The Mates of Monsters

Chapter 44

I didn't tell him I love him.

I should have.

There are so many things I should have said, but there would've never been enough time for me to say them. There are so many things I wanted to do with him, and half of those things are the repetition of others. He said an hour, but nothing feels real, not since he agreed to the rite. My head is scrambled, but I can focus on one thing: the bond.

The roar of the wind at the edge of the cliff blows against my bareness and sways my hair from my back. I hold my legs to my chest and stare out at the sea of forest below-an expanse of green and shadow. All I can hear is the wind as it crashes and drags and swells like monstrous waves. I'm perched at the tip of the rock, at the edge of the sheet, and Lyde monitors from behind. It wasn't long until she tracked me. She called my name, placed a blanket beside me, then gave me my space.

I can feel the mascara dried on my cheeks with the salty residue of my tears. Every second that drawls by, I praise the Goddess that the bond hasn't snapped. The moment it does-the second my world rots beneath me... I'll do whatever it takes to be with him again, and the jagged rock a hundred feet below will make sure of it.

I wonder if he found another way. Maybe they aren't fighting at all. He'll come back to me unharmed and I'll breathe knowing it was never a possibility-his death.

Maybe they are fighting. Maybe they're doing it right now.

I've never seen two Alpha males fight. These days, I don't think anyone has, not with the fury it takes to kill. Giant, razor teeth flashing and snapping down by jaws strong enough to crush a bear. Claws vicious enough to tear deep into flesh and pour out the wet, beating makeup of our insides. The brute power of ancient beasts and speed to curdle blood. And they're watching-Tarlo, guards, maybe even Aurora regardless of David's request. Nicodra wouldn't care if she saw him do such things. He already does enough to her.

Maybe they're in a clearing, gathered around like a crowd for a gladiator fight. There wouldn't be rules to state, or maybe Tarlo would clarify to Nicodra that he couldn't attack anyone else. They would shift and circle and wait to see who makes the first move. Then my mind whirls to nothing. It blurs with swift, dark bodies and snarls and gnashing. The pounding of the ground, and the spotlight cast by the moon.

And everyone watching tries to keep track, tries to assess who's winning, but it isn't over until it's over. No one knows until one beast stops moving and the other spits out his blood.

"Luna?" Lyde calls wearily, tiptoeing up to me. She's a tall woman, tan-skinned and built of lean muscle. I don't have the energy to ask her to call me Brigette. There's nothing I can do but watch, and breathe, and wait. "Would you like to return to the house now?"

I shake my head.

"I don't feel safe having you stay over the borders. I told the Alpha I would look after you, and I'm sure he wouldn't want you out here like this."

I part my dried lips. "Please. Just let me be," I request, my voice worn and rasped.

She opens the blanket and lays it over my shoulders then returns to her post.

The bond hums like a microscopic line of electricity draped and coiled around everything inside of me. I feel it from the tips of my fingers to the smallest toes of my feet, and this wait torments me like a pair of scissors. The blades shift in and out, close and far, and I become strained for relief. Cut it, or leave it, but don't make me sit here in agony.

I ease myself onto the rock and lay along the edge. My fist tugs the blanket over my body, and I find peace in closing my eyes.

He trips and tumbles before me like an injured animal. It's working now-the mere drops that were slipped into his wine. He crawls in the grass, devastated, worthless like a bug under my looming shoe. He looks back in terror, pleading with his body to invigorate, for his muscle to find that last bit of primal might.

I creep up on him like a figure at the foot of his bed, leering and hungry. I kick him onto his back and kneel at his side.

"You have forgotten what we are, haven't you? Shh, sweetheart, it's okay. You don't have to be upset. It's only natural," I coo, stroking the side of his face. I grip my dinner knife and raise my hand, the moon gleaming on the blade and the sight of it startling him. "You're a hothead, Nicodra, and a fool."

"Untrustworthy," he spits, "unstable... dangerous."

"That may be so, but you're the one on your way out," I seethe and plunge the blade into his chest. He yells and coughs until blood spurts from his mouth and trails down his jaw. "It was your mistake-believing you were strong enough."

He fights to make words, but the blood clogs his throat.

"You're right. We are monsters, but not because we shift into ones, not because the wolf lives inside all of us. What you fear... it's the human."

His red teeth clench as his head falls back to the grass. Inch by inch, his body goes limp and his eyes stare longingly at the nothing above.

I thought maybe he would emerge from the trees, and I would leap into his tired arms and squeeze him and kiss him all over. I thought he would clutch me just as hard and whisper that he would never let me go. But I don't know how long it's been since he left and I came here and I slept.

I'm sure time is moving very quickly for him, but here it seems to be moving very slow. I struggle to my feet and let Lyde take me to the house with my blanket covering everything but my head and my feet. Helena is waiting in the kitchen and releases her tensed limbs when we saunter through the back doors.

I thought maybe he would scoop me up on the edge of the cliff and carry me home. And I would ask him if I'm dreaming or if this is heaven, and he would happily tell me no.

Lyde and Helena remain downstairs as I journey up the staircase and into our bedroom. I come to realize that what I thought was going to happen was not going to happen. He held me and told me one hour, and when I see the clock on the bedside table, I learn that it has been three.

I wash my body first, and my face. I take my time with every part of myself as I decide how to organize the closet because after my shower, I take my things from the spare room that have not yet been transferred, and I bring them to our bedroom. My clothes are hung or folded away, and my bathroom bits are stored or displayed. The documents and money from my duffel bag are kept in a safe place in the closet, and I hide the duffel in my empty suitcase before zipping it up for storage.

I return to the spare room and look it over one last time for anything out of place, then I close the door and return downstairs with my wits about me. My matching silken pajamas drape elegantly over my frame, and the two women look at me as if I've been murdered and replaced by a doppelgänger. "I'll be on the computer in the dining room," I tell them. "I have emails and invitations to respond to."

"Brigette-"

"I'm fine," I assure Helena. "He isn't dead. By now, Nicodra must be gone."

"Should I try to get an update for you?" Lyde offers.

"That would be nice, thank you."

I grab my laptop and sit at the head of the table. I open it and falter just once. My breath wavers in a hiccup of air, of lingering breakdown, but I shove it away as fast as it appears.

And I get to work.

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Thought I would update these together since they are both shorter. Thanks for reading as always!