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“Okay,” I breathed, sinking to the floor. “You said you’re still you in there. Does that mean you understand me?”

The fox nodded. Actually nodded. Or, well, did a fox-ish version of one.

“This can’t be real.” I shook my head. “It’s not real. This is some weird stress dream. Or a hallucination. Or maybe—maybe it’s the coffee. It didn’t taste right this morning.”

The fox cocked his head at me. I took that as a sign.

“I feel like we need to talk about this with… words.”

A few seconds later, Garner, the man, was there, every bit as naked as his brother had been.

I remained seated as he pulled on his jeans, leaving himself shirtless. My mouth went dry.

“I wanted to tell you,” he said softly, inching toward me. “I’m… I’m a shifter. That’s why we hired Denmarke.”

I blinked. “I don’t get it. What is this?” I waved my hand up and down his body, then gestured to the door. “What does this have to do with Denmarke?”

“You don’t know?” he asked.

I shook my head. “No.”

“Remember when I was looking for Harold?”

And suddenly, it clicked. My partner was like them. “Oh. He’s a fox?”

Garner smiled. “He’s part of our world, yes.” Which was not the same as yes.

“You can’t say anything,” he added. “We’re not supposed to talk about it.”

I groaned. “So I have to pretend to my best friend that I don’t know what he is?” And technically, I didn’t, but I pretty much did know he wasn’t human.

“No—yes—I mean…” He exhaled, rubbed his temples, and then took my hand. “That’s better,” he said.

And yeah, it was. I didn’t even realize how tightly wound I’d been until that moment. His mere touch gave such comfort.

“Let’s sit and talk. There’s a lot.”

So we did. We went into the living room, and he explained everything—how they were all foxes, how the company was owned by shifters, how being a shifter meant they were human but carried an animal inside of them.

He told me what it meant to him, to his family, to his den. What hiding that part of himself had cost him… especially when it came to me. How much it meant to him that I didn’t run or cower when I saw him shift.

It was a lot to take in. I wanted to understand, I really did, but somewhere in the middle of his explanation, my brain latched onto one thing:This was why we weren’t more. This was the secret. The reason he didn’t want me.

“So that’s why we’re not… more?” Saying that one sentence took all of my strength.

“No, no, no.” He took both my hands again, firmer this time. “I knew the very first day I met you,” he said, voice low. “I knew you were my forever. That you were my mate.”

There it was. That word.Mate.

He’d said it a couple of times in the past, but it had always been vague, nestled into the afterglow or whispered nearly too low for me to hear. Never directly. Never this seriously.

“A mate is like marriage,” he continued. “Only… more.”

“But you acted like?—”

“I acted like someone who was scared that if I put it all out there the first day, you’d freak out and leave.”

I wanted to argue with that. To sayI wouldn’t have. But I probably would have.