“I got you something.” I pull a small jewelry box from my pocket.
“Oh.” Madi’s eyes round as she splits a glance between the box and my face.
“I made a mistake denying what you meant to me. I went mad. I didn’t have a chance to…propose before I marked you for life.”
“Propose.” She sounds stunned. This isn’t quite the moony-eyed reaction I was hoping for.
“Claiming you was the shifter form of a proposal, but I should have given you this first.” I crack the box open.
Inside is a giant baguette cut rectangular emerald, surrounded by tiny diamonds that continue around the length of the slender band.
Madi stares at it but makes no move to take the box.
I pry it from the container and reach for her hand.
She pulls her fingers away. “Hang on. Brick, the reason you didn’t propose before is because we were nowhere near that level in our relationship. Just because you marked me doesn’t mean we just skip ahead to marriage.”
Damn. Clearly Madi doesn’t understand that I’m way past marriage. She’s mine. I’m hers. There’s no other option for us, except the miserable form of anti-mating my parents lived out, which I’m not willing to reenact.
But she’s human. She has no idea what the marking means. And if I look through her eyes, I can see that I jumped the gun with this ring. I’m anxious to seal the deal with Madi and floundering.
“Okay.” I put the ring back in the box and pocket it. “I’ll make you a deal.”
The corners of her lips tick up. My beautiful mate loves a challenge. “What deal?”
“You run from me. I’ll chase. If I catch you, you wear the ring. It doesn’t have to be an engagement ring. We’ll call it a late Christmas gift.”
Madi downs the rest of her wine. “Do you mean run and chase literally or figuratively?”
I arch a brow. “
Run, Madi.”
“Now?” She slides her chair back in the sand.
“I’ll give you three minutes’ head start. Then I’ll be on the hunt-and you’ll be my prey.”
Madi bolts from her chair and runs barefoot down the darkened beach, her flip flops left in the sand under the table.
I close my eyes, savoring the vibration of my wolf readying for the hunt. Knowing that I will catch my mate, that I will master her, and that she will love every minute of it heightens the experience. I remain perfectly still, listening to the waves crash against the shore, drowning out the fading sound of Madi’s foot falls.
I wait until she’s had ample time to put distance between us. Perhaps to hide.
Tension builds beneath my skin. I’m sure my eyes begin to glow amber as my night vision engages to seek her. I kick off my shoes beneath the table.
Without looking at my watch, my body calibrates to three minutes, and the moment the last second ticks by, I surge into motion. I sprint in the direction Madi ran for several hundred yards and then stop, turning in a slow circle.
My clever mate wouldn’t run in a straight line. She’d double back to fool me.
I lift my nose to the air. The salt spray fills my nostrils, but I catch her scent. I turn in another slow circle.
There.
I catch her scent more fully. I take off again, slowing when I lose the scent. I find it again near the rocks. I turn and climb the jagged stones to the top of a small cliff. There, I find Madi’s scent grows stronger.
When I draw closer to it, she darts out of the crevice where she is hiding and jumps to the sand below. I vault after her, catching her around the waist and hauling her into the air.
She laughs.
I spin her in a circle, drop her to her feet, and let her run a few more feet before I catch her again. This time I tumble us both to the ground, making sure my body breaks the fall for hers. I roll her to her back in the sand and straddle her waist.
“Now, I’ve got you.” There’s a deep purr to my voice.
She blinks up at me, a smile on her face. “What now, Big Bad?”
“Now you wear my ring.” I pull the box back out of my pocket and pry the ring out. “Give me your finger.”
She offers up her right hand.
“Wrong hand.”
“You said it wasn’t an engagement ring.”
“It isn’t.” I pick up her left hand and slide the ring on her fourth finger. “But I still need to see a ring on this pretty finger. I can’t have some other human thinking you’re available.”
“What if they did?”
“I will destroy any man who makes a move on you,” I growl.
“Hmm.” Madi pulls my face down to hers, moving her lips across mine. “I kind of like the jealousy.”
“Get used to it.” I yank her shirt up and slide my hand inside her bra. “I’m possessive as fuck.”
“You caught me. Now what are you going to do with me?” She shivers a little, so I scoop her back up into my arms.
“Now I’m going to fuck you senseless. But after I strip you and warm you up in the hot tub.”
She loops her arms around my neck. “That sounds amazing,” she murmurs against my ear.
Madi
The island is incredible. Brick and I spend the next day exploring the natural beauty-hiking to the highest points to take in the incredible views in the morning then taking sea kayaks out through the natural stone arches in the afternoon. I saw a pod of dolphins. Brick made love to me out on the golden beach, bringing me to orgasm after orgasm until I scarcely remembered my name.
Tonight, he took me in a boat to a restaurant on Corfu.
It’s all been so magical, but we haven’t addressed anything real.
Not my job. Nor his pack. We haven’t discussed what life will look like for the two of us when we leave this beautiful island and go back to reality. The problem-solver in me can’t stand the avoidance of said reality.
And yet I’m reluctant to ruin the fantasy. I’ve never been so pampered, so doted on. I’ve never felt this kind of luxury and believed I deserved it or that it was for me.
And I still don’t. But something in me is willing to pretend for the moment.
Maybe I just need a break from all the drama and trauma of the last few weeks.
When we get back to the island, though, I sense things change. Brick goes back into Big Bad Boss mode as we walk back to our building. His expression becomes a stern mask. His demeanor grows more powerful, more distant.
He’s holding my hand but isn’t present.
“What is it?” I ask.
“I have to go away for a couple of days.”
A bucket of ice water dumps over my head. “What? Where? Why?”
Brick hesitates, and I pull my hand out of his and stop walking.
“Brick?”
“I’m going to Sweden for the Winter Pack Games.”
My stomach knots up. “When did you plan on telling me?”
Brick winces. “Now. I planned on telling you now.”
“So what? I go back to New York alone?”
“You’ll stay here for a few days until I get back. I was thinking-your mom and Brayden are still on their winter breaks, right? I could send the jet to get them.”
My eyes and nose get hot. As much as I would love to share all this luxury with my hard-working family, there’s nothing about this scenario that doesn’t stink.
“What are these games? Why do you have to go?”
Brick grows even more stiff. “They are mating games. A chance for single wolves to show off their prowess and catch the scents of available she-wolves.”
My stomach draws up so tight, I feel like puking. “
Mating games?”
“I’m obviously not going for that purpose.”
“For what purpose are you going?” I blink hard to keep back the angry tears.
“To show my pack their leader is still strong and capable. That I’m not moon mad.”
“By entering these games?”
He nods.
My voice gets deathly quiet. “As a single wolf or as a mated wolf?”
His silence is the worst possible answer. “I will never look at or touch another female, Madi.
You are my mate. But everything is breaking and blowing up right now, and I’m not sure my leadership could withstand revealing I’ve mated a human just yet.”
Betrayal rips through me. Shreds my insides with a million tiny forks.
But I refuse to listen to my emotions. Logic is my only friend here. I do actually believe Brick when he says he won’t look at or touch another female, and if I take away the searing pain of inadequacy and rejection, there’s a problem at the heart of this that needs to be solved.
“When are you leaving?” I’m proud of how even I keep my voice.
“Now.”
I nod jerkily. “Go then.”
Brick reaches for me, but I pull away. “I love you, Madi.”
I blink hard. “Go.”
“I’ll be back as soon as I can. Send the jet for your family or Aubrey-whoever you like-but don’t leave the island. I need to know you’re safe while I’m gone.”
I walk away without answering. If I spoke now, it wouldn’t be well-thought out. My emotions would be leading. I don’t have the spaciousness to unpack my own insecurities about this relationship.
I need to dig into this pack leadership situation and get all the facts. Arrange and rearrange them in my mind until they make sense, and I find a solution.
It’s either that… or walk away.
Permanently.
Aster
I never like being near Catherine Adalwulf. I mean, I don’t dislike her, but the female she-wolf is soaked in pain. Being in the same room with her physically hurts me.
Now, as she enters Oma’s room to pay her respects, there’s something chaotic about her energy. If I had to express it as an image, it would be like trapped butterflies scrambling to get out. Beating themselves against a glass cage.
Now that I see it, I realize she’s always had those trapped butterflies in there, but before they were barely alive. Hardly moving. Drugged.
I squint my eyes, trying to see beyond the veil. I must learn to interpret these sensations. I won’t have Oma to guide me much longer. She’s nearing her last breath. I saw that in a dream last night. She’ll be dead before month’s end.
Catherine comes in and sits beside Oma, picking up her gnarled hand.
Oma can’t speak anymore. She hasn’t spoken out loud for three days. She only speaks into my head now.
“She says,
You served your pack,” I interpret.
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