“Because I called my friend in East Texas and lied for you. Because I’ve been defending you to every wolf in this compound who’s had doubts, and now I find out the doubts were right, and the defense was wrong, and the man I was defending never once told me the truth.” She sets the staple and turns to face me. “But just now you said you were afraid. The Garrett Forrester I’ve been following for five years would never have said that word. So either you’re falling apart, or you’re turning into someone who can say it. And I want to see which one.”
She walks back toward the compound.
I stand at the fence until she’s back inside the gate. The meeting hall, the main house, the barn, the yard — everything I’ve run for ten years, sitting in the late afternoon light, looking exactly the way it always has.
My wolf chose a magic-blooded female. Chose her the way he chooses everything — without asking me first, without weighing the cost. The same kind of magic that killed Maren on that ridge is in the blood of the woman he’s been pulling me toward sincethe clearing. I’ve had six days to talk him out of it. I stopped trying yesterday.
Jessie just told me she wants to see who I’m becoming.
So do I.
I walk back to the main house. Pack a bag. Ma is in the kitchen, and she looks at the bag, looks at my face, and puts a sandwich in a paper bag without asking where I’m going. I tell her I’ll be back in a few days. She nods. She’s been reading me since I was a boy.
I drive north before dark. The country station plays. This time I leave it on.
The burn in my gut settles into something steadier as the miles pile up. Not gone. Closer. My wolf stops fighting me for the wheel and rides alongside instead, his attention fixed on the road ahead.
Somewhere past the state line, the heat sharpens. Her body escalating, mine answering. We’re closing the distance on both counts, and my wolf has been patient long enough.
He doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t have to.
Chapter 12
[Content note: this chapter and the following one contain depictions of medical trauma involving children.]
Briar
The heat hits me on the ward line. I’m checking the markers on the compound outskirts — my standard morning circuit — and somewhere between the third marker and the fourth, something that’s been building since before dawn tips past the edge, and my legs go.
Not pain. Fire. A wall of it, rolling up from below my navel, soaking me in sweat that has nothing to do with the work. Myskin flushes. My knees soften. Between my thighs, a sudden clenching want — specific, pointed, so pure that my legs fold and I’m down on one knee in the dirt before I can stop it.
I stay there for a moment with my hand on the marker stone and my body demanding a man three hundred miles away, and every cell I have is in on it.
“Fuck,” I grit out. I know this sensation. But never quite like this.
Sienna appears. She’s been watching from the fence line because Sienna watches everything. She’s beside me fast, her hand on my shoulder. The contact makes me want to snarl.
“Briar?” Concern colors her voice. “You okay?”
“Cramp.”
“I can call Sable.”
“Don’t. Give me a second.” I try to stand and end up doubled over.
“Easy,” she says, crouching beside me. “You’re burning up. And your scent is—”
She stops.
Sniffs again.
“Oh.”
“Don’t.” I wish she’d just leave me alone.
“Briar, how long since your last—?”
“I said don’t.”