The spike of jealousy those words evoked was both ridiculous and wholly unwelcome. Gabriel Mason had a soulbond with Rys Calder. The idea that either of them felt anything more than friendship towards anyone else was so ludicrous a huff of laughter escaped. What the fuck was wrong with me?
I glanced at Max, not surprised at the concern in his eyes, or the way his gaze swept over me as he tried to decipher what my problem was.
And that right there was my problem.
He’d looked at me like that a thousand times before and it had never affected me like it did now. The warmth in my chest that bloomed to life every single time his actions showed that I was special, that we were more.
Or we could’ve been.
And now we were in some sort of limbo where we couldn’t go back to being the best friends we’d been before, but we couldn’t move forward either. And it frustrated me enough that Max wanting to go out for a drink with his fucking partner, a man so off the table it wasn’t even funny, made me want to break something.
Fuck my life.
And fuck you, Dad, for causing all of this.
I wanted to erase that thought as soon as I’d had it. Which made me consider the other thing Max had typed on my screen. Maybe it needed moving to the top of the list.
“Hey? Are you okay?” Max gripped my shoulder, fingers digging in enough to get my attention. It wasn’t the hug I’d wanted, but his touch never failed to soothe my wolf. And it was that base part of me, the wild, instinct-driven side, that needed it right now.
Because as far as my wolf was concerned, Max was mine. Had been from the moment we’d given in to the attraction between us, the first time I tasted him on my tongue. It was my head that said we couldn’t have him. Those pesky human emotions like guilt, and loyalty to a man who, despite trying not to, I’d felt had let me down.
Alpha orders, on the other hand, affected all parts of me.
And that was why I couldn’t give in and let my wolf have its way. Even raw, primal instinct couldn’t overcome an alpha’s direct order.
“Jake?” Max tried again, giving me a gentle shake until I looked up at him.
The sigh I let out seemed to release something inside of me. I’d been about to tell him I was fine, but the words stuck in my throat. I couldn’t lie to him at the best of times, and definitely not when he looked at me like that. Like he’d do anything in his power to make it all go away.
Except this time he couldn’t.
Not on his own anyway. I didn’t know if anyone could.
I leant back in my chair, hands clasped behind my head as I tried to sort my feelings into something coherent.
“When it first happened, when we first walked into that room and saw what my dad had done—”
“Allegedly done,” Max said.
I rolled my eyes but didn’t contradict him. Until we found evidence to the contrary, I refused to get my hopes up that it had all been some huge mistake. I felt like the shittiest son, but my dad had been so drunk he had no clear memories of that night. It’d taken longer than I expected for the aconite to wear off, so it was no surprise really. I wanted to believe there was another explanation, but realistically, the most obvious one was usually right.
I secretly thought Max clung to the idea my dad was innocent because hope gave him the strength to keep fighting this, and he needed that.
“Anyway,” I said. “When it happened, I was so fucking mad at everything and everyone. My life had just been ripped apart and put back together in a way I didn’t want but was powerless to do anything about. I was angry, and ready to fight tooth and claw to get out of it.”
I held my hands out wide. “And then nothing happened. Haylen Frost wanted to let the pack grieve Faris’s death. Xen was quite happy to put it to one side until Frost was ready to move forward, and we were so busy dealing with all that shit with Axel—”
“It felt like it wasn’t real?” Max offered, and as stupid as it sounded, that was exactly how it had felt.
“The only thing that kept reminding me it wasn’t something I’d dreamt up was the fact that I couldn’t fucking touch you like I wanted to.”
Max’s low whine cut into me, sharp and direct, hitting its mark with unnerving accuracy. I rubbed the heel of my hand over my chest, trying to ease the ache. “And now Frost has suddenly decided the mourning period is over and it’s like we’re right back to that night. Like the last couple of months haven’t happened. I’m as angry, scared, and powerless as I was back then.Nothing’s changed.”
Max grabbed my hand. “You’re wrong. We have a plan now. We havetimenow. And we have people who can help. I know it’s going to be difficult to work around Xen’s orders—”
“Difficult?” I gaped at him. “We’re literally prohibited from talking about anything to do with that night. How are we supposed to ask for help?”
I wanted to fix this as much as Max did, but I honestly had no idea how to get around Xen’s orders.
