Page 42 of Winter Lost

A while ago, he’d dismissed it as one of those weird things magic sometimes did. He’d found it neither threat nor help, so he’d mostly ignored it. Until October.

Mercy wasn’t the only one the Soul Taker had affected. Since he’d fought that damned artifact, this bond had grown deeper in a worrying way. It was too easy to lose himself in the exploration of every roadway, every blade of grass, the ancient sheets of basalt that lurked beneath the earth. His territory.

“Is she okay, Adam?” Warren said, his voice calling Adam back to himself.

He blinked. If he’d been in wolf form, he’d have shaken the numbness off. In human-seeming, he just rubbed his face with both hands.

“Mercy?” Warren stood at the top of the stairs and looked worriedly at the door between them and Mercy.

“She’s okay,” Adam said. “Or at least she’ll be okay after some sleep. I was just recharging.”

As he followed Warren down the stairs to where his people were waiting, he realized that was true. He did feel better. Refreshed. And he hadn’t drawn that from the pack, had he. Had he?

—

Mercy crossed her ankles and rested her feet on the dash because she knew Adam hated that. He wasn’t worried about the car, but he’d seen photos of what happened to people in car accidents. He was a very good driver, but there was a “wintry mix” dripping down and he wasn’t the only person on the road.

Mercy wouldn’t walk away from a car accident the way he would.

One of the first things he’d noticed about Mercy was that she understood people. She really knew how to get under their skin. Under his skin.

Her feet on the dash told him that she was really annoyed with him. He wasn’t sure why. He dealt with it for a few miles, giving her a chance to tell him. Just outside of Eltopia, the car behind them fishtailed violently and pulled off onto the shoulder.

Mercy wiggled her feet.

“What did I do?” he asked in what he hoped was a reasonable voice.

She gave him a look that said his tone had been less inquiry and more demand. But she took pity on him because, when push came to shove, his Mercy was the more reasonable of the two of them.

“You need to be in New Mexico,” she said. “Darryl isn’t military, and neither is Auriele. He doesn’t know how to thread the needle between threat and cooperation that allows your company to work with the various military arms of the government.”

“Darryl will be fine,” Adam told her. “He’s smart.” Brilliant, in fact, which was why he had a bunch of letters behind his name and a big check for working with a think tank. “Auriele can charm the birds out of the sky.”

That last drew an incredulous look from Mercy that made him wave an acknowledging hand.

“Nothing you have seen her do,” he said, a little sadly.

Auriele had adjusted to Mercy as his mate. Mostly, she’d even quit blaming Mercy for hurting Adam’s first wife with her very existence. Christy was good at making her friends forget that Christy had left Adam a long time before Mercy had looked at him with anything besides exasperation. But Auriele didn’t go out of her way to be friendly with the woman she’d always see as Christy’s replacement.

“Can they handle the business in New Mexico as well as you would?” Mercy asked.

There was a problem with living with someone who could hear even the whitest of lies. He chose not to answer—which was an answer in itself.

“You left the pack with Warren and Sherwood,” she continued. “The first time they disagree, they will pull the pack apart.”

Ah. He knew what she was so angry about.

“If they do,” he said, his voice rough with some emotion he couldn’t quite label, except that it made his wolf stir under his skin. “If the pack can’t manage a few days without me to babysit, if Darryl and Auriele between them can’t run down the problems in New Mexico—that is on me. My choice.”

“Because of me,” she said, her face turned away from him. He didn’t need to see her expression to know he’d nailed it.

“Mercy,” he said, quelling the growl that wanted to exit his throat.

“I would have been fine on my own,” she said sharply. “Or you could have sent Warren or Sherwood with me. Or Warren and Sherwood. That would have helped Darryl run the pack without our three most powerful wolves killing each other in your absence. You could take care of New Mexico.”

The SUV slid a little, sending the traction lights into a quiet frenzy.

“Would you please take your feet off the dash?” Adam asked.

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