Instead, I take a long step back, and it takes every ounce of energy in my body.
The distance physically hurts, and my wolf whines in protest at the separation. Caelan stares at me with her lips slightly parted and her chest rising and falling with rapid breaths that match my own.
“Why did you stop?” she asks.
“Because you haven’t said yes.”
Something changes in the way she looks at me. The wariness remains, but underneath it, I see something new taking shape. It looks almost like respect, or maybe the beginning of trust that wasn’t there before.
She doesn’t say anything else. She just keeps looking at me like she’s seeing me for the first time, like the fact that I stopped means something important.
Chapter 13 - Caelan
The water in the sink has gone cold, but I keep washing the same plate over and over because it gives my hands something to do.
Patrick left twenty minutes ago to haul water from the stream, and the cabin feels too quiet without him. I’ve grown accustomed to his presence over these past ten days, to the sound of his breathing and the creak of the floorboards under his weight and the way he hums tunelessly when he thinks I’m not listening. The silence he leaves behind makes me restless in ways I don’t want to admit.
I set the plate aside and reach for the next one before scrubbing at it despite it already being clean. My mind keeps wandering to last night, to the moment he stepped back instead of kissing me, and the way he chose my consent over his own desire when every line of his body screamed that he wanted to close the distance between us.
I haven’t stopped thinking about it.
The mate bond pulls at me constantly now. It’s like a persistent ache beneath my breastbone that grows stronger whenever he’s near. I catch myself watching him when he’s not looking, studying the way his shoulders move when he chops wood or the concentration on his face when he skins rabbits for our meals. I notice things I shouldn’t notice, like the exact shade of amber in his eyes or the scar on his forearm that he rubs when he’s lost in thought.
He’s been so careful with me. So controlled. He sleeps on the floor every night, even though I can see how uncomfortable it is; he never touches me unless absolutely necessary, and he keeps a respectful distance that should make me feel safe.
Instead, it makes me wonder what would happen if he stopped being careful.
I scrub the plate harder as warmth creeps up my neck. I’m not sure I would be strong enough to resist if he actually tried something. The curse suppressed these feelings for nineteen years, and now that it’s broken, everything hits me so much harder than I expected. Every emotion feels magnified, every want feels desperate, and every time Patrick looks at me with those amber eyes, I feel like I’m standing at the edge of a cliff trying to convince myself not to jump.
Maybe that’s why I’m grateful for his restraint. One of us needs to be sensible, and it’s clearly not going to be me. If he pushed, if he so much as crooked his finger in my direction, I would go to him without a second thought. I know this about myself now with a certainty that should frighten me more than it does. The wanting has grown too large to contain, and the only thing keeping me from acting on it is his refusal to take advantage of my vulnerability.
Part of me wishes he would. Part of me wants him to make the decision for me so I don’t have to admit how badly I need him.
I’m reaching for another dish when the glass explodes across the kitchen floor.
A massive shape crashes through the window, and I drop the plate as shards scatter around my feet. A wolf lands in a crouch among the debris with yellow eyes already locked on me, and he’s bigger than Patrick, with dark hair and a cruel twist to his mouth that makes my stomach lurch.
I scream and scramble backward, slamming into the counter as he lunges toward me.
The sound is hardly out of my mouth before the cabin door splinters inward.
Patrick tears through the opening in a form I’ve never seen before, something caught between wolf and man with elongated claws extending from fingers that have thickened into paws. A muzzle full of razor teeth juts from a face that’s still recognizably his, and coarse fur sprouts across muscles that bunch and flex as he throws himself at the intruder with a ferocity that steals my breath.
They collide midair, and both of them crash into the table hard enough to splinter one of the legs. I press myself against the wall as they fight, unable to look away despite the violence unfolding three feet from where I stand.
The scout is larger, but Patrick moves with a viciousness that makes something primal wake up in my chest. He dodges a swipe that would have opened his throat and drives his claws into the other wolf’s side, and blood spatters across the floor in dark arcs. The scout howls and retaliates with a bite that catches Patrick’s shoulder and tears through flesh, and I hear myself scream as crimson blooms across his skin.
Patrick doesn’t slow down. He twists free of the bite with a snarl and brings both hands up under the scout’s jaw, where he sinks his claws deep into exposed flesh. The wolf makes a wet, gurgling sound that will haunt my nightmares for years to come.
Patrick wrenches his hands apart.
The body drops to the floor with a thud that seems impossibly quiet after so much violence.
My heart pounds in my throat, my temples, and behind my eyes. Patrick looms over the corpse with his chest heaving, still caught in that monstrous half-form with blood drippingfrom his claws, his shoulder, and the corner of his mouth where the scout’s claws grazed him.
He doesn’t speak. He just grabs the dead wolf by the ankle and drags him toward the ruined door, leaving a dark smear across the wooden planks. I hear movement outside, something heavy being pulled across dirt and leaves, but I can’t make myself follow. My legs refuse to cooperate, and all I can do is press my back against the wall and try to remember how breathing works.
Time loses meaning. Minutes pass, or maybe longer.
