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They stood like that, breathing in tandem. His breath ruffled her hair, his pulse hammering through her skin. It should have been an awkward embrace. Instead, it felt…
Beyond natural. Right. He belonged here. He belonged withher.
But he didn’t want to. He didn’t want this. She could feel the second he wrestled his emotions under control.
“You should go eat,” he murmured, pulling back.
“You should too,” Loren countered breathlessly. If anyone needed food, it was him.But he shook his head, turning to face the trees.
“Need to scout,” she thought she heard him murmur. “If those men really were Eislanders, they’ll be back.”
She could tell from the set to his shoulders that he intended to spend the night out in the fields again, patrolling for trouble.
“You should go inside,” he added with his back facing her. “I’ll keep watch.”
His tone left no room for argument.Go inside.With a sigh, Loren turned, intending to head up the porch steps, when he called out behind her.
“Loren—” He was still turned away from her, but with every muscle in his body so tense, he could have been made from stone. “I’m sorry about what happened the other day. I…I got carried away. It...it won’t happen again.”
Before she could react, he lunged, taking off on foot beyond the shadows.
Carried away.Was that what they called it these days? Kissing someone sohardthey could feel it all the way down to their toes? Absently, Loren reached up, trailing her fingers along her bottom lip.
“Hey!”
She spun around to find Micha leaning against the doorway to the kitchen, noisily chewing on a chunk of bread. He waved what she guessed to be the sole surviving sandwich through the air.
“Was I supposed to save some of these?”
She shook her head. “Knock yourself out.”
Though, if it could help any at making sense of these past few days, maybeshewas the one who needed a good tap on the head.
39
Bill scowled at the sky, hating himself for showing restraint almost as much as he was relieved to have lasted this long. Days with a warm, receptive female in his midst, and he hadn’t gone further than a kiss—few men could say the same.
Not that he had a right to do a damn thing beyond that, of course. The logical arguments didn’t matter. Biology and instinct didn’t care about the morality of the situation. Add to it all that the female in question was his mate and…
There was no way they could go on like this for long. Already, he could sense her responding to the same urges plaguing him constantly. She craved his touch. His acceptance. More.
Breaking the bond now—with or without Lukka—could be the most humane decision in the long run. She would have to suffer her mental and emotional wounds alone, but she would have a sense of agency over her emotions again. Otherwise…
The longer the bond persisted, the more her unexamined memories weighed on his mind. Sooner or later, he wouldn’t be able to keep himself from going through them and learning Loren Connors in and out. What haunted her at night when he could sense her fear and felt driven to comfort her?
A part of him didn’t want to know. If he overstepped that boundary, there would be no turning back. He’d already lost one mate. He couldn’t survive that pain again.
Not to mention, the threat of Lukka, Kyle, and now the Eislanders.
There were only a handful of ways both he and Loren could survive this mess unscathed—none of them appealing.
The first was to break the bond and prepare her to live as an unofficial rogue—at least until she could find a pack other than Black Mountain to take her in. It was a huge ask of an untrained lycan—assuming, of course, that she handled the revelation of their mating bond without…
Fireworks.Though she would have every right to be furious. Violated. Worse. Dropping that bomb on her and cutting her loose was cruelty he doubted he could go through with.
The second course of action was to try again to have her accepted into Black Mountain and go against every cell in his body, warning him not to trust Lukka farther than he could throw him.
But the third…
It was the option that lingered in his mind the most, feeding off every trace of Loren Connors he could still sense on the wind.
He could keep her here and accept the unofficial title thrust upon him as an Alpha. Going a step further, he could train her as a lycan. Educate her on their ways and prepare her fully for the dissolution of the mating bond. That, however, would require time—a luxury they didn’t have.
Bill wasn’t sure which decision he would be able to live with, let alone Loren.
But they would need to pick a course of action. Soon.
~ The story continues in Howl ~
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