What would I do if I lost her?
She was the one person who understood that I didn’t actually want to be alone when I said I needed time alone, and the only one who had been there for all of my worst moments.
I’d always known she was human and therefore had an expiration date, but I had never actually considered losing her.
It was more than a possibility, now.
It was almost a guarantee.
Though I wanted to pull into a gas station and cry as I worked through that, I couldn’t allow myself to let more than a few tears free as I drove.
Harper didn’t need me to mourn now, or lose my shit.
She needed me to hold it together—and try to come up with a way around the inevitable.
So I swallowed my emotions down like a good fucking friend and tried like hell to think of an alternative.
CHAPTER NINE
maverick
I tappedmy foot repeatedly while watching the small selection of security footage before Steven’s murder that our tech team sent over. Someone had looped it, so we couldn’t see a damn thing, but I was trying to see if anything out of the ordinary had happened.
I was supposed to be, anyway.
My mind was on one thing.
Cherries.
My office door opened and closed. Rhone’s scent stained the air, irritating the beast within me. Though our wolves weren’t separate entities from us, all weres reported feeling like they had two different parts.
One more animalistic, and one less so.
The beast, and the man. Or woman.
It was easier to refer to them separately at times, because the instincts tended to butt heads.
“You’re still watching this?” Rhone dropped into the chair across from my desk. Not the one that smelled like my female. I’d moved that one to my side, obviously.
“Haven’t gotten to the good part yet.”
Rhone leaned back. “You’re obsessing over the vampire again.”
“Anyone would.”
“I can’t believe you haven’t abducted her yet.”
Most male werewolves, upon fate forcing their hand, would take their mate back to their den kicking and screaming if they had to. It took about two weeks for sanity to return after realizing you were fated to someone. The pull was incredibly strong.
I was above that, of course.
But fantasizing about abduction anyway.
“Maybe I’m not interested,” I remarked.
Rhone lifted an eyebrow.
We both knew I was really fucking interested. I’d spent days trying not to be, and failed miserably.
