Pressing the heels of my hands into my eyes, I fight back tears and a groan. I need caffeine. Bad. My brain feels like it’s being pressure-cooked inside my skull. Nothing like a little emotional turmoil and a dependence on bitter bean water to really round out my morning.
“You’re right,” I admit after a moment of heavy silence where I manage to collect myself. “I know what the right thing to do is—whatIneed to do. I just don’t know if I can do it.”
My Nightingale blue eyes soften. “Because you’re scared of what will happen when you’re forced to be around him?”
I don’t answer right away because I don’t need to. The truth of my situation is clear as day.
“Yes,” I finally say as I lift my head.
Siggy’s mouth opens like she’s going to say something else, but then she freezes, head tilting suddenly. She looks over her shoulder at the empty doorway behind her. It’s not until a few beats later my weaker senses pick up on the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs.
The person in the doorway isn’t the one I was expecting. Or hoping for, apparently, if the drop in my stomach is any indication.
“Canaan?” Siggy asks from where she’s sprawled across my bed, her wheat-blonde brows scrunching together.
Rennick’s second-in-command looks unsure of himself as he takes one singular step into the room but makes no move to take another one. He just hovers there with a steaming coffee mug in his left hand.
“Good morning,” he offers, wearing the kind of easy smile that doesn’t reach his tired eyes.
We echo the sentiment, mine sounding thin.
My wolf has never done well with men. Any time one got too close, she snapped her teeth and sharpened her claws. For a long time, I thought it was fear-induced, but I now know it was loyalty. While my memory of Rennick had been manipulated, she never forgot. But the first time I met Canaan Roarke, she bristled, sure, but had stayed quiet inside me otherwise. I think she sensed the good in him, and watching how he is with Rhosyn since has only proved her hunch right.
His light-brown hair is still damp from the shower, the strands a few shades darker from the water. The stubble on his face is more prominent than I’ve seen before. Bothering with a razor is understandably low on the list of priorities today. It looks good on him, though. He’s also dressed in jeans and a navy flannel with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. Where he got those clothes, I have no idea, and I don’t ask.
“What can I do for you?” I ask.
His attention flicks from me to Siggy and then back again, but he still stays where he is. But then he sighs, the sound betraying how exhausted he is. “I was hoping I could talk to you.”
“Oh, okay…sure.”
Siggy watches the exchange like she’s courtside at the slowest tennis match. She lets the silence cling before finally pushing herself up. “All righty. I’m gonna go find Seren. See if she needs help with…something.”
She slips past Canaan before I can respond.
Canaan lingers at the threshold a moment longer then finally crosses the room. When he’s close enough, he holds out the mug. Steam curls up between us. “This is for you. Don’t worry, Seren walked me through how you like it. Even gave me a full lecture on your relationship with caffeine.” His mouth tilts faintly. “Codependentmay have been the word she used.”
“That sounds like Seren.”
He steps back once my fingers are secure around the warm ceramic. Espresso, cream, and vanilla curl into my lungs, and I almost moan with relief. I swallow it down, resisting the call of the first sip. This clearly isn’t just a latte. It’s some kind of loaded offering. I wait for him to speak, but his silence stretches, his apprehension making him look like someone I don’t know.
The quiet gnaws at me until I can’t take it anymore. “Where’s Rhosyn?”
“I sent her with Nick to get the SUV we abandoned on the side of the road yesterday,” he tells me, stuffing his hands into his front pockets like he’s the poster child for forced nonchalance. “We took shifts running patrols last night, too, but between the two of them and their restless energy this morning, I was worried they’d start chewing on your baseboards like poorly housebroken puppies if they didn’t get outside and run.”
The image makes me snort. It’s the first flash of genuine humor I’ve felt since the wreckage began. But it dies just as quickly when I catch myself almost asking for more updates on Rennick. The urge lodges in my throat and I cram it down before it can slip through. Distance. I’m supposed to be keeping my distance.
It’s for your own good, Noa. Remember that. Remember he rejected you once already—broke your heart. How can you possibly trust him to safe your life now?The little voice of reason feels paper-thin against the thundering longing coming from the vacant space behind my ribs.
Taking a page from Siggy’s playbook, I decide to just cut to the chase. “This is a bribe, isn’t it?” I ask, raising the mug a few inches.
Canaan’s mouth pulls into a sheepish line, but he doesn’t deny it.
He shifts a step back, eyes flicking to my bed for half a second before he rethinks it. I know what he’s thinking—that it’s my nest, that sitting there would be an unthinkable violation. But he’s wrong. My bed has only ever been that. A bed. I’ve never built a nest, never had the innate desire to curate a haven comprised of carefully selected pillows and fabrics. But with my mother’s spell unraveling and instincts I’ve never known starting to surface, that could change. I have no idea what I should expect from myself anymore.
“What’s going on, Canaan?” Anxiety has taken root in my stomach so deep I have to fight the urge to curl forward, arms around myself, as if folding in would ease the ache.
“I’ve never seen him as scared as he was yesterday, Noa.”
