Page 8 of Seeing Harper

Cristie narrowed her eyes at Remi.

Remi stood there, silently waiting to see which would give in first.

“I could, but then I’d be breaking the trust of a Pride member who came to me as her Alpha — kind of.”

“Alpha kind of?” Remi asked with a grin.

“I’m kind of her Alpha, but not really fully. And I kinda grabbed her and pulled her into the house when she started crying, so she didn’t really come to me, I brought her to me.”

“Ahhh, I see. Thought you said you would have told me anyway.”

“I would have. And I will. But I think I need to know why Kaiser left first.”

“You can’t call him just to rub his face in his reasons. They’re…” he hesitated, looking for the right word to describe Kaiser’s actions, “noble.”

“Noble?!” Cristie said.

“Yeah, in my opinion they absolutely are.”

“Okay, tell me. Then I’ll tell you.”

“Promise me, Cristie.”

“I will not even tell him I know unless you and I agree that he should know that I know. And if we can’t agree, I will not talk about it to him, I will just continue to harass you until you agree that I can tell him.”

Remi laughed. “At least you’re honest.” He walked over to the bed and sat down on its edge, grabbing one of the huge support pillows that graced the bed for when they were watching TV in bed rather than stretching out relaxing, and shoved it behind his back so he’d lean against that and the headboard, rather than their sleeping pillows. “Alright, he came looking for me after the dinner your dad had to introduce me to everybody. He and I talked that day, then he showed up here later that night.”

“Yeah, I wondered what the hell y’all talked about.”

“Keegan,” he said simply.

“Keegan?” she asked, her brows raised in question.

“Not at first while he was still at your dad’s, but later when he came looking for me. He was confused, and feeling guilty, and hurting even. I told him I knew that one of the girls at the family dinner was his mate. There was no way he’d convince me otherwise, and that I thought that was why he was hurting. He broke down and admitted that I was right. He said that he had no idea, not even a hint until the last time he’d been home, and that it was killing him knowing that she was right here and that she had no idea. What made it even worse was that he knew that he could never have her. He wanted to know how I dealt with knowing that I might never have my true mate at my side.”

“But you do.”

“But at that time, you still hated me.”

“I never hated you. I resented you.”

“Same thing. Anyway, after we talked, or maybe as we talked, he decided that he was going to leave.”

“Why? Why not stay and talk to her, talk to her parents?”

“Because of their age difference. Because she’s still in high school. Because he didn’t want to take her freedom, or make her feel like she had no choice in her future, so he left. He said that she had the right to grow and dream and live and experience, and if he took that from her, what kind of a dick would that make him. He said he couldn’t live with himself if he did that to her, not to mention that Lucas would probably kill him if he tried to even reach out. And he didn’t even think that she was aware that he was her mate.”

“She’s aware,” Cristie said.

Both Remi’s brows went up in surprise. “Hmpf.”

“Did he say anything else?” Cristie asked.

“Yes. We talked about a lot of things that night. I told him how much I admired him for removing himself from her until she was ready. He told me that it didn’t really matter if she ever chose him or not. What mattered was that she was happy. What he felt didn’t matter.”

“Wow,” Cristie said, as she lay there across the foot of their bed, looking up at the ceiling as she thought about everything Remi had shared with her.

“So, how do you know she knows it’s Kaiser that’s her mate?”