I freeze, panic clawing up my throat. He seems like a good guy, but I don’t know him well enough to trust him completely. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Beau sighs, shaking his head. “I have sisters, Carla. I used to help my mother hide the women in our clan who wanted to leave when theirs was coming. I know the signs. And your scent...” He taps his nose. “It’s pretty unmistakable.”
Mortification burns through me, hotter than the fever. I stare at my hands clenched in my lap.
“Does he know?” Beau asks gently.
There’s no point in asking what. Beau already knows what it means, what Billy is to me.
“No,” I whisper. “And he can’t. Not yet. This is all just… a lot.”
If I tell him, and he sticks around for my heat, there’s no going back. We’ll be bound for life.
“He’s going to figure it out. He’s too worried about your safety right now to think about anything else, but soon… it’s going to hit him.”
I look up, meeting Beau’s sympathetic gaze. “Please,” I beg. “Don’t tell him. I need time to... to process this.”
Beau studies me for a long moment, then nods. “Not my secret to tell. But Carla? He deserves to know. Eventually. And he’s a good guy. He’ll look after you.”
Look after me.Not necessarily mate with me, though.
“I know. I just...” I trail off, unsure how to explain the tangle of fear and hope and confusion that’s twisting inside me. How do you tell someone they’re your mate when you barely know them? When they don’t feel it the same way you do?
For all Billy knows, it could be the heat drawing him to me, and my mate could be any of the men in his clan I’ve encountered.
“All clear,” Billy calls, appearing beside the car and yanking open my door. “Room 7.”
I step out, immediately assaulted by the bitter cold and swirling gales. It should be a relief after the heat consuming me, but somehow, it only makes it worse, the contrast between external chill and internal fire, disorienting.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Beau says, already climbing back into the driver’s seat.
Billy nods, taking my elbow to steady me as we make our way through the wild weather to the room. Even through my sleeve, his touch sends electricity skittering across my skin. I try not to lean into it, not to give away how desperately I crave more contact.
Room 7 is exactly what I’d expect from a place called Pine Haven Motel. Cheap wood paneling, worn carpet, and a single queen-sized bed covered in a faded floral bedspread. The heater rattles to life when Billy adjusts the ancient thermostat, but it does little to dispel the chill.
One bed. Of course. Because the universe really is determined to torture me.
Billy seems to realize it at the same moment, his eyes flickering from the bed to me, and back again. “I’ll take the floor,” he says quickly. “You need the rest more than I do. In any other circumstance, I’d leave, but… if there are people out searching for us, for you, it’s not safe.”
Relief and disappointment war within me. I want him beside me, want his arms around me, his body against mine. But because he wants me too, and not because he’s worried about someone bursting through the door to drag me back.
“Thank you,” I say, avoiding his eyes as I cross the room quickly. “I need a shower. Badly.”
A cool shower might help with the fever. Or at least give me a few minutes away from his overwhelming presence.
The bathroom is tiny but functional, with peeling linoleum, and a shower stall barely big enough for one person. I strip quickly, desperate to get under the water, to wash away the basement, the fear, and the confusion.
The water pressure is pathetic, but it’s better than nothing, and for a moment, I just stand there, letting it cascade over my aching body. Steam fills the small space, and I close my eyes, trying to think through the fog of need clouding my mind.
I’m safe. Away from Leon. I’m on my way home, back to my normal, mundane life.
Normal, except for the slightly inconvenient mate bond forming with a bear I hardly know.
I wash quickly, using the generic motel soap, which smells like fake flowers. As I’m rinsing off, I realize a problem. I have no clean clothes. The only option is to wrap myself in the thin motel towel and face Billy again.
Taking a deep breath, I steel myself for the inevitable surge of desire and open the bathroom door.
Steam billows out around me, and I find Billy standing by the window, staring out at the dark sky, heavy with thick, grey clouds. He turns at the sound of the door, and his eyes widen slightly, gaze travelling from my wet hair to my bare shoulders, to the towel clutched tightly at my chest.
