Page 209 of The Alpha's Pen Pal

Her conflicted emotions flooded me through the mate bond, and I wrapped myself around her more, pulling her naked body as close to mine as I could, protecting her from the rising sun and the cool early morning air. My hand reached for a fur blanket and pulled it over us to hide our nakedness, even though we were now alone in the temple.

My hand rubbed the back of her head in long, soothing strokes down through the ends of her curls. I could feel every bittersweet emotion from her, embedding into me like shards of a broken mirror, reminding me this was a pain I could not fix.

This was a pain she would carry our whole lives together. The pain of knowing her mother loved her and watched her for her whole life, but still gave her up, still left her alone for so many years—for her whole life. And the pain of knowing it was just as hard for her mom to watch her grow up but never be there for her as it was for Haven to grow up without a family, feeling alone and abandoned and unwanted.

“It’s okay, Sugar Plum,” I whispered, my lips against her forehead. “Let it all out,” I told her.

She clutched at me, her body trying to get closer, even though she was already as close as she could be. It was as if she was trying to get under my skin, to fuse herself to me.

“She loved me,” she whimpered, her voice muffled by my chest.

“She did,” I affirmed.

“All that time. All those years when I thought nobody was there, thought that nobody cared, she was watching me, and I never knew.” I nodded at her words, my hands moving to her back and rubbing circles into her soft, warm skin, letting the mate bond do its job to comfort and protect.

“Does it make me a bad person that even though I understand why, I’m still angry at her for leaving me on my own?” she asked, peering up at me with bloodshot eyes.

“I think it makes you human,” I reassured her. “I think it’s perfectly normal to be conflicted. To empathize and understand but still be hurt.” She blew out a shaky, relieved breath and pressed her face back into my chest, inhaling my scent. “But you won’t ever need to feel alone again, Haven. I promise you. I am all in. I am yours until the end, whenever that may be. And I will mark you during the next new moon. Everyone will know that you’re mine and that you always will be. Everyone will know how much I love you.”

She nodded, her face scrunching up and her lip quivering as a fresh wave of tears hit her.

“Don’t hold it in Haven,” I whispered. “It’s just me. You don’t have to hide it from me.”

Her keening sobs echoed off the marble floors and pillars and into the sky. I kept a firm hold on her, creating our own safe cocoon on the floor of the temple, our own space where she could mourn the life she never had. Water filled my eyes as well as I took some of her burden from her through the mate bond, so she didn’t have to bear or face it alone. Never alone. Never again.

I let her cry. I let her expel everything built up within her over her twenty-one years of life. She needed the catharsis. I knew she loathed crying in front of others, but I wasn’t just anyone. I was her Wesley. Her pal. Her mate.

As her cries quieted and her tears slowed, another sound filled my ears and jolted me to attention, putting my lycan on alert—the sounds of racing footsteps and shouting.

I tucked the fur tighter around my Sugar Plum, pulling her to sit up with me as my eyes zipped over to the entrance of the temple, where Nolan sprinted down the path, several oracles and acolytes following him, yelling at him.

“This is sacred ground!” Cassandra exclaimed as he stopped in the entrance. She was the only one to keep up with his pace. “We have not given you permission to be in the temple! You could—”

“I’m sorry, but this is important and urgent,” he said to her, his chest heaving as he caught his breath. “Wesley. Haven,” he said, his face apologetic as he looked at us and took in our swollen, puffy, and tear-stained faces.

I growled at him when his eyes stayed on Haven longer than my lycan thought necessary, even though I knew it was from brotherly concern instead of any other reason.

“What?!” I snarled, pulling the blanket even higher around Haven’s bare shoulders.

“I just got a call from Sebastian,” he said, his eyes snapping back to mine. “They found the Wainwrights.”

Forthethirdtimethat week, I found myself in the cells, staring at someone through the one-way glass of the interrogation room. Two someones, this time.

It had taken us less than twenty-four hours to arrange our travel and return home to California. Even though our trip wasn’t for leisure, I had hoped to spend one more night there. The sand and the bright blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea called to me. I wanted to take Haven down to the beach, to relax on the shore with her in my arms, watch the sunset, and dip our toes into the water so I could show her not all oceans were as cold as the Pacific.

But a romantic getaway such as that would have to wait.

“Tell me again how you found them?” I frowned, turning to look at Sarina and her friend—Riven, I think it was—where they stood with Sebastian, Levi, and Reid.

Haven was at my side, holding my hand, and Nolan stood at her other side. She had been understandably quiet and withdrawn since we left the temple, although thankfully, she hadn’t wanted to leave my side. She’d been touching me in some way the entire journey home, using the mate bond to soothe herself and me.

“I told you, we saw them trying to sneak across your borders. It was clear from how they talked and the way they moved that they weren’t from your pack. It was obvious they were plotting something,” she said, telling me word for word what she’d told me when I asked her the first time and what Seb had told me on the phone when I’d called him back while we were still in Greece.

I glowered at her, pushing my aura out. I couldn’t command her since she wasn’t part of my pack, but I could make her and her friend feel uncomfortable under my aura, and maybe that would be enough to get her to admit if she was lying. She was a smaller she-wolf, and in the week or so since we’d found her and her group of nomads, I had yet to see her shift.

“It seems oddly convenient that you just happened across them,” I snarled.

Everyone in the room flinched under my aura except Haven and Seb. Haven, because she was my mate, and my aura and alpha command would never work on her, and Seb, because we were of equal rank since I hadn’t taken over the pack yet.

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