Leaving Mason silenced with surprise at my intent, I ran past him, keeping myself steady yet fast. It was merely seconds before he caught up.
Chapter 12 - Mason
I shouldn’t have called her atrack girl.For the most part, it had been a teasing memory, something I’d held onto in the months after Bryce had left town, but the way she had flinched after hearing it only reminded me of what had come after I’d called her that.
My pack, too young to know better; me, too young and immature to teach them any better.
The words were on my tongue, another apology, another acceptance that I had been unbelievably idiotic. But Bryce was already blowing past me, plunging herself beyond the treeline. My eyes fell to her ass, and I barely remembered to follow her instead of simply staring at her.
The woods were draped in darkness, the moon above us visible in slivers, and I laughed loudly as I caught up to Bryce, thundering past her. We’d all underestimated her, and never should have, because Bryce pressed on, keeping pace with me.
The wolf in me roared to shift, to tell her to shift at the same time, so we could run, connected only by thought and emotion alone. To be absorbed in the woods, and the feel of crunching leaves beneath paws, and the bunch of muscles as we crossed creeks and zipped through the trees. But in this form, I couldn’t stop looking at her as we sprinted down a trail neither of us even communicated. It was like we both knew where to go, where the other would veer left. When I headed towards the mount of the Honeycreek hills, Bryce turned at the same time.
When she led us up another incline, I knew exactly where she’d go.
As we ran, the tension between us melted. I wasn’t the alpha who had rejected her, and she wasn’t the town runawayscared to come home. We were just Mason and Bryce. Her hair streamed out behind her, a dark cloak that caught the sparse light above us. Her laughter rang out, as carefree as it once had been. Our bodies were in sync, and I could see how she relaxed like this. How many times had she gotten to do this in White Bay?
Whohad she done it with?
The question surged up in me, thick with jealousy, and I clamped it down.
Instead, I reached out for her, trying to catch hold of her to see if she would run faster, turn it into a game of chasing one another, or if she would stay, let me keep her close. But she was already anticipating me, and she circled around a thick tree trunk, giggling, as her eyes met mine.
For one moment, our eyes met, and the air around us stilled.
My breath loosened, and Bryce’s giggles tapered off into something that looked like confusion as she gazed back at me. And then there it was: the small, unburdened smile I had come to love and miss.
My chest ached, and my heart pounded beneath my ribs. I went to lean in, yet she was gone in the blink of an eye. I laughed aloud, and my chest loosened, my own tension easing as I chased her down. Bryce was a speck of dark hair in the distance, and I couldn’t help marveling at her speed. Goddamn, she would be the death of me one day.
Did she know how crazy she drove me?
Easily, I caught up to her, tackling her, and caught her around the waist. Bryce shrieked, the sound far happier than she had appeared over the last week, and I grinned as I spun heraround. But then her hands immediately batted at mine, and I set her down. She turned to me, her eyes wide.
“I’m heavy,” she murmured, her shoulders tight.
I reached out to tuck a loose lock of her hair back behind her ear. “Not to me, you’re not.”
Bryce blinked, and I saw tears in her eyes. “You… you don’t mean that.”
I stepped closer to her. “You want me to prove it again?”
She swallowed, her breath coming hard and deep with the exertion of running. Taking a step back, Bryce put more distance between us, and I followed, not willing to let the space grow again. Turning, she looked ahead, nodding at the ribbon of water cutting through the trees. Eventually, it led into a larger river in the town, and then that fed deeper into the Atlantic Ocean.
“Honeycreek,” she said, “the namesake of the whole town.”
“This is where I took you the… the last time.” My throat closed up, and I cleared it, trying to dispel the nerves in my voice. What power did she have over me to reduce me to this?
“The last time.” Bryce’s voice was quiet, soft, and I could hear how lost in thought she was. “Do you think about it often?”
Images flashed through my mind. My hand slipping beneath a pink and white polka dot skirt, my mouth pressing to the skin that my other bared as I pushed up the white t-shirt she’d worn. My name on her lips, breathed shakily. Her name pressed to her bare, freckled shoulder as I entered her.
Heat curled through my stomach as I was silent, long enough for Bryce to look back at me. I nodded. “All the time. Do you?”
“I hate that I do,” she confessed. “And yet… the hate is never enough to bring me enough comfort.”
“Bryce, you’re killing me.” My voice was tight, thick with desire, as I moved closer to her again. She withdrew once more, her hands tucked behind her back. I knew she was tugging the ends of her hair, a nervous habit I’d already noticed she hadn’t overcome.
“Why?”
