“I’m tough,” Lyric said lightly, forcing a smile.
“Lyric,” Destiny whispered, her heart in her eyes.
“He will come back—”
“He’s no closer—”
“He will. He will come back to me.”
“Not when he has no reason to.”
Lyric frowned. That stung. “What does that mean?”
“You go spend every day with him. He never has to miss you too long.”
Her eyes burned and Lyric hung her head and retied her apron tighter. She’d been losing weight. Every muscle in her body hurt and her organs were aching lately. She didn’t tell the Pack that part. Liam would order her to stop Changing, and she couldn’t stomach that. She needed to be with Vic in the only way she could now—as a wolf.
“Liam wants to order him to Change back again.”
“It didn’t work the other three times. What makes now any different?” Lyric asked tiredly. “I can’t even smell his human side anymore. I think that shot to his head broke something in him. I’ve never even heard of a wolf staying in this form for this long, Destiny. I think…” She swallowed hard and closed her eyes. She shook her head hard and blew out a long breath, trying not to cry again.Be strong. “I think this is just our life now.”
“Look, I think you’ve been through so much, and there hasn’t been a lot of time for you to process and cope.”
“I have way too much time. I can’t sleep. I lay up there alone in his loft, remembering every moment we were together. I remember every touch. It shouldn’t be like this so fast, right? I barely know him.”
Destiny shook her head and tugged at Lyric’s hand to sit on the couch next to her. “That’s not now a Mating Bond works, and you know it. No one here is going to judge how fast you fell in love with Vic. We all understand. Well, except for Tabian.”
Lyric huffed a laugh and rolled her head back onto the cushion. “Tabian is the king of the insults.”
“Yeah, well he’s the only one who doesn’t know what a Mating Bond feels like.”
“Bridger is single too.”
“Bridger is a widower.”
Lyric snapped her attention to Destiny. “Wait what?” she asked.
“Rumor is he lost a mate.”
“Oooh my gosh,” Lyric whispered, sitting up straight again. “When?”
Destiny shrugged. “He won’t talk about it much.”
Lyric thought of the parts of Vic she’d lost, and she understood in a way. That was an ache you just endured. Who in their right mind would ever want to talk about a wound that severe?
“Do you want to know something so strange?” Lyric asked.
“Yes.”
“It’s Vic’s house I’m staying in. It’s his den. I touch as little as possible, because it isn’t mine, but it feels so strange in there. It doesn’t smell like him. He hasn’t decorated it, or moved in. The home feels…empty. It’s just me up in the loft on a mattress on the ground, and Earl in his little cage, and the rest of the place just echoes.”
“Maybe that’s how we help. Maybe we should move him in.”
“Maybe. I keep stopping at that general store down the street from where I work. You know the one?”
Destiny nodded. “The one by the gas station?”
“Yeah. I get paid mostly in tips, and I know I’m supposed to be saving for a car. I know it. I’m supposed to free myself completely from my old Pack, and from my sister, and from the Elders. I do know. But I stop at that store every time I finish my shift, and I buy little things for his home. Pictures. Dish towels. Washrags. Food to stock the pantry. Spices. Cleaning supplies, shower curtains, bathmats, and blankets. I can’t help it. Sometimes it feels like I’m buying Vic little presents for when he comes back to his human skin. But lately…” She swallowed hard and stared at her hands in her lap. “Lately I pick up the items I want, and I put them back, because I don’t know if he will ever see them. I walk out of the store empty-handed, and try not to cry in whoever’s car is picking me up that day to bring me back here.”
