Chapter 62 Breakfast With A Flustered Wolf
The kitchen smelled like warm bread and something sweet.
Sunlight spilled through the small window, painting soft golden streaks across the wooden floor. The house was quiet, still wrapped in the hush of early morning — the kind of silence that settles after a night filled with tenderness, whispered breaths, and the sort of closeness that changes everything.
I rubbed my eyes, letting my fingers trail down my cheek before stepping quietly toward the kitchen.
What I found made me stop.
Aiden… was cooking.
Well—trying to.
He stood by the stove, tall and broad and completely out of his element, holding a spatula like it might suddenly grow teeth and bite him. His long golden hair was messy, falling over his face in soft waves, and he kept blowing strands away with tiny frustrated puffs of air. His tunic was crooked, half-tucked, and there was flour on his shoulder — flour, as if he’d somehow fought a baking battle and lost.
I leaned on the doorway with a hand covering my smile.
“You’re… cooking?”
Aiden jumped so violently he almost dropped the spatula.
His head snapped toward me, eyes wide, cheeks instantly blooming a shy, lovely pink.
“I— I can cook!” he blurted, voice cracking just slightly. “Or, well… I can try. Sometimes. Maybe.”
I raised a brow. “Maybe?”
He cleared his throat and tried to stand taller — except the spatula trembled in his hand, betraying him completely.
“Stop looking at me like that,” he muttered, turning back to the stove.
“Like what?” I asked, stepping closer.
“Like I’m entertaining you.”
“You are entertaining me.”
He groaned under his breath, soft and low, and the sound made my smile widen.
I walked behind him and peeked over his shoulder at the pan.
I should not have.
The pancake inside was shaped like a tragic accident — lopsided, uneven, one side dark brown and the other still pale. It looked like a confused piece of bread trying its best.
“Aiden…” I whispered, struggling not to laugh. “What is that?”
“It’s a pancake,” he said defensively. Then he frowned at it. “I think.”
I gently rested a hand on his back.
He went rigid. Absolutely, adorably rigid — like a shy wolf pup pretending to be made of stone.
“You didn’t have to cook for me,” I said softly.
His eyes flickered away.
“I wanted to.”
He swallowed, lowering the spatula.
“I wanted your morning to be good. After last night… after everything.”
My breath caught.
He wasn’t talking about the physical closeness — though my cheeks heated remembering his warm hands, the way he’d kissed me with slow devotion, the way he’d touched me like I was fragile and precious and needed to be held.
He meant the safety.
The tenderness.
The trust.
“Aiden,” I whispered, brushing my fingers along his arm.
That did it.
He turned pink from his neck to the tips of his ears.
Then, desperately trying to hide it, he turned back to the stove and flipped the pancake too fast.
It flipped right out of the pan and landed on the counter.
He froze.
I couldn’t hold it anymore.
The laughter spilled out of me, soft and bright.
He covered his face with one hand.
“I am never cooking again,” he declared dramatically. “Ever. This is a disaster.”
I stepped closer, sliding my hand up his back to the nape of his neck.
“Hey,” I whispered, tugging playfully. “It’s sweet.”
“It’s embarrassing,” he mumbled into his palm.
“It’s adorable.”
His ears turned even redder.
I reached past him, gently plucking the pancake off the counter. “Aiden, look at this,” I teased. “It’s shaped like—”
“Don’t say it,” he warned, voice muffled, still hiding his blush.
“A failing crescent moon.”
He groaned again.
I placed the pancake on a plate and smiled up at him. “You don’t have to be perfect.”
He slowly lowered his hand, eyes meeting mine in a soft, shy glance.
His lashes were long, framing his golden eyes, which were still sleepy and warm.
“I wanted to make you feel special,” he admitted quietly. “But I don’t really know how humans do breakfast. I only know pack traditions.”
“What are pack traditions?”
He hesitated, looking away.
“Mostly eating whatever we hunted as a group. And fighting for the biggest share.”
I blinked. “Aiden…”
He shrugged sheepishly.
“I tried.”
I slid my hands around his waist, pulling him gently toward me. His breath hitched, and he stood stiff for a moment — not from discomfort, but from flustered surprise — before melting slowly, lowering his forehead to mine.
“You trying,” I whispered, “means more than any perfect breakfast ever could.”
His hands found my hips, warm and careful.
He whispered softly, “I just… I want to be good for you.”
“You already are,” I murmured, lips brushing lightly against his. “Even if the pancakes are not.”
He let out a soft laugh — breathy, shy — and hid his face in the crook of my neck, his hair falling around us like a curtain of gold.
His warmth pressed against me, and my heart swelled.
When he finally pulled back, he cleared his throat and clapped his hands once, trying to recover.
“Okay,” he said too loudly, “breakfast. I will try again.”
“No,” I laughed, grabbing his wrist before he could burn something else. “Sit. I’ll cook.”
He blinked. “Me?”
“Yes, you. Sit.”
“But—”
“SIT.”
He sat.
Like a scolded, embarrassed wolf.
His hair fell into his eyes as he looked up at me, cheeks rosy, fingers fidgeting with the edge of the table.
He looked… soft.
Young.
Absolutely undone by morning affection.
When I cracked an egg into the pan, he leaned forward, chin in his hand.
“You’re better at this than I am,” he murmured.
“Well, at least my pancakes stay inside the pan.”
“…that was one time,” he grumbled.
I set a plate in front of him, warm and fluffy with real pancakes. He blinked at it as if I’d handed him something magical.
“For me?” he whispered.
“Of course for you.”
He took a bite.
Paused.
His eyes widened.
“…this is amazing.”
I smirked. “Better than yours?”
He flushed to the tips of his ears.
“Shut up,” he muttered, smiling shyly into his food.
I sat beside him, brushing our knees together.
Aiden glanced at me from under his lashes — shy, warm, utterly smitten.
And for the first time, I realized…
wolves could blush too.
And mine blushed the most for me.