If I don’t bite her, Cristofer could grab her and bite her, and I would lose her.
8
KAT
It’s the middle of the night, and I can’t sleep.
I stretch out on the bed, my arms wide. It’s a big bed.
Aren is over six feet tall, he has shoulders like doors, and…
Stop it, Kat.
Everything about him is big, including his presence.
And even though I’ve spent most of today and probably the last couple of days in this bed, it still smells of Aren. The Wolf King of Burning Wood.
My mate.
A man I hate, but a part of me needs.
I toss and turn for the better part of an hour before I finally get up and cross over to stand at the floor-to-ceiling windows. Below me is the creek, and beside the creek, something stirs.
I bite my lip as I stare. Then I walk out of the room and downstairs.
I don’t bother with shoes. I’m in a pair of baggy shorts, a T-shirt, and my hair has half-fallen out of my messy braid with all my tossing and turning.
Dragging my fingers through my hair, I tease it into some semblance of order so I won’t look like I’ve been dragged through a hedge backward.
The house is quiet.
A couple of lights are on in the bunkhouse. The small guest cabin that my family is staying in is dark and silent. Only Aren sleeps in the main house, a beautifully rustic, log-style two-story home.
It’s dark, but with wolf sight, it’s easy enough to spot Aren sitting on a flat stone beside the creek. He has a folded blanket next to him.
“I thought you were joking,” I say, sitting beside him.
“About?” Aren skims a stone across the water's surface.
“Sleeping beside the creek.”
It takes more courage than I thought I had to pretend everything is fine and that my heart isn’t racing. But I’m studying the dark forest opposite, telling myself I’m just imagining I see a glint of metal.
It’s in your head, Kat. Nothing is there. Just your paranoia going into overdrive.
The last time I sat beside the creek, Cristofer shot me in the belly with a crossbow bolt, and the pain was agonizing. I will never forget that pain as long as I live.
Aren brushes his palms on his pants and faces me. His eyes sharpen. “Are you inviting me up to your bed?”
I focus on the water and order myself to stop staring into the forest opposite. Nothing is there. If someone were, Aren would not be sitting calmly by my side. His instincts are a thousand times sharper than mine. He’d have shifted in under a second and be across the creek ripping something to pieces. He seems the type.
“Not exactly.”
I’m not even surprised when the soft weight of a blanket settles on my shoulder. “I’m not cold.”
It’s not the first time Aren has done that, and something tells me this is going to be a pattern of behavior if I choose to stay here with him. He keeps trying to take care of me, and it’s getting harder to convince myself I don’t like it.
“You will be later. What’s wrong?”
