“I was a couple of hours late,” I yelled back.
“More than a couple of hours!”
“You’re safe here.” Gods, I felt like a broken record. “But I cannot make sure that you’re safeeverywhereif I don’t find the head of the fucking snake.”
“So…go,” she screamed, shooing me away. “Go find the head of the snake, or watch videos of your dead brother, or whatever hell else you want to do. Don’t mind me. I’ll befine. Just like I was fine today and fine yesterday and fine the day before that. I’m dealing with it. I tied myself to you, and I’m fucking dealing with it, okay?”
“You regret the bond?” I asked, jerking back from her.
“What bond?” she hissed. “This isn’t a mating bond. This is some cosmic joke.”
“Are you fucking serious?”
“You shouldn’twantto leave me,” she screamed, grabbing a wrench off the workbench to throw at me. “If we were mated, it would be agony for you to leave me.”
“Itisagony,” I argued, catching it.
“Oh, yeah, a six out of ten. Sounds really terrible.”
“I lied,” I roared, dropping the wrench.
“Yeah, right.”
“I fuckinghateleaving you,” I said, moving toward her. She backed away with each step, and a part of me liked it. I wanted to fucking chase her. This time, she’d never make it into the loft.
My emotions were too close to the surface. The small box that I’d stuffed them into on the day we’d seen Zeke’s mutilated body was coming apart at the seams.
Anger pounded between my temples. At Zeke. At the people who’d murdered him. At the situation I’d found myself in, torn between my family and my mate. At Rosemary for not understanding that I was trying to do the right thing.
“What’s wrong with your eyes?” Rosemary asked. She lifted her chin a bit, but I could hear the tremor in her voice.
“Nothing,” I lied.
“That’s not nothing,” she argued. “It’s like they’re flickering.”
“Stop talking about my eyes.”
“I can’t?—”
“You should’ve told me how bad it was,” I said, catching her around the waist. I ignored the way she strained against my arms. “I had no idea?—”
“Well, now you do,” she said as she stopped trying to pull away. “Tell me, what difference does it make?”
“I know now.”
“So you’re going to start taking me with you?”
When I didn’t immediately reply, she scoffed.
“That’s what I thought.”
It wasn’t that simple. How in the hell was I supposed to willingly put her in danger? Once she was out in the world again, she’d be seen. Once she was seen, she’d be on their radar again. It wasn’t a matter ofif,butwhen.
But I couldn’t stop searching for the Vampires and humans responsible for murdering my brother. I had to be out there, following up on leads and watching my brothers’ backs.
Didn’t she realize that the only way I could do that was if I knew she was safe here with her pop?
How had I become the fucking bad guy in this scenario for protecting my mate?
