Page 29

I stop two steps above him. Close enough to touch. Close enough to see the tremor in his jaw that he’s trying to hide.

“You remember our past lives,” I say. Quiet. Not a question. The words come out shaped like a fact I’ve been assembling all evening without knowing I was assembling it. “Don’t you.”

The silence that follows is so complete I can hear the refrigerator humming in the kitchen. Darian slowly turns toward me. His hand falls from the doorknob. The hallway light catches the angle of his jaw, the way the muscle there jumps once, twice, like something behind it is trying to get out. Our eyes lock. Neither of us speaks.

I reach for him through the bond... not with words, not with questions, just with the quiet, open handed gesture of a mind turning toward another mind the way a flower turns toward light. Gentle. Patient. Offering without demanding. He opens his mind… completely. The bond floods with memories like a motion picture.

Not words spoken between us. Not the careful, measured exchange of two people choosing what to share. Something deeper. Something only true mated bonds learn over time… but our bond always seemed older. The door between us swings wide and everything behind it comes pouring through… not in a trickle, not in a stream, but in a torrent, a wall of water, and I’m standing in it and I can’t close my eyes.

My eyes begin to glow. His do the same, amber meeting green, the light filling the hallway between us like something alive. Memories.

Not mine. His. I’m seeing through his eyes now, feeling through his skin, and the first one hits me like a fist, the cell, the suppression runes pulsing green, Candice’s needle at the base of his skull, the silver racing through his nervous system like liquid ice, and then the silence. The absolute, howling silence where his wolf used to be. Half his soul. Gone.

I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I should have listened to you.

The words aren’t spoken. They’re felt. Pressed into our bond like a handprint into wet clay, and I can feel the weight of them, five years of weight, five years of a man carrying a guilt so heavy it’s reshaped his bones.

I close the distance between us. My hands find his face, thumbs tracing the sharp lines of his jaw, and he flinches, not from pain, but from the tenderness itself, like he'd forgotten what gentleness felt like. His skin is warm under my palms, rough with stubble, and I feel the bond pulse between us like a second heartbeat waking up.

"I'm here," I whisper. "We're here."

His hands come to my waist, hesitant at first, fingers curling into the fabric of his oversized shirt I'm wearing. Then gripping. Hard. Like I might dissolve if he doesn't hold on tight enough. The bond between us pulses warm, alive, no longer a wound but a heartbeat. I feel his relief through it, the way it floods his system, loosens something in his chest that's been clenched for years. His shoulders drop. His breath stutters out of him.

I kiss him.

It starts soft, a question, a confirmation. His lips are warm, slightly chapped, and they move against mine like he's relearning the shape of me. My fingers slide into his hair, and he makes a sound low in his throat, something between a groan and a sob that vibrates against my mouth.

"Arlene," he breathes against my lips. My name sounds different now, lighter, like he's finally allowed to say it without the weight of grief behind it.

I pull back just enough to look at him. The hallway light catches the tears tracking down his cheeks, and I wipe them away with my thumbs.

"No more," I tell him. "No more silence. No more running."

He nods, swallows hard, and then his mouth is on mine again, hungrier. His tongue slides against mine, and the bond flares hot between us, golden light pulsing through my chest. I feel it everywhere, my nipples tightening under the soft cotton, heat pooling low in my belly, my skin prickling with the electric tingle of the mate bond waking up after years of dormancy. Every nerve ending lights up like he's running current through me.

His hands slide under the hem of the shirt, palms flat against my bare skin, and the touch sends shivers cascading down my spine. I gasp into his mouth. His fingers trace up my sides, slow, reverent, mapping the territory he thought he'd lost forever. He reaches the curve of my ribs, and I shudder.

"Off," I murmur, tugging at the shirt. "Darian, off."

He pulls it over my head in one motion, and the cool hallway air hits my bare skin for half a second before his mouth is on me. He kisses down my throat, my collarbone, and when his lips find the crescent moon scar, he stops. His breath hitches. He presses his mouth to it, and the bond pulses so hard I see white.

"Mine," he growls against my skin. "Always."

His mouth travels lower. He cups my breast, thumb brushing over my peaked nipple, and I arch into his hand. He leans down and drags his tongue across the tight bud, slow, deliberate, and my knees buckle. His other arm catches me around the waist, holding me up.

"Don't you dare stop," I breathe.

He takes my nipple into his mouth, sucking gently at first, then harder, rolling the other between his thumb and forefinger. The dual sensation rockets through me, wet heat on one side, firm pressure on the other, and I dig my fingers into his shoulders. The bond hums with every pull of his mouth, every flick of his tongue, golden thread vibrating tight between us.

He switches sides, and I whimper. Actually whimper. His tongue circles my nipple before he sucks it into his mouth, and my head falls back against the wall. I'm wet. Soaked. I can feel it on my thighs.

"Darian... please."

He kisses down my stomach, dropping to his knees on the carpet, and his hands grip my hips. He looks up at me, and his eyes are dark, almost black, the amber swallowed by something primal. He presses his mouth to the inside of my thigh, and my legs shake.

"I need to taste you," he says. "I need to know you're real."

His tongue finds me, and the world whites out. He licks my pussy, slow, thorough, like he's memorizing me. My hands fly to his hair, gripping hard. He groans against me, and the vibration sends a jolt through my clit that makes my vision blur. His tongue circles, then dips inside, then drags back up to that tight bundle of nerves. He sucks gently, and my hips buck against his face.