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No way to help him.

She nodded briskly. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said it like that.” She got up, pulling a sweatshirt over her tank top. “I’ll get you some tea and breakfast. You’ll need your strength. And I’m sure we can find you a place to live, sooner rather than later. My aunties will know of somewhere.” She was rambling, tidying her room, tossing clothes into drawers, grabbing empty mugs from the night before, anything to avoid looking at Theo’s broken expression.

“Fee, wait⁠—”

“It’s okay.” She gave him a tight smile. “You need your rest.”

“Not that,” he growled. “Listen, about last night⁠—”

“You don’t need to explain.” She would not ask for this. She would not beg for Theo to want her, to love her. She didn’t need it.

“I do need to explain, Fee. I fucking do. But I don’t know how. I don’t know anything right now. I’m a goddamn mess.” He gestured down at his battered torso, but Pheobe didn’t see a mess. All she saw was the body that had held her last night. She saw Theo. Her best friend.

“It’s okay,” she said again, softer this time, gentler. Like she meant it. She was determined to mean it. She crawled back into bed and wrapped her arms around Theo. His body rigid against her until finally he gave in, his body shaking with sobs.

“I’m sorry, Fee. I’m so sorry. I just can’t.”

She didn’t need to ask what he meant. She knew perfectly well what he couldn’t do. He couldn’t love her. Not now. Not like this.

He’d promised that things would be different now and even if he’d been asleep when he called her his Mate, he’d made those other declarations when he was wide awake. And now he was taking it all back.

Theo had made her want something she never knew she needed and then he’d yanked it away from her. He had burrowed himself into her life, into her heart. He’d made her love him and now he’d made her a fool. What would her mother say?

Maybe she was being unfair. Theo was hurting. But so was she. She’d let herself think she could be different from her sisters, but she was wrong. Nymphs didn’t settle down, didn’t tie their lives to anyone.

Nymphs didn’t need anyone. Their souls belonged to the trees, not to wolves.

So, she resolved to remain Theo’s friend. She couldn’t imagine her life without him in it, even now, even after he’d broken her heart. And she didn’t let herself think of those words whispered in the middle of the night.

She couldn’t.

If she did, she would surely go mad.

Chapter Two

Theo wasn’t surprised to find Phoebe sipping tea in his kitchen when he woke up, but his heart fluttered anyway. His stupid heart was always doing shit like that around her.

“Morning, Fee.” He padded out into the kitchen, running a hand across his bare chest. It had been a while since he’d seen her, but his best friend had a tendency to disappear sometimes.

“Morning, Theo.” Phoebe peered at him over her mug. He paused to look at her before tearing his gaze away. He never really could get over how distractingly beautiful she was. Even now, as he made his coffee in his own kitchen, he had a hard time concentrating, knowing that she was watching him with those big brown eyes.

“How long have you been back?” Theo asked.

“A few days.”

He didn’t ask where she’d been. It was an unspoken rule of their friendship. Neither of them dug too deep into what the other was up to when they were apart. It was safer that way.

“You changed your hair.”

Fee ran her hand over her newly blonde locks.

“Got tired of the red,” she said with a shrug.

He never really knew what Fee would look like when she showed up, new hair color, new style, new colored contacts. There was even the time she appeared with a nose ring to match the many piercings in her ears. And then she’d let it close up a few months later.

It didn’t matter, though. However she looked, she was beautiful to him.

He’d never met a version of her that he didn’t like.