We'll Be Waiting

Havermouth, Three Weeks Before

The river house was dark when Heath arrived home, and he knew by scent and the stillness that neither or his mates were there. He sat in the snug drinking whiskey and weeping, the tears tracking slowly down his face and off his chin onto his shirt in a constant stream of grief and misery.

It stung. He had begged for her to love them, and she had turned it around on him, responded with anger and vileness. It wasn’t supposed to be like this, he thought bitterly. Mates were meant to recognize each other, to want and need each other, the way he had wanted and needed Cameron and Rhett even before he was mature enough to understand the source of that craving.

Instead, they had been burdened with Aislen f-king Carter of the smart mouth, bad temper, who knew what they were, and… He felt a chill. How much did she know? He wondered. Did she know about rejecting the bond? No, he decided. She didn’t know that much, or he suspected, from her attitude, that she would