“I need to talk to Zach.” She did. Desperately. She needed to hear all this from him. To hear that he would still try. That he might consider becoming a beast to be with her.
Then her heart quailed. How could she ask that of him? If the situation were reversed, could she make that kind of sacrifice?
Cara shook her head. “My advice? Don’t make this any worse for Zach than it already is.” She reached out to pat Jessie’s hands. “You have to trust Fate. She will show you the way.”
“I don’t know that I believe in fate.” Jessie thought her heart might be tearing in two. Give up on her and Zach? How had she not seen this coming?
She’d really thought the blood thing would work. She’d refused to see any other possibility. But it wasn’t working.
“There’s no other way?”
She read the answer in Cara’s eyes. To avoid a lifetime with a monster, Jessie had to mate a Sabre. Their rugged faces spun through her mind, but there was only one possible choice. And one possible Sabre.
Could she do this? Mate Kade to save herself? Even if it meant Zach and she might never be together?
This wasn’t just about her. “Kade—in the dream, he—does he want this? I thought you said it might not be possible for him to mate again?’
“I didn’t think it was,” Cara conceded. “But the energy between you is strong. I can feel it. It may not be as strong as his original bond. It is hard to say. But there is potential. Definitely.”
Potential. Could she see herself as Kade’s mate? She was attracted to him. He was sexy as hell. But a life mate? What if they ended up hating each other? They’d had so little time together.
Cara said there was a connection, but Jessie wanted to hear it from him. She didn’t want him to be obligated, just to save her.
She stood. “What about Laura?”
“She woke up when Zach attacked Braden. I had this discussion with her, then.”
“How did she take it?” Jessie asked.
Cara’s brows lowered. “I’m not sure. She was very quiet. Trevor has expressed an interest in helping her.” She sighed. “We need more time, but we don’t have it.”
Two days. Two days to decide their future. And if she and Kade were to mate, she had a day until that thirty-hour window opened.
“I’m sorry, Jessie. I’d hoped the blood would set you free.”
“Not your fault.” Jessie turned away. “As you say, Fate is playing fast and loose with our lives.”
“What they say is true,” the Watcher conceded. “Fate can indeed be a bitch. But she always comes through in the end.”
* * *
Jessie walked from the dining room and stopped at the bottom of the stairs.
Zach was up there. Everything in her wanted to run to him. To spill out her heart, and to tell him they were meant to be together. Her heart longed to finish what they’d started. But now, to do that, he’d have to take the tortuous journey to become a beast.
Asking someone to move halfway across the globe kind of paled in comparison. And few people ever did that, just to be together. Cara was right. It would be beyond cruel to show him what might never be. And pointless, too. Because even if she didn’t take Kade up on his offer, Zach wasn’t a possibility.
She would belong to Braden.
All her current choices involved teeth and claws. Zach wasn’t among them. Her heart hurting, Jessie turned away and went looking for Kade. He didn’t appear to be in the house. She passed through the busy kitchen.
“Made pancakes,” Kitani offered, pointing to the steaming stack on a plate.
“Thanks,” Jessie replied. “Maybe later.”
Kitani’s brows rose, but she shrugged as Jessie headed out the back door.
Kade was sitting on Cara’s bench, beneath the crabapple tree. A surprising place. The Weres usually avoided the horses because they had such a terrible effect on them.
