Hayden continues glaring at me. I said it. It’s out there. Leaving is the only choice I have. New York? Russia? How far do I have to go to escape her maddening scent? To no longer feel a pull towards my brother’s mate.
I guess I’ll find out.
After I gather a few things, I start walking towards the door.
“Remy, wait,” Hayden barks. “I need to tell you something.”
“What is it?” I ask, guardedly turning to face him again.
“Part of the reason I haven’t completed the mating ritual with Ansley is because it feels like there’s something missing,” Hayden sighs. “What if… what if she’s not justmymate?”
“Our kind doesn’t share,” I say. “Ever.”
“Ansley defies everything we know, brother,” Hayden says. “Remember what happened when the wolf showed up when we were young? The one our mother almost wed before she realized our father was her mate?”
“Vaguely,” I say. “I remember our father ripping his throat out… then his heart.”
“I asked him about it, some years later,” Hayden explains. “He said it wasn’t something he did because he wanted to. He said that the idea of another wolf even looking at his mate that way filled him with so much rage he was chewing on a heart before he even realized what he’d done.”
“Are you going to go for my heart first or my throat?” I ask, letting my bag drop to the ground. I thought he was going to let me leave. Clearly, I was wrong. “You’re only going to get one shot. After that, you won’t touch me again.”
“Neither, Remy,” he sighs. “I don’t feel that rage. I’m not even angry. Not really. I think that means something. Don’t go. We need to figure this out. It might help us understand what she is.”
“She’s your mate. That’s all that matters,” I grind out, reach for my bag.
“It doesn’t feel like I would be sharing her with you, brother. I don’t even feel jealous when I think about it,” he continues. “It feels… right.”
As I listen to my brother, I realize I feel the same way. If she was only meant for me, I wouldn’t let anything stand between us, even my Alpha. I’d have her. Claim her. Mark her. My instincts would demand it. I’d die trying to get to her, if that’s what it took.
“Are you sure?” I question, still struggling to make sense of it.
“As sure as I am that she’s my mate,” he answers. “This feels like the missing piece. It could be why I haven’t been able to knot. Because she’s meant for both of us.”
“If that’s true, then how do you think she’s going to react?” I ask, carrying my bag to the table and unpacking.
“I don’t know,” he admits. “We’ll tell her tonight. First, we need to find these fucking vampires.”
I open my laptop, wait for it to load, and pull the maps back up. As I do, I see a notification from a camera near one of our safehouses. We set up surveillance to be safe. I got a notification when Hayden left this morning. This one is more recent.
“Well, your mate…ourmate… she’s a defiant one,” I say, turning the laptop around. “She didn’t stay in the safehouse.”
“What do you mean?” he yells, looking at the screen. His eyes flicker with anger when he sees Ansley driving away. “Fuck. I told her to stay put.”
“Where do you think she’s going?” I ask.
“Work,” he says, shaking his head. “She cares about that job more than she cares about her own safety.”
“Are you going to go drag her back to the safehouse? I can let the others know you’ll catch up with us later,” I say.
“No, she’s still my mate. I’m not going to embarrass her like that, even if she defied me. I’ll go keep an eye on her,” Hayden says. “I doubt vampires would storm into York Financial. That’s too risky, even for them.”
“They may not even be looking for her,” I say. “Even if she’s a Scion, they’re going to be more worried about us than her. We’re the ones hunting them.”
“Yeah, but I’d still feel better if she was at the safehouse. If she’s out on her own, I need to be close,” he explains. “But she’s definitely getting punished tonight. I already had to spank her for lying to me.”
“Mm, then maybe tonight isn’t the night for us to talk to her,” I respond.
“No, we’re going to tell her tonight, regardless,” he says. “She has two mates now, and since she does… you’ve got as much right to punish her as I do.”
