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“I can do this. I can do it because I know you will be by my side the whole time. They deserve to have what we have, Cade. What the others have. We don’t know the full extent of what was done to them, but all of us can imagine. I hurt Dove.”
“You didn’t mean to,” he snaps the words, getting defensive on my behalf.
“I know, but it doesn’t change the outcome. Dove had to die to reset her mind because of my actions.” I break off, unable to hold his gaze anymore as shame and guilt fight for my attention.
“Baby, please don’t do this to yourself.” He sounds tortured, but it doesn’t change anything. This has to be done. It’s the only way.
“We’re about to go into a dangerous war. They’re stronger as mates,” I say. “Unless you don’t want Dove to be part of our pack.”
Cade shakes his head. “It’s not that. I’ve grown to like Dove.”
“Then what is it?”
He scrubs a hand over his face, the emotions coming through our bond mixed and hard to decipher. “I want to protect you from even the tiniest amount of pain,” he admits. “I know this is going to be hard for you. First, dealing with your aunt, then with Klaus. I don’t like it.”
I fist my fingers into his shirt, pulling him against me. His heat blazes against my body as I melt into him. “I know,” I say, “but I have the power to give them this. Please, help me do that.”
Cade’s gaze locks with mine, softening in the way it only does for me. I study every inch of his perfect face, committing it to memory. This war is dangerous—that wasn’t a lie. We could all die defending our kind. It makes these moments even more valuable.
“I’d do anything for you,” he whispers, pressing his mouth to mine.
We kiss as if it’s the last chance we’ll get, and when we break apart, my body feels liquid and my heart is pounding. “I love you,” I tell him.
“I love you too. Let’s make the call.”
Chapter 27
Jackson
Dove is faster than I expected, and I have to rush to catch up with her. As soon as my fingers wrap around her bicep, she spins, collapsing against me. I hold her tight to my chest as she buries her head into my shirt.
“I’ve got you,” I say into her hair as I stroke her nape.
Fuck, seeing her like this unravels me. Dove is so strong, so resilient, but this is undoing her.
“I hate this,” she admits, her voice mumbled against my body.
“Me too, but we’ll get answers,” I promise her. “Right now, we don’t know anything for certain, and we have to hold on to that. Heat cycles are a tricky business, even between mated pairs. There’s every chance our imprinting didn’t lead to a successful heat, Dove.”
Her head lifts off my chest, tears dampening her lashes, but her eyes are hard as stone. “I want to kill him.”
She doesn’t need to elaborate on who that him is. We both know she’s talking about the white-haired man. The asshole behind all this pain and suffering. “We’ll do it together,” I say, cupping her cheeks so I can press a warm kiss to her mouth.
I keep it short and sweet, even though I want to show her how much I love her with my body. But that’s not what she needs right now.
I pull her to my side, and together we walk back to the house. It’s quiet inside, the others still in the main building. The room feels cold, and goose bumps pebble both our skins. The helplessness I feel as she sinks onto the couch, her gaze distant, threatens to drown me.
“Come and sit with me,” she invites, and I instantly move, dropping down next to her before she curls against my body.
For a while, neither of us speaks, lost in our own minds. I keep trying to find a way to fix this shit, but there’s so many things to put right that I don’t know where to start. What if we do have a child together? What happened to them? Was Dove alone when she gave birth? Was she scared?
I shut those thoughts down, stopping myself from spiraling into despair. We have to focus on the present, not the past. There will be time to make amends.
“Have you had any more visions?”
Something in her tone has me snapping my gaze at her, the Order suddenly forgotten. My jaw feels tight as I grind my teeth together at her anguish. I wish I could give her something to cling to, some hope to hold on to. “No; have you?”
She shakes her head. “I hoped I could unlock more of our past to fill in some blanks, but there’s been nothing. It’s like hitting a wall.” She lifts her head to look at me. Her eyes are swimming with emotion. She’s so vulnerable in this moment that I want to wrap her in my arms and never let her go. “What if we never get any more of our memories back?”
