That was why I hadn’t stopped her from walking out onto that balcony this morning. Why I hadn’t insisted she leave through the door and walk down the hallways to her room, leaving a scent trail to support my claim that I’d won the bet.
Instead, I’d let her go.
Cade would believe me if I told him. He knew how seriously I took our bets. Lying would have undermined all the fun. And as far as Cade was concerned, the bet was still on because I hadn’t told him about Ryker and Rynn yet. He wouldn’t be happy, but I’d made the executive decision to withhold that information from him because he was dealing with a lot right now.
The monsters coming down from the mountains had been increasing their attacks. Given the one Rynn, Ryker, and I had squared off against on our way home, I understood his concerns. We’d gotten lucky. No, not lucky. Rynn had saved our asses with her quick thinking. But there wouldn’t always be a partially frozen river around.
We’d taken the brunt of the monster attacks in the Avala Order because our territory stretched coast to coast across Lunaria and bordered the mountains the whole way. We had the most skilled hunters out of not just the Velesians but the Moroi and Furies too.
In the last two weeks, five hunting parties had gone missing, which, in Lunaria, meant they were dead.
Cade was working on getting support from the Moroi and various Velesian packs, but that meant a lot of tedious negotiating. I could use my visit to the Fervis territory to help him with this while also giving Rynn the cover she needed.
I was toying a dangerous line by not telling Cade everything. He gave me a lot of leeway in my plotting, trusting me to handle things on my own before coming to him with them. But if this blew up in my face, I knew he’d be pissed about it.
For all his bluster about not trusting Rynn, Cade liked having her around. The perks of knowing someone for over fifty years was that you became very good at reading their tells. He liked her even though he’d never admit that to anyone. Just like me, if the situation were different, I had no doubt Cade would have made his feelings known to Rynn.
Unlike me though, he was doing a much better job of keeping his desires in check.
Because Rynn couldn’t be our mate. Our loyalty was to the Alpha pack first, and she would never be a part of that. Ryker might feel differently, but he hadn’t been here in the early years when we’d fought tooth and claw for our position. Him joining our pack had been an exception only because he’d had nowhere else to go and we’d known we had his complete loyalty.
There was also the problem that if Warrick found out about any of this, he would kill her.
My hand fell to my chest, rubbing at the dull ache.
I needed to get rid of any trace of Rynn being in my room. Warrick had an annoying habit of showing up when I least expected it, and even though I’d never invite him into my room, I knew he’d let himself in.
My mate had little respect for personal boundaries.
Would-be mate, that is. I let my hand fall away from my chest. It wasn’t like our mating bond would ever finish forming. It required both of us to accept it, which we would never do. I mean, neither of us had even acknowledged that we felt the mate bond in three decades now.
We would out-stubborn each other until the end of our days.
Cade knew about it, or rather suspected. I’d never told him, and I doubted Warrick had. But just like I knew all his tells, Cade knew mine. Rynn spending the night here might have further complicated my feelings about her, but on the plus side, since I’d won the bet, Cade was out of luck about me telling Warrick how I felt.
Still, that was a small silver lining. I was supposed to be fixing the Rynn problem. Not making it worse. Letting her sleep here had been a mistake, one I didn’t regret but couldn’t afford to make again.
For everyone’s sake, including her own, Rynn had to go. Which meant I needed to get Cade to agree to let me take her to Fervis territory. I didn’t know what Rynn was plotting, but I was confident it would work. She was incredibly clever and resourceful. In a different world, she could have been a member of our pack in truth.
But we’d suffered too many betrayals. From people we’d known a lot better than Rynn. Maybe when we stabilized the Velesian realm, we could consider adding new members or pursuing mates. But that was not today, and it wouldn’t be right to ask Rynn to wait for a day that might never come.
Reluctantly, I got out of the bed that still smelled of her. I’d change the bedding tomorrow. Maybe her lingering scent would allow me to get one more night of sleep with no nightmares to plague me. For now, I needed to go for a run to clear my head and then speak with Cade.
It was time for the Princess to leave our castle.
“Have you spoken to Selene about this?” Cade tapped his fingers rhythmically on his desk.
“Yes.” I nodded. “We had lunch today, and she agrees with me. The Dragomir clan can’t be trusted, but politically, it will be good for us to visit Fervis now and further cement our alliance. If the opportunity arises, I can also start laying the groundwork for Remy to take over.”
Cade’s fingers froze. “We need to think that through carefully. There is a good chance Rynn’s brother will be the Narchis Alpha someday. If Remy takes over Fervis, that means we’ll have two Alphas with strong connections to Rynn—not us.”
“All the more reason to consider letting her be a member of our pack,” Ryker said from where he leaned against the bookcase. There was an edge to his words that had Cade giving him a careful, appraising look.
That tone usually meant Ryker was pissed off about something but didn’t want to talk about it or didn’t know how to articulate it.
Cade glanced at me, and I grimaced. We both knew that something in this case was Rynn. It was impressive how well she’d managed to dodge Ryker over the past couple of weeks. Currently, she and Selene were in the kitchen, making bread.
Well, Selene was. Rynn was perched on one of the counters chatting with her. It turned out Selene actually had a lot in common with Warrick. They were both excellent at cooking and baking . . . and they were both incredibly territorial over the kitchen.
