by Sarah Piper
“So what do I do, Meelo?” she asked, her voice cracking on my old nickname. “Let you in, even after everything?”
“I can’t answer that for you, Lainey.” I pressed a kiss to her hand. “But I’m glad you want to try.”
“But where do we go from here?”
“Nowhere. We just stay here. Right here. Take it day by day. Maybe one of those days, we’ll find the first crack in the wall.” I smiled, reaching up to smooth away the last of her tears. “Or maybe you’ll get tired of me and decide to add some more bricks, make it even stronger, add some turrets and battlements on the top, a couple of armed guards, a canon, a cauldron of boiling oil…”
“Okay, okay, I get it.” She rolled her big brown eyes, a faint smile touching her lips. “You watched too much American TV as a child. I tried to warn Mamá, but she never listened.”
“Day by day,” I repeated, my tone serious again. “Fair enough?”
She tucked her hair behind her ears and nodded, her smile growing a fraction wider. “Day by day. Yes, I think I can manage that,” she said, and the heaviness that had descended between us dissipated in an instant, burned away like fog in the morning sun.
“He’s awake?” A familiar voice called out from the doorway, and I turned to find my brujita, tears filling her eyes as she clasped her hand over her mouth, just like my sister had done. It made me smile.
“And doing much better now that you’re here,” Elena teased. “Hmm. Look at that color in his cheeks! It’s like someone just flipped him over and gave him a shot of adrenaline right in the—”
“Arm,” I finished for her.
“Sure, Meelo. If you say so.” She gave me a wink, smoothing her hand over my cheek once more.
“I’m… I’m sorry,” Gray said. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. I can come back later.”
“Don’t be silly.” Elena rose from her chair and stretched. “We were just finishing up.”
“For now,” I reminded her.
“Sí, mi hermano. For now.” She smiled one more time, her eyes bright, her shoulders squared. It was like a weight had been lifted, one we’d both been carrying for far too long.
I didn’t dare admit it out loud, but that smile of hers did more to heal my wounds than all the medicine and bandages in the world. For the first time in twenty years, Elena had given me hope that she might one day forgive me. And in that forgiveness was the seed of something even more powerful: if my sister could find a way to forgive me after everything I’d done, maybe I could find a way to forgive myself, too.
“Elena,” I called out, just as she reached the door.
She squeezed Gray’s hand, then turned to look at me over her shoulder. “Sí?”
“Empanadas for dinner tonight. Lots of ‘em. Piles and piles. With extra chimichurri.”
“So demanding, this wolf! As if I’m his personal chef!” She let out a put-upon huff, but I saw the covert little wink she’d flashed at Gray, and I knew without a doubt there’d be a feast waiting for me tonight.
Fifteen
GRAY
It’d been so long since I’d heard Emilio’s voice, I was afraid this was just another dream. Tentatively I reached out to stroke his cheek, rough with several days’ worth of stubble. His black hair was getting long, curling over the tops of his ears in a way I suspected he’d hate if he could actually see it, but to me he was beautiful. Warm and alive and really, truly here.
“No need to wait for an invitation, querida.” He opened his arms, waving me in for a hug despite the bandages wrapped around his chest. “I know you want a piece of this.”
“But your injuries…”
“Paper cuts compared to how it feels not being able to hold you. Especially when you’re standing right next to me, smelling like strawberries and sunshine and everything I want to be close to for the rest of my life.”
His voice had faded to a whisper, his eyes serious and intense, and in that moment every last protest died on my lips. I leaned in close and buried my face against his chest, not bothering to keep the tears in check. They soaked right down through his bandages—tears of relief, tears of joy, tears of love, tears for every emotion I’d been struggling to keep in check since the moment I’d seen him fall beneath Orendiel’s silver blade.
“Don’t you ever scare me like that again,” I whispered.
He cupped the back of my head. His hand was big and warm and strong, and right now, it felt like the only thing keeping me from falling off the edge of the earth.
He was here. He was really, truly here.
“I’ll do my best, mi brujita.”
“That’s not good enough.” I lifted my head so I could look into his eyes. “I’m serious, Emilio. What we’re building here… It doesn’t work without you. I don’t work without you.”
He said nothing at that, only nodded, the depths of his brown eyes so beautiful it almost hurt to look at them. I leaned in close, brushing my lips across his mouth, my kiss as gentle as a breeze.
But before I could pull back, his hands were in my hair again, holding me close as he deepened our kiss. I parted my lips, and his tongue swept across mine, unleashing a soft moan from deep inside me as his sweetness flooded my senses.
It was so precious, so special. And I’d come so close to losing it.
Never again.
Without breaking the kiss, I slid into the bed beside him, leaning against his body, threading my hands into his hair. Heat emanated from his skin, and I breathed in his vanilla-and-pine scent, welcomed the scratch of his stubble against my chin, memorizing every sensation. This kiss was the first of the rest of our lives, the second-chance welcome-back embrace I’d been dreaming about, and I intended to carry it with me always. Forever.
He shifted beside me, pulling my leg across his hips, his hand sliding up the back of my thigh. God, I’d missed his touch, missed the feeling of being small and safe and well-protected in the arms of my big, muscular wolf, and under his powerful grip, it wasn’t long before I’d forgotten all about his injuries.
We kissed long and hard, slow and sensual, teasing and gentle, every kind in every way until I could no longer feel my lips. When we finally broke for air, I turned over on my back, my head bent against his, staring at the ceiling and thanking all the forces of the universe for making this possible.
“Now look what you’ve done, brujita,” Emilio teased.
I followed the line of his gaze down to the sheet draped over his hips, now tenting upward.
“Hmm.” I nuzzled his neck. “That looks… uncomfortable.”
“I’m not so sure about that. Would you like to try it on and find out?”
“Please.” I laughed. “Spare me the crass jokes. Now you sound like Asher.”
“Hey, I faced down Death and got another chance. If you think I’m going to waste any more time holding back my thoughts—even the dirty ones…” He turned toward me and kissed me again, a soft moan rumbling in his chest.
Desire flooded my core, but I didn’t dare act on it. I’d just gotten him back, and from the dark circles under his eyes, I could tell he still needed a lot of rest.
The patient himself, however, had other plans.
“What do you think, doc?” he asked, turning on his hip. His hard length pressed against my outer thigh, and it took every ounce of willpower I had not to slide my hand beneath the sheet and touch him. “Is this wolf cleared for physical activity?”
“I’m not a doctor, Emilio,” I said.
“Maybe not. But you can definitely make things better for me.”
I gave him a playful eye-roll. “Who is this wise-cracking, innuendo-dropping beast in my bed, and what have you done with sweet, kind Emilio Alvarez?”
“You really want to know? Fine. I’ve fallen in love with a bruja, that’s what I’ve done.” His voice dropped to a sultry whisper as he traced my lips with his fingertip. “And nothing will ever be the same again.”
I gave in to the magnetic pull of his words, his eyes,
leaning into his embrace once again. Each kiss was deliberate now, intense, as if he were kissing me for the very last time and wanted to memorize the taste of me.
“I thought I’d never see you again, Gray,” he whispered. “That night in the warehouse… It’s a blur. But you were there. With me every step. I thought—”
“Shhh.” I kissed him again, too scared to go down this path, to rehash the moment Orendiel’s blade cut through the air, to revisit everything that had come after. But it was too much to hold back, and seconds later, I was breaking our kiss, my heart twisting, my eyes filling with tears at what tonight would feel like if he hadn’t made it back. “I know,” I said. “I know, because that night, when I saw the blood… I thought I’d never hold you like this again, or kiss you or watch the moonrise or eat a whole pan of brownies with you. It all happened so fast, and then Ronan was shouting at me to get the others to safety, and I just…”
I trailed off and closed my eyes, the memories still so fresh, so present.
“I’m so sorry, querida. To put you through that… I never… It was stupid.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for, Emilio. You were there to help our friends. To liberate innocent witches. To help us restore the balance of power to our communities. You’re a hero. You know that, right?”
“Hero? I could’ve ruined the entire mission.” He shook his head, his earlier humor receding. “I was a fool. I left myself wide open for the attack—rookie mistake. But I saw Elena in the line of fire, and in that moment, all I could think about was saving her. I couldn’t let her fall, Gray.” His jaw flexed, his eyes going to some faraway place I couldn’t see. “Not there. Not again.”
“Not… again?” I placed my hand over his heart, my brow creased with confusion. “What do you mean?”
“Hmm?” He shifted his gaze back to mine, his eyes cloudy. Perhaps he hadn’t meant to say all of that out loud, but now that he had, there was no taking it back.
“You said you couldn’t let her fall again,” I said.
“I… I did.” He sat up higher in the bed, sliding an arm beneath my head, but not meeting my eyes. Instead, he watched the window, the snowflakes piling high along the bottom edge. It was a Darkwinter-induced storm, they’d told me. Fae magic meant to isolate the residents of Blackmoon Bay. Eventually, it would do the same thing here.
But right now, safe in the arms of my wolf, I thought it was beautiful.
After what felt like hours, Emilio leaned over and kissed the top of my head. Then, speaking softly into my hair, “Do you know why I became a cop, querida?”
I shifted onto my hip, trying to look into his eyes, but he was back to watching the snow fall.
“We never really talked about it,” I said. “I guess I just figured you wanted to help people. Supernaturals, especially.”
“I did. I do,” he said. “And I’m good at it, Gray. I feel like I’m really, truly meant for this work.”
“I know you are.”
“But that’s not why I do it.”
I waited, slipping my hand beneath the sheet to find his. He laced our fingers together, and I squeezed him tight, sensing that he needed the reassurance.
“I… I’m atoning,” he said. “I never put it into words before, but I see that now. I wanted to help our kind in Blackmoon Bay because I couldn’t help them in Mendoza.”
“Atoning? That’s a strong word, Emilio.”
“Not strong enough.”
“But… atoning for what?”
He finally tore his gaze away from the window, turning to look at me once again. What I saw was shocking; there was so much pain and regret in his eyes, it scared the hell out of me. This man had faced death, come back from it. Yet whatever he was thinking about now had been more traumatic than even that. I had never seen him so wounded. So ashamed.
“Emilio,” I whispered, squeezing his hand even tighter. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Do you remember that night,” he said, “when we got the call about Reva? When you and Elena were having a midnight snack?”
“Of course.” I was still carrying the weight of my conversation with Elena—the things she’d revealed to me. Even after everything we’d endured since that night, her story still haunted me.
Her husband—her true mate—had been slaughtered, along with her three-year-old child.
“She told me that her husband and daughter had been killed,” I told him, though I suspected he’d heard as much. He’d interrupted us to tell us about a call from the RCPD—that Reva was waiting for us at the station. Still, it seemed like he needed me to say it again. To make absolutely sure I knew where the rest of this conversation was headed. “She said the two of you barely escaped Argentina with your lives. That even your parents… Everyone… I’m so sorry, Emilio.”
My words were useless, but I had to say them. I was sorry. They’d lost their parents, their family, their pack. Sometimes I wondered how they even found the strength to get out bed in the morning.
“We lost everyone we loved except each other,” Emilio confirmed. “But Elena… Did she tell you why?”
“Not specifically. Just that your pack had been betrayed.”
“It’s true,” he said, and by the sadness in his voice, I suddenly knew what was coming next, even before he said the words. I wanted to press my fingers to his lips and stop him, to kiss away his confessions before they escaped, to preserve his and Elena’s private grief and the trauma of what was obviously a very personal, very terrible situation.
But when he met my eyes again, I saw the truth: Emilio needed to say these words. To confess.
Perhaps, I realized, it was the very first time he’d ever felt able to do so.
“Our pack was betrayed, querida,” he said. “By me.”
Sixteen
RONAN
“These roads are absolute shite,” Beaumont grumbled.
“Be glad you’re not the one driving.” I took my foot off the gas again and peered out the windshield, trying to keep a little distance between our vehicle and the taillights in front of us—the van Lansky and Jael were in. But the task was proving futile. They were sliding around as much as we were, and even though the plows had been through recently, the snow was accumulating faster than they could keep up.
“This is insane,” Haley said from the backseat. “I’ve never seen so much snow.”
“That’s because it’s totally un-fucking-natural.” I clicked on the wipers, trying in vain to keep my view clear, but it was useless. The snow was falling in big gobs, reflecting the light from our headlights until it looked like we were doing warp speed through outer space. The woods didn’t help—the pines were several stories tall, their branches thick with heavy, wet snow, blocking out any ambient light we might’ve picked up from neighboring towns.
Our plans to lure the Darkwinter Knights out of the Bay had been temporarily put on hold in light of the crazy storm, and for the last couple of days our focus had been shoring up the house and making sure we had the supplies we needed to wait out the weather.
The five of us had just finished up a major supply run in Baldersville, a few towns down the highway from the Cape, middle of fucking nowhere. We’d tried all the stores in town closer to Elena’s place, but they’d already been cleaned out. Same story everywhere we stopped along the highway until we’d gone about two hours out of our way and spotted a well-lit plaza with a couple of big chain stores—it’d felt like a fucking oasis in the desert, and we dove right in. The weather hadn’t been as bad down there, either. But now that we were getting closer to the Cape again, forced onto the backroads due to highway closures, it was a frozen shitshow nightmare.
“I’m starting to think we might need a contingency plan,” Beaumont said as I slowed down again. We were only doing about fifteen miles an hour now, crawling like sloths along the road, our little caravan the only fuckers crazy enough to venture out on a night like this. But we had no choice—with so many people staying at Elena’s, we
couldn’t risk running low on anything, especially with this insane fae-mojo weather. “Maybe we should find a place to stop for the night.”
“And day,” I reminded him. “If we stop now, we won’t be able to leave again until the sun goes down tomorrow.”
“Better delayed and safe than frozen solid,” he said.
“Look around. There’s no guarantee this is going to lighten up. For all we know, conditions will be a hundred times worse tomorrow night.”
“It pains me to say this,” he grumbled, “but you make a fair point.”
“Hey. We’ll make it,” I assured him. “Elena will beat our assess if we don’t. She’s got a whole feast planned, and I’m already working on my toast.”
We’d just finished loading up the vans with everything on our list—bottled water, flashlights and batteries, matches, candles, every kind of food imaginable, blankets, sheets, pillows, air mattresses, extra clothing, coats, boots, winter gear, toiletries, paper products, herbs and crystals for some more warding magic, and of course, the all-important cases of booze everyone had begged for—when I’d gotten Elena’s call. All five of us whooped and cheered in the parking lot at the welcome news that our wolf pup was awake and finally out of the woods.
Haley had insisted on running back into the plaza for a get-well gift, despite the fact that Emilio had already gotten well. Still, she’d gone ahead anyway, coming back out fifteen minutes later looking like a walking hospital gift shop. The woman had picked out at least four dozen roses in just about every color of the rainbow, all arranged in a giant vase she could barely get her arms around, three big-ass “Get Well” helium balloons trailing behind her. Looped over her elbows were two more shopping bags—one full of stuffed animals, the other crammed with boxes of chocolate-covered, well, everything.
“Seriously, Hay? Seriously?”
“What?” she’d asked, taking her time arranging all that shit in the back seat. “He was practically in a coma. He needs to be surrounded by bright, cheery things. Plus, he loves chocolate. Everyone knows that.”