The wind made me shiver and I opened up my eyes. Sitting up, I looked around. I was in the clearing by Olivia’s house. Blinking, I tried to think of what had happened. Alpha James’s sorry attempt at the Fey Queen. Seeing Olivia fight, willing to protect me and my pack. The kiss of her mother. Her fear and then lust. Pure unadulterated lust. I swallowed and looked next to me. Olivia was curled up on her side, as naked as I was. My eyes roamed her body but narrowed when I saw a shimmering against her skin. Leaning forward, I saw her entire body from the neck down was covered in a silvery threaded pattern. Her mate bond had bloomed. Bloomed and took over her entire body. My heart hammered in my chest. What had I done? Once smelling her heat, her arousal, I had lost it. We hadn’t figured out what we were going to do yet. I pinched the bridge of my nose. My urge was to run. To shift and just run away. Looking down at my sleeping mate’s body, I sighed. I couldn’t do that. My actio

I sat in a chair staring at the cells of the two werewolves. The third was already dead in the cell next to them. He had been of no use to me. Too new to his job and had no information about Alpha James’ next moves or even where in the territory he was staying. My scouts confirmed that he wasn’t in the main city anymore. He had taken up residence elsewhere. “Dinner should be down soon. Aren’t you excited?” I growled out, smirking. Aamon had taken over and we were on day four of me torturing these assholes. I managed to get bits and pieces of information I could use but at least one of them knew where the Alpha was holed up and I was going to get my hands on him. Scott came down with a plate of food and handed it to me. I smiled and nodded, taking the silverware from him. “Alpha, Liam is here. He seems…upset over something.” I nodded. “Tell him I’ll be up once I finish my food.”  Scott nodded and

***Olivia’s POV***   The glass potion vial exploded against the wall. I screamed at the wall, knocking over the current batch of liquid still boiling on the stove. It splashed and covered my hands. Hissing, I watched as both my hands immediately turned bright red. Going over to the sink, I plunged them into the ice-cold water. It hurt and I squeezed my eyes shut. “Fucking god damn it.” They were definitely going to blister. My eyes closed and I fell back on the dining chair, staring at my hands, at the silver marks covering my arms. I didn’t want them to show on me. I didn’t want them. Not when I was going to visit my family, visit their resting place. My actions felt like betrayal. I knew it was the mate bond. I knew it was a pull that my soul wasn’t able to fight. It was more than that though and that’s what killed me. Desmond was someone I was falling for and I hated myself for it. Hated that I was even thinking about having a family.

Pulling on my platform shoes and a dress, I decided to go into town. One because I was running low on a few items and two, I thought maybe I would catch a glance of Desmond. It had been a few days. Between the time I was with Vic, to being at the house for another two days having Vic flitter around me to make sure I was okay, I needed to get out. Vic went home yesterday but I still couldn’t bring myself to venture into the twilight zone of a town. My heart hurt though. It hurt not seeing him and I knew I needed to talk to him. I would suck up my fear and I would actually talk to him. Nasir walked with me all the way to the edge of town. He also had been extra hovering lately but I knew I scared him. I apologized but there wasn’t much more I could do to make him feel better. Having bandages still on my arms didn’t really help the matter either. Meandering through the store, I picked up only a couple things that I needed. Soap, shampoo, conditioner, pasta, cans of soup

The next few days I didn’t see Desmond. He didn’t even reach out to me through the mate bond. It wasn’t cut off, he just never reached out and neither did I. I had started to avoid him. Between the shame of my own actions and the anger over his, I couldn’t face him yet. Marcus delivered a large supply of wood for me to start redoing the walls. Today was the day that I was going to start the larger part of the process. Going through, figuring out where to start and attacking the project. Dressing in my shorts and tank top, I pulled my hair up into a pony tail. Opening my door, a flash of red caught my eye. A red envelope hung from the peg that I normally would put the lantern on. Pulling the envelope down, I opened it up. There was a baggie of a blue shimmering powder and a note. ‘Video us now’ I rolled my eyes. Were they trying to be hip with the times? I stomped back into the house and pulled out the large cast iron I had. Filling it near to the top with wat