Chapter 4

After turning off the light, I lay down with my back to the werewolf burrito.

I clutched my communication crystal, anxiously tapping the seller's icon.

This was a matter of life and death.

Me: Urgent! I think my werewolf is about to explode. He's hot as a furnace, he seems delirious, and he keeps growling. Did I do something wrong?

[Seller: Dear witch, if you have any questions regarding the care of your werewolf, please consult the Werewolf Domestication Guide included with your order.]

[Seller: Oh, my apologies. The system shows your shipment was sent out in a hurry, and it seems we forgot to include it.]

I sighed and replied quickly:

[Me: It's fine, just send me a copy. But I don't have time to read a guide right now. His core temperature is absurdly high, it feels dangerous, and physical cooling isn't working.]

[Seller: Besides the elevated temperature, could you please describe any other symptoms?]

[Me: There's a rumbling sound in his throat, like an overheating engine. He's very agitated, and his eyes are incredibly fierce, like he wants to eat me alive.]

[Seller: ...Oh, that's quite normal. A werewolf's territorial instincts are very strong, especially...]

[Me: No! It's not normal! It has to be because I've been working him too hard! Do you have any idea what he has done? He single-handedly scrubbed a half-ton cauldron, helped me move three hundred pounds of dried lizards, and has to act as my personal furnace at night.]

[Me: He must have acute wolfsbane fever from overwork!]

The crystal on the other end went silent.

The silence lasted for a full minute.

Just when I thought the connection had been lost, the seller finally replied.

[Seller: Scrubbed... a cauldron??]

[Seller: Miss Cici, are you saying... you made a top-tier Alpha werewolf, in the prime of his life... scrub a cauldron?]

I was completely baffled. Is there a problem? Doesn't your product description say "strong," "durable," and "amazing stamina"?

[Seller: And when his temperature rose, his eyes turned gold, and he growled at you...you wrapped him in a blanket?]

[Me: Yes! I was helping him cool down!]

[Seller: ...]

[Seller: By the gods.]

The seller seemed to be having a breakdown. A string of text full of exclamation points followed.

[Seller: Ma'am, that's describing his performance in bed! Not his performance doing housework! He's just hungry!]

I froze.

[Me: Hungry? But he ate five steaks for dinner. Should I go get him something else?]

The seller seemed to take a deep breath, their tone becoming brutally direct, as if speaking through gritted teeth.

It was the kind of tone that screamed "you hopeless idiot."

[Seller: He's not hungry for food.]

[Seller: He's the kind of...hungry that makes him want to pin you to a wall, sink his fangs into the glands on your neck, and leave a permanent mark on you.]

[Seller: In other words, this poor werewolf is being driven mad by lust, and you've had him scrubbing pots.]

The connection was cut from the other end.

Driven mad by lust? Wants to pin me to a wall? What was all this?!

My hands fumbled as I opened the Guide the seller had just sent, my eyes scanning it frantically.

The very first line was written in bold: Never suppress an Alpha werewolf's mating instincts. Doing so can lead to irreversible feral rage.

I froze.

So that's what "strong" and "durable" meant.

Slowly, as if my neck were made of stone, I turned my head.

In the darkness, the "werewolf burrito" I had put under a tranquilizing spell and wrapped so tightly had, at some point, broken free. The enchanted blanket lay pooled at his waist.

Bruce was lying on his side, his eyes glowing faintly in the dark, churning with raw, undisguised desire.

I felt something tighten around my waist.

Looking down, I saw his thick, fluffy, silver-white tail had snaked its way over, wrapping itself possessively around me and holding me close, as if afraid I would run.

Seeing that I had turned to face him, Bruce made no attempt to hide his intentions.

Instead, he shifted closer, his nose brushing against the sensitive skin of my neck.

He took a deep, shuddering breath, and the suppressed growl in his throat broke, turning hoarse.

Bruce stared at me, his gaze so intense it felt like he was about to devour me whole, skin and bone.

"Cici..."

"I'm in pain."

He had said it more than once.

And I, a self-proclaimed genius witch, had wrapped him up and cast a tranquilizing spell on him to "help him cool down."

I swallowed hard, my mouth suddenly dry. With a trembling hand, I lifted the binding spell from the blanket.

As the heavy wool slid down, revealing his lower half, my breath caught in my throat.

My gaze followed the lines of his abs downward, landing on the source of his "pain."

There was a dark metal device there, a chastity lock.

But it wasn't the lock itself that made my head spin. It was the sheer, terrifying scale of what was trapped underneath it.

It looked... magnificent. And dangerous.

My face flushed so hot I thought I might catch fire. The air in the room suddenly felt thick, and my knees went weak, a strange sensation while lying down.

My voice came out as a breathy, barely audible whisper, "Do you... need me to unlock that for you?"