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Sweet Goddess, what had he just done?
Why the hell had he said that to her? For a woman who had never belonged anywhere until the past couple of nights, he couldn’t have said crueler words.
He needed to go after her and apologize.
And he would, but not yet. First, he had to process what he’d just learned, then figure out what to do about his wife?
After a few minutes, however, he realized that he’d never truly believed Emily was dead. On some realm level, he must have known she was still alive, yet he never allowed himself to consider the possibility. Of course, to do so would mean he’d have to own up to his temper, his obstinacy, and to the fact he’d chosen the wrong woman to wed.
All his frustration over his marriage rose to the surface once more. Only this time he made a conscious decision to let it all go. Having spent a few nights with Olivia had helped him to understand that Emily had simply not been the right woman for him. And he’d definitely been the wrong man for her.
In fact, what truly bothered him was that his wife had believed it necessary to stage her own death in order to escape him. Regan had been right when she’d challenged him about Emily needing her freedom. To her sensitive nature, he must have seemed like a wild boar always jabbing at her with his tusks.
He owed the woman an apology, a very big one.
How many times had she asked him for a divorce, but he would never agree to it. She’d taken matters into her own hands and had forsaken her life, her world, in order to find some peace in the U.S. How much her marriage to him had cost her.
Somehow, he’d find a way to make it up to her.
Sweet Goddess, Emily was alive. He knew it would take some time to truly process what this meant, but for the moment he was grateful Olivia had been the one to tell him. Her presence in his life made it easier than it might have been otherwise. Olivia was strong, forthright, very physical, and a good match for him. She had no problem challenging him and she made him laugh. And maybe it was the contrast between the two women that helped him to move forward.
Olivia.
A strange sensation, like a stream flowing over a waterfall, ran through him: Awareness, perfect understanding, a sense of time and space coming together seamlessly. Love.
He loved Olivia.
He loved her passionately.
She’d become the moon and stars to him, the booming thunderstorm in summer, the wind blowing hard off the ocean over his rocky barren land. She was a battle Zephyr, a shifter, a woman of independence and ready for anything.
And he loved her.
He’d also cast a cutting barb at her and she’d left.
His chest felt crushed once more. What if she never forgave him?
~
In her wolf form, Olivia headed back to Barker’s Bend, but not to her house. Instead, she bounded and raced to her farm just a few miles south.
She hadn’t left the cottage because of Zane’s absurd words, but because she’d become acutely aware in that moment just how much she’d grown attached to the Mastyr of Swanicott. Watching him devastated by the fact that his wife had faked her own death rather than fight Zane for a divorce, had made her own heart ache as it never had before.
That’s when she’d understood the truth about her involvement with Zane.
She loved him.
She loved serving him as his blood rose, and she really loved sharing his bed.
With every particle of her half-human, half-wolf form, she loved him.
But how could he ever feel the same way about her?
Within a few minutes of running and bounding, she reached her small farmhouse, refitted to serve her laborers when they needed their meals or a bathroom break. Given that night had fallen, all her workers had gone home, most of them either trolls or shifters who could bear the sunlight of day-work.
She went inside and took her time brewing a fresh pot of coffee. Though most shifters lived out their lives during the day, she’d been on Zane’s schedule from the time she’d first ghosted him.
Now she was here, waiting for the hot water to drip through the fine grounds and release its treasure.
