Page 80 of Fae Devoted
The mating bond shifted, the sensation like a sickening slide of oil rolling off water. Panic set in, and she grasped at the rapidly fading connection, not ready to let it go.
What the hell is wrong with me?
Shouldn’t she be glad Jacob was respecting her wishes?
The faint awareness dimmed to nothingness, the bond slipping through her fingers along with the tray. The metal sheet hit the floor with a discordant clang, and Johnnie followed it down.
Sitting on the cold tile with pieces of charred, broken cookies littering the floor, she drew her legs to her chest, rested her forehead on her raised knees, and cried.
Chapter 24
The unmated RemingtonPack male Johnnie hadn’t been introduced to yet made an abrupt about-face, hightailing it out of the coffee shop the instant he caught the scent of a semi-Marked she-wolf.
“Sorry about that,” Johnnie apologized to the human cashier but refused to be embarrassed. It’d be hypocritical to complain about the few minor, albeit annoying, inconveniences of an unfinished mating bond when she’d taken advantage of the same societal idiosyncrasies many times since leaving Memphis. Johnnie had even abused it less than a week ago outside Remington’s office, exploiting the Ferwyn guards’ ingrained response to a female in the thick of the Dance to get past them. And considering she hadn’t seen Jacob since asking him to close the bond three days ago, there hadn’t been an opportunity for them tofinishanything.
“Whatever.” The teenage girl shrugged and snapped the lids on Johnnie’s order of black coffee and a large vanilla latte. “He’ll be back as soon as you leave.”
“Right.”
Pocketing her credit card and a handful of sugar packets, Johnnie accepted the takeaway cups and foil pan of cannoli crepes, aka the olive branch. The sweet pastry might not be her homemade baklava, but didn’t they say it was the thought that counted? Whoevertheywere, Johnnie decided to take their advice because she was sick of being mad at Jacob and wanted to make up and move on. She missed him. She missed their bond, amazed at how quickly it became an integral part of her life. Itwas exhausting reaching for the connection a hundred times a day and bumping against a soft yet impenetrable wall of her own making.
Yes, Jacob made a mistake, and her initial anger at how he handled things at the cabin was justified. But expecting a dominant alpha to deny his primal nature was beyond irrational, and her refusal to deal with the issue head-on was immature. Punishing him—punishingthem—by insisting he close the bond hadn’t given Johnnie the clarity she thought it would; if anything, the aching loneliness of the past three days accomplished the exact opposite.
Johnnie had every intention of spending centuries with Jacob as his Ca’anam, but she knew taking the final step in the Dance didn’t preclude the occasional disagreement ortwelve. They needed to talk to each other, not shut each other out when things got rough. Johnnie wasn’t perfect either, and the next time Jacob might be the one doing the forgiving. Decision made, she exited the café with a new spring in her step, feeling a hundred pounds lighter. It was a beautiful autumn morning, the air cool but not cold.
Turning left, she headed to the side street where Jacob’s truck was parked. It was nearing the end of the warm season in the UP, but the sidewalks were bustling with tourists.
After checking in with Noreen at work and catching up with Blake before he left for school that morning, there was nothing for Johnnie to do with her time except wallow in self-pity. No new Ferwyn families were scheduled to transfer to Mud Island, which meant no prep work, and her pre-dawn run barely took the edge off her pent-up frustration.
Although Remington’s hotel was within walking distance of the waterfront, she needed Jacob’s pickup to transport repurchased ingredients for another round of baking. She stillhad a debt to fulfill with the local pack as nothing from the previous night’s debacle was salvageable.
Setting the coffees on the truck’s roof, Johnnie opened the door and laid the container and her jacket on the front seat, then retrieved the drinks with a drawn-out sigh. Forgiving her male wasn’t the only decision she had to make. Samuel and the queen were returning to Memphis soon.
Now that Jacob had permission to stay behind and search for Jeremiah, he didn’t need to hide his presence in the territory. And with the king promising ENC resources and Ethan Hall joining the hunt to find the facility, and by extension, the missing witchling and Willow twins, Jacob didn’t need her help. He had someone far more qualified than her to guard his back.
Johnnie slid behind the wheel, still having trouble wrapping her mind around the revelation that Ethan was a battle witch. Who would have guessed the easy-going Anwyll with a lethal dimple, ripped abs, and killer dance moves was dangerous in more ways than one?
Now that Johnnie was speaking to Jacob again, even if he didn’t know it yet, they needed to sit down and have an open discussion about their immediate future. She didn’t want to leave Michigan without Jacob. The reasons may have changed, but he still needed her.
Johnnie wanted nothing more than to complete the bond. She wanted to be there to share in the joy of Jacob’s eventual reunion with Jeremiah and couldn’t do that from a thousand miles away.
Or, if things didn’t work out as they hoped, she could help deal with the temporary disappointment and immediate follow-up plan because failure wasn’t an option. Johnnie wouldn’t allow Jacob to lose his brother again.
“Not happening,” she promised, starting the engine and checking the rearview mirror for a gap in the slow-movingtraffic. Her gaze was drawn like a magnet to the male in a gray SUV approaching at a crawl, and she froze. Mouth hanging open, she stared at the eerily familiar profile as the vehicle rolled past her parked truck.
“Jeremiah.”
Heart in her throat, she jammed the gearshift into drive and brazenly utilized the pickup’s bulk to steamroll into the steady stream of traffic, ignoring the screeching brakes and honking horns from the other drivers.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” she cried, snatching her cellphone from her jacket while keeping Jeremiah’s vehicle four cars ahead in her sights. She couldn’t allow him to get away.
Her eyes darted from the windshield to her screen and back again, tapping Jacob’s number with her thumb and trying not to crash into the bumper in front of her.
It rang. And rang. “Come on, come on.”
She hung up and tried again. “Pick up, pick up.”
It went to voicemail. Damn it, why had she insisted on closing the bond?
