Page 151 of Conner's Luna

I frown, "that's insane, baby, and unnecessary."

"Conner-"

"I'm not letting you start off in my - in our - pack with a bad rep." I think about it for a minute.

"What about the council? Do we have to tell the pack right away?" she asks.

I heave a deep breath. "Honeygirl, look around," I say gently.

She finally does, squinting her eyes. When she sees where we are, her eyes start to open wider and wider. "Oh my God," she says quietly. "Where are we? We were in the garden, Conner! This is not the garden!" she hisses.

"I moved us," I tell her slowly. "With some help."

She looks down at her naked chest. "I'm naked, Conner. You're naked. We're naked."

"They saw nothing," I lie again. I was barely able to move when Sean, Sarj, and Braxton helped us limp in from the garden.

"You. Are. Lying."

"Yeah, isn't it cool how you can tell now that I've Marked you?" I try to distract her.

Fortunately, she's a genius, my Bailey. I'm starting to understand that her mind just doesn't work quite the way that everyone else does.

"And?" she prods. "Was our mating public, Conner?"

"Ah... sort of?" I offer. My hands tighten on her hips to keep her with me, but she doesn't try to move away from me.

"That's..." she sniffles and my wolf's head jerks up, terrified at the sound. "I guess..." her voice trails off.

"I didn't plan for it to be public, babygirl," I say hurriedly. "I just... shit! Just don't be angry with me, right? I Marked you, honeygirl. It gives you so much power over me. You have no idea. What do you need? I promise that everyone who was... nearby..." I stumble a little, "they love you."

"It's just... you should tell me things. We're life partners now, Conner."

"Yeah, we are, babygirl."

She takes a deep breath. "So, you'll tell me things, from now on? I just... I need to know."

"Of course," I soothe her. "Anything you want to know, honeygirl."

"Last night, Velia got a text from Braxton. From real Braxton. I didn't think about it at first, but it bothered me. Brax wrote,'it happened again.'There was another murder, wasn't there?" Bailey asks me.

I narrow my eyes on her as a sense of smugness trickles through our bond. The little genius-stinker in my arms just played me. No wonder Mom loves her so much.

"Not telling," I mutter. A chill races over me at the memory of Nikki's body, the hole in her middle, the bloody message on Bailey's bedroom wall.

"It's bad?" Bailey asks in a hushed voice.

I clear my throat, "in your old house. Dead girl. Message on your wall." My wolf snarls, back to pacing back and forth, eyes aglow as he searches the dark for the unseen enemy of his female.

"What did the message say?" she asks me.

"’You're lucky,’" I say quietly. "And... she was pregnant."

Bailey inhales sharply. Tears fill her eyes. "A baby died, too?"

"Don't know. Maybe survived. Maybe not. No sign of the pup anywhere. I want to stay with you, honeygirl, but I have to go join the investigation again."

"Oh, Conner," she wraps her arms around my neck. I hide my face in her hair, shivering at the memory of the fear that scalded my throat when I saw the inside of that house of horrors.

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