Almost like they’re strangers.
Then Trystan’s eyes blink open. In the dim bedroom, his turquoise irises look almost gray, but the moment our eyes meet, the numb feeling evaporates. All of my feelings for him—for all of my mates—rush back in as if a spell has been broken.
Trystan smiles lazily, his fingers trailing possessively up my hip. “Morning, beautiful.”
He follows his touch up with a kiss to my bare skin beneath the hem of my sleep shorts, and fire tingles through me, chasing away the last of the strange feeling I awoke with. But it doesn’t chase away the worry.
For a moment, I didn’t feel like me. It was like something else had control of my body, and it wasn’t anything good.
As Dare stirs behind him, Trystan sits up and rubs away the sleep from his eyes. He studies me, his brows pulling together. “What’s wrong? You look pale.”
Archer has been waking up slowly, and at that, he bolts upright, jostling my legs. “What’s going on? Something’s wrong with Sable?”
“More nightmares?” Dare grunts, sliding his back against the headboard and giving Trystan more room to maneuver.
They’re all used to my nightmares, so it would be an easy out. I could just agree with Dare, and they’d all do their best to soothe away the fear. But I don’t want to lie to them. If I lie about what happened, even by omission, that secret will fester and turn toxic.
I can’t do that. I can’t lie to them or withhold parts of myself from them. They’re my mates, and I want them to trust me just as much as I trust them. Lying to protect myself, or to hide the fear I feel about this thing inside me, would just strain the bond between us.
“I had nightmares,” I say softly. “But that’s not the worst part.”
Archer scoots closer and takes my hand. “Tell us.”
I give them a quick rundown of how I felt upon waking up—the way I seemed to be outside my own body, every part of me numb and out of my control. How I looked at them and barely recognized them or even felt our mate bond until Trystan opened his eyes and chased the feeling away.
Trystan and Archer exchange concerned glances over my head, but all three men reach out to touch me.
“It’s okay, Sable. It’s all right,” Archer says firmly, wrapping his arms around my shoulders and tugging me against his chest. “Whatever caused it, we’ll figure it out and fix it.”
Trystan’s hands come to rest on my thighs, and he rubs my skin soothingly. “Archer’s right. We know what we’re up against better than we used to, and that’s a good thing. It’s just a matter of helping you control it.”
Dare’s arm snakes around Trystan to brush over my hair. “We’ll stick it out together.”
I smile at him, surprised by the force of the conviction in his tone, and earn a dazzling, scruffy grin in return. I’m used to Archer and Trystan going above and beyond to reaffirm their commitment to me, but it’s nice to see Dare making an effort too. His entire pack was murdered by witches, so the grudge he carries has been a little hard for him to control.
Ridge appears in the doorway a moment later, a sheen of perspiration on his skin and his t-shirt in his hand. He wipes his forehead, his gaze finding mine in between the other men.
His lips turn down into a frown as he looks at the four of us. “Why does it feel so heavy in here?”
I slide out from the protective, comforting touch of my mates and set my feet to the cold hardwood floor. “If you make pancakes for breakfast, I’ll tell you.”
“That, I can do,” he says with a grin.
While we mix pancake batter, I tell Ridge what I told the rest of the guys about the strange thing that happened when I woke up. Like Archer, he takes a pragmatic approach to it.
“I think we should prepare for certain manifestations that we can’t explain,” he says. “We’re in new territory here, so we should expect the unexpected when it comes to your power. But no matter what happens, we’ll deal with it. We’ll get through as a team.”
I lean into his arm. “Thank you.”
Abandoning the batter, he turns toward me, tugging me against his chest as his fingers curl into my hair and tilt my face up toward his.
“There’s nothing to thank me for, little wolf,” he says, his voice a low rumble against me. “I’d do anything for you. Face anything with you. We all would.”
Then he kisses me, slow and steady. It’s comforting and sweet, but with an undercurrent of heat that promises a whole lot more where that came from.
I want more. I want so much more. My body and mind have been through a lot in the past twenty-four hours, but I can still feel a pleasant soreness between my legs from when my mates and I all cemented our bond last night.
I cling to those remembered images and sensations as I press up onto my tiptoes to deepen our kiss a little. No matter what happened afterward, up to and including burying a dead body, I refuse to let any of it ruin the memory of that perfect moment.
Finally, Ridge breaks the connection of our lips with a soft growl, pressing his forehead to mine. He takes a deep breath as if he’s gathering my essence from the air, claiming even my scent as his own. Then he kisses my temple before we reluctantly break apart and turn back to the kitchen counter.
“What were you doing out this morning?” I ask as he resumes the task of making pancakes. My voice is a little husky, but I clear my throat and pretend I can’t hear it.
He pours a ladleful of batter into the sizzling pan. “I needed to think, and I do it best when I’m running.”
“Think about what?”
It’s a stupid question, given everything that’s happened recently. But I just want him to keep talking. I like standing over the stove with him, helping him cook breakfast while my other mates drink coffee at the table and talk amongst themselves. It feels like home.
“Lots of things. Most importantly, how to handle the pack’s misgivings,” Ridge says, his voice serious. “I think our best bet is to head things off before they can start to cause us problems.”
“How so?”
“Ultimately, we’ll need to have a summit and invite all the packs in for a dialogue. But for now, a North Pack meeting to discuss this situation could be the best place to start.” Ridge slides the spatula under a bubbling pancake and flips it expertly. The butter coating the pan starts to sizzle in earnest as fresh batter hits the hot surface. “In the midst of Lawson’s challenge wasn’t a great time or place for the truth about your powers to come out. We’ll need to do some damage control and tell it to the pack straight. The less we withhold, the better.”
I nod, thinking how his own thoughts are mirroring the way I talked myself out of lying to my mates. Lies are so messy and hard to hold on to. Ridge is right—we have to be open and honest if I’m going to have a life here among these people.
I can only hope they give me that chance.
Ridge picks a time after lunch, swearing that recently fed shifters are easier to talk to than shifters who are called into a mandatory meeting without a chance to fill their stomachs beforehand.
He shifts to wolf form on his front lawn after giving me his clothes to carry, and then the five of us head down the road toward the council meeting house. Every few feet, Ridge lets out a piercing howl with three short, sharp notes to it. A signal, I guess, and find myself proven correct as shifters begin to leave their homes and join us on our walk.