She finished dressing slowly, taking the extra time to steel herself. It was insane to feel as though she’d done something wrong, but that didn’t change facts.
She felt like hell.
Shut up, Carmen. It was karmic payback for sniping at Alec every time he pulled away, unwilling to take advantage of her heightened instinctive drives. He’d only been trying to do what was right, what was best.
I need you to be all right. I need to keep you safe.
Best for her, not himself, and that was the key. She climbed the stairs, her mind racing. Alec would hurt himself before he hurt her, and it was more than a platitude or something he’d try to do, except when he f**ked up.
It was who he was.
Alec wasn’t upstairs, but the pretty brunette who’d picked Kat up from the clinic sat at the kitchen table, fidgeting. Carmen smiled and hoped she’d already stopped visibly shaking. “Hi, Mackenzie.”
“Hey. Good to see you again.”
“Want some coffee? I could make some.” It probably wouldn’t help Mackenzie’s fidgeting, but it would keep them both from sitting at the table, twiddling their thumbs. “I get the feeling it might be a long night.”
“Sure, coffee’s great.” Mackenzie rocked to her feet. “I would have already made some but I don’t know where anything is in Alec’s kitchen. Or if he has coffee.”
“After the last few days, I’ve figured out the lay of the land.” She rinsed and filled the carafe. “If I hadn’t, by Alec’s own admission, I would have starved by now.”
“Yeah, I get the impression Alec eats a lot of takeout. God knows no one would deliver all the way out here. He’s pretty well in the middle of nowhere.”
Carmen paused in the act of settling a fresh filter into the pot. “I have no idea where we are. South of the city?”
“Southwest.” Mackenzie hesitated. “You were pretty out of it, I guess. But you seem to be doing a lot better.”
“I don’t think it worked,” she confessed. “Or maybe it did, it’s just not finished. The witch said she needed more time.”
Mackenzie hopped up onto the counter and crossed her legs, bouncing one foot so that her sandal dangled. “I’m not a magical expert or anything, but based on my experience, you’d know. I had some big badass spell cast on me to keep me from shifting, and when it started to fall apart….. Well, there weren’t exactly lucid periods. First I tried climbing the walls, then I tried climbing Jackson.”
Suppressing the blush that rose was impossible, so Carmen kept her gaze riveted to the coffee maker. “The, uh, climbing. Yeah, I’m familiar with that part. What happened to you…..afterward?”
“They had to reinforce the spell, but the second it was gone, I shifted. I couldn’t have stopped it.”
It sounded nothing like the way she’d had to strain and grasp for the slightest flicker of magic. “Definitely not, then.”
“Well, congrats.” Mackenzie hesitated, her foot frozen mid-bounce. “Right?”
“Right.” Even as she spoke, Carmen shook away the tiny, inexplicable frisson of doubt that rose. “Right. I mean, this isn’t something I would have chosen.”
“Then it’s good. And the rest will shake itself out.”
“Of course it will.” Carmen leaned one hip against the counter. “Are Jackson and Alec outside?”
“Yeah. Jackson’s got Kat on the phone about something and Alec’s dealing with…..”
“Oh.” She grasped the edge of the counter and tried not to babble. “Seems like I should help him, doesn’t it? They came here because of me. Alec wouldn’t have two dead people in his front yard if it wasn’t for me.”
“That’s not—” Mackenzie leaned forward and dropped a hand to Carmen’s shoulder. “I don’t know if this is going to make you feel better or worse, but either way you deserve to hear it. This isn’t anything new for him.”
Another warning. “Don’t worry, Alec’s already taken pains to explain to me exactly what his life is like. I know.”
“Then let him take care of it. Let him do what’s going to put him on solid footing.”
She’d spent years avoiding her father’s family and all other lasting connections to wolf society. Yet here she was, with a man who knew nothing else, treading the line between casual involvement and something that could change her life.
Carmen didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Mackenzie slid off the counter a second before the front door swung open. “I’m going to go check on Jackson.”
Which meant it was Alec coming through the door. “Later, Mackenzie.” Carmen ran her hands through her hair and reached into the cabinet for two mugs.
Footsteps sounded behind her, but Alec didn’t touch her before he spoke. “You okay?”
She turned to face him, and her heart skipped at the implacable look on his face. “I think so. What about you?”
He shrugged one shoulder, then looked away. “Nothing kills a hard-on like burying bodies.”
Harsh words that covered something, though Carmen couldn’t tell what. She reached back and gripped the edge of the counter to steady herself. “I could have done it.”
“It’s not—” Alec sighed. “I’m sorry. That was a shitty thing to say.”
The space between them was more than physical, a palpable emotional distance that left her feeling awkward. “Do you want me to go?”
“I don’t want you to.” That at least had the emotional punch of honesty, but it didn’t erase the tension vibrating off him. “I think—I think maybe you need to, though. Franklin can keep an eye on you, and I’ll be a lot more effective at finishing this shit with your family once I’ve got my head on straight.”
“Once you—” Once she was gone, and he didn’t have to think about her anymore. Carmen shivered and crossed her arms over her chest. “That’s it, huh?”
“It has to be it.” He took a step toward her, filling the small kitchen with the intensity of his power. “When you’re in a room, seventy-five percent of me is focused on you. The rest of the world might as well not be there. I can’t be effective like this. I can’t protect you.”
He’d already told her that was what he needed more than anything. More than being close to her. “I understand.”
“It’s not about you. You get that, don’t you?”
“Yeah.” If anything, it made it hurt worse. He wasn’t pushing her away because she wasn’t what he wanted, or because they didn’t fit. She simply wasn’t worth fighting for. “I’m not going to sit around, Alec, waiting to be convenient for you. If I leave, I’m moving on.”
It hurt him, and he couldn’t hide it. But he didn’t admit it, either. “This isn’t how I wanted it to go. I wanted—” A breath. His shoulders slumped. “Doesn’t really matter what. My life’s never going to be safe. There’s always another crisis.”
Then you’re always going to be hiding. She didn’t want to torture either of them, so she took a step toward the door. “I hope you find—” The hard lump that formed in her throat choked off the words.
He stared at her in anguished silence until the front door crashed open. Mackenzie strode in, bright-eyed and smiling and riding a wave of sympathy. “Hey, Alec. Sorry, should have knocked, but Jackson’s got some stuff for you in the car and it can’t wait.”
Alec pivoted and leveled a glare on her, one so sharp it should have flayed her skin. Mackenzie just stared back, completely unperturbed—and clearly unwilling to leave. After a tense few moments, Alec stalked past her, pausing at the door to look at Carmen. “I’ll be right back.”
It didn’t matter, because she wouldn’t be there, even if it meant she had to walk home. “Excuse me, Mackenzie. I have to pack my things.”
Alec slammed the door behind him.
“Well.” Mackenzie folded her arms over her chest and eyed Carmen. “I’ll hit him, if it makes you feel better. Probably won’t do much damage, but it pisses the hell out of him that I’m faster than he is.”
Of course Mackenzie would have heard. Carmen flushed and shook her head. “I just need to go. Can you give me a ride?”
“Not a problem. I’ll even help you pack.”
The faster she could leave, the better. Maybe, if Carmen was lucky, the other woman wouldn’t want to talk about it, and she could lock down until she got home.
She just had to make it home.
Alec talked to Jackson long enough to make sure he and Mackenzie would get Carmen home safely. Then he got in his truck and drove.
The coward’s way out, but he was feeling cowardly. Way too weak to watch Carmen pack her things and walk out of his life, even if letting her was the right thing to do. It had been so clear outside, with the stench of death in the air and the proof of danger at his feet. Carmen needed to be safe, and she wouldn’t be safe around him. No woman ever had been.
But when she looked at him…..
He drove twenty miles before he was sure he could relax without turning the truck around and going back to stop her. His wolf clawed at him, furious that he’d let the female they both craved slip through his fingers. There’d been a hunt. A chase. So close to claiming her, and now she was gone, and they were alone.
Always alone.
At least someone else understood his pain. He called Andrew from fifteen minutes outside of town. A half an hour later they faced each other across the wooden floor of Zola’s second-floor sparring area.
Words weren’t important. They’d never needed them anyway, not when Andrew had been reborn with instincts as overpowering as Alec’s own. Usually those instincts gave Alec the advantage, but today they felt fuzzy, compromised by his need for Carmen and the lack of her ripping its way into his soul, like she’d taken chunks of him with her when she’d gone.