Page 13 of The Wolf's Kidnapped Mate

I tossed the bag of ice from one hand to the other. “Where have you been?”

“In town.”

“That explains a lot.”

He studied me quietly, no expression blooming on his face despite his eyes dropping to my waist. “Do tell.”

“I can’t leave the pack, or else I would have probably run into you in town, right?”

His demeanor sank. Was that disappointment I saw in his eyes? “Not with the circles I ran in.”

“How do you know that?”

“I don’t know, Kylie. I don’t control fate.”

I tossed the bag at him, hoping to catch him off guard. He didn’t even have to look when he grabbed it out of the air. And then he tossed it over his shoulder where it landed in a bin underneath a window.

I squinted at the window. “Is that a kitchen?”

“Are you here for a reason?”

“Yeah, I saw the posting.” I tried to skip around his irritated tone. We used to be friends at one point, right? I didn’t understand what had happened. “The plant caretaker thing. I want to apply.”

He made a high-pitched squeaky sound that sounded like he was about to start laughing again. Though I expected his expression to change, nothing but his eyes seemed to hold liveliness. It was like he was dead everywhere else. Dead from the missions he had carried out.

Dead from being considered dead for so long, no doubt.

“Well?” I snapped.

It wasn’t like me to act like that, especially not with Fred, but he had really gotten under my skin with that performance at the pack meeting. One rejection was fine by me. But two?

He had to know the details of why I was hiding here. Why was he trying to make it harder for me? “I guess there’s always tomorrow.”

There—that did it. That got a reaction out of him. I didn’t know how, but saying that really did it.

“There’s only ever today,” he said stiffly. “At least for those of us who aren’t treated like royalty in a damn castle.”

“I didn’t ask to hide here—”

He snorted. “But you sure have lapped it up, haven’t you? I mean, you’ve gotten really fancy with the damn makeup these days. It looks good.”

I blinked with bewilderment. “Is that supposed to be an insult?”

“It looks damn good because you have all this time on your hands while the rest of us are cleaning up the tiny fires leftover from Tehran.”

My throat tightened. “Don’t you dare talk to me about that mission. You weren’t even there. You have no idea how slimy it felt for Bernadetti to—to do the—” I choked.

Now something really must have cracked between us because there was a moment—a split second, I swore—where Fred started to move toward me with a sudden spark of concern in his eyes. I knew because the green was typically solid, cold. But right this second, right when I was about to break, the sharp emerald softened to a forest pine.

Softened. Just for a second.

“Kylie, I—” His face hardened, eyes dropping to the ground. “You should leave.”

“Yeah, I should.”

The corner of his mouth twitched. If I hadn’t known Fred personally, I would have thought it was spite or annoyance—but I knew it was him resisting the urge to smile. This was my brother’s closest friend, the guy who had been with us from the very start of our black ops journey.

I knew him. And he knew that.

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