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“No. I don’t think… I don’t think either of us is prepared for this. But will you give us a real chance to be a family? That whole mate thing… I bit you. I couldn’t help it—isn’t that special?” Zeke breathed in deeply, as if absorbing my scent.

“It means your spirit knows I’m the right one. You didn’t force it, I know, because you didn’t know the world. Instinct told you.” I hesitated before licking my lips, taking in the metallic flavor of the shower water. “But it’s not a full bond. It’ll go away after a few months…”

“Why is it not a full bond?” Zeke spun me around, eyes wild. As his lips parted, like the very mention of the bond drew it out, his teeth shifted into something sharper, canines desperate for flesh.

“Because I didn’t bite you back,” I said, glancing away.

“Then bite me back!” Zeke crouched down a little, tilted his head to the side, and pulled my face in. An ache in my jaw twinged as my teeth shifted, the pleasant sensation rather like biting down on something too hard. I wanted to bite, to finish the connection; the unfair link he had to my heart had grown and mine hadn’t. I didn’t know what he wanted from me or what he needed.

“It’s forever, Zeke.” I flinched when he pulled me in again.

“And? So is marriage. When I was younger, we courted far less before we married—especially if someone’s pa found out we’d been rolling in the haystacks.” Zeke tugged on my head again, wanting that bite as much as I wanted to give it.

“Fine. I’ll…” I opened my mouth as I flinched and realized something. “The spell to stop you from writing… Since your body changed, is it still on you?”

Zeke frowned and pulled away from me. “I don’t know.”

I shook my head and turned the shower off, finding my robe in a flash as I scoured my apartment for a lone pen, some chewed-up ancient thing from a bank that I’d changed the ink cartridge in a dozen times because I had some sort of foul emotional attachment to it. Plus, it was a pretty shade of blue.

I rummaged around my bookshelf and found the first book in that world she wrote, where the basis of all things was established. I brought them back to him as he stood on my bath mat, dripping with my hand-drying towel wrapped around his hips, wet pants thrown to the floor.

“If I give you this pen, if you could write one thing, change anything about what happened, would I remember this?” I stared him down as a tremble ran through me.

He stared at me with haunted eyes, glancing from the book to me. “No. Only me.”

The whisper that left his throat left me wounded, as if I’d asked him to do something horrid.

“What would you write?” I fisted the pen and held it out to him, watching him stiffen, hands clenched at his sides.

“You’d never know. It’d be pointless to tell you.” Zeke swallowed hard, throat bobbing.

“Humor me.” My heart thundered in my chest as I took a step closer. I’d gotten myself into this, and the only real way for him to have his way was if he wrote the future he wanted. I held the pen out, and he reached for it, fingers trembling.

As he neared it, he froze and drew his hand back, face twisted with uncertainty. He rested his hand over his face, covering his mouth as he stood there, as nervous as I was.

“I wouldn’t start with that book, for one.” He stared at the floor. “I would need paperwork, a newspaper, or a book with your name in it. An album? Something that says something about you.”

I swallowed. The desperate look in his eyes had something to prove.

I thought for a few moments before I really considered it. Everything I had was digital—untouchable.

Then I thought about something and rummaged through a box in my closet and pulled out a high school yearbook. I flipped a few pages into an article about a book club I’d been in, my name mentioned. I put the pen between the pages and held it out to him, lips pursed.

He took the book and opened it, staring down at the words with desperation before his trembling hand reached for the pen. Nothing happened, fingers spreading as if some invisible force field stopped him.

“Do you trust me?” He stared at the book, at the pen, lips twisting.

I had to. A lifetime bonded to someone I didn’t love sounded terrible. A lifetime bonded to someone I couldn’t trust was worse. And I couldn’t make myself force him into the situation. So, all I could do was nod once.

He lowered his head and picked up the pen between with his teeth. Determination flared in his eyes as he whispered around the pen. “I’ve been saving this for an emergency…”

I closed my eyes and clutched my robe. He could write me dead, take away my gift, make it so I never met him. I’d never know.

With the book held up and his head tilted, he scratched the pen across the surface.

I waited for what seemed like a small eternity and flinched when a clatter made me open my eyes wide. My heart thundered in my chest as I tried to think about what had changed, but again, I wouldn’t know.

I was in love with him—but not infatuated. I felt peace, but again, nothing that made me feel like I would take risks… Or…