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“I know you didn’t.”
“I don’t understand. We were right there, Cait. She was open. She kissed me, really kissed me. Then she looked at me like I’d hurt her, and she bolted.”
Caitlynn adjusted Elianna on her hip. The baby had fallen asleep, her fist curled around a strand of auburn hair.
“What kind of kiss?” she asked.
“What?”
“The other times. Were they like this one?”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “No. Before, it was heated. She could keep her guard up through that. This was different.”
“Tender.”
“Yes.”
Caitlynn looked at him with the same steady, clear-eyed patience their mother used to wear, the expression that meant she’d already arrived at the answer but was going to let him walk there himself.
“Chris. She’s spent her whole life around men who were gentle right before they were cruel. Her father stroked her hair, called her sweetheart, then put cigarettes out on her skin. Tenderness isn’t safe for her. It’s a warning signal.”
He closed his eyes.
“She didn’t run from you,” Caitlynn said. “She ran from what it felt like to trust you. Those are very different departures.”
“So what do I do?”
“What you’ve been doing. You stay. You don’t chase. You let her figure out that gentle doesn’t come with a cost.” She leaned into his shoulder, briefly. “She’ll come back. She’s not running from you. She’s running from the last person who was soft with her, and she hasn’t realized yet that you’re not him.”
He sat with his sister in the cooling evening. Elianna slept against Caitlynn’s chest. Through the bond, Sloane was still, far away, her signal dim but steady.
He stayed.
***
“Sloane.”
She dropped her hands. Kahn stood ten feet away, jacket unzipped, boots muddy from the trail. His ice-blue eyes moved over her face, the wet cheeks, the bloody bandage.
He didn’t ask if she was alright. He sat down against the tree across from her, stretched his legs out, and crossed his ankles.
“I saw you come through the east gate,” he said. “Moving fast for someone with a leg wound.”
“I need to tell you why I went after your wife.”
His expression didn’t change.
“It wasn’t about you. I know everyone thinks it was. An ambitious she-wolf wants the Alpha, hates the human who stole her place.” She pressed her palms flat against her thighs. “It was never about you.”
“Then what was it about?”
“Safety.” The word came out smaller than she intended. “The Luna is untouchable. If I could get there, he couldn’t reach me.”
Kahn was quiet.
“My father used to burn me with cigarettes when I talked too loud. He’d hold my wrist over the stove burner when I forgot to clear my plate.” Her voice held. She made it hold. “When he was banished, I stood in that doorway watching them drag him out. I was so relieved I nearly collapsed. I needed to be Luna because I needed to be safe. When Caitlynn won, my plan fell apart.”
“And Caitlynn?”
