Chose Your SIL's Pup Over Ours and Left Me to Freeze, Now Meet the Luna Who Erased Your All novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: Guests Sleep in the Guest Room

"Poor girl," Lenore said, loud and gentle, to the whole circle. "Her body hasn't caught up. It's still looking for him."

She turned the baby's face into her shoulder.

"Take him home, Lenore," Garrick said. His voice was rough.

The Beta looked from my shirt to the faces of two packs and did the arithmetic.

"The charge is withdrawn in mercy," he said. "The circle is closed. The bridge stays open for now."

For now.

Bram's coat came around my shoulders before I'd finished shaking.

He walked me down the hill without a word, with his arm across my back and his body between me and every eye.

Sinead met us at the door of the lodge and sent everyone else away.

In the kitchen, I stood in front of the stove with my arms wrapped around myself.

The wet cloth had gone cold against my chest.

I had never been so ashamed in my life.

"They'll say I'm mad," I said. "They'll say my body doesn't know he's dead."

"Let them."

"It leaked in front of two packs, Bram."

"I saw."

"Say something kind."

"I'm not going to say something kind." He came around the table. "I'm going to say what I think, and you can throw the tea at me."

I waited.

"A wolf mother knows her own pup's cry," he said. "My mother used to say it. She said you can put a hundred pups in a dark room, and the right one will bring the milk down."

My breath caught.

"And I watched Lenore's face when it happened."

"She was shocked. Anyone would be."

"She wasn't shocked. She was counting the exits."

"Don't," I said. "Don't give me hope. I can't."

"I'm not giving you anything. I'm telling you I saw it."

I put both hands over my face.

He didn't touch me.

He stood there and let me shake, and that was worse, and better.

"I'm so tired of being cold," I said, from behind my hands.

"Then be warm."

I lowered my hands.

He was close, closer than I'd realised, with his eyes dark and steady.

"Is that an offer?" I said.

"It's a fact. I have a fire, and a bed, and a roof."

"You said I was a guest."

"You said you were," he said. "I just agreed."

I laughed, and it came out wet.

I took one step.

He didn't move.

I put my palm flat on his chest, over the flannel, and felt his heart hammering up into my hand.

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