Page 102 of Knot Broken

“So we’ll go in and take a look at the paint chips,” I said after Nadia and I got out of the car. Walking into the big box hardware store with my girl on my arm? I looked down at her with a grin. Yeah, this was a perfect way to spend a weekend. “You pick a colour you like, and then me and the boys will get started on your room.”

When we bought our place, the four bedrooms were seen as a good thing, purely from a resale perspective. I now knew that fate had to have a hand in it. We’d realised we were a pack and now we had somewhere our mate could move into. The biggest bedroom had been cleared out in preparation for Nadia moving in and I couldn’t wait to get started on making it look beautiful for her.

“Before or after a Bunnings sausage?” Nadia asked, looking up at me with a smile.

“After, obviously. Now, do you have mustard on them like a complete heathen, or just tomato sauce?”

A couple of sausages on bread later and we walked up the paint aisle to take a look at the colour wall.

“So these colours…” I plucked a few cards from the wall and handed them over. “Were used in the rest of the house.”

“That’s a whole lot of grey.”

My mate’s nose wrinkle told me everything I needed to know, so I plucked them from her grip and placed them back in the right spots.

“Grey chose them,” I explained. “The men seems determined to live up to his name. Now these…” I grabbed a few softer grey greens. “Are very popular at the moment. I see them a lot on interior design feeds.”

“This one is quite pretty.”

Right then, it felt like I was saw everything. The way her fingers stroked a pale celadon green card. The slight crease between her brows.

“Nope, that’s not it,” I said, placing them back.

“It’s nice,” she spluttered.

“Don’t want nice.” Every time I looked at her felt like I’d won a prize I didn’t deserve. Maybe that’s why I just stood there staring for a little too long. “My girl deserves perfect. So… if Millennial green isn’t your thing, there’s some nice neutral blues. They’ve got a grey undertone…” A quick glance Nadia’s way told me exactly what I needed to know. “Or we could try something a little warmer. A greige perhaps?”

The same part of me that used to detect every subtle change in Dad’s mood activated now. I took in the way her lips pursed slightly, the shift of her weight from one foot to the other and knew I wasn’t on the right track.

“Are you a pink girl? Because we did a gynaecologist’s office in this colour.”

It was super soft almost terracotta colour, kinda like the inside of a shell.

“I…” She shook her head and smiled. “There’s just so many colours. Maybe if I just take a look at them all, something will jump out at me.”

That wasn’t it, some secret part of me knew, but I let her pull away, walking past one brand’s colour wall, then another’s, but it wasn’t the swatches she pulled out, then put back, that had my attention. The wolf was a far more insistent presence in my life since Nadia’s first shift, and I could almost feel his cold nose pressing into my ribs, moving me forward.

“Maybe this one?” Nadia held out a swatch of a silvery green colour, but I focussed on her expression. A tiny tightening of the muscles around her eyes, the corners of her mouth turning down just a little. “Or this one?”

She picked another similar colour, but it felt like she was asking for my approval, rather than expressing a preference.

“You know you can pick any colour you like, right?” I said, then reached over and grabbed the most obnoxious shade of Barbie pink. “Like if you had some childhood fantasy of having a pretty princess bedroom and your parents wouldn’t let you, I’d paint the room this colour and get you all the four poster bed and voile curtains you could possible want.”

“You know what voile is?” She grinned. “Impressive.”

“Seriously.” Putting each of the swatches back, I took her hands in mine. “This is going to be your room, your space…” There, her grip tightened for just a second before she seemed to consciously release it. “The paint isn’t the issue.”

“What? No.” Pulling free, she turned back to the colour wall. “I’m just no good with colour. Though I do know I definitely don’t want that pink.”

“Nadia…” At my growl, she turned back my way. “I’m your mate. You can tell me what’s on your mind. Whatever it is, we can work through it.”

It felt like it was then that the mask dropped. Her eyes fell to the floor, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip before she forced herself to look at me.

“What if…?” She nodded to herself, then smiled. “What if I’m not ready yet?”

“To pick a paint colour?” I frowned, then it struck me. “Shit, to move in.”

It’d only been a couple of weeks since her first shift. We spent pretty much every night together, so as a pack, we broached the idea of her moving in with us. It made good sense, because it meant no one had to schlep their crap from one house to the other. But what was practical and what felt right was two different things. My hand shot out, grabbing her by the shoulder and then pulling her close.