“I was coming to apologize to you the night Cristofer took you.”
“You’re lying,” I whisper.
“I fucked up believing you were a feral,” he says quietly. “And I kept on fucking up, over and fucking over again, thinking that I could get you to forgive me without having to admit I was wrong. I havenevermeant anything more. Believe me.”
I look down at him as more tears blur my vision. “I can’t. It’s too late. Let me go.”
The bleakness returns tenfold. “I will give you whatever you want, Kat. I’m begging for a chance to make things right.”
“I wantnothingfrom you, Aren,” I say, yanking my arm free.
He grasps my hips, holding me when I move to step around him. “This is what you wanted. I'm on my knees, begging for forgiveness because I fucked up.”
“I didn’t think you would,” I snap.
His expression shifts. Bleak becomes lost. “So you never intended to forgive me at all?”
In the distance, the sound of an approaching car’s engine grows louder.
“Aren? Kat’s family is here.” Finan’s voice comes from feet away.
“Kat?” Aren prompts not taking his eyes off me.
4
AREN
The creek used to be where I found peace.
I would ponder the pack’s problems and tease out a solution to them. Today, no amount of staring into the slow-running water is doing a damn thing to calm me.
Deep down, I know I’ve lost her.
“I left it too late, Fin.”
Kat’s parents practically knocked me down when I got up off my knees and went to open the bedroom door.
Never in a million years did I ever believe I’d get on my knees for anyone.
Then I met Kat.
If only I’d let go of my stupid belief that sex or flirting would make Kat forget how much I’d hurt her. Maybe then I wouldn’t have lost my mate.
Her face was pale, her chestnut hair loosely braided because that’s the best I could do to keep it out of her face as she slept. Barely awake and on her feet, she’d been unsteady, but her beautiful, striking blue eyes, flecked with hazel, stayed determined.
Fate has tied us together, but she doesn’t want me.
Finan saw me standing at the bottom of the staircase, lost, and suggested that fresh air and sitting by the creek might help.
It hasn’t helped.
Someone cleaned Kat’s blood from the spot where Cristofer shot her. The blood is gone, but faint traces of her pain linger.
“She’ll forgive you.” Finan bumps his shoulder against mine.
“Is that wishful thinking or hope speaking?” I angle my head to face my beta.
He’s the only reason I didn’t kill Jasper for something he hadn’t done, or spend all night and day running the length and breadth of northern Montana looking for Kat.
