“Join hands,” Amelia instructs. “Let your blood mingle, and let your souls recognize what they have always known.”
I reach for Skylar, and she lets me take her hand. When our wounds press together, something happens in my chest. Something clicks into place that I didn’t even realize was missing.
The mate bond roars to life.
It’s not the distant sensation I’ve been suppressing for ten years. This is a wildfire, a flood, a force of nature that refuses to be ignored. Skylar’s presence blazes into existence inside my mind, and her emotions tangle with mine until I can’t tell where I end and she begins.
Anger. So much anger, burning white-hot beneath the surface.
Fear she’s trying desperately to hide.
And underneath all of that, buried so deep she probably doesn’t know it exists, something that feels almost like relief.
“By the authority vested in me by the Alpha of Silvercreek,” Amelia announces, “and by the blessing of the ancient magic that guides our kind, I pronounce you bonded. Mates for life, from this moment until your last breath.”
The witnesses offer quiet congratulations. Luna comes over to squeeze Skylar’s shoulder. Nic claps me on the back and mumbles something about talking later that I barely register.
Through it all, Skylar stands perfectly still with her bloodied hand still clasped in mine.
When the others finally step back and give us space, she turns to face me for the first time since the ceremony began. Her eyes are dry, but something behind them has shattered into pieces that I’m not sure can ever be reassembled.
When she speaks, her voice is barely above a whisper, meant for my ears alone. “I wish you’d never come back.”
“Skylar—”
“I will never forgive you for this.” Each word lands like a blade between my ribs. “Not if I live a thousand years. Do you understand me? Never.”
She pulls her hand free from mine, our mingled blood smearing across both our palms, and walks away without looking back. I stand alone in the clearing, surrounded by witnesses who suddenly can’t meet my eyes, and feel the mate bond pulse between us like a second heartbeat.
She’s mine now. Bound to me by blood and magic and ancient law.
And she has never hated me more.
Chapter 6 - Skylar
I wake up in a bed that doesn’t smell like mine.
For a moment, I just lie there with my eyes closed, trying to convince myself that last night was a nightmare. That I didn’t watch Bryan tear through six wolves like they were made of paper. That I didn’t stand in a moonlit clearing and bind myself to him with blood and ancient words and feel the mate bond snap into place like a shackle closing around my soul.
But the ache in my palm tells a different story. I open my eyes and stare at the thin red line crossing my skin, already scabbing over. Proof that it all happened. Proof that I’m trapped.
The cabin is small but clean, with rough-hewn walls and furniture that looks handmade. I don’t recognize the curtains or the quilt draped across the bed. Everything about this space is foreign, and yet I’m supposed to call it home now.
I sit up slowly, taking stock of my surroundings. The bedroom door is cracked open, and through the gap, I can see a sliver of the main room. A couch with a pillow and a rumpled blanket. Bryan slept out there, apparently. Small mercies.
The ceremony was binding, but we didn’t consummate the bond. That’s the one line I refused to cross, the one piece of myself I managed to hold back. Bryan didn’t push. He just showed me to the bedroom, told me to get some sleep, and closed the door between us.
I don’t know what to make of that. I don’t know what to make of any of this.
My clothes from last night are draped over a chair in the corner. My duffel bag is sitting on the floor next to my boots. I grab fresh clothes and change quickly because I don’t want tospend another second in the outfit I was wearing when my life fell apart.
When I push open the bedroom door, the smell of coffee hits me first. Bryan is standing at the small kitchen counter with his back to me, pouring dark liquid into two mugs. He’s wearing jeans and a gray t-shirt that stretches across his shoulders, and I hate that I notice. I hate that some traitorous part of my brain has already memorized the way he moves, the breadth of his back, and the bulk in his arms.
The mate bond vibrates between us, pleased by his proximity. I tell it to shut up.
“Coffee?” He turns around and holds out one of the mugs like a peace offering.
“I don’t want anything from you.”
