I swallow past the lump in my throat. It’s fine. Better than fine, it’s exactly what I wanted. Koen, staying with the Northwest. The right thing to do. “Good,” I echo. I need to change the topic, before I beg him to do something he really shouldn’t. “Were the huddle leaders fuckwaffles about . . . stuff?”
“No more than usual. They said that I’m emotionally compromised over you. Which is true.” His thumb traces my lower lip. “Has been true for a while, really.”
“Maybe. So you have- so you have feelings. Big deal.” I might be indignant on his behalf, which is ridiculous. Koen doesn’t need me to protect him or advocate for him, and yet here I am.
“It changes nothing. Every single decision you have ever made has taken into consideration the good of the pack.”
“Yeah. They would agree with that.”
“Good. Because it’s bullshit. You can- you can be in love with someone and still be a fantastic Alpha. The thing is, I love you, and mate or not, I wouldn’t love you half as much if you weren’t the kind of person who deserves it. And one of the reasons you deserve it is that you care.” My stupid eyes are leaking. And Koen . . .
Koen is failing, abysmally, to bite back a smile. “Everybody agrees with you, killer. Including the Assembly.”
“Good. They fucking better.”
“That’s why they rescinded the covenant.”
I don’t get it. Not at first. “What?”
“They know what happened. They know how you stood up to me. They know that I let you be our bait. They know that you saved my life. They said exactly what you said.” His hand runs through my hair. His eyes follow its path. “That your presence doesn’t influence my ability to do my job. But I think they’re wrong.”
“Wrong?”
He nods. “I think it does affect me. I think you make me a better leader.” His smile widens. “You make my world better, for sure. And mate or not, I wouldn’t love you half as much if you weren’t the kind of person who deserves it.”
My own words, thrown back at me, and it’s like my entire life reorients. The breeze, the trees, the grass, the moss, the seals, the waves- they stop, immobile, for a fraction of a moment. Then they resume blowing, rustling, swishing, whispering, splashing, lapping, but in a slightly, enormously different way.
“Does it mean that . . . ?”
He nods.
“We can . . . ?”
“If you want to.”
“If I- ” My laugh is thick. Watery. “If
I want to? Do you want to?”
He laughs, too. “Let me think about it.”
I lean forward and bite him on the jaw, hard. I feel his smile grow between my teeth. “So we can just . . . stay here? In this cabin? And I’ll find some job? And you’ll do your Alpha stuff? And we’ll . . . we’ll go for runs together? And be boring?”
“That sounds like a dream, actually.”
“And I’ll cook? And we’ll see Misery and Lowe? And you’ll build me more chairs and let me decorate the cabin?”
“Whatever you want, sweetheart.”
“And we’ll have Twinkles as our wolf dog who sometimes sleeps on our bed?”
“Is that why I nearly walked into a water bowl earlier?”
I nod. Burrow into him.
He sighs. Tightens his hold on me. “Such a fucking nuisance.”
I wonder why it took me until this very moment to realize that it’s been his way of saying
I love you all along.
EPILOGUE
HE MANAGES TO HOLD IT TOGETHER FOR A LITTLE OVER SIX weeks.
As feats go, this one is so Herculean, so strenuous, so immensely exacting, Koen is certain that it’ll make up for every single shitty thing he’s done during his wretched, questionable life. He is able to control his instincts and deny himself the one thing he wants with an all-consuming, ferocious, overwhelming passion. That, if nothing else, will guarantee him a place in his particular brand of Were heaven.
Which, he’s come to realize, requires only one single thing: Serena.
“ARE YOU BORED YET?” SHE ASKS HIM A MONTH OR SO AFTER MOVING in for good. It’s an absurd question. And yet, in a rational, detached sort of way, Koen understands what she’s getting at.
They had a rocky start. The near murders and the kidnappings and that other bullshit. The medical scares. The fact that he had to push her away over and over, even as keeping his distance tore him apart. Bottom line, their first few months were very eventful. Compared to all that, the last few weeks have been strikingly low stakes.
They wake up in the morning. He leaves for his job. She does hers- remote, for Karolina, something about money or stocks that reminds Koen every day how much smarter than him she is and fills him with glowing, besotted pride. He returns home. The end.
Taken at face value, it does seem boring. But there’s so much hidden in the crevices of their daily rhythm, Koen can’t imagine ever finding his time spent with her anything less than thrilling. Not that he’d be caught dead admitting it to anyone, but he’s just fucking . . . enamored, that’s the word. The way she needs to be coaxed out of bed with tea and kisses in the morning. Her unabashed joy at discovering every corner of their territory. The fact that every mundane little action feels new and shimmery and magic when she’s around.
And yeah, it’s ordinary stuff. Boring, he supposes. She sits in his shop doing her crosswords while he builds her more goddamned chairs. She makes him buy her a TV and forces him to watch stupid Human movies she grew up with, and it’s just not plausible, that the twins came back from camp having switched places and the parents did not immediately figure it out from their scents. She chatters and mumbles to herself and tells him things, all sorts of things, funny and serious, big and small, and the more she talks, the more he wants to do nothing but listen to her. She asks him to play the piano for her, so he finds some Bach sheet music. She wants to go on runs, and that’s when he takes her to his favorite places, deep in the belly of the forest. She cooks, and that’s- he’s so fucking lucky. Especially because when she doesn’t feel like it, when he hunts small game for her and drops it by her feet, tail wagging and tongue lolling out expectantly, she also acts happy and satisfied and pleased with him. Alpha instinct doesn’t normally concern itself with external approval, but Serena . . . she feels like another part of him.
His heart, in another body.
“Are you bored?” he asks her, instead of replying. They’re on the porch, and she’s brushing the wolf dog with some de- shedding tool she bought online. He now sports a collar, equipped with a heart-shaped charm that sparklingly proclaims:
Twinkles. Koen keeps expecting to see betrayal in the beast’s eyes, but he seems genuinely happy to have been domesticated and bedazzled.
Koen can relate.
“No,” Serena tells him. “No. I’m not. This is everything I’ve ever . . . It’s just, you’re an Alpha. Maybe you like adventure?”
To him, it feels like an adventure. This.
Them. Waking up every morning wondering if he’ll survive the intensity of his feelings for her. Seems unlikely, and yet. He always makes it to the night. “I’m good,” he simply says.
“Okay. As long as you don’t mind.” Another swipe of the brush. “The whole boring, married routine.” Her teeth bite fussily into her lower lip. She is so enchantingly beautiful, sometimes Koen loses track of time and space. Sometimes he finds himself wanting to snarl at other people for looking at her. He’s going to have to work on that. “As long as you don’t change your mind,” she adds.
Koen doesn’t immediately follow, too taken by the soft curve of her neck as she folds her hair behind the delicate shell of an ear. He considers asking
Change my mind on what? When it finally occurs to him what she’s talking about, he takes the brush from her hand and pulls her into his lap.
To kiss her in the least bored way he’s capable of.
HE HAS WANTED IT FROM THE MOMENT HE FIRST SAW HER IN Lowe’s living room, on her knees to receive Ana’s hug, her hair pinned up and her expression sad. That is to say: he has wanted it for a long time, but now he aches for it. He itches.
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