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He wants me to wear the ring? I’ll wear it.
“There.” I jam the ring on my finger, showing it off to him. “Happy now? It’s on. Okay, West? It’s on.”
The ring might be back on my finger, but I was too, too late.
West has already let himself off the leash.
His features sharpen. Dark fur rushes out along the top of his arms. The seams on the collar of his t-shirt pop as his body hunches.
As shifters, we have two forms: one that mimics ‘human’, and another that mimics ‘wolf’. Every now and then, when something interferes with our instincts, a rare third form appears. It’s a partial shift. Half wolf, half human, it’s more beast than anything—and it’s the mark of a feral when a shifter gets caught in that shape.
It doesn’t last. Thank the Luna. This twisted version of West falls forward, but he’s not the one he hits the ground.
In a shower of torn jeans and his ruined t-shirt, he shifts to his wolf before searching for me with his golden shifter gaze.
His dark grey wolf dips his muzzle. His sleek tail is low, tucked between his back legs.
He’s ashamed. As his wolf, there’s no hiding his emotions from mine. Desperate and bursting with love for me, West is also full of shame which is exactly why his spins, claws scrabbling against the strewn material on the floor before he disappears out of the room.
Rushing forward, I slam the door closed and whirl around. The skirt on my dress flares around me, slapping into my thighs the same time as I hit the wood of the door with the palms of my shaking hands.
I don’t lock it, but not for the same reason as before.
If West really is on the verge of turning feral, it wouldn’t matter if I did. My West would respect a closed door. That ferocious beast masquerading as the Beta of the Sylvan Pack?
A little thing like a lock won’t stop him if he decides to come after me again.
After all, I think hollowly, looking at the golden band on my right ring finger, he thinks I’m hisbride.
* * *
West doesn’t just fleefrom my room. He leaves the cabin.
I know him; at least, I want to believe I still do. No way would West go too far, leaving me on this unfamiliar territory alone. Wherever he is, I have to believe he’s near enough to keep me safe while also getting some control over himself.
He’ll be back. I’m absolutely convinced of that fact. And since I don’t know how long he’ll be gone for, I decide to take the chance to explore the rest of the cabin to get a better idea of the situation I’m in.
And who am I kidding? Though my stomach is tight with nerves, I haven’t eaten since dinner last night. To keep mine and my wolf’s energy up, we’ll need to eat something.
Food is a huge part of shifter cultureandcourtship. Whatever he thinks is going on here, he wants me to choose him over Rafael. If I ate the food he laid out for me when I woke up from the quicksilver, I would be signaling that I was interested in doing that.
Sure, I might have gone too far when I flipped the table, but he deserved it. Just like he deserves me sneaking into the kitchen, finding something to snack on.
He’s cleaned up the mess from before. I refuse to feel guilty when I notice that the wooden table is sitting a little crooked. Instead, I go rooting through the cabinets, searching for something quick and easy I can throw together so that I’m feeding myself.
While our wolves are carnivores, as a human, I’ll eat anything. But, since I am only human, I have a few preferences. Like how I like blackberry jelly instead of grape, and my peanut butter needs to be chunky instead of creamy.
When I figure I can make an easy PB&J and top it off with some chips, it takes a second before I realize that everything in his cabinets are my preferred foods, down to the brand of peanut butter I like, and the flavor of chips he stocked up on.
Finding an abandoned cabin in the woods and fixing it up for a den for him and his future mate… that’s one thing. Tracking down some quicksilver to drug me… I thought it had everything to do with Chase’s appearance in Hickory.
But that was only a few days ago. To set up this cabinandstock it with everything I would ever need or like… this wasn’t the spur of the moment decision like I thought it was. It wasn’t only because he found out that Rafael was ready to send for me.
That was just the catalyst to something he’s obviously been planning for so long—and I have no idea how he pulled this off.
Too bad I wish I could claim the same ignorance as towhy. Impossible when he already gave me that ultimatum.
I still can’t believe he did. Especially since, if I actually could make the choice, it would be so easy.
