Page 140 of Hawke

Journey laughed, patting her leg. “Hawke, I think you really tried not to get involved with Delilah then, too, but you could not deny the connection. The pull, the longing you had for her was just as strong as it is now. She was your little ray of sunshine then, as she is now.” Journey leaned back into Grim’s arms. “And Delilah, you obviously had a pull toward him back then.”

“But of course.” I rubbed my hand up and down Hawke’s arm.

“There was a bond for them, even back then?” Bram asked.

Journey nodded. “There was.”

Everyone except Journey, Grim, Hawke and I stared at one another in confusion.

“And then one night, Hawke bit her and claimed her. It was his instinct to do so. Delilah’s soul didn’t mind, obviously. They were in love.”

A flash of the past awakened another memory. Hawke was biting me on my shoulder. I felt a rush of heat between my legs and pressed my thighs together to muffle my desire.

Hawke’s rumble in his chest could be felt on my back, his hand tightening on my thigh.

“I can see it all, too,”he said.“I’m down for a reenactment later.”

I clamped my teeth down on my lip, trying to muffle the sound of my burning desire.

I am all down for some role play.

“But then, eventually, she got sick,” Journey continued. “Her body got warm. She couldn’t keep her food down. The town’s doctor couldn’t help her, they even banished her for fear of spreading disease. Hawke was outraged her own kind wouldn’t help her, so he did the only thing he could do—take her through the veil and back to his own kind.”

Journey’s words filled the hushed room, creating an uneasy atmosphere.

“As they traveled, her smell changed. She was turning, like him.”

Locke uncrossed his arms, pushed away from the doorframe, and came closer to the group. He had always been more distant, more stand-offish than the rest, but now, he seemed more interested than anyone.

“When they arrived, the pack seemed to understand what was happening. First, they were angry that Hawke bit her, they were afraid they would bring the Council’s wrath, but with the change of her smell, they hoped they would keep the secret.”

“They took them both in, put them in an empty cabin. The pack doctors told them she was shifting but immediately knew that the shift wouldn’t be completed because her bones were not healing fast enough.”

There were no more visions coming to me. I did not see myself breaking, dying in a cabin. And thanked the goddess for that.

Anaki’s icy hand sent a chill through my body as he tenderly rubbed my ankle with his thumb. He held my gaze with eyes that brimmed with tears, as if he could sense the suffering of my past life. But honestly, I was doing okay.

I felt sad for her, but she was another person, another path that my soul had taken. I was here on another journey, in another time and space. If I had not died, if I had bonded, then my soul would not have gained the family that I had standing around me.

My soul had undertaken many lives, maybe more than this one that Journey told me about, but it was now that I knew my journey would end in happiness.

Maybe that was why I wasn’t crying.

Hawke held me tighter, his fingers intertwining in the back of my hair and pulling my head back.

Such softness in his eyes, I’d never seen; he was almost unrecognizable from the big baddy I first met.

“The woman died shortly after,” Journey concluded. “Along with the wolf of a broken heart.”

“But why?” Locke snapped, breaking the solemn atmosphere. “Why the fuck did she, Delilah, have to die and suffer? They were following a bond, they were–”

Locke’s face grew red with anger. As his chest moved with his wide arm movements, his satchel opened and the contents inside spilled out onto the floor with a thud.

Journey winced as Locke’s voice grew louder.

I managed to get myself partly up, my body tense as I tried to protect Journey, but the men in the room had already sprung up to contain Locke.

“Let’s calm down.” Bones grabbed Locke by the forearm. “We aren’t quite done with the story. Let’s hear her out, alright. You’re scaring Journey.”

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