She was quiet for a long time, her gaze dropping to her hands. The silence stretched between us like a living thing. When she finally looked up again, her eyes were shining with unshed tears.
"That doesn't explain how I feel," she whispered. "Why I have this intense need for you."
I took her hand in mine, unable to resist bringing it to my lips, letting them brush softly over her knuckles before continuing. Her skin was silk and warmth beneath my mouth. "When a male Kaelak's spine tingles for his mate, his body emits pheromones when he is around her."
Harper's eyes went wide, and she stiffened slightly but didn't pull away. A smile played at the edges of her lips, though she tried to stifle it. "You're gassing me? That's why I want you?"
I couldn't help the chuckle that escaped. "Not quite. The pheromones will only work on a female if she is interested. If you felt no attraction for me, the pheromones would not affect you."
"I am attracted to you," she whispered, and the raw honesty in her voice nearly undid me. "So very much."
The words I needed to say next lodged in my throat like shards of glass. "There is something else you need to know," I admitted, forcing them out. "Something that shames me to admit."
"Shame?" She repeated the word as if she didn't believe it could possibly apply.
I faced her, watched those bright, understanding eyes fixed on mine, while I felt my own darken with guilt and conflict. "You are Xytol's mate. But I want to claim you too." The confession tore from somewhere deep inside me, leaving me raw. "It's dishonorable. It goes against everything I was raisedto believe, everything my kind holds sacred. A warrior does not claim his brother’s female. It's forbidden. It's…." I shook my head sharply, unable to finish. "It would bring shame upon my family, upon my name. It would mark me as someone without honor, without respect for the old ways."
"Xabat," Harper began, but I cut her off with a wave of my hand.
"I know. I know you have never met Xytol in person. I know he claimed you without truly knowing you. But that doesn't change things. He has made the claim all the same. That doesn't change what it would mean if I were to challenge him, if I were to claim you as my own." I held her gaze, knowing she could see hope and agony warring in mine. "I would be branded as a traitor to my own blood. You as well."
Harper looked at me, those bright blue eyes considering, and then she did something I never could have anticipated.
She laughed.
Not a hateful, mocking laugh, not the bitter, ironic sound of someone who'd relinquished hope, but a genuine laugh that seemed to bubble up from somewhere deep within her soul—bright and unexpected. It started as a soft exhale, then grew into something fuller, richer, her shoulders shaking slightly with the force of it.
"Where did you get the idea that Xytol had claimed me as his mate?" Harper asked when she'd calmed, amusement still dancing in her eyes. "Did he say something in his message to you?"
I thought for a moment, replaying the transmission in my mind. No, he hadn't said anything directly. There had been a moment at the end of the message, when the signal cut out before he could say anything more. I inferred his desire for her in the protective urgency of his words, in the way his voice had simultaneously softened and sharpened when he spoke hername. "Not specifically, but the message was short, and his worry for you was greater than for himself. And you yourself said you bonded with him through sharing your grief."
"As friends, Xabat," Harper murmured, her hand reaching out and curling around mine, her skin warm against my rougher palm. "We are friends. Good friends and nothing more. There was never anything remotely romantic between us."
"Never?" I pressed, my throat tight, afraid to hope, afraid to believe what I was hearing.
"Never," Harper assured me, lifting my hand and holding it against her chest where I felt the softness of her breasts and the steady thump, thump, thump of her heart beneath my fingers. "In fact, he asked my advice once about how to approach someone he was interested in."
"He did?" The hope in my chest flared brighter, spreading warmth through my body like wildfire.
"He did," Harper smiled, her eyes crinkling at the corners in that way that made my heart stutter. "Someone he was working with."
"He never asked you to be his?" I needed to be sure, needed to hear her say it again, needed the words to sink into my bones.
"No," Harper assured me, her gaze steady and clear. "And if he had, I would have said no."
"Really?" The word came out shocked, disbelieving. My brother was brilliant and kind, gentle, whereas I was harsh. I was a brute, a soldier—he was the better catch by any measure.
"Really," Harper's laugh was soft, musical, and it wrapped around me like a caress. "Xytol is my friend... one of my best friends, but I've never felt about him the way I feel about you."
"And how do you feel about me?" My voice was barely more than a whisper, rough with emotion I couldn't contain.
Harper's eyes searched mine, and I saw something vulnerable there, something raw and honest that made my breath catch in my chest.
She started to speak, then stopped, her teeth catching her lower lip as if she were gathering courage. "I haven't felt this way about anyone since my husband died. Not once. Not even close." Her thumb traced slow, deliberate circles on the back of my hand, and the gentle touch sent shivers racing up my arm. "With you, I feel safe. Cherished. Like part of me didn't die with Seth—it was just buried, waiting for you to unearth it."
Her eyes glistened with unshed tears that caught the light, and her free hand came up to rest against my chest, palm flat over where my heart hammered beneath muscle and bone.
"You've awakened something in me I thought was gone forever," she whispered, her voice trembling. "I want you. I want to be with you. I know it's complicated, I know there are a thousand reasons why I shouldn't, but I can't deny what I feel anymore."
