jasper doesn’t reply, I say, “Sorry. Silly question. Feisty?”

The werewolf nods.

“Adventurous?”

Jasper shrugs, and I sigh. “This would be so much easier if you would just talk. We’re not getting good data this way, and you’re going to be hard to match.” I’m tired of the way Jasper is wasting my time, and while our sexual dance has been fun, I have work to do. I stand, ready to walk out the door and let someone else deal with the guy. I say, “Even if I do manage to find you a woman with this incomplete profile, it’s not going to be very scientific and will probably fail.” I close my laptop, which snaps loudly. “Who’s going to want to be with a scary-looking werewolf who won’t talk, anyway? She’ll think you’re an idiot.”

Jasper’s glare has tried my patience long enough, and I snap. “Are you stupid? Is that it?”

I huff and pace to the other side of the room. I hate losing control, and I manage to calm myself before turning around and moving back toward the table. “I get it. I don’t want to do this either. But I have to find you a mate, and you need to take one. Don’t you care about finding a woman you’ll like?”

Jasper’s eyes flash with something that doesn’t appear natural, and his voice is steady and much deeper in tone than I expected when he speaks. “It’s you.”

A mix of emotions rushes through me and makes me so dizzy that I sink into my chair. My body is practically trembling like a live wire from his admission, while my brain is screaming “No way in hell.”

I burst into nervous laughter that I quickly force myself to replace with calmness. “That’s not possible, but thank you for the compliment.”

I gaze at Jasper and notice his brow is knit, but it’s not a scowl like he’s angry. Is he hurt? I soften my approach. “Well, now that you’ll speak, perhaps we can get a more accurate profile. I’m sure we can find you the perfect woman to make this whole thing a pleasant experience.”

Jasper shakes his head. “Now who’s being stupid? I am your mate, Marilyn.” His green eyes flash at me, and his tone changes to one of dominance. “We will be together, and neither of us has a say about it.”

His words are like arrows flying toward my heart, but I’m prepared. While he’d likely be the sexual adventure of a lifetime, I won’t fall for a guy like Jasper. “Apparently our versions of the truth are two different things.”

His eyes are dark, and the muscles along his jawline twitch. I’m not sure what the werewolf is about to do, and I don’t want to find out. My laptop scrapes across the table as I slide it off to put it in my bag. “I think we’ve done enough today,” I say. “We can get back to the profile tomorrow.”

Jasper stands up to lean down on his hands toward me as he says, “I must not have been clear.”

He’s close enough that his woodsy musk fills my nose, and my hormones switch into overdrive. All I can think about is kissing, and touching, and getting naked with the sexy man across from me. His strong fingers are splayed out on the table, and I imagine his huge hands holding my bottom as I ride him. I close my eyes in an attempt to squash my visions. Jasper is a million kinds of wrong for me.

Since he seems determined to have me, though, I’ve got to figure out how I’m going to make him understand this human is not his mate. I take a deep breath. “I may have underestimated how difficult finding you a match will be.” I smile as my tenacious spirit kicks in. “But I love a good challenge. I’ll have you paired off with the perfect human woman by the end of the week. I’m sure of it.”

Once the words have left my mouth, my heart sinks with sadness as I imagine Jasper picking one of the other applicants in the database. But I shake it off because the nerdy werewolf I crave will come to sweep me off my feet when the time is right. Until then, I’ll have to get over my physical attraction to this bad boy and get to work.