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A few minutes later, Edie was sitting in the living room while I opened the complimentary bottle of wine that we included in every cabin.She was wearing soft pants, a baggy Johns Hopkins tee, and a robe that looked like it belonged to an old man.Comfort clothes.My shirt was destroyed, so I’d gone without.
“Let’s start with the dreams,” she said, pushing her glasses up her nose as she accepted a glass of wine.“How is it possible that we’d be sharing the same subconscious experiences?”
“I don’t know,” I said.“It’s just one of those things that goes along with being mated.It only happens when we’re not sleeping in the same bed.My mom says it happened with my dad, but they only spent a few nights apart from the time they met until he died.”
“So if I go back to Baltimore, I’m going to have sex dreams about you for the rest of my life?”
My heart felt like a stone in my chest.“If it’s any consolation, I’ll be having them too.”
“Huh.”She took a deep drink of her wine.“And why didn’t you tell me about this?”
“I thought it would freak you out.”
She tipped her wine at me.“Well, you’re right there.But my freak-out meter has a whole new scale now.Are you saying that everything I’m feeling is part of some cosmic plan?”
“I don’t know,” I said.“I mean, you did save my mother’s life.So…maybe?”
“Your mother is in a coma right now because of me.Because she was trying to protect me.”
“No, she’s in a coma right now because of Dr.Barnes.She’s alive because of you.”
“So…fate brought me here.Fate made me care about you.”
I scrubbed my hands through my hair.“Humans have this idea that if something is fated, then it’s out of our hands.But shifters feel differently.Fate presents us with opportunities, and it’s our responsibility to make the most of them.”
“Why are so calm about this?”
“Oh, I am definitely not calm.”Acid was swimming in my veins.“I might appear calm, but it’s actually a defense mechanism that is keeping me from begging at your feet.”
Her eyebrows shot up.“Begging for what?’
“For you to stay.”My voice broke on the last word, and I took a sip of my wine to steady it.“But I can’t ask you that.Especially after what happened today.It’s too dangerous.So I’ve decided you should go back to Baltimore until this situation settles.”
“You’ve decided?”She crossed her arms over her chest.“What about your mother?”
“Flint’s been right all along, she should have been in a hospital.Dr.Barnes wouldn’t have been able to fake her test results, and none of this would have ever happened.”
“You’d have to tell them she’s a shifter.”
“If that’s what we have to do, that’s what we have to do.I almost lost both of you today.”There was that tremble in my voice again.“I’m not taking that chance again.”
“So you’ve decided, instead, that we should both be miserable?”
“Not forever.Just until…”
She raised her eyebrows.“What’s the goalpost now?When your mother gets better?When you figure out what Dr.Barnes was planning?After the winter?When do you get to stop sacrificing your happiness for the sake of your family?”
“That’s not what I’m doing.I’m trying to protect you.”
“You’re trying to protect me from a loving, supportive, dedicated relationship with the man I love?Great, thank you so much.”
There was an alchemical reaction happening inside me, activated by the word ‘love.’It bonded the fear and need inside me and turned it into a spiky, dangerous hope that left me breathless.
Luckily, Edie didn’t need my input.“Let me ask you, Jasper, where does my opinion come into this equation?I told you I didn’t want to be managed.I told you not to lie to me, that I’d rather have the truth than your presentation of the truth.”
“I couldn’t tell you.I wanted to, a thousand times, but it was never the right moment.”
“When you kissed me that first time, in front of your family, Flint said something about you taking the choice away from me.I thought he meant that you’d taken away my option to leave once I saw you were a shifter.But he meant you took away the choice to be your mate.”
