Page 50 of An Uncertain Claim

He pinched the bridge of his nose and muttered something I couldn’t make out. When he removed his hand and his eyes opened, he frowned at me. “You are not going to bait me into forgetting about this conversation.”

I held up my hands in an “oh well” gesture and sassed, “Can’t blame a girl for trying.”

“Look.” Nathan dropped onto a chair next to the end of my desk and crossed his arms over his chest. “Along with the other symptoms we’ve experienced, when couples are in the second stage of mating—”

“Symptoms?” I interrupted in a dry tone. “You make it sound like mating is a sickness, but as I recall, you were the one who pushed us off that particular cliff.”

Nathan rolled his eyes. “Poor choice of words. Anyway, along with the attraction and emotional connection, there’s a need to be close. Some of that probably stems from wanting to fuck you every second of every day, but it’s more than that. From what I’m told, it’s not quite as bad when the bond is complete, but we’ll always have a hard time being away from each other for too long.”

So he’d just forced me to do the one thing I’d told him I never wanted to do—be permanently tethered to a person or a place. I had ties to some, like NYC and Sam and Linette, but if he was right, I wouldn’t be able to leave Silver Lake without Nathan or risk becoming depressed and desolate until I was near my mate again.

Rather than freak out about it, I decided to take things one step at a time. The emotional reactions I’d been having ever since I met Nathan obviously hadn’t done me any good. First, I admitted my part in accepting his mark, but I was still pissed that he’d done it. Especially with this new information. “What you are telling me is—wait.” I paused when something occurred to me. “I’ve been away from you for a couple of hours and I’m not ready to kill you—for that, at least. And I’m not depressed or obsessed over being without you.” My panther had been a little more morose this morning, though.

“For one thing, you didn’t wake up to a missing mate who has a deranged killer after her and had already been taken once.”

I inclined my head. “Fair point,” I conceded. “I’m sorry. But I did leave a note.”

“That’s how I knew where to find you, but letting me know where you are wasn’t what I said, was it? Since you have perfect recall, I know you didn’t miss it.”

My brow knitted. “A baby, a mating bond, a marriage, a psycho serial killer—not those oranythingelse will ever anoint you as my keeper, Nathan.”

“I don’t want to be—” I raised an eyebrow and he grunted. “Fine, I wish Icouldbe your keeper and that you’d do what you’re told and stay where you’re put—”

“You’re a complete Neanderthal, you know that?”

“Be that as it may, I might want those things, but I’m not stupid enough to try to contain you. Nor would I want to.” He uncrossed his arms and placed one hand on the desk, leaning toward me. “I don’t want to blow out your fire, Peyton. I simply want to make sure that you don’t burn the world down trying to prove that you don’t need anyone. You said you’d let me protect you, so stop fighting me and let medo it.”

I wasn’t sure I had the power to turn the world into the Golden Hills of San Francisco—or the more accurate description, dead grass—but he was right, I’d promised and what he was asking wasn’t totally unreasonable. Besides, it was temporary, right? And the truth was, while I hadn’t fallen into an angry pit of despair, I’d missed Nathan since the moment I left his bed. I nodded. “Okay. I’m not saying I won’t go anywhere without you, but I promise to discuss it with you. Unless you are unavailable, and I feel it’s an emergency.”

He narrowed his eyes and I thought we might end up arguing over an “emergency,” but when he spoke, he just said, “Thank you.”

It hadn’t seemed like a pattern before, but as I thought back, I realized that lately, Nathan always thanked me for making a concession or agreeing to something he’d asked of me. Instead of being arrogant that he’d won or acting like it was a given that I would follow his commands, he acknowledged and expressed gratitude for my concession. I wasn’t totally sure what to make of the change, especially from someone so old and set in his ways. Was it me? Was he attempting to alter his behavior for me? That was yet another question to ponder, especially because it had me wondering if I could change for him. My panther yearned to be with Nathan and his wolf more and more, making me consider that perhaps she had already started to adapt to this new life. Could someone alter the very core of their nature? And if I did… would I lose myself?

“Speaking of mating stages,” Nathan said as he sat back in his chair.

“This isn’t really the place to talk about that stuff,” I said, cutting him off. “Can it wait until we go home?”

Nathan ran a hand over his beard as he studied me. I started putting together other excuses to put off this conversation, but I got lucky because he just nodded and agreed. Then he stood, walked over to me, and bent over. Cupping my face in his hands, he kissed the hell out of me and by the time he pulled back I was a puddle of need. “Good morning,” he whispered. With that, he straightened and strolled toward the entrance to my office.

“Tease,” I grumbled.

He stopped at the glass door and gave me a boyish smile over his shoulder. “Admit it,” he prompted with a wink. “You missed me this morning.”

I fought it for half a second, then gave up and laughed. “Yeah. I did.”

Nathan looked surprised for a beat, then he grinned and turned to leave. “I’ll send Tanner back,” he informed me before walking down the hall.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Peyton

“We’re still trying to figure out how he’s gaining access to the databases and how he chooses his victims from the lists.” Tanner finished explaining the theories associated with the victims and their DNA tests.

“Do you have copies of the ME reports?” My mind was whirling through possibilities.

“We’ve gone through them multiple times, but a fresh set of eyes couldn’t hurt.” He picked up his phone and shot off a text. “My assistant will email them to you in a few minutes.”

“I want to read them over, but I’ll be honest, it’s not the reports from their deaths we should be analyzing.”

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