Chapter 4

4

D amien had stayed away for four years ... four fucking long years. To say that was one of the hardest things he has ever done was an understatement.

Danika was his mate, his too young and inexperienced mate. She was also the daughter of his best friend, Tyler, and that should have had Damien backing off and realizing that being with her, mate or not, was a bad idea.

Tyler was like family, like his brother, and mating with his daughter, imprinting on Danika, would complicate things.

He should have left for good though, should have just forgotten about everything, packed up his shit, and gone far away. That would have been the right thing to do, the safe thing.

But he couldn’t, no matter what was the best route for everyone. His body was pulled toward her now in a way that wasn’t just about taking care of her, protecting her.

For the first two years he had stayed away, wanted to give her until the age of maturity so she could be told what she was to him.

He’d traveled the country, visited old military buddies, seen his mother and father, and tried to center himself for his return to claim his mate.

But when he’d come back to her it was to find out she’d left for college. There had been a sliver of relief that she’d gone and done something with her life.

But the bigger part, the imprinted part of his animal, had paced to bring her back, tell her what she was to him, and claim her. When a shifter found their mate it was instant, consuming, and had all other thoughts and needs becoming basic and primal.

The shifter was only focused only on making sure that the female they had imprinted on was theirs irrevocably.

Now she was twenty, and he’d been back in town for the last two years, staying in his own world, working toward trying to figure out how things would work out with Danika.

But he knew from Tyler that she had her Associate’s degree now, and had a job offer in town. He was outside beside his truck, pacing back and forth as he counted down the minutes until when he was supposed to head to Tyler’s for dinner.

He had yet to tell his friend that Danika was his mate. But he was going to tell Tyler and Danika tonight, let them both know that he’d waited for the last four years for this, and he wouldn’t be denied. He’d never force Danika into a mating, but for him there was only her.

There would only ever be her for him. His need for her was

unbearable, but it helped that she’d been gone, away from where he was.

“This is it. Don’t be an asshole, take this situation nice and slow, and hopefully this won’t change everything for the worse.” Bracing his hands on the driver’s side door of his SUV, he lowered his head and closed his eyes. “Fuck,” he said in a low voice, feeling like he was about to break in two from the anticipation, nerves, and the tension in his body.

He pushed away from the SUV, stared up at the sky, and felt his lion move inside of him, impatient, needy, and so territorial at the thought that he was just an hour away from seeing his mate. “Calm down, you bastard,” Damien said, breathed out, and got into his car.

Once he had it started he sat there for a moment, staring out in front of him, his hands wrapped tightly around the steering wheel. This was it, the moment he had been waiting for since he had come back to settle down four years ago.

The imprinting desire may have started out as only wanting to protect Danika and make sure she was safe, but for the last two years it had continued to grow to this blistering need of arousal. Going this long without claiming his mate should have been some kind of record.

But the truth was he’d never met another male that had gone through the imprinting. He had heard about it plenty of times, but the men he’d associated with had been SEALs, the same as he was, and they had been focused on fighting.

There had been no claiming going on while he had been serving his country, no desire to have a female for more than just a few hours at a time anyway. And since meeting Danika, for the last four years, he hadn’t been with anyone.

Once an imprinted male found his female he couldn’t even get an erection for another woman. But that was how Damien wanted it because Danika was the only female he’d ever want.