Mercy hissed from the sidelines, her arm bound in someone’s jacket. “She doesn’t belong here.”
Hudson lifted his gaze to the pack, who waited with bated breath as the promise of violence hovered around us. “CoraRoberts is my mate. She has shown time and time again that she values us. She has kneeled in pain while clutching the life force of our young to ensure their survival. She bleeds to protect you and never hesitates to put herself between danger and the pack. If you don’t like my choices, then you are free to leave. No one will stop you. No one will beg you to stay. Cora is going nowhere. The mating ceremony is but a formality. She is my forever and the one thing that I can and will put before pack.”
A knot formed in my throat, and I squeezed my bloody palm. Mercy glared at me, and I tilted my head up, refusing to back down from the hatred swimming in her eyes. After a moment, her shoulders dropped, and she melted into the forest.
Hudson turned to face me. “Ready?” he asked, his expression tight. Maybe the reality of the secrets he promised me was hitting hard. He guided me to the car, and no one stopped to say farewell or offer their thanks for the protection.
My stomach growled as we pulled out of the driveway.
“What was that?” Hudson wondered.
“The worst crime of tonight wasn’t an infatuated wolf or a bleeding mate. It was my half-eaten burger left behind on the dirty ground.”
“I could have resolved a number of those problems with one quick bite,”Indigo lamented.
The drive home was silent, the kind that weighed heavily with the promise of violence. The rain started, tapping a rhythm on the windshield like impatient fingers. Hudson’s grip on the wheel tightened until the leather creaked. Then, without warning, he flicked the blinkers on and veered off the main road.
The forest swallowed us whole, headlights carving narrow paths through mist. I couldn’t tell if the tremor running through me was fear, fury, or something far more dangerous.
I braced my hand on the dash. “Where are we going?”
“Somewhere private to have this out. No secrets, no hiding, no interruptions. I want to make sure you’re looking me in the eye when you explain all the reasons you made a deal with a god and hid it from me.”
My pulse quickened. “Oh boy,” I muttered. “That won’t end well.”
“Depends on what you promised, mate. Even death fears what he himself embodies, and I won’t hesitate to remove his heart if he has so much as laid a finger on you.”
“This,”Indigo sighed.“This is why we are soulmates.”
Save me now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Protect your peace. Tell me your secrets and bare your soul… but keep it outside.
My pulse raced as Hudson pulled off the main road. His hands gripped the wheel with that deceptively calm, Principal-level of self-control that meant something inside him was coiling, not relaxing.
The forest swallowed us whole, like it did when he’d whisked me away to propose. It was the same hidden track, the same light-dappled tunnel of oak and cypress. I knew where we were going long before the gravel turned to moss and the world went quiet enough that even the birds held their breath. His secret place. Our secret place. And apparently where we were now holding life-altering conversations.
He could keep the pack house and its many acres. This is where I’d choose to live out my days.
He parked beneath the towering oak, whose roots curled like sleeping serpents, and the stunning cabin suspended between the thick branches took my breath away. It looked exactly the same as the last time we’d come here to breathe when everything had been falling apart around us—Eloise’s schemes, my psyche, ghost armies, and a little interference from Heaven and Hell.
It was heartbreakingly peaceful.
Hudson cut the engine and dropped his head back against the seat. “Text Rebecca and let her know we are okay and will be back tomorrow,” he muttered.
I grabbed my phone from my bag.
Me: Gone to a secret treehouse in the forest for a little heart to heart. Be back tomorrow.
Rebecca: That’s what you kids are calling it these days?
Me: Just call me if anything urgent comes up.
Rebecca: Hopefully, both of those things are in your near future.
I scowled at the phone.What?
