“Exclude any shifters who answer yes to those questions from the meeting,” I say, “and make sure no information gets back to them. Then make your decision.” My gaze moves over Vincent and Irene, Apani and Kane. “As for me and Memnon, you already know our decision. If a fight breaks out, we will defend any shifters present at the auction as well as any other supernaturals there against their will. I hope your pack considers joining us, but if not, then I want to thank you all anyway for considering me a friend of the pack for a time. I will still always consider the Marin Pack friends of mine.”
I stand and nod to each lycan. Vincent and Irene stare at me speculatively. Apani dips her head, and Kane, Kane looks heartbroken all over again.
Nothing more to say, I head for the door. I’ve barely passed Kane when the shifter catches my wrist.
“Selene.”
I stop and turn to him, decidedly ignoring Memnon.
“Swear to me you won’t die.”
I stare down at him, and though I cannot read his mind, I can practically feel his worry and powerlessness. Kane is hemmed in by the will of his pack. And I think right now, he desperately wants to join the fight, or at least protect me from it.
Memnon’s chair scrapes back, then the sorcerer’s heavy hand falls on Kane’s shoulder.
“You’re a good man, Kane,” Memnon says, “and your protectiveness will serve you well as a leader one day. Selene cannot make you that promise any more than I can. But I can vow to you this: I will not willingly lead her to her death.”
Kane stares at me a moment longer, and I nod.
“It will be okay,” I say softly.
It’s as close to a promise as I can make, and it might not even be the truth. Because none of this is okay. Not the forced bonds, not the killings, not the auction, and not the upcoming violence.
But there’s no going back from what happened last night. Not for Memnon and not for me. The only option for either of us is to stop the Fortunas before they stop us.
And hopefully the shifters decide to help.
CHAPTER 43
I drive Memnon’s car back to his house while the sorcerer takes his motorcycle. The sky has been heavy with the scent of rain this whole evening, but it’s only once I’m on the winding mountain roads that the heavens open up.
I flick on the wipers and try to force my focus to stay purely on the road.
Unfortunately, it keeps drifting.
“Did she tell the truth?” Vincent had asked.
“As she knows it, yes,” my mate had replied.
What had he meant by that?
Memnon?
I shouldn’t be bothering him. Not when he’s traveling these same slickened roads I am. On a motorcycle. With no helmet.
Yes, est amage?
Forget it, I say.
Well, I cannot forget it now, after I’ve been teased. What is it?
I adjust my grip on the wheel. Fuck it.
Tell me something you don’t want me to know.
I ignore the twinge of guilt in my stomach that comes with the command and brace for some horrible truth.
I think about marrying you all the godsdamned time, Memnon says down our bond. I think of ways to work around our arrangement just to make it official sooner. And once you’re my wife, I plan on convincing you with gifts and food and mind-blowing sex to stay with me, in our house, forever.
I rear back in my seat. That…wasn’t the confession I was expecting. I assumed he’d tell me some scheme he’d been keeping from me, not serve me his heart on a platter. I’d almost forgotten the unbreakable oath I made to him. But Memnon hasn’t.
You didn’t want me to know that?
No, he says. He doesn’t explain himself further.
When I pull up the long driveway to Memnon’s secluded house, he’s already there, standing out in the elements, waiting for me to get to him. The rain mats his hair to his face. Distractedly, he runs a hand through the wet locks, and the sight sets my whole body on fire.
I look at him, and finally, I see him, really see him. He’s no longer just some strange menace come to haunt me. He’s my soul mate, the man whose mind reached out to mine two thousand years ago when we were both children in the ancient world. He has been my enemy recently, but he has always been my partner.
The truth of it hits me like a blow to the chest, and it’s as though I can breathe again for the first time since he reentered my life.
I turn off his car and step out of it.
My gaze moves from him to his motorcycle, then back.
I shut the car door and round the vehicle. “You’re never going to drive that motorcycle again without a helmet,” I say.
I see him shiver at the command in my voice.
He twists his lips into a smirk. “And why is that?’
He wants the answer. He’s a wolf who’s scented the truth.
I stop walking, and the two of us stare each other down.
“Because I care about you. Because you’re my soul mate,” I say. I’ve always known it, but now I accept it. I accept him. The two of us are connected by an invisible cord of magic. It mingles, his darkness tingeing my power, my light brightening his. “And I claim you as mine.”
My power flows through me, yearning for one thing, and he’s standing in front of me.
Memnon looks at me like I contain the whole world beneath my skin. “Selene.” His eyes begin to glow, and thick plumes of his magic flow out of him.
I don’t know which one of us moves first, only that we come together as the rain batters down on us.
Memnon’s mouth finds mine, even as his eyes still burn like embers. The press of his mouth is desperate, insistent, as though he might coax more truth from it.
I thread my fingers through his hair, reveling in the strange feel of his floating locks.
This is our deepest truth. That time and place can change—even life experiences can change—but we will still come together.
Memnon closes his eyes as though basking in this moment. “How I have longed to hear those words.” He presses his forehead to mine. When he opens his eyes, they are that beautiful, complicated brown once more. “I am yours, dear soul mate,” he breathes. “Always yours.”
He kisses me again, and there’s a heady rush.
The leather jacket he wears hangs open, and I push it off his shoulders. It hits the driveway with a wet plop.
I need to get closer to him. Need to feel his very essence on me and in me. There’s a hurried, almost instinctual rush to this, and I don’t know if it’s driven by my magic or my repressed feelings.
Perhaps it’s a bit of both, because when I reach the hem of his shirt, my magic has beaten me to it. It tugs the garment up, breaking our kiss. Memnon grins devilishly as my power pulls it over his head and casts it aside. Then the sorcerer’s hands and his mouth are back on mine.
His chest is deliciously warm, and I step closer into his embrace, savoring his heat and closeness.