Buff is thinking. And that’s never good.
A cold ripple scrapes down my spine. Because with Buff, thinking always comes right before something either brilliant or catastrophic—usually both.
Then I feel it through the bond.
That spark.
That bright, stupid, dangerous flicker of hope igniting in his chest.
And then it hits me.
Like a punch of someone else’s idiotic idea slamming straight into my ribs. Like I can already hear the words forming in his brain before he even opens his mouth.
Nope.
No, no, no.
He winks. Actually winks.
Oh fuck. I am not going to like this at all.
He looks up, eyes wide, glowing with that deranged Eureka-light only Buff gets when he’s about to suggest something harebrained.
“Jason.”
“No.”
The growl flies out of me so fast it startles a bird out of a nearby tree.
“She needs a guide dog.”
“Absolutely not.”
“And she already trusts you.”
“That’s the stupidest fucking idea I’ve ever heard.”
“Well,”Buff says, maddeningly reasonable,“do you have anything better?”
I stare at him like he’s just sprouted fangs and glitter and joined a vampire coven.
Has he lost his goddamn mind?
“Think about it,”he presses, leaning in with that dangerous, hopeful energy humming through the bond.“You kept her calm. You helped her stand. She held on to you like you were a life raft.”
His words hit something deep in me because I felt that moment.
Her fingers sliding into my fur with this desperate, instinctive trust that didn’t belong to a stranger. Her body leaning into mine because she couldn’t see and the world had just turned on her, so she reached for the nearest solid thing.
Me.
A wolf.
The last thing she should have trusted.
And yet she did.
“Don’t,”Froggy barks.“Don’t you dare.”
