I can sense you, Ness. It’s pretty much all I can sense these days. The damp breeze rushed his words to my ears.
I’m sorry. I wasn’t sure why I was apologizing for something I had no control over.
He rolled one of his shoulders in a shrug, then faced away from me and started up again. I’m sure it’ll get more manageable.
I was no longer the small pup he’d run alongside six years ago, but I still had to lengthen my strides to match his own. He must’ve noticed, because at some point he slowed his brisk pace. Silence grew and grew between us, but there was nothing awkward about it. If anything, it was like a balm, healing the deep cuts Liam had gouged in me.
I’m glad you’re home, I whispered.
August looked at me in that quiet, all-seeing way of his. Once you get back with Liam, you’ll probably change your mind about that.
I bristled, horrified he thought I would go back to Liam. I might be all over the place, but I do have some self-love. Liam and I, we’re not getting back together. I thought about the time he’d sniffed me. I forgave him once before.
Although cloaked in fur, his limbs seemed to grow harder. What did you forgive him for?
August’s green eyes bore into mine, but I didn’t explain. I would take what had happened between Liam and me to the grave.
Even though the sky was mottled with pale puffs of clouds, I could still make out the glittery pinpricks of stars. They made me think of my father, of the night we’d star-gazed from our rooftop. He’d been such a gentle and righteous man.
A man who would never have lashed out at someone so bitterly and so publicly.
There were some lines that shouldn’t be crossed. I’d rearranged those lines to allow Liam closer, but after today, I would paint new ones around myself and wouldn’t let anyone undeserving past them.
August had parked his pickup in the lot where I’d morphed from human to wolf. He’d tracked my scent from Tracy’s to the metal bins behind which I’d taken cover to strip.
Boulder was quiet and dark when our claws clicked onto the lot’s pavement. When we reached the pickup, August’s spine heaved, and then his brown fur receded into his dark, bronzed skin. When he unfurled, all his joints and muscles elongated and thickened until his backside was entirely man and no longer wolf. I noticed a line of puckered skin at the base of his spine. I wondered how he’d gotten that scar. When he began pivoting, I averted my gaze, taking great interest in the scratched rim of his back wheel.
A car door clicked, and then fabric rustled and a zipper purred shut. Only then did I let my gaze drift back to August. Lucas said I needed to get used to nudity, but it was easy for the males of the pack. They’d grown up walking naked around each other; I hadn’t.
Barefoot and shirtless, August extended a cream flannel button-down to me. “Your clothes are still damp.”
The shirt dangled between us. Was he expecting me to shift in front of him? When I didn’t make any move to snatch the shirt, he draped it over the side of the cargo bed and turned. I was thankful he’d understood my mute plea. Closing my eyes, I arched my back and allowed the magic to pulse through my limbs and drag away the fur, the claws, the fangs, and every other part of my lupine constitution. My ears migrated back to the sides of my face, my jaw flattened, my lips reshaped.
Back in skin, I pressed my hands into the damp gravel and rose, bones clicking as I stretched to my full human height of five-seven. Glancing sideway to make sure August was still turned, I plucked the shirt from the bed and speared my arms through. I fastened the buttons quickly, leaving smudges of mud on the soft material that smelled so strongly of August it made my head spin. Or maybe it was the miles I’d traveled at breakneck speed that was making my head spin.
Pushing my stringy hair back, I said, “You can turn around now.” My voice sounded raucous, as though it, too, had been dragged across the rough terrain.
As August turned, I tugged on the hem of the shirt, thankful he was an entire head taller. Otherwise, the shirt would’ve exposed a lot more of me.
“Thanks,” I said, nodding to the shirt. I pinched the hem to prevent the material from flapping open.
He palmed his close-cropped hair. I’d never known him with any other haircut, but I remembered Isobel showing me pictures of him as a toddler where his face had been haloed by a mane of soft curls that couldn’t seem to decide which way to bend. Only two things remained of the little boy from those pictures: the spray of dark freckles over his nose and cheekbones, and the penetrating green eyes flecked by sable and gold. But where the boy had had a soft jaw, the man’s jaw could saw through wood.
“Feeling better, Dimples?”
The nickname startled me. I’d spent my childhood hearing it, responding to it, but I wasn’t sure I liked it anymore. It made me feel juvenile. I didn’t say anything, though. To August, I supposed I would always be the little pigtailed girl he’d ferry to and from school on his way to work.
“Ness?”
“Hmm.” I released the lip I was reflexively sliding through my teeth.
“Are you feeling better?”
“Yeah.” I wasn’t.
When he cocked an eyebrow, I added a meek smile.
“I promise. Running cleared my head.”
Although he still didn’t seem convinced, he tipped his head to the truck. “Get in. I’ll give you a lift back to the inn.”
He pulled the door open. Clutching the shirt closed, I heaved myself onto the bench seat and slid all the way to the passenger side door. The scraped leather was rough and cold against the backs of my thighs.
“I need to stop by my new place first.” If only I’d had the presence of mind to run toward it instead of-I looked around the lot-wherever it was I’d ended up.
“New place?”
“Yeah. Jeb and I. We’re going to be living in town. In an apartment on 13th Street.”
He slowed at a traffic light. “You are? Why?”
“Because my cousin sold the inn to Aidan Michaels.”
August turned toward me, his stomach muscles rippling in the faint moonlight. For someone who’d sprinted through a drenched forest, he looked incredibly clean, barely flecked with mud.
Unlike myself…
My thighs were smeared brown, and my hair felt like dreads. A glimpse at myself in the side mirror confirmed the dreads part. I rolled my hardened hair into a larger rope, coiled it, and threaded the ends through to make it hold.
“You’re kidding me?” August whispered.
“Afraid not.”
August shook his head as though trying to drive the new information into it.
“Effective upon Everest’s death. I bet that’s why Liam believes I saved my cousin’s life,” I grumbled. “To make sure the inn didn’t switch hands.”
The word backstab shrilled in my brain again. I pressed my fingertips against my temple and massaged it. “Actually, can you drop me off at the inn? I need to grab a couple things. The apartment isn’t exactly move-in ready.”
There were mattresses, but no sheets, no pillows, no cleaning products, and no food.
“Sure.”
While we drove, I took my phone out of the bag. My screen was full of messages. Mostly from Evelyn and Sarah, but one of them-a missed call and a voicemail-was from Everest. I dropped my phone onto my lap, then fumbled to grab it before August could see the name in the notification bubbles.
“Is everything okay?”
I blinked at him like a deer in headlights; I hoped I didn’t look like one. “Yeah. Just Evelyn worrying. I was supposed to go sleep at Frank’s place tonight.”