“I’m so happy you came back,” she said simply.
Spencer took a step back, letting the shift take him. The air crackled with that familiar static electricity, his form gone for a moment before his human form appeared.
Meryl’s eyes widened, but she didn’t retreat. She stood her ground as Spencer stood before her.
“I had to come back,” he said, his voice rough. “I couldn’t leave things like that.”
They stood facing each other in the moonlight, the cottage a silent witness behind them. So many words formed in Spencer’s mind, but he forced himself to wait, to let her speak first.
“Meryl, there’s something I need to tell you. Something I should have told you before.”
Meryl wrapped her arms around herself, but her gaze remained steady on his face. “There’s more?”
“Just a little.” Spencer took a deep breath. “You’re my mate, Meryl.”
She blinked. “Your... mate?”
“Yes.” He stepped closer, needing her to understand. “For shifters like me, there’s someone. One person who... fits. Who belongs with us in a way no one else ever could. I knew the moment I first sensed you.”
Meryl’s expression shifted, realization dawning. “You knew? All this time?”
“Yes.” The admission felt like stepping off a cliff. “I’ve known since that first day on the porch.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” The question wasn’t accusatory, just bewildered.
This was the heart of it. The truth he needed her to understand more than anything else.
“Because I wanted it to be your choice,” Spencer said. “The mate bond... It’s powerful. It pulls at both of us. I know you feel it too, although not as strongly. But I didn’t want to tell you the truth. Not then. Because I wanted you to get to know me first.” He gave her a crooked smile. “I wanted you to choose freely, not because you think some instinct told you to.”
Meryl was very still. “So when you helped with the cottage...”
“I wanted to help,” he said immediately. “That was real. All of it was real. I just... I didn’t want the mate bond to decide for you.”
She looked at him for a long moment, her expression unreadable in the moonlight. “And now? Why tell me now?”
Spencer’s chest tightened. “Because you’re making decisions. About the cottage. About staying or going. And you deserve to make them with all the facts.” He swallowed hard. “Even if knowing doesn’t change anything.”
“Doesn’t change anything?” Meryl repeated. “How could it not change everything?”
“It doesn’t have to,” Spencer said, though the words cost him. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Being my mate doesn’t obligate you to anything. It’s just... It’s the truth. And you deserved to know it.”
Meryl turned slightly, looking back at Pine Cottage. Its windows glowed warm against the night, like a beacon in the darkness. When she faced him again, her expression had softened into something he couldn’t quite read.
“All this time,” she said quietly. “All this time, working together, rebuilding the cottage, and you kept this to yourself.”
Spencer nodded, unable to speak past the tightness in his throat.
“And you would still let me leave?” she asked.
“It had to be your choice,” he repeated. “Not mine. Not fate’s. Yours.”
Meryl took a step toward him, close enough now that he could see the flecks of gold in her hazel eyes. “And if I choose to stay?”
Hope flared in his chest, bright and dangerous. “Then you stay because you want to. Because this place matters to you. Because...” He hesitated. “Because I matter to you.”
“And if I choose to go?”
The question hit him like a physical blow, but he made himself answer it honestly. “Then you go. And I...” His voice roughened. “I learn to live with it. Or I come with you. If you’ll have me.”
