Page 60 of Fated to the Feral Wolf

“Oh,fuckno. Did you really just say that to me? What are you, my father?” I yanked my hand out of his grip and began to pace. “You had better explain yourself right now. Because what I’m hearing is some misguided patriarchal shit, which boils down to you rejecting our mate bond, and I am seriously going to lose it if after everything we’ve been through, you’re going to reject our mate bondfor my own good.”

“I amnotrejecting our bond. I just don’t know what else to do.” The sorrow in his tone stopped me midstride, and I turned to face him. To study him, really. What had changed?

“You’d better start from the beginning,” I hissed through clenched teeth. I was still hot under the collar—no, scratch that. Mywolfwas pissed off. She was strong, and she didn’t take kindly to him backing out of the bond. He was ours, damn it.

As soon as I realized it was her riding me so hard, it got a little easier to separate her fury from my own emotions. Confusion, mostly, but there was fear too.

“I’ve been thinking about the vision.”

“The Fetya’s vision?” Okay, that was not at all what I was expecting.

“Yes, that one. They showed me you dying, but you’re still alive. Your fae background meant that you couldn’t die, not really. And as beyond fucking grateful as I am, I’m scared that they might feel cheated that they didn’t get their price.”

I ran my hand over the back of my neck, confused but trying to process what he was saying. “I thought me dyingwasthe price.”

“So did I, but you came back. What if they demand something else in exchange for your life?”

“Like what?” I asked, disbelief and the first trickle of fear starting to win over the fury as my wolf settled. Dirge wasn’t abandoning us; he was concerned for us. We could work through this, right? “Do you think they’ll take your life if I’m immortal?”

He shook his head. “They had the chance to take me, and they didn’t. But Brielle has fertility powers now. What if… what if you get pregnant, and they take our child?”

Shock didn’t feel how I thought it would. I’d experienced it a time or two, like when that assassin had stabbed me. That had felt cold, as if I’d been dunked in a bucket of ice water.

This shock felt numb, as if all the blood had drained out of me between one heartbeat and the next. My fingertips started to tingle, and I forced myself to breathe again. But then my brain caught up, and objections to what he said were popping up left and right like those annoying New Year’s poppers.

“You can’t know that. It’s not set in stone that they would take another life. Your vision only saw me dying, and I did. We have no reason to believe they’d take my immortality out on our unborn children.”

“No, it’s not. But it’s a possibility. And I promise you, I couldn’t live with myself. I couldn’t bear it if I caused you that pain.” His shoulders slumped under the awful weight of it, andmy heart broke at the sight of him. The fury was gone as quickly as it had sprung up, leaving nothing but determination in its wake. He didn’t get to make this choice for me.

I could make my own choices, and I was choosing him.

“No,no. Stop it.” I closed the distance with a speed I didn’t know I possessed, wrapping him in my arms. “This is not your fault. Surely you know that?”

“It is a hundred percent my fault. How could you love me if I cost us our children, our future?” His words were a hoarse whisper, but I felt them like a dagger to my soul. He meant every word, and the pain in that question almost drove me to my knees.

“I could love you because you’re my other half, Dirge. My soul mate. The one the Goddess made for me. Because you’re brave and strong and loving. Because in your arms, I feel safety that I’veneverfelt anywhere else. That’s how.”

“But what if?—”

“No.” I put maybe a little too much force behind the word. “No, we’re not going to even consider that possibility.”

“Muzica mea, we have to.” Even as he said it, he gripped me tighter, like he was scared I was going to run away any second.

“No, we don’t. We can’t live our lives in fear like that, okay? We just… no. If these Fetya are so all-powerful, all-knowing, wouldn’t they haveknownI was half-fae? That the assassin would stab me and my other side would kick in?”

“I-I hadn’t considered that.” He frowned down at me, brows drawn tight and low.

“Well, do. Because I’m not willing to live apart from my mate for a maybe.”

He studied me carefully, fingertips tracing the line of my jaw before trailing down to my throat. He gripped the back of my neck, pulling me closer.

One second, we were balanced on the knife’s edge of deep emotional pain; the next, his lips were on mine, devouring,wiping away everything but him in this moment. I opened up for him, and he backed me toward the bed as our tongues tangled. His hands were everywhere, one branded on my hip, the other anchoring me at the back of my neck, then roving to the hem of my sleep shirt.

His scent was heavy in my nose, spurring on my lust as I could smell the arousal spike his cedarwood with a layer of musk. My wolf growled her approval at what she sensed, loving that we’d brought our mate back around.

He pressed me back into the soft duvet with a look in his eyes I’d never seen before, passion and primal need, all rolled into one.

“Take this off,” he demanded, tugging at my shirt as he sank to his knees, already peeling off the thin pajama shorts I’d slipped on while I waited for him.

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