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“That I know.”

My bottom lip quivered.

“Your heat will now come once a month until you are pregnant.”

“Like a period?”

“Yes, but a horny one.”

“Fuck.”

“And I’ll be there to take care of you. Food, warmth, comfort on any level, and of course. . .”

“Lots of cock.”

“Yes. Indeed.”

“I’ll need to have my heat sessions in five-star hotels. I believe that’s the proper way.”

“Then, so be it.” His smirk widened. “My mate gets only the best.”

“And it will need spaces like this.” I gazed at the steam rising from the water.

“You’ll have that too.”

I looked back at him. “So Inari gave you your female form.”

His smirk disappeared. “Yes.”

“And then what?”

He sighed. “My form was curious. Hungry for the world. Yet, she also wanted what I wanted. Our mate.”

I pursed my lips.

“We’d watched other kitsune get their mates in a year or two, but never too long. Decades passed and no mate came.”

My heart ached for them.

“She crossed oceans looking for you. India. China. Kingdoms whose names are dust now. The humans there still tell stories about a beautiful woman who came from nowhere and changed everything. Those stories are her footprints. And of course she never found any mate. Just lovers here and there and disappointment.”

“That’s sad.”

“It was infuriating. We went to the god.”

“And what did Inari say?”

“Be patient.” He shook his head. “That only pissed us off more, so. . .”

“Okay.”

"After two hundred years of searching every face, every scent, every soul. . .nothing. Her grief turned into rage, and her rage made her stronger than me. I wore her form far more than my own. People trusted a beautiful woman faster than a strange man."

"Damn."

He smiled. "I like that you are so curious."

"Good because I have so many damned questions. I'll be asking you shit for decades."