“She’d understand,” I said. “She would’ve wanted you safe.”
“I know.”
We sat in silence, listening to the crackle of the fire. I went over his story and my heart hurt for him and his sister. Just twenty-two.
Wait.
Wait a phaaning second.
Twenty-two?
Ace had kissed me on the eve of his twenty-second birthday before disappearing.
“Is that why you left?” I held my breath and waited for his answer.
He looked down at his hands again. “I shouldn’t have kissed you. I shouldn’t have…”
He shouldn’t have let the kiss transform into something more when he knew he’d leave the next day.
“You planned to leave before we kissed.”
He nodded. “I didn’t know how the transformation would go for me. I didn’t want to place anyone in danger, but I selfishly wanted you at the same time. I wanted to have that memory of you. Of us. Even if we couldn’t be together. It was selfish and wrong and I’m sorry.”
My mouth fell open. I didn’t know what to say. All this time, I’d suspected he’d left because of me. Now I was finding out the truth, and it left a hollow feeling in my chest.
Ace grimaced. “I also worried I might end up on the wrong end of your arrow.”
“I only hunt the human kind of animals.”
“That’s exactly what I am,” he said. “And you also get the night bunnies.”
“And deer, but the last time I checked, wolves were never on the menu.”
“Don’t think I’d taste too good.”
“Too gamey,” I said, but warmth flooded my body remembering the moment we’d shared before he left. I licked my lips. He was wrong. He tasted like perfection, not gamey at all.
“You said you kissed me because you wanted me.” I said. “You were pining for me that whole time and just didn’t know how to express your emotions, so you settled on asshole as your default?”
“I was actually avoiding expressing my emotions altogether,” he said. “I?—”
A deep growl echoed down the cave, rattling the walls. Dirt and small rocks shook from the ceiling and rained down on us. The ground trembled.
“What the phaan was that?” I scrambled to my feet.
“No idea.” Ace stood beside me. “Nothing good.”
“Should we run?”
The unknown monster roared as if to answer the question.
Prickling coldness swept along my skin.
“I can’t figure out which direction it’s coming from. The echo is throwing me off and I haven’t caught its scent yet,” Ace said. “Can you?”
“It’s scent? I’m not a wolf.”
Ace scowled at me. “Can you tell which direction it’s coming from?”
