Page 134 of The Good Boys Club

“It doesn’t mean anything.” He marched off again.

This cat and mouse game of ours was starting to piss me off. It was clear I wasn’t going to get any sense out of him while he was in this state. I found a gap in the trees and took it. To the left, I could see the corner of the marquee. How had we wound up here?

“Bangers?” Mash called out. “Why are you running away from me?”

“Because I’m not playing this stupid game of yours where you say something, reel it back in, then make me chase you for more. If you don’t want to tell me what this whole mate-bite comment means that’s fine, but quit messing me around.”

Mash stopped walking and fell behind. I didn’t stop. “I’m just not ready for us to be over,” he said.

I slowed, still didn’t stop.

He caught up to me. “I don’t want you to go back to the city. I want you to stay here with me, and be my fake mate forever.”

This time I did stop. “What?”

He scratched the dirt with his paw, wouldn’t look at me.

I waited for him to speak. A weird heavy feeling clung to my chest. It made it difficult to breathe. Rain pattered harder now against my fur. Mash didn’t seem to notice.

“Fine, okay,” he called out. “This is the most selfish thing I’ve ever asked for. Even more selfish than ignoring the call of the alpha for a decade. More selfish than not telling you any of this beforehand, but . . .” He trailed off.

“Mash?” I said, my tone a warning.

“I want you to stay with me. Here. In Howling Pines, as my beta. I want you to pretend to be my werewolf mate forever.”

The world slowed, blurred. Pretend. He still used that word.

“I’m not ready for . . . this to be over. Our friendship,” he said. Friendship. “I know we can still chat on the phone, text, FaeTime, blah blah blah, but it’s not the same. I’m gonna miss you too much. I feel like . . . I feel like my heart can’t handle being that far apart from you. Like as soon as you go back to Remy, it’s going to stop beating.”

“Mash. Fuck.” I didn’t know what to say. I started pacing wide circles. His words bounced around in my head.

I’m gonna miss you.

My heart can’t handle it.

Pretend.

Friendship.

Friendship.

I started speaking, tentatively, because I was fucking afraid. Even though Mash wouldn’t remember any of this conversation in the morning, I was so scared to hear his answer.

“Do you think you’d ever want anything more than . . . friendship? More than friends who fuck?” Can you ever love methe way I love you? I chickened out. He wouldn’t remember, but I still couldn’t bring myself to utter those words aloud.

Mash’s mouth opened to speak, but no sound came out. He closed it. A whole minute ticked by where he decidedly did not answer my question. His gaze was a knife to my heart.

“I didn’t think so,” I said.

“Ci, if you’re asking what I think you’re asking, then no. We can never be . . . I’m not the right person . . . Ugh, you told me once—no, I can’t.” He looked up at the sky and shook his fur, dislodging the rain from his coat. “I take back what I said. I don’t want you to be my fake mate any more. We need to stop this charade now. It’s . . . gotten out of hand.”

Now it was my turn not to say anything.

“Cian.” Cian, not Ci, or Bangers. “What do you want? Out of life, I mean. If you could start over with everything, work life, home life, love life, what would you wish for? What would you change?”

I couldn’t answer his question. “I wish we were humans right now. I don’t want to be the only one who remembers this conversation.” And I didn’t want to have it twice.

“I’ll remember it.” He’d said it so convincingly, I almost believed him.

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