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“Because there’s a risk. You could change. Permanently.”
“I know.”
My temper spikes. “So why the hell are you acting like that doesn’t matter?”
“Because it matters to me!” Nora’s eyes spark with anger and determination. “It’s my body. My life. My choice. The risk matters because I’m the one taking it.”
I throw my hands in the air. “And the wolf is the one causing it!”
“There.” She points at me, her eyes narrowing. “You still think the wolf is something you do to people. He isn’t a disease, Hewit. He isn’t some weapon you’re carrying around that might accidentally go off.”
“You didn’t see what happened that night. You don’t know what it was like afterward. You don’t know what I can—”
“I know you.”
Nora’s words cut straight through mine. Her eyes shine, but she doesn’t look away. “I know how careful you are with me. I know how you hold me when I’m sleeping. I know you wake up if I move too far away from you.”
Her hands settle against my chest. “And I know the wolf. Your wolf. I’ve felt him every day since I got here.” Her fingers curl into my shirt. “I felt him want me before I even understood what it meant. I’ve felt him protect me. I’ve felt him when you shift, and when you’re scared, and when you want to mark me so badly that your teeth ache.”
My breathing changes.
Hers does too. “I love him.”
The room disappears. Maybe the whole damn world does because all I can see is her.
Nora’s eyes fill—not enough for tears to fall, but enough to wreck me.
She slides one hand up my chest and cups the side of my face. “And I love you.”
Nothing in me moves. Not my lungs. Not my heart. Not the wolf. For one impossible second, everything goes silent. I haven’t heard those words directed at me in so long that I don’t know what to do with them.
Then the wolf surges with joy. Pure, wild fucking joy. It hits so hard that my knees almost give way.
Nora gasps, feeling it too. Her hand tightens as she strokes her thumb over my cheek. “I love you, Hewit.”
My eyes close. “Don’t.”
Her hand stills. “Don’t what?”
“Say it unless you mean it.”
“I mean it.”
I open my eyes. She’s still there, still looking at me like I’m not too much. Like I never was.
“I love you,” she says again. “And you’re not leaving.”
“Nora—”
“No.” Her mouth trembles, but her voice doesn’t. “I came here because I felt something waiting for me. I didn’t understand it. I didn’t even know if I believed it myself. Then I found you.”
The ache beneath my ribs becomes almost unbearable.
“I found this life. Your cottage and mine. Your brother and Scarlett. Your wolf. You.” She presses her palm flat over my heart. “And now you want to leave because Karloff says we can choose to let what we have together fade?” Her eyes harden. “No.”
“You don’t know what the bite will do.”
“Neither do you. But I won’t allow uncertainty to rule my life. I won’t allow you to push me away. Not from you.”
