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“Yeah,” Mosa agreed, throwing a nervous glance at her mate.
As far as I knew, Doone’s secret was still safe, but we couldn’t be sure how long Taron would keep the secret from his mate or from the club’s president. The big bear seemed like a good, honest man who understood how much danger Doone would be in once exposed. But, if Taron thought Doone could become a threat to those he loved or was honor bound to protect, the truth would come out.
“We’re in a good position,” Mallory said, giving my flesh a gentle squeeze. “Right now, we need to rest and recharge so we’re ready to fight.”
I nodded as Mosa rose up and hugged me before she sheepishly turned toward Mallory. For a split second, he pretended he didn’t understand. Then a familiar, wolfish grin erupted across his face and he pulled her into his arms. When he let go, he gave Doone a stern warning.
“Keep her safe.”
“With my life,” Doone agreed.
And then, just like that, they were gone and I was alone, truly alone this time, with the mate I had betrayed a quarter century ago. Not knowing what to say or do, I rose and began tidying the place. Not that there was much to tidy. From the scents laid down before Mosa’s arrival in Night Falls and my rescue, I could tell Doone had earned his keep with more than just repairs. His scent was on the new broom and dustpan and the natural cleaning remedies he had concocted.
Still, I made a show of being busy fluffing and dusting while my nose scented for any trace of another woman beyond our daughter and the mated ones I had already met.
“You’re not going to find it,” Mallory gently growled from where he had absconded to his recliner.
Frowning at him, I returned to sitting at the table.
"Find what?"
"Some amorphoussheyou think I've been fucking," he snorted.
I shook my head. I wasn't sure whether I was trying to lie with a gesture that suggested I hadn't been scenting for a female, or that I damn well didn't believe he'd been celibate for so long that no odor of his trysts remained.
Of course, he could have conducted any such rendezvous away from his home.
"So, you want me to believe you were living alone before this?" I challenged.
“Well, that lunk head was here for a few weeks while I sponsored him.”
Heat flamed across my cheeks. Mallory knew what I was asking, but the stubborn alpha in him was going to make me ask directly.
“So where were you sinking your balls?”
He smirked and I wanted to bite that damn bottom lip of his.
"Can't say I'm familiar with that term, Hummingbird."
My chest hollowed out at the old nickname.
"Never mind," I said, returning the cleaning cloth to where I had found it. Shutting the cupboard, I didn't know where to move next. The small cabin really didn't look like it accommodated guests. Not just that it didn't accommodate guests, but actively discouraged anyone who came by from staying. There was the recliner in the living room, along with a television and a DVD player, both of those sitting on three two-by-fours covering the top of a fifty-gallon drum barrel with no lid. The kitchen table only had two chairs, one that looked like it came with the table and the other one of those metal folding kind I had seen scattered around in the cavern during what they called church.
If I didn't already know how restless he was as a sleeper, I'd expect a monk's cot in the bedroom.
"Didn't you used to call me a glacier?" he asked, as if the answer would explain anything, let alone everything.
He damn well knew his nickname had nothing to do with passions running cold. He had been an inferno in bed—when we had a bed. More often, our trysts were in the woods or a barn. Once it had been a human’s greenhouse filled with fragrant blooms.
"Iceberg," I corrected, trying hard not to think about what had been a little less than six months of a burning passion that still had the power to singe my heart. "And that was because you were a loose cannon plowing into things before thinking."
"Plowing?" he started, that damn smirk resurfacing then quickly fading as my gaze blurred with the threat of tears.
Leaving his recliner, he slowly approached me. I kept backing up until my bottom pushed against the refrigerator. Reaching out, he took my right hand in both of his.
"Hello, Justine," he said in a voice that suddenly sounded as youthful as the day I first met him. "My name is Mallory, and you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.”
With that, he leaned in and brushed his lips across mine.
