And Dog was right. There were far too many upper-hierarchy Breeds here and one more important to him than all the others.
“I heard the rumors,” Dog stated then. “But until now, I never believed them.”
“And what rumors would those be?” Stilling the anger that threatened to bloom inside him wasn’t easy.
“The rumors that you used to be in love with her.”
Dane straightened slowly. “That will teach you to listen to rumors.”
Tossing the cigar into the narrow disposal unit, he strode quickly away from the Coyote and the hotel, heading to the parking lot and the vehicle he kept parked there.
He didn’t “used to be” anything, he thought furiously as he shoved his hands into the pockets of his slacks and let the darkness enfold him.
He loved her then, he loved her now, and he feared he would always love her even more in the future.
She was his weakness, and he didn’t dare allow anyone to learn that secret.
Not again.
CHAPTER 27
Rule would have missed it if Lawe hadn’t forced him to stop, forced him to use his senses and the knowledge he’d gained over the months where his incredible little mate was concerned. And Lawe wouldn’t have known if Cassie, God bless her heart, hadn’t contacted him just before Rhyzan had allowed Gypsy to overhear the cruel, destructive words that had spewed from her mother’s lips.
As Gypsy had stood still, her gaze locked on the shattered screen, the soul of the woman he realized was more than just his soul ruptured in such agonizing knowledge that Rule wanted to howl with fury. Riding quick on its heels was something far more dangerous, more destructive than her pain, though. The link he hadn’t known he’d established within the stubborn, independent little hellion snapped quietly, so naturally going into effect that if Lawe hadn’t forced him to wait for it, he might not have realized it was there until too late.
And he would have missed perhaps the second most important moment of not just his life, but also Gypsy’s.
Gypsy had realized something far more than her mother’s belief that the daughter had been the cause of the son’s death.
She had realized something far more dangerous, to herself.
Turning down the hall to their suite nearly an hour later, Rule watched with narrowed eyes as Lawe stood outside his door with several other Breeds.
He could feel Gypsy tensing, uncertainty rising within her as Lawe nodded to the nearest enforcer. The Wolf stepped to the door, unlocked it quickly and pushed it open.
“I need to talk to Kandy,” Gypsy protested, though only halfheartedly, he realized as he dragged her into the room.
The door closed behind them.
“To tell her good-bye?” Using his hold on her wrist, he swung her into his embrace, one hand going to the back of her neck to ensure that his gaze met hers as she stared up at him in surprise.
And in an undercurrent of nervous suspicion.
“Good-bye?” Bravado suddenly gleamed in her eyes. “Why would I need to tell her good-bye?”
“What did you remember, Gypsy, that has you steeling yourself to die?” he asked, rather than answering her question. “Why did I suddenly sense the fifteen-year-old child you once were, filled with such guilt and self-hate, suddenly still, before she winked away as though she had never existed? Did she finally realize that what happened that night wasn’t her fault?” His head lowered, his lips pulling back from his teeth furiously. “Did she finally figure out that the same person might have betrayed her and her brother both?”
...
How had he known? How could he know?
Gypsy stared back at the Breed whose presence in her life had changed so many things, too many things too fast; she felt a part of her soul that lay so undefended, so raw and bleeding since the moment she realized who and what had taken a child’s only security, fill with something so much stronger, so much more intuitive than anything she had ever known.
Suddenly everything was more intense, more intent.
Each sound, each scent, the brush of air across her flesh, the heat of her mate’s body next to hers, the feel of him, inside her spirit, where none should exist but herself.
Yet Rule was there. A comfort. A strength that grounded her as nothing had ever grounded her before.
She couldn’t tear her gaze from him.
Gypsy felt her breathing slowly even, felt the heartbeat that she hadn’t known had been racing with fear suddenly slow and calm.
“Lawe and I survived because of a bond no one knew we had,” he growled, satisfaction glittering in his eyes as that presence inside her refused to vacate. “Because we could strengthen each other. Because we could open ourselves, allow each other in, and whether the strength we needed was physical or psychological, we could provide it. Until he mated. Until I realized he was building a much stronger, much more intuitive bond with the woman he called his mate.”
She shook her head, emotions rioting through her as she realized there was nothing she could hide from this man, this Breed. There was nothing she could do to hide from him, and nothing she could do to protect him.
She couldn’t push him out. She couldn’t hold on to the fear, the driving fury or the hunger for vengeance. She couldn’t shut that inner, emotional door on the Breed who had stood by her side since the night she had stared across a crowded bar into his eyes . . .
“Far longer than that,” he revealed as her eyes widened in disbelief. “I’ve been by your side, Gypsy, since you were fifteen years old. If not I, then later, Cullen Maverick. Or should I say, the Bengal Judd.”
He knew what she had suspected? That Cullen Maverick was the Breed Jonas searched so desperately for?
Gypsy shook her head, her breathing roughening. “No . . .”
“Your contact is the Bengal Judd, Gypsy,” he told her quietly, his expression filled with such emotion that she had no idea how to combat it. “I may not have realized I was your mate, but the instincts inside me, that animal that ensures I never completely fuck up, knew. It knew, connived and conspired within my subconscious, until I did exactly what I had to do to always watch over what belonged to me. Including conspiring with a Breed who would become wanted by every agency, every Council team, every fucking scientist in the world, and even the one man I owed every iota of loyalty to, Jonas Wyatt. I conspired to the point that I ordered him to take the bargain of working with him to you, on the condition that no other man touch you. That you have no lovers, no one to stand between you and your mate when the time came for me to claim what was mine. And later, when Jonas began searching for that Breed, I hid my knowledge of this from even my own brother. Trusting. Believing he had sent everything he had to Jonas. Knowing, without him, you would have drifted away from this world within a year of Mark’s death.”
He was the reason that demand had been made of her?
She could feel adrenaline pumping into her system—disbelief, amazement, it was all there, yet her heart wasn’t racing, and she couldn’t feel betrayal. She couldn’t feel it, because she was just as entrenched in his heart as he was in hers now. Feeling him.
Breathing him.
“I was a part of you before I ever caught your attention that night,” he promised her, his free hand moving to cup the side of her face, his thumb brushing against her lips. “I’ve always been here, Gypsy. Just a heartbeat away from you. More damned scared of what I was feeling than you could imagine, because losing you would have destroyed even the animal that lurks beneath the skin. The animal that fought with every heartbeat, with every breath, to ensure your protection every second after the night you lost what was most dear to your heart. Because you, mate, are most dear to my heart.”