He howled his pain to the sky and ran until his muscles clenched in pain from being overused. Hours later, he stared down at her while she slept. He’d have to fix her door tomorrow. The lock was broken, which was probably how Terrance had gotten in so easily.
She moaned as a scowl marred her delicate features. She was dreaming. Then an idea hit him. He turned to leave, but couldn’t resist fingering a soft curl before heading back to the barn. He would find a way to make her want him again, make her understand that they were meant for one another.
Chapter Twelve
“It’s beautiful.” Myka watched the slow rise of the sun above the tree line from the pasture fence.
“Yes. It is,” Galen agreed softly.
She spun around.
“I didn’t mean to startle you,” he said.
“Why do you keep showing up in my dreams?”
“We are connected by fate. We share a bond that can never be broken.”
“No.” She turned back around to face the sunrise.
“It’s the truth, but it can’t force you to be with me. Nor would I. But I won’t deny I will never quit trying to convince you that we belong together.”
“I’m scared . . . confused . . . worried. I don’t know how to handle this. I’m going to become something I only thought existed in fairy tales.” She shrugged. “When will it happen? Can I choose to stop it? Is there anything I can do to make this all go away?”
He leaned against the fence beside her. “You will change for the first time during the next full moon. You have no choice the first time. After that, you can decide when or if you want to shift again. Although I won’t lie. Your wolf will call to you no matter how hard you try to ignore it. It will become a part of you.”
“Why? Why did this have to happen?” She took in a shuddering breath. There was no way to stop what she would soon become.
“Will you ever be able to forgive me, Myka? I never meant for this to happen. I would never hurt you in any way.”
After everything that had happened, in her heart, she knew that to be the one thing true no matter what. He would never hurt her. Not intentionally.
“I’m beyond frightened right now. I don’t know what to do.”
He gently urged her into his arms, and she quietly sobbed against the warm comfort of his wide chest. Why did the one man she’d fallen in love with have to be a werewolf? Why couldn’t he have been a normal person with a normal life? The answer was simple. She would have been bored with a normal man. Galen could show her a whole new world. Maybe she was viewing all of this the wrong way.
“It’s okay. Everything will be all right. I’ll be here with you every step of the way. I’ll help you. I love you, angel.”
“Since you told me I won’t be dangerous to Patrick, I assume I’ll have control over what I’m doing once I . . . I can’t say it.”
He stroked her back. “You won’t be any different than you are now. You won’t do anything as the wolf that you wouldn’t do as a human. Your wolf and human sides will both be conscious of one another at all times no matter what form you are in. The biggest changes you will notice are your heightened senses and strength. You’ll be faster, stronger. Your hearing, taste, smell, sight will all be enhanced. Your instincts will become more honed. Best of all, if you get hurt, you will heal when you shift.”
“Seriously?” She looked up at him.
“Yes.” He smiled.
“I wasn’t imagining it,” she said quietly.
“Imagining what?”
“You were hurt. When Terrance had me, you were bruised and bloody, but after I woke up in your arms, you looked fine. You were still covered in dirt, and strangely naked, but not hurt.” Her mouth fell open. “They hurt you, and you changed and healed yourself.”
“Yes.”
She stared at him for several long minutes before finally asking, “From the very first day we met, you knew I was your mate. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“How do you walk up to someone and say, ‘Hi. I’m Galen. And by the way, I’m a lycan, and you are my mate. Will you let me change you and spend the rest of your life with me?’ I was going to tell you, but we were interrupted. Remember?” He frowned. “Your life span will be”—he cleared his throat—”a bit longer as well.”
“How much longer? How old are you?”
“Do you really want me to answer? Because I won’t lie to you, but you already have a lot to handle.”
“How old are you?” she asked firmly again.
“Five hundred, give or take a few years.”
She gasped, stepped back, then slowly covered her mouth with her hand. After several seconds, she looked up at him.
“I’m going to outlive Patrick?”
He grimaced and nodded.
“After he grows up, can we change him if he chooses?”
“No. Only a potential mate can be turned. Patrick would not change if bitten. He could even possibly develop an infection from the bite.”
“No! This is not fair. How am I supposed to be expected to watch him die one day?”
“Myka.” He took her by the shoulders. “It won’t happen for a long, long time. Death is something we all have to deal with. You can’t imagine how lonely my life has been. You can’t imagine how happy I was when I found someone who I wouldn’t eventually have to watch die.”
Now she was beginning to understand Galen better. He’d always had an edge about him. Always seemed to be friendly, yet kept a distance from others. He shielded himself from getting close to others because he knew one day he’d lose them. She couldn’t imagine how many people he’d cared about that he’d lost in his long lifetime.
Her chest ached thinking about all of the pain he must have endured. Now he’d found her, and she wanted to leave him too. But she couldn’t deny the part of her that felt betrayed. Although he did have a point. He couldn’t exactly have walked up to her after their first meeting and expected her to believe that he was a lycan. And he had been about to tell her before they’d been ambushed.
“When you say you are here in my dream because we are connected, what exactly does that mean?”
“When we are together in our dreams, it is real. This is real. Everything we experience is real. But only the memories of what happens here—nothing physical—can be carried back when we awake. And while it is possible to carry real injuries we might have sustained while awake into our dreams, once we realize we are dreaming, those physical limitations disappear here as well. Nothing physical—tangible—can travel between the two.”
“How am I supposed to wrap my mind around all of this? What am I supposed to do?”