I press her. “How long have you known? Were you even together when Dad died?”
“Of course we were. We were married, committed to each other.”
“He couldn’t have gotten another shifter pregnant if you were bite bonded.”
“That’s ridiculous. A dangerous myth and an utter lie.”
“I imagine a DNA test would make it all very clear to you,” I say, knowing I’m being nasty but absolutely unable to stop myself. “I imagine the fact that he … Rian … that he looks like a fucking replica of Dad —”
“That’s enough, Bolan. My relationship with your father isn’t in question, and I don’t believe for a moment that —”
The sound of rapid footsteps overhead— one of my younger sisters running down the hall— interrupts my mother’s impassioned denial. She snaps her mouth shut, levels a warning look at me, and spins away. As if I won’t just follow her into the kitchen.
I thread my fingers through Mirth’s. Her skin is chilled. But when I pause to check on her, she just regards me with her purple eyes softly glowing and her chin raised — ready to stand where I now need her. At my side.
Still, I need to justify my behavior, so I latch onto just one of the things currently bothering me. “If I had a brother, I had a right to know. I had a right to have him in my life, if he wanted to be. And now … now I need …”
“You need Rian to know that,” Mirth says softly. “You need him to know that you would have fought for him. Will fight for him.”
“I’m tired of letting people down. My people.”
“Your bond mates.”
I nod at her understanding. At her acceptance. I’m not sure why doing so makes my chest ache, though. Maybe because I don’t deserve her. I open my mouth to say some of that, any of that. But Mirth just touches my cheek, then brushes her fingertips across my cheekbone and down my jaw.
“I’m going to fuck up,” I murmur. “I know I am, but —”
“I’ve seen all your so-called fuck-ups, Bolan. Literally witnessed them. My eyes are wide open.”
“I’m so sorry —”
“That’s not what I meant,” Mirth says a little sharply. Calling me so effectively to heel that my wolf presses against my skin, rumbling and pleased. “You say you’re mine.”
“Yes. Utterly. Devotedly.”
“And … when haven’t I been yours? When haven’t I taken your side against the world?”
I grin at her. Fuck, I’m changeable today. Like always, maybe. “If you like, I can recount the number of times you’ve been livid with me just in the last week.”
“That’s between us. It has nothing to do with this conversation with your mother,” she says, all poised and pretty.
As if we haven’t just been fucking in the dirt. As if she hadn’t taunted me, taunted my wolf, until I claimed her exactly as she wanted to be claimed, harsh and ready. As if she hadn’t shoved my hand back between her legs while I was still recovering fromcoming so hard I could barely stay upright, demanding to come herself and showing me exactly how to help her do it.
And yeah, no matter how mind-altering that orgasm was, I’m never going to forget her snarling ‘that was my fucking come’ right before she milked my cock.
“What are you thinking?” Mirth murmurs, eyes glinting.
I shake my head, stepping back from her even as I tighten my hold on her hand. “These sweatpants are way too tight for us to follow the path of my thoughts right now.”
She flushes, then deliberately drops her gaze to my crotch.
I catch her chin, raising her eyes back to meet mine. Then keeping my eyes wide open, I lean in and brush a gentle kiss across her lips.
She doesn’t close her eyes either.
She looks right at me, accepting. I know it’s tentative between us. That I’ll have to earn her trust. But I’ll do anything, anything it takes to be worthy of her friendship and our bond.
Livi,my older sister, is standing before the massive granite kitchen island with her dark-blue eyes fixed to our mother, who is spooning fruit salad into smaller bowls with her back to the rest of us. Barefoot, Livi’s thrown an oversized light-brown sweater over her ballet exercise gear. She’s tall and slim, her dark-blond hair slicked into a bun on the top of her head.
