Griffin grinned, oblivious. “Devon’s brother. Didn’t you hear? His whole family moved here recently.”
I blinked. Oh.
Oh.
I hadn’t connected it. Somehow hadn’t put the pieces together. Of all the ways to run into him again, I hadn’t expected this.
Another bar. Another night. Both of us alone.
“Mark,” I said again, quieter this time.
And suddenly, the noise of the bar faded into the background. My wolf pressed closer, satisfied and purring, like it had been waiting patiently all this time for this.
Mark slid onto the empty stool beside me once Griffin moved off.
“So,” he said lightly, “why exactly are you trying to clone yourself?”
I huffed a quiet laugh and took another sip of my beer. “Long story.”
“I’ve got time.”
Something in the easy way he said it made my shoulders loosen before I could stop myself.
“My, uh, band might not be able to do the Winter Festival,” I admitted. “I already signed us up for the audition, assuming they’d be free. Turns out they won’t be.”
Mark hummed, listening.
“I feel kind of stupid for assuming,” I went on. “Like, of course people have other plans. It’s the holidays. But I didn’t even think to ask first.”
I stared at the condensation sliding down the side of my bottle.
“I don’t want to back out,” I said quietly. Part of it was pride, but I didn’t voice that. “I just… really want to play that night.”
The words sat between us.
I frowned faintly at myself, realizing I’d basically just unloaded everything on someone I barely knew. I wasn’t usually like this.
I didn’t even talk to Noah and Ethan like this, not really.
And yet, every time I met Mark, it felt like I was already halfway there. It was like something about him made it easier to say the things I usually swallowed down.
The first time we’d met, I’d been nursing a breakup. Complaining into my drink. Now here I was again, two years later in a different bar, in the same mood.
I picked at the edge of the label on my bottle.
“Anyway,” I said, forcing a lighter tone, “I’ll figure something out. I have to.”
I could even hear myself thinking through options I’d laughed off earlier. Calling Maurice. Asking for a collaboration. Going solo. That thought alone made my stomach flip.
I shook my head and looked up. “Sorry. Forget I said anything.”
Mark hadn’t said anything yet. He was just watching me with a thoughtful expression.
I almost asked him something then, what he thought I should do, but stopped myself.
Instead, I tried to change the subject. “You said earlier that cloning myself would be a bad idea.”
A corner of his mouth curved. “Yeah.”
