“No. But they know about the mating link, and they know how I feel about it.”
Heat wrapped around my collarbone and neck like a rampant vine. “Are they horrified?”
He stared at the sprinting pulse point in my neck. “Why would they be horrified?”
“Because I’m so much younger, and like a little sister to you, and you held me in the maternity ward.” I said all of this in one breath.
“Hey . . .” He stepped closer, and his heady heat scent enveloped me. “First off, age doesn’t matter. You’re not a kid anymore, Ness. You’re a woman and I’m a man, and that’s all that matters. All that should matter. And if anyone ever makes a derogatory comment to you about our age gap, then send them my way, and I’ll set them straight. Secondly, you are not related to me, therefore you aren’t my little sister. And yeah, I held you in the maternity ward, and yeah, back then I didn’t think I was holding my mate, but apparently I was. How many people can claim they saw the person meant for them come into this world? Not many. So I’ll always cherish that, and no, it doesn’t color the way I think of you today.” His words were so quiet they tangled with his exhale.
His exhale which I tasted on my parted lips.
“Fuck.” His pupils bled into his gold-green irises. “How long are we supposed to stay away from each other?”
I smiled, even though my pulse felt like it had hitched a ride on a fighter jet. “You give your mom that hundred dollar bill yet?”
His pupils retracted. “Not yet. I was waiting for you to witness the donation.” He tipped his head to the house. “We better go inside before I break all the rules and take you back to my house.”
A breathy gasp escaped me, and that little sound made August’s gaze flick to my mouth.
He shook his head as though trying to clear it of any dirty thoughts. I assumed that’s what his jerky movement was about since I had my fair share of brand-new steamy scenarios scrolling through my mind.
We didn’t speak the whole way up the path. He gestured for me to go ahead of him inside the house. The scent of simmering tomato sauce and caramelized onions hit my nostrils, awakening my hunger for something other than August.
Isobel smiled at me from where she stood at the stove top. “We finally managed to get you to come over.” She set down the wooden spoon and approached me, arms extended. I wasn’t sure if she wanted to hug me or take the flowers from my arms, so I remained statue-still.
Her arms wrapped around me and pulled me in.
“It smells so good in here,” I said into Isobel’s dark-brown hair.
Even though the strands were real, they weren’t hers. They had this chemical keratin smell to them like all wigs. I remembered visiting a shop for one with Mom before she’d decided she wouldn’t need a wig. The reminder of her cancer had me pressing away and inspecting Isobel’s face for signs of the disease.
“How are you feeling?” I asked.
“Alive. Very much alive.” She smiled that bright smile of hers that could burn away the densest of fogs.
I gave her the bouquet, examining her for a noticeable slump or another mark of fatigue. She ran a knuckle over my cheek. “Don’t you start worrying now, too, sweet girl. I promise I’m fine.”
I nodded.
“August, honey, can you get one of the vases down from the shelf?”
August strode past me and opened one of the kitchen cabinets. Barely straining, he reached the top shelf and took down a fluted crystal recipient just as his father came in through the open doors that gave onto the paved terrace.
“Hi, Ness.”
“Hi, Nelson.”
Holding a pair of tongs out so that the charred greasy bits didn’t transfer onto my dress, he leaned in for a one-armed hug. I suddenly wished August hadn’t told them anything. Then they’d just be Nelson and Isobel, my parents’ best friends instead of a set of parents whom I felt like I needed to impress. My nervousness was so violent that the air probably shimmied with it.
“We probably shouldn’t be offering you alcohol, but would you like a glass of wine?” Nelson asked. “I opened one of the bottles from our wedding. It’s matured as beautifully as my bride.”
Smiling, Isobel shook her head. “I’ve matured, huh?”
“You’ve gotten more ravishing, which was a feat considering how beautiful you were thirty years ago.”
When he dropped a kiss on his wife’s glowing cheek, I became misty-eyed. They reminded me so much of my parents. My parents who’d loved each other so fiercely and completely that they’d resisted a mating link to stay together.
My eyes bumped into August’s worried ones, before vaulting to the serrated egg-shaped heads of the purple tulips.
“So, wine?” Nelson asked me, even though his gaze was on August. “Or is my son going to give you a hard time about underage drinking again?”
August raised his palms. “She didn’t drive here, so I’m not passing any judgment.”
I suspected that even if I had driven here, he wouldn’t have objected to me imbibing alcohol since the one and only time he’d made a fuss about it was back at Frank’s when August had been annoyed with me over Liam.
Nelson gestured to the terrace.
Before I walked out, I put my bag down on the speckled granite. “Can I bring anything out?”
“You can grab the pitcher of water from the fridge,” Isobel said, stirring her tomato sauce before removing the pan from the burner.
I pulled the water from the fridge and headed to the terrace where I set the pitcher between two giant candles flickering in glass hurricane holders.
I gazed around the paved veranda where nothing had changed: the stacked firepit was still surrounded by five burgundy Adirondacks; and the low stone wall, from which sprouted little purple blooms, still girdled the deck.
When I was younger, I used to skip atop the wall with my arms stretched out like a tightrope walker picturing a pit of hungry alligators beneath me. I had a vivid imagination back then. Not that it had changed. My imagination was still plenty vivid, except it ran on a very different frequency these days.
“You okay?” August asked, coming up behind me.
“Your parents . . . They just remind me so much of Mom and Dad.”
He draped his arm around my shoulders and tucked me into his side, and although we weren’t supposed to touch, I didn’t fight his embrace. Even though his fingers only connected to my bicep, it felt like they were resting on my heart, towing one ripped segment toward the other.
After a while, he whispered a quick, “Sorry,” against my hairline before releasing me.
I wasn’t sorry.
That hand might’ve left a trace on my body, but it had also left one on my heart.
I thought of Mom again, of her claim that the right man could fix a broken heart. August could touch mine, and this was as thrilling as it was terrifying because that meant he could mend it just as he could break it.
8
Dinner was delicious and laid-back. Neither Isobel nor Nelson brought up the mating link, and neither of them asked questions about my intentions toward their son or his intentions toward me.
But after dinner . . . Well, after dinner was a different story.
While the men cleaned up the vestiges of our meal, Isobel brewed a pot of chamomile tea before leading me to the firepit. Flames snapped in between the circle of stones and warmed the cooling night air, casting shadows over her haggard face.
She’d promised me she was well, but the deep creases around her eyes and lips worried me nonetheless. As she reclined in the burgundy Adirondack, I prayed her fatigue wasn’t a symptom that her double-mastectomy had failed its purpose.
“August spoke to us before you arrived,” she said, jouncing me out of my pessimistic musings.
Clutching my mug, I focused on the dancing blaze.
“Nelson and I, we don’t want to meddle, but your parents are no longer here, and well, we feel a responsibility toward them to discuss it wi
th you. This . . . link, it’s momentous and not without consequence, for you and for our son.”
How I wished the fire could leap out of the pit and incinerate something, anything, just to drag the focus away from me.
“I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but your mother, she was intended for—”
“Heath. I heard.”
“Oh.” There was a pregnant pause, then, “The reason I’m bringing up your mom is because I want to remind you that you have a choice in the matter. You and my son might have a connection—you always had a connection—but I guess, what I’m trying to say, is that this connection has grown into something . . . more.”
At this point, if the flames decided to incinerate me, I wouldn’t have truly minded.
“August feels strongly toward you, but you’re so young, so if you don’t reciprocate his feelings, he’ll understand. Maybe not right away, but in time, he will.”
She touched my forearm, and I jumped, spilling tea all over my lap.
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” The tea seeped into the red silk, darkening it.
“A mother wants only one thing in life, and that’s her child’s happiness. You’ve always contributed to August’s, but now you’ve become the pivotal object of it. And although he claims it’s not because of the link, the link doubtlessly enhances what he feels. Doubtlessly enhances what you feel, too.”
Although I wanted to melt through the planks of my chair, I finally looked at Isobel. Her green eyes were gentle instead of reproachful like I’d feared.
“I want what’s best for both of you, and maybe that’s each other. But you’re only seventeen.”
I’d be eighteen in two weeks, but then August would be twenty-eight in March, so we’d always have this nine-years-and-some-months gap.
Over the husky notes of the jazz song pouring from the outdoor speakers, Isobel said, “Nelson and I, we met when I was sixteen and he was twenty-two. And Maggie, she was—”
“Thirteen. And Dad was three years older, which had made a lot of people balk.”
She smiled. “How I remember. But Maggie was so spirited and strong-willed that whenever anyone mentioned the age difference, she’d get all up in their faces.” Isobel turned her gaze to the flames and sighed. “I guess age doesn’t really matter in the end.” She removed her hand from my arm. “What does matter, though, is making an informed decision. You have options. August is one of them, but the Winter Solstice is another.”
I cast a glance over my shoulder to make sure the men were still out of earshot. August was drying a plate by the sink while Nelson was stacking the glasses inside a cupboard. They seemed deep into their own conversation.
“Isobel, would you and Nelson be disgusted if I chose August?”
She whipped her gaze to me. “Disgusted? No! Absolutely not. Ness, we love you. We’ve always loved you and we will always love you. Whatever you decide. The only reason I brought this up is because we care so much about you, and we don’t want you to feel pressured into something you’re not ready for.”
I twirled my mug, wishing it could leak warmth into more than just my fingers. “I understand my options, and I’m not going to rush into anything that’s indelible.”
“Good.”
“What’s good?”
I glanced up at August. “The tea,” I lied, raising it to my lips.
He eyed me suspiciously. Yeah . . . he hadn’t bought that.
“I brought you girls some covers.” He handed one to his mother, who draped it over her lap, then gave me the other folded rectangle that felt like spun clouds. I set my mug on the rim of the firepit to tuck the soft blanket around my shoulders.
August sank into the chair beside mine, and then Nelson arrived with a glass brimming with wine and sat next to him.
“Look at that sky,” he mused.
We all raised our gazes to the glittering darkness overhead. Magical. Simply magical.
August leaned a little toward me. “Did you find Cassiopeia?”
I stared at the dark freckles beneath his left eye where a thin pale scar lingered—a remnant of when my wolf claw had scraped across his face. How I longed to drag my finger over the freckles shaped like the constellation. Instead, I burrowed my fingers into the cashmere wrap. “I always find Cassiopeia.”
His gaze blazed as bright as the fire.
But then the heat in his eyes turned cold as a voice entered our minds.
There will be no full moon run this month. I apologize to the elders, but I urge you all to stay in skin.
Liam’s voice dragged me away from the starlit evening that had been a welcomed parenthesis in my tumultuous life.
I will be leaving to meet with the Rivers tomorrow morning, and I’ll return the following day. Please clear Monday evening for a debriefing.
I waited for him to mention I would be accompanying him. When a full minute passed and nothing more was uttered, I let out a quiet breath.
“The Rivers, huh?” Nelson said.
“What about the Rivers?” Isobel asked.
August studied my face as he said, “Liam’s going to meet with them.”
“The pack that commissioned you to build their meeting hall?” Isobel said. “I thought Heath had given you grief for working with them.”
Nelson swirled his wine. “He did. Liam must be desperate for a new ally now that we lost the Pines.”
“Did you know he was traveling East?” August asked me.
I nodded. Informing him that I was accompanying Liam hung on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn’t propel the words out of my mouth. I was afraid my confession would stoke August’s jealousy.
Besides, if Liam hadn’t mentioned me, then maybe he wasn’t taking me with him in the end. I held on to that possibility as the night wore on. But of course, right as I was about to call a cab, Liam’s voice resonated inside my head: I’ll be at your place at 7:00 a.m.
August nodded to my phone. “You weren’t actually going to call a cab, were you?”
I forced my features to smooth out. “I don’t want to get you in trouble.”
Sitting together in a confined space was against Liam’s rules.
“You don’t want to get me in trouble, or him?” he asked slowly.
I swallowed. “Both of you. Either of you. I don’t want to get either of you in trouble.”
Nelson and Isobel were still outside on the patio, speaking quietly. Was it about us? Even though she’d given me her blessing, her anguish was palpable.
“It’s a short ride.”
I sighed and put my phone away. “Okay.”
I prayed Liam wouldn’t find out and challenge Cassandra to punish me for disobeying.
As we made our way to the pickup, August kept casting concerned glances my way.
Only when I was settled in the car did he ask, “What did my mother say? Did she try to talk you out of being with me?”
I fingered the hem of my dress, not quite daring to look at him. “She reminded me that I had options.”
“Options?” His voice was low and rough.
“She told me I could let the Winter Solstice go by before deciding.” I raised my gaze back to his. “That you’d understand.”
Would he, though?
His lips parted a little, then pressed tight. I sensed he didn’t want me to choose that option. I sensed he feared that the disappearance of the bond would lead to the disappearance of my feelings for him.
I guessed neither of us could be sure it wouldn’t.
Perhaps tomorrow’s trip wouldn’t be so unwelcomed after all. At least it would shed light on how I really felt about him since the bond would vanish.
When we arrived in front of my apartment, I didn’t linger in the car, afraid someone would spot us and report to Liam.
“What are you doing tomorrow?” August asked after I’d hopped out.
My heart, which had been beating double-time since we’d left his parents’ place, stilled.
Should I tell him?
“I wanted to show you something,” he said.
I opened my mouth.
To lie.
Or at least that had been my intent, but he would sense I was out of Boulder. Besides, I didn’t want to lie to him. “I’m going with Liam.”
His Adam’s apple seemed suddenly spikier. “If I hadn’t asked, would you have told me?”
“No.”
He dropped his gaze to his illuminated dashboard, features tightening.
“I was afraid you’d torture yourself with what I could be doing with him in a place where the bond doesn’t affect my body.”
His wolf must’ve been close to the surface because his eyes shone like emeralds. Jaw barely budging, he muttered something that sounded like, If Cassandra doesn’t kill him, I might. “I know the Rivers. I’ll come too, then.”
My heart twitched back to life. “August—”
“Unless you don’t want me there.”
I pressed my lips together. I wanted him there, but I also wanted him to trust me. Besides, I needed to know what distance did to us. If not now, then later, but later might hurt more.
His pupils gushed darkness into his irises. “You don’t want me there.”
“What I want is for you to trust me.”
“You, I trust.”
I gripped the edge of the car door. “Then trust that I can handle Liam.”
“Sweetheart”—his nostrils flared—“you’re asking a very human man to be superhuman. I’m not sure I’m capable of that.”
My lips bent with a smile. “Says a werewolf.”
My humor defused some of his anger. Not all of it, though. The tether was so stiff it seemed made of metal instead of magic.
“Let’s hope the Rivers know something we don’t,” he said.
It took my hazy mind a second to understand he was talking about Morgan’s tricks. “Yeah. Let’s hope they do.”
We stared at each other for another endless beat. I sensed him tugging on the tether, trying to reel me to him. I had to clutch the door harder to avoid stumbling.
“August,” I chided gently.
“What?”
A Pack of Love and Hate Page 6
