It still felt a little strange at first, but less awkward than I expected.
After a few steps, I noticed his hand shifting slightly. It was no longer just holding mine, but settling closer to my side instead.
“Your hand.”
He looked at me, genuinely confused. “What about it?”
“It’s supposed to go here.” I let go of his hand just long enough to guide it lower to my waist.
Dane stiffened slightly. “That feels lower than necessary.”
“It’s not.”
“It feels like it is.”
He exhaled loudly, clearly unhappy about it, but didn’t pull away. He let me position his hand properly until his palm finally settled against my side.
For a moment, it hovered there uncertainly before pressing into place, careful, like he was still figuring out how much of this he was allowed to be.
“Better,” I said.
The park had filled out more than I’d realized. People were scattered across benches with coffee cups and iced drinks in hand, others stretched out on picnic mats.
And then there were the couples, not many, but enough that I noticed them anyway.
Hands linked, arms draped over shoulders, bodies leaning together without hesitation. They looked like us, except they weren’t pretending.
A quiet feeling settled in my stomach, nothing sharp enough to name properly, just the echo of something familiar I hadn’t let myself reach for in a long time.
Comfort, familiarity, and the idea of having someone beside you without needing to think about it. I swallowed and forced my attention back to the path.
This wasn’t real. It was practice. Just practice. Beside me, Dane said something about the trees changing colour earlier than usual this year.
He hadn’t noticed the shift in me at all, and I answered automatically, my voice falling into step with his as easily as my feet had.
5
DANE
The annual summer pack cookout was probably the worst possible place to bring a fake date. Naturally, that was exactly where I brought Seth.
In my defense, I hadn’t fully thought this through when I invited him. At the time, it had seemed simple enough.
Bring Seth to one pack event, let my family see I was capable of finding my own dates.
It would get my mother off my back before she started handing out my number to random eligible bachelors at the grocery store. It was supposed to be easy.
Except now I was parked outside Seth’s apartment building with my hands gripping the steering wheel while my wolf paced circles in my head nervously.
I told myself to calm down. This plan would go without a hitch. My wolf disagreed. The passenger door opened before I could spiral further, and then Seth climbed into the truck.
My brain promptly forgot how language worked. He wasn’t dressed fancy.
That somehow made it worse. Seth wore a pale blue short-sleeved button-up, sleeves rolled casually to his forearms.
That was accompanied by dark jeans, and sneakers. His curls looked slightly damp, like he’d showered not long ago and lost a fight with a towel afterward.
He smelled like soap, vanilla, and coffee. My wolf immediately sat down and paid full attention.
