Sienna blinks. Sets the honey on the counter. “You’re apologizing to me?”
“You were upset. Understandably. And I should have been more—”
“I was embarrassed. There’s a difference.” She tilts her head and studies me with genuine curiosity. “Why would I be upset?”
The question catches me mid-sentence. I open my mouth. Close it.
“Because…” I trail off. The explanation that’s been so clear in my head for days suddenly sounds absurd when I try to give it air. “Because you and Merric are—”
Sienna’s eyebrows climb her forehead. Her mouth opens. And then she laughs.
Not a polite laugh. A real one; full-bodied, slightly incredulous, a laugh that comes with a hand pressed over the mouth in a futile attempt to smother it.
“Oh my God,” she manages. “You think… Me andMerric?”
The kitchen floor opens up beneath me. Or it should. It feels like it should.
“You’re not,” I say, already knowing the answer.
“Brenna.” Sienna is wiping her eyes. “I’m gay. Extremely, enthusiastically, exclusively gay. Merric is my alpha and my best friend, and I love him dearly, but the man could be the last wolf on earth and I wouldn’t—” She stops. Presses her lips together. Fails to suppress another snort of laughter. “Oh God. How long have you been thinking this?”
“Since the ridge.” My voice sounds strange. Distant. “When I came down to watch the ranch. You were always near him. Coffee. Touching his arm. Sitting together on the porch.”
“That’s called friendship. Pack. We’ve known each other for years.”
“I know that.” I pull a face. “I know thatnow.”
“But you didn’t know it then. And you’ve been carrying this around for all this time? While trying to deal with everything else?”
I lean against the counter. My legs feel unreliable. “It seemed obvious.”
“It seemed obvious because you were looking for a reason not to let him in,” Sienna says gently. No judgment. The observation of a woman who’s been watching two people circle each other and has finally been handed the missing piece. “If he was mine, you didn’t have to deal with the fact that he’s yours.”
The refrigerator hums. Cameron shifts on the couch in the other room, murmuring something in his sleep.
“He’s… not mine,” I mutter.
“You can keep telling yourself that. Doesn’t make it true.” Sienna shakes her head. “For what it’s worth,” she adds, “he’s been a wreck since you came back. A functional, competent, holding-it-together wreck, but a wreck. I’ve never seen him like this. Not even close.” She picks up the honey jar. Pauses at the doorway. “He’s in the bunkhouse. Alone. In case you were wondering.”
She leaves. Her footsteps cross the porch and fade into the yard.
I stand in the kitchen rubbing the back of my neck while my understanding of the last few days reorganizes itself. Every glance, every casual touch, every porch-step conversation I’d interpreted as intimacy was pack. Just pack. Years of friendship and loyalty. The easy physical language of wolves who’ve run together long enough to stop thinking about it.
I was wrong. About all of it. I built a wall out of a lie I told myself, and I’ve been hiding behind it because hiding was safer than—
“Brenna.”
Merric. In the hall, with his arms crossed and a raised eyebrow that tells me he heard everything. Maybe not the words. But enough.
“How long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough,” he confirms.
“You heard.”
“I heard Sienna laughing like she hasn’t laughed in weeks. I heard you apologize to her. And I heard her set you straight.” He steps into the kitchen. “You thought I was with Sienna.”
“I thought—” My voice catches. “It doesn’t matter what I thought.”
