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“Between you and the vampire, I am happy you’re the one who walked away. That fucker was alive for hundreds of years, killing people without even thinking about it. You deserve a medal.”
She shook her head. “I don’t feel good about it.”
He gave her a sad smile. “And that’s why you’re a normal person. A sweet and kindhearted woman who wouldn’t want to hurt anyone. Not even whenherlife is on the line.” He kissed her forehead and held her closer.
It was a true testament to how freaked out Valentine was that she let him hold her. She hadn’t brought up the mate thing, but it hung over them. Another tension. Another issue they’d have to face eventually when things calmed down. He couldn’t push her to think about forever with him when her life was falling apart.
All he could do was be there for her and hope to fuck it was enough.
Nero hated that his mate was this sad and that she had to go through this.
Had he any sense, he would have posted a wolf at her door while Lilliane was in town. Then, all of this could have been avoided. She had barely come into his life, and already, he had let her down in a big way. He held her tightly and kissed her temple. “If anyone asks,” he whispered in her ear. “I’m the one who dusted the vamp. And it won’t even be a lie.”
To prove his point, he stood, placed Val on the couch, and grabbed a broom. When the vampire dust was out of the cabin, he rubbed his hands together. “Dusted,” he said. “All done. All forgotten.”
Now, he just had to convince Valentine of that.
TWENTY-FOUR
VALENTINE
Afew hours later, Valentine was still feeling more than a little shell-shocked at her actions that afternoon. Had she been surprised to find a vampire in her cabin? Yup. Had she been even more surprised to find her sister chatting on the couch with said vampire like it was nothing? Double yup.
Had she entered some kind of hellish other dimensions where her whole world was falling apart? Apparently.
Had Nero refused to leave the cabin? Had he swept away the evidence of her crime? Had he made an enormous batch of spaghetti sauce … from a bottle, but still.
Yup. Yup. And another, yup.
The mere fact she’d called Nero … of all people … to help her was … odd? Confusing? A bit comforting too. Val wouldn’t let herself think about the reasonswhyNero was the first person she thought of.
The wolf who claimed she was his mate.
Because he was a liar. Wasn’t he? Valentine didn’t understand why he had waited until the worst possible moment to tell her the truth if it even was the truth. How could she be sure he wasn’t using her somehow?
Shecouldask him, but he could lie some more. Her father had done it enough in her life, and now, the one person she would have thought would never lie to her was hiding things.
If her sister Lilliane could keep things from her, then there was no reason why Nero couldn’t be doing the same. Valentine was all out of trust, and she didn’t know what to do, what to think, what to believe.
It was a confusing place to be.
Especially when Nero refused to leave.
He stood in her kitchen, making dinner for her and Lilliane, who had refused to come out of her bedroom since Nikolas was killed. Lilliane had vanished in the woods, but before Atlas could find her, she had come back of her own volition and slammed the bedroom door behind her, coldly saying, “I do not wish to be disturbed.”
Val had tried on more than one occasion to go into the bedroom, but Lil didn’t want to talk to her. At all. Lilliane was glued to her phone, and Valentine had spotted her texting. She wasn’t, however, able to seewhoLil was texting. Lord? Whoever the fuck that was.
“Give her space,” Nero suggested as he pulled out one of the chairs at the dining table for her. He settled beside her and busied himself, twirling some of the pasta around his fork. “She needs some time to come down from the last month. A lot to process, I bet.”
“And the vampire murder,” Val added bitterly, stuffing a huge mouthful of warm and delicious pasta into her mouth. She didn’t mean to moan, but it was just the right amount of spicy and cheesy. It filled her belly with heat. No one had ever cooked for her. Not a man, anyway.
Ceecee plopping a half-burned grilled cheese on the table and telling her to be grateful wasn’t exactly the same thing as watching Nero chop vegetables and brown meat for a good hour. He had even forgone garlic because he knew it wasn’t a good ingredient for her half-vampire self.
Thathad messed with her head more than anything. Because Nero, the alpha sheriff, was taking care of her like he … well, like hecared.
“Let’s stop calling it vampire murder,” Nero said. “We need to call it what it is. It was self-defense and totally justifiable.”
“I think Lil would disagree. I even think she would testify against me in a court of law.”
