Trembling, shivering, she wrapped her arms around him and held on tight. Breathed deep the spicy, foresty smell of him, letting the sense of warmth and security and strength he exuded wash over her. Calm her.
The arms that held her so protectively were taut, and his heart was a rumble of rapid thunder in the ear she pressed hard against his chest. His anger was a cloud of red that burned her mind and stung the night, but behind it was fear. For her. The knowledge made her heart do a weird little dance.
She didn't know how long they stood there like that, holding each other in the middle of Main Street as the snow danced around them. She didn't really care, because she'd never felt so safe in her life. When he eventually pulled away, he caught her chin, directing her gaze to his.
"Was it Betise and Iyona?"
She nodded. "I doubt that it could have been anyone else, if only — "
"Tell me about it later," he cut in. "Right now, you need to get to the emergency room." He bent, swinging her up into his arms.
"I don't — "
"No arguments." His voice was almost savage. "That arm needs stitches."
She glanced down. The sleeve of her coat was ripped to shreds, and blood covered her arm and fingers. "It's not as bad as it looks."
"Maybe. But who knows what you can catch from a bite from a bitch like Betise?"
A smile played across her lips. "A rather nasty thing to say." Though as nasty comments went, she was thinking far worse.
"Right now, I'm feeling particularly nasty." He glanced at her. Though his black eyes were as unreadable as ever, something in his expression made her tremble. "You're mine, if only for the rest of this moon phase. No one attacks anything of mine and gets away with it."
His words seemed to echo through her, doing strange things to her pulse rate and her heart. Moons, it would be so easy to believe he cared. But that was something she dared not do, because it would be all too easy to fall.
If she hadn't fallen already.
She closed her eyes. No. It was the moon and the power of the man himself. Nothing more. She couldn't fall for a man like Duncan. He was everything she'd never wanted.
He strode through the night, not saying anything, just holding her with a tenderness that suggested she was precious cargo. Tears prickled her closed eyelids. She wouldn't think that. Couldn't think that. It wasn't safe.
"Safe isn't always what it's cracked up to be," he said softly. "Safe can be horribly lonely."
Which she'd discovered over the years, so why was she holding on to it so tightly? She didn't know, and that scared her almost as much as exploring what she might feel for him. She let her gaze rake the face she knew would haunt her dreams forever. "How could a relationship between us ever work?" Especially given her father's edict? "You don't want to come back to Ripple Creek, I don't really want to leave. I want a family. You want nothing more than a good time."
"All relationships must compromise to survive."
"But not all relationships are worth the effort. It's just the moon that binds us, nothing more. I can't help what I feel."
"You haven't explored what you feel." He paused as the doors to the hospital swished open. "Let's discuss this when we're alone."
"There's nothing to discuss." And there would be no later. Not for them.
Because of who he was. Because of who she was, and the way she'd been brought up. She was willing enough to shake the shackles of her parents' beliefs and rules, but she didn't want them completely out of her life. She was a wolf, and family was everything. She couldn't walk away from her parents — not forever — and if she wanted Duncan in her life that's what she would have to do. Her father had made it clear he'd forgive the moon dance, but he would not forgive a continuing dalliance with someone like Duncan.
If it came down to a choice, there really was none. To keep her family in her life, she had to stick to her original plan and walk away from him. No matter what she might feel.
No matter how much it hurt.
* * * *
Duncan paced the confines of the emergency waiting room. He itched to be a part of the posse Savannah was arranging to go after Betise and Iyona, but his first priority was Neva and her safety. But once he had her tucked securely away, he was going after the two bitches. No matter how forcefully Savannah had ordered him away. And yet even as he paced he knew the anger that burned him was not so much the need for revenge, but rather annoyance at Neva's continuing insistence that this was nothing more than a moon dance. Because of who he was. Because of what he'd done. And because of her parents.
His mother had once told him that fate had a way of catching up and making you pay. He'd thought jail time had been his punishment, but this was far worse than anything he'd faced in the few days he'd spent in jail. He'd once been sure there was never going to be anyone out there for him. To actually find her and hold her, and yet be faced with the knowledge that she might never admit to what lay between them, was surely a punishment that far outweighed any of the crimes of his past.
But as he'd told Savannah, the past was something he could do nothing about — beyond regret it. It had shaped him, had helped make him what he was today, but it wasn't who he was today. Surely time would make Neva see that. If she'd give him time. Right now, he doubted she would.
Footsteps echoed down the hall. He looked up and saw a nurse wheeling Neva towards him. Her face was pale and she looked tired, but the smile that touched her full lips made his blood surge.