Page 146 of The Werewolf’s Wrong Mate

At first, I could hear her breathing and Sava’s low instructions. Then their voices dropped into the wind, and the ruins swallowed them.

Cormac came down the steps and stopped beside the gate, his cane tapping lightly on the path. “You look calm.”

“I am not.”

“No?” he said. “You look calm. I said nothing about being it.”

I kept my eyes on the ruins. “Do you have a purpose here?”

“Several, but annoying you is the one giving me the most pleasure.”

Ronan remained on the terrace, but I felt his attention sharpen when Sava emerged alone at the far end of the ground.

My body went rigid before my mind caught up.

“She is inside the boundary,” Sava said before I could speak. “She is hidden. She is stable. She is also smug, which I assume is normal for her.”

Cormac’s smile widened.

Sava came to the gate, and when she got close enough to scent me, her expression changed by the smallest degree.

“Open it,” she said to Cormac.

He did.

I stepped out, but she lifted one hand before I could pass her.

“Wait.”

“I have waited.”

“I know,” she said quietly. “That is part of the problem.”

My jaw tightened.

Sava glanced toward the ruins, making sure Cassie could not hear us, then brought her voice lower. “You need to understand what is happening before you go in there.”

“I know what is happening.”

“No. You know the hunting part. You know the wolf part. You do not know the medical part because none of you ever do.”

Cormac made a small pleased sound.

Sava ignored him. “Her pulse rose when she hid, but it was not panic alone.She is responding to pursuit.”

The wolf went very still inside me.

Sava’s eyes stayed on mine. “You are not in full rut, and she is not in full heat, but you are closer than I like. This training is going to push both of you toward it, and if you cannot keep control, you need to say so before you walk into that ground.”

I looked toward the ruins. Cassie was hidden somewhere beyond stone and hedge, alive, angry, afraid, and waiting for me to find her. The mark pulled toward her in slow waves, not with pain this time, but with anticipation so unmistakable that the wolf knew what it meant before I allowed myself to name it.

“I can keep control,” I said.

Sava took one step closer. “If she wants you?”

The words hit harder because she didn’t soften them. My gaze returned to hers.

“If she wants you,” Sava said again, “you still ask. You still listen. You still make sure the choice is hers and not only the mark looking for a stronger anchor.”