“Touché.” She grimaced, put her knife and fork down. “You’re right, but I can only tell you again how rare it is that managed to happen, and while I would have dealt with it had it happened again, with you, I didn’t really worry that it might.”
“You’re so sure you could have handled it?”
She considered sugarcoating it, decided he could handle the truth. Would need to understand the truth, if he was to accept the life she wanted him to live, one where he was in contact with wolves, if not an active part of a pack.
“Yes, I’m sure. Between my strength and Michael’s, what he could pull on from his pack if he’d needed to, and what I can, and did, pull on from the other alphas while I’m National President, it wouldn’t have been a fight. Fights between wolves are fairly rare, and they’re between wolves of equal strength.”
She let him think about that for a minute while she ate a couple of bites.
“That strength, that I have, that I have access to. That you have. With it comes responsibility. It’s why the strong amongst us are so driven to help the weaker. It’s a compulsion.”
He didn’t look confused, so she pushed. “You’ve felt it.”
No response.
“Is that why you’ve stayed away from the packs?”
He stared at her, his face expressionless, but she gave him only patience in return.
He wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Maybe some of it. I wasn’t going to risk falling under someone’s authority, but yeah. I had no interest in being that authority and I could feel the tug of it, if I was around the younger wolves long enough.”
She nodded, took the last bite of her steak.
“That doesn’t make you mad?” he asked.
Surprised, she looked back up at him. “I think you earned the right to ease into all of this—if,” she added quickly, “you want in at all. My hope is that you do, and that you’ll find the peace and comfort that I know you can in a pack, but as long as you aren’t harming anyone, I’m not judging your choices.”
He paid the bill despite her protests, so she decided it was a good time to try to bring the conversation back to him.
“How do you make a living?”
He held the diner’s door open for her, then followed her to the truck, waiting until he’d eased back onto Main Street to glance at her.
“Computers.”
“Oh, right, you were a computer science teacher. That’s good, then. You were able to do that remotely?”
“Yes.”
“You avoided people for a time, but then began to feel more comfortable? Safe?”
He sighed, settled into his seat, one hand on the steering wheel, the other resting on his thigh. She licked her lips.
“For the first year or so, I stayed away. Lived in the woods a lot, stole a bit of camping gear now and then. I don’t feel great about that, but it was better than risking hurting someone.”
“I understand.”
“Eventually I decided I was safe enough to go to the library, access my bank accounts, that sort of thing. I moved around, tried out different areas, ended up here a few years ago.”
“What about people? You can’t be all alone all the time.”
“I wasn’t really good company for a long time. Now, I have some people, reconnected with a couple of people from my old life, mostly online, I have…relationships, when I want to.”
Since he gave her the side eye, she understood he meant sex, merely smiled.
“You don’t need to worry about me,” he said, putting both hands back on the wheel. “I’m comfortable with my life. I appreciate that you wanted to check on that, but once this poison business is taken care of, you can cross me off your list of things to handle.”
She leaned against her door, pulled one leg up onto the seat and hooked her arm around her knee. “That’s great to know. I’m glad.” She meant it. Of course, she left a lot of what she meant unspoken, but he wasn’t an idiot. He knew full well she wasn’t going to be satisfied with that.
