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Chapter 7 - Matéo
You’re not safe here.
The look on her face—the way Rose touched me after I said those words—caused me greater pain than my night terrors. The faint taste of candy tickled the back of my throat. Sticky heat prickled my neck as I hovered over my workbench, sanding furiously.
What was I even making? I couldn’t remember. But it wasn’t the item itself that gave me relief. It was the sanding. It was the repetitive motion. It was the birds chirping just outside the garage window.
Peace. Quiet. That was what my cabin gave me.
I stopped sanding.Until it doesn’t.
Getting involved with Beaufort Pack affairs meant there was a target on my back. Those vampires were hungry for vengeance, irritated by my involvement. I knew better than to stay alone, but alone was all I knew. Going back to a crowded place would only put those people in danger.
And that wasn’t my style.
By myself was best. All my weapons were here, the pantry was stocked, there was plenty of wood outside for the fireplace. The tools for my survival were plenty, having been embedded into my very DNA as a child.
It was stupid to leave her like that, I thought as I pictured Rose standing expectantly in the hallway outside the conference room. She set up all that food and I took two bites of a pastry.All that effort was wasted on me.
I yearned to return to her, to sweep her into my arms and thank her for everything she had done. Every ounce of patience she had given me was noted.
And it was also aggravating.
Couldn’t she see I was a broken man? That my past haunted me? Was she attracted to that?
And if she was, then what did that make her?
Broken, desperate, weak.
The words circled my mind as I sanded the wood down to a fine sheen. Dust coated my fingers, knuckles, and wrists, layers of it piled like snow on the workbench, thin wisps of it swirling like tornadoes in the air.
It wasn’t working. Nothing was working. I couldn’t get her out of my head.
And the truth was that I didn’twantto get her out of my head.
Of all the years I spent locked up inside this cabin, I never imagined that such a bright and wonderful woman would be the one to awaken my heart. The shards of pain I had carefully locked away were loose, shredding my insides to pieces. It hurt. Yet the pain was refreshing, too.
It had been so long since I had felt it so deeply.
And that was the nature of being around Rose. She made me feel safe. She made me feel vulnerable. She made me feel safe tobevulnerable.
Which was probably the scariest part of all.
I shook my head while staring at the bird feeder I had hacked up way too quickly to be useful. Hell, it could be firewood if it wanted. What could make a better fire than a failed project?
And about a million little feelings that were way too confusing to be real did the trick, too.
Fuel for the flames, I thought as I tossed my weird creation into the fireplace.In more ways than one.
It was irritation that pushed me outside. It was anger that sent me into the yard and through the trees. Passion inspired my limbs. Desire drove me to the stump where I chopped firewood. Physical labor was the only thing that was proven to keep things off my mind—which meant it would work with Rose, too.
Ithadto work. Otherwise… I was out of options.
I placed a log on the stump and steadied it, glaring at it as I raised the ax above my head.
She’s not safe there.
The solidthunkof the blade charging through the log cut through the chorus of birdsong above my head. Wings fluttered. Branches rustled. Excited squawks echoed through the trees.
