of him wanted to be mad, wanted to get out of bed and leave the intoxicating warmth of her body pressed flush against his own, but then there was that other part, the overwhelming voice in his head that told him to stay, to enjoy. Take what she offered him.
And that was more than her body, he realized. This hadn’t just been about sex. There was need. In both of them. For some reason, he needed her. And he hadn’t needed anyone, hadn’t felt bonded to another soul since his mother. For years, he’d been alone and that had been just fine. Until he met Darby.
She sighed against his skin, her breath moist and warm and spiking his hunger for her all over again. She nestled herself closer. His hand moved from her hair to the warm curve of her hip. For the first time he began to think about a future after Cyprian.
He began to think of a future like this.
DARBY WOKE WITH A panicked jerk, screams reverberating in her head. It took her a moment to realize the screams weren’t her own. She shook her head, shoving tangled strands of hair from her face. Years of waking to the sound of her own screams and she couldn’t be too sure.
But these weren’t her screams. They were Aimee’s.
She and Niklas both bounded from the bed. As Niklas dove for a weapon, Darby raced from his bedroom and across the small sitting area, grateful that she’d slipped her T-shirt on during the night.
“Darby, wait!” Niklas roared, but she couldn’t wait, couldn’t stop. Not for anything. She had to reach Aimee.
Guilt stabbed her for ever leaving Aimee, for putting her own selfish desires before the child. The girl probably woke up frightened and alone. At least that was the hopeful, desperate thought that rolled feverishly through Darby’s head in the second it took her to reach Aimee’s bed. Her empty bed.
“Aimee!” She looked wildly around the room before plunging back into the sitting area. That’s when the cold hit her, penetrated her, slapping against her bare legs. Snow blew into the room like powdery smoke.
Niklas stood there, armed with a gun in each hand—staring straight ahead where the window stood open, his expression coldly blank, void of emotion. And in that moment she knew.
“Aimee,” she whispered faintly, inching forward, her bare feet sliding over the flat carpet. She shook from head to toe—and not from cold. Not from the cold at all.
Niklas’s arm shot out to stop her from going too close to the open window. She stilled, froze, but not because of him. Her own fear held her in check—fear of what she would see when she looked out that window. Of what she wouldn’t see.
Without a word, he moved to the window and peered out. And down. Four stories down.
Niklas turned and faced her. The cold look in his eyes told her everything she needed to know. Everything she couldn’t bear knowing. She closed her eyes and turned her face away, as if she could turn from the horrible truth.
Her stomach lurched and she pressed a hand to her roiling belly. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
“Darby,” he spoke her name steadily, lacking emotion, and she wondered if anything ever reached him, affected him. The violent urge to slap him seized her. Not wholly fair, but it was there nonetheless.
He slid one of his guns into his waistband and approached her, his hand reaching for her as if he would comfort her. That, she couldn’t endure.
“Darby,” he repeated her name softly, and she was flooded with the memory of their night together when that same soft voice filled her ear with intimate whispers … when she’d conveniently, selfishly forgotten all about Aimee.
She shook her head against this memory and took a step back, holding up a hand. “No, no, damnit! No!” Even now, shaken with grief for Aimee, he was still clouding her thinking.
“I’m sorry.” His voice was infuriatingly calm. “He took her. I should have seen it coming—”
“Then why didn’t you?” she lashed out, uncaring at that moment that she was being unfair.
“I should have,” he admitted even as he flinched. “They’re linked. Even more than I’m linked to him. She’s freshly infected. He’s her alpha. He sensed her … and low on pack members, it makes sense that he’d come for her. He’s desperate to grow his pack again.”
Desperate enough to claim a seven-year-old child.
“Great!” She tossed up her hands and then knotted them into fists,