by Mason Sabre
“I know.” He shot her a frosty glare, and she was almost sorry for speaking.
She pressed herself against the counter wishing for that moment she could be invisible. Maybe she should have gone for a run and kept out of his way, like he had done all day. Maybe he would trap himself in his room for their entire relationship.
With another sigh, one she kept low and to herself, she reached up and pulled two mugs from the cabinet above her. She would make him coffee, and he could drink it if he wanted, or not. It didn’t matter. The silence between them was so heavy she might buckle with it. It created the edges of a hole inside her chest and made her want to ask what she had done, but also … it made her crave him. His proximity made the longing inside her even deeper. She could just touch him. Her wolf could scent him, but everything in the way he moved made it perfectly clear he didn’t want her anywhere near.
“Do you hate me?” she asked after several minutes of silence passed. She nudged his mug closer to him, and he ate his rabbit. “Do you want me to leave?” She wanted to unsay the words, but at the same time, she wanted to know. Even if the answer was bad. It was better than this.
Cade leant backwards against the counter, plate in one hand, fork in the other. He put another chunk of meat in his mouth and then put the plate down. Several painful seconds of silence followed.
“Cade?”
He gave a nod and turned, leaning so he gripped the edge of the counter, and then he pushed his back out, stretching so his head was down between his arms, his shoulders bunched by his ears. “I don’t hate you.”
“But you want me to leave?”
Holding himself in that position, he shook his head and then peeked out over one arm. “No.” His words were muffled by his arm, but she understood him. “I just can’t …”
Natalie put her mug down on the side … letting go of the protective shield she had held just in case he said he wanted her to go. She was ready for that. Anyone else in this position, if this was Kara, she would have told her, you can see for yourself what he is saying with his actions. You just have to listen. But yet, with Cade … it was so impossible.
Her stomach knotted as she moved closer to him, and Cade didn’t back away, didn’t put his head down. He had his mouth pressed to his arm, hiding himself almost. Bright blue lights shone in the depths of his eyes. She had seen his wolf last night. She had heard the warnings in her own head and knew if he hadn't been so sick, he wouldn’t have breached the walls he’d so eagerly crashed through ... not willingly. She had ignored it then, and she was ignoring this now. She had to try.
The hem of his t-shirt had risen from the edge of his jeans and it exposed a thin line of tanned skin. He tensed when she reached for him and her fingers grazed across the flesh, but he didn’t move, and she let out the breath she hadn't even realised she was holding. He was watching her. Fierce eyes locked onto hers. She slid the edge of his t-shirt up, revealing toned hard and defined muscle along his back.
“Natalie …”
She splayed her fingers across his skin, both hands. Then she slid them up along his sides, feeling the ripple of muscles and bone. He gasped when she pressed her face down against his flesh. The counter gave a crack under the weight of his hold. He tasted salty and sweet. She pressed her face harder, dug her fingers in. She closed her eyes to savour the pleasure of touching him.
He gave out a ragged breath. “Natalie … please.”
She paused at the sound of her name and the pleading in his voice. She was unsure what it all meant, and he pushed himself up, turning to face her, but he didn’t move her hands from him, and that gave her wolf hope. He parted his feet, so she could stand between them. Their bodies were so dangerously close she could feel the heat rolling off him. Trembling, she ran her hand up his chest, never taking her eyes off his. All evidence of his arousal pressed to the front of his jeans. He put his hands over the top of hers, pressing them against his skin, and then he let his head go back and his eyes closed in a long, slow blink.
When they opened again, they were the blue of his wolf. He was fully there now. Even the tips of Cade’s teeth started to change, and he had to open his mouth to accommodate them. His lips curved, and her own wolf rose to the calling … answering her mate as he breathed deeply. “You’re in oestrus,” he said, his voice deep and husky. “It’s driving me crazy.”
Her own breath became shaky as she stood with her hands on him. She dared to move her hands from under his and then lift his t-shirt. He didn’t stop her as she pushed it up, and when she had it at his shoulders, he pushed her hands away, grabbed the top and pulled it off himself.
Her stomach was a tight ball of knots. Heat burned between her legs. She could so easily just tease him again, push him. Female wolves in oestrus became the dominant ones. The need to mate and reproduce was a basic instinct, but Natalie fought it. Unlike last night, she was determined not to just go with what she wanted. “Is that why you’ve been upstairs all day?”
His eyes widened at her question, and for a fleeting second, the blue of his eyes dimmed, and Cade came back. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
She frowned. “You won’t hurt me. I’m wolf. I am built for this.”
He nodded, and his eyes flared again, igniting her own wolf, but this time, too much. It brought her right up and made any sense of control Natalie thought she had, slip away. Her breaths grew ragged and she couldn’t help herself. She pressed herself harder to Cade, pressing the core of her body to his erection.
“If you do not move away from me …” He went to grab for her hand, but she snapped from his grasp and slipped her hand into his jeans, wrapping her fingers around the hard length of him. Her own desire took another notch up as Cade moaned in response to her hand on him. He went to move, and with a hard yank, he pulled her hand from his jeans, and instead of pushing her away like she expected him to, he grabbed hold of her and spun her around, so her back was against his chest.
Her wolf exploded in her mind when Cade pushed her toward the table and made her bend over it. He hitched her skirt up and pulled her panties down, bringing a growled gasp from her when he slid his hand between her thighs and nudged at them. She opened for him, pressing her chest to the table.
But Cade moved away, pulling himself hard and almost throwing himself to the other side of the room, leaving her wanting.
“Cade?”
“Stay there.” He put his hands up as he had the night before. This time she stayed.
She couldn’t fight the sob that escaped her lips, half desire, half longing for him … “I’m sorry. I—”
“It’s not you. I promise. It’s not you. Just stay there.” Cade crouched in the corner, his chest rising and falling in quick succession. He was trying to control himself.
Natalie pulled the skirt of her dress back into place. “You won't hurt me.”
A long pause before he answered her. “Do you ever watch the elders of Society? Do you ever see my mother and father?”
“I’ve seen them many times.”
“No.” He shook his head and his eyes met hers, the blue toned down a little now like a fire turning to smouldering embers. “I mean actually together. Not obligation.”
“This is an obligation?”
He let his head hang. “I don’t want to end up like my father. I don’t want to be in this kitchen thirty years from now and see you and hate you. I don’t want to come down and see the same hate in your eyes, too.”
Natalie lowered herself, still keeping the distance, but she wanted to be level with him. “It doesn’t have to be that way.” If he could only just see that. She had seen her own parents. They had been matched together, but they had found love in each other in the end.
“My father hits my mother.” The intensity in Cade’s eyes when he looked at her made her move back a little more, but at the same time, she wanted to go to him and tell him she was sorry. There was a whisper of not just a man in his eyes, but a son … a son with sadness on his shoul
ders. “They hate each other, but she’s afraid of him.”
“We won’t be like them.”
“How do you know? You don’t know me.”
He was right there. But she wasn’t blind. She had seen his father, and Cade was nothing like that. “Do you think you will hit me?”
“No …” He rubbed at his face and then sat back, letting his legs spread out in front of him. “He was forced into a relationship, though. He had someone else before my mum … someone he loved, but he had to leave her. She mated someone else too. Moved away.”
“And?”
A nonchalant shrug. “Nothing. She’s dead now. She’s been dead a while. I think it's why he hates me so much.”
Natalie frowned. “You had nothing to do with her death ...”
“No, but I am not alpha, or beta … I am just me. Unless Aaron disgraces his family, I will only ever be me. I am not bound by the same restrictions.”
“You’re free?”
Cade gave a slow nod. “I was. I had everything my father couldn’t have.” He paused. “I don’t want to hate you one day.”
Natalie processed all of what Cade was saying, and everything he wasn’t. She wanted to ask him the one thing … that one question. Cade had had a life before her. She pushed her question aside. What would the answer get her? Heartache?
Swallowing hard, Natalie moved closer to him. She crawled along the floor and it made Cade tense.
“Natalie …”
“You're not your father. If you were, you wouldn’t be here worrying about hurting me.” He would never hurt her, not in the way he feared, not physically, but she was willing to risk the other. She had to.
He fixed her with such a stare that an hour ago, she might have backed down from it. She realised now that Cade would never come to her. Not on his own. Not without his wolf fuelling him.
“I should get back to work.” He put a hand down to push himself up, but that was as far as he got before pausing. Natalie caught his hand, and she kept hold of it as she pulled herself closer to him, invading his space. His touch was a fire along her skin, sending waves of heat through her body.
“We can make this work.” She’d never been forward with a man like this before, but Cade brought this out of her. She broke eye contact with him for a fraction of a second and lifted her small dress and pulled it over her head.
“And if we can’t?”
She didn’t know, and she didn’t care, and right then, she took in a deep breath and filled herself with it, bringing up her wolf, her desire, and every ounce of need that swelled deep in her body. “I trust you.” She leant into him and called to his wolf.
Chapter 3
Gemma
Gemma woke up in an almost sleep deprived haze. Her head ached, giving a thumping pain that increased with every move she made. She let out a groan and rolled onto her back, blinking sleep from her eyes as she tried to figure out what had woken her to begin with. Then her phone vibrated on the bedside table. She reached for it, eyes still closed as she brought it in front of her face. She had to raise her brow just to get her eyes open enough so she could see the screen.
Missed call.
She was about to scroll to see who had called, when it rang again and made her jump. Danny MacDonald’s name flashed across her screen, and for a fleeting moment, the sight of his name made her heart weep—a simple connection to Cade. She was already walking along a very dangerous ledge between her heart and her head. One day she had managed without him … one long day she had crawled through every hour and fought the urge to call him and give him the answer he wanted—yes.
“Hello.” Her voice still thick with the remnants of sleep.
“Gemma? It's Danny.” He was whispering.
She gave a yawn. “What time is it? Are you okay?”
“Almost seven.”
Almost seven? She tried to sit herself up. “What’s wrong?”
“Are you busy?” he asked not answering her question. Gemma rubbed at her face, trying to make herself come around. His question rang in her ears and hung there while she took a moment to process it.
“I’m not busy.” She stifled a yawn. “Is everything alright?”
“Can I meet you?” His voice was so quiet and there were no sounds around him, like an echo in the distance.
“Sure.” She pushed herself back up along her bed, stuffing a pillow behind her back.
“Not Cade, though. Okay?”
“O … kay….” If he had said, not Aaron, that would be understandable, but not Cade? “Have you spoken to him?”
“No. Can we meet? Please? It's urgent. Just you, though. Okay?”
“Okay. Where?”
“Hucklies.”
Hucklies … Gemma screwed her eyes up. She knew the name … it was there, somewhere in her head. “The one near Raven?”
“Yes. Please.”
If Gemma remembered right, Hucklies was a small coffee shop in town near Raven’s bar. It was a busy little place—Human owned, but they permitted Others to use it … a meeting place between Society Other and stray Other. It was also private enough that one could have a full conversation and be assured no one was listening. Something was wrong, and if the burning in the pit of her stomach wasn’t telling her that, it was Danny’s hushed tone. “Can you give me an hour?”
She had to dress, shower, and then find some way of getting there that wouldn’t arouse suspicion. Her car was toast. Karl had looked at it the night they had run and told her he needed to get her a part for it, and not even to use it. She tried to remember what he said it was, but her knowledge of cars was where to put the petrol and how to top-up the oil.
“Don’t be late,” Danny said.
He hung up before she could say more to him, and Gemma stared down at her phone for a moment until it rang out with the dead tone. She tapped her finger against the screen and then quickly scrolled to Cade’s number before changing her mind, her desperate heart giddy with an excuse to speak to him.
The phone gave half a ring, and then the call was accepted. There were footsteps and then the click of a door closing. “Hello, Cade MacDonald’s phone?” It wasn’t Cade who spoke. Gemma froze, her blood turned to ice in her veins at the shocking sound of Natalie’s sweet delicate voice. She almost choked at hearing it. Nothing like the cackled scratchy voice Gemma had always imagined.
Sucking in a breath, Gemma blinked hard. The tang of dread laid thick across her tongue. “I was after Cade. Is he there?”
Natalie’s voice was hushed. Not like Danny’s had been, but in a more delicate manner. “He’s asleep. Do you need me to wake him up?”
Gemma pressed a hand over her mouth for a second. Her stomach twisted with agonising knots and her breath threatened to leave. She bit down on her trembling lip and shook her head.
They were in the same bed together.
Bile rose in Gemma’s throat and pain stabbed at the back of Gemma’s eyes.
“Gemma?”
Gemma had forgotten Natalie was on the line. Her mind and her tiger had sunk into the darkness of her imagination and the sight of Cade in his bed with someone else by his side. “Sorry. It’s okay,” she croaked. She clicked end on the call and pressed the phone to her chest, trying to stop the feeling of her heart as it tore open and bled through her. Pain lanced through her core, down the centre, through her heart and into every part of her body. She let out a sob, rocking forward with it into a ball.
What had she done?
This was what she wanted … what she had told him to do. But … maybe some part of her had never believed he would. He was safe, though. Safe like this …
Gemma heaved herself further onto the bed, trying to seek comfort in her own scent, her own place. It didn’t matter how much she told herself that this was the right thing, though. Her body and limbs were plastic dismembered toys as she wrapped her arms around herself and tried to hold everything in. She could barely breathe. She pushed the balls of her palms into her eyes, rocking
and rolling onto her back, her legs up, keeping herself in a foetal position. This was what she wanted….
After a while, she lowered her legs and stretched out on the bed, arms by her sides, just breathing. When her heart calmed back to its silent beating, Gemma took in another breath, holding herself and her tiger still.
“Get your shit together, girl.” Words Stephen would have used if he were there. She missed him all the more. He would have pulled her up and told her exactly what he thought. She made her choice. She told Cade to go.
I wish you were here. The thought brought another sob from her. She wished it had all been as it was years before … when they were all happy.
If she didn’t have to go to meet Danny, Gemma would have crawled back into her bed and stayed there. All she could do was coat herself in numbness and make herself get going. She had to.
In the space of twenty minutes, Gemma got herself showered and dressed and a little closer to alive and functioning than she had been. She called for a taxi and waited for it with a coffee, trying to get enough caffeine into herself so she might look like one of the living … although, mostly it was so she could drink it too hot and focus on something more than where Cade was, and what he was doing. He filtered into her mind the moment nothing else occupied it. Sometimes he got in even if there was.
The taxi came and drove her to the other town, just out of Society boundaries. She paid—too much, got out and scanned the people around her. The customers at this time of day were the on-the-go coffee types. They bought their coffees with sandwiches and low fat, low carb, bags of whatever, which they took to work, sat at their desks and waited for the clock to tell them it was time to go home—sheep.
The chime above the door rang out when Gemma entered the shop. It alerted the staff that there was a new customer. No one bothered to look and there was a queue in the centre … people who hadn't yet started their work day were waiting to be served by those staff who had begun work two hours ago.
