Sheena was all warmth and softness. She’d shifted without her clothing and without meaning to, Fleance’s hand slid over the generous curve of her hips, the other spreading across her upper back between her shoulder blades. Her head was perfectly tucked under his chin and her body molded against hers like they were made to fit each other.
Fleance’s breath was ragged. He’d come so close to losing her that for a moment he couldn’t force himself to let her go. He breathed in and her scent filled him: sweet and delicate, like nectar-filled flowers and fresh green grass.
She made a soft, longing noise against his neck and Fleance’s world turned upside down. Because he wasn’t only touching her, she was touching him, her arms wrapped around him and her lips hot against the sliver of skin at the collar of his shirt.
The mate bond hummed with wordless need. Sheena tipped her head back and pushed herself onto her tiptoes, losing her balance just enough that she had to press against him to stay upright. Her eyelids fluttered against his cheek; her lips were so close to his he couldn’t think of anything else—
“Ow,” Sheena burst out, wincing. She dropped heavily back only her heels as her whole body hunched over with pain. “Fucking—ow. Please tell me that prick didn’t literally bite my whole leg off, because that’s what it feels like.”
Fleance’s voice clawed up through his throat. “He bit you?” He shrugged off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders. She leaned into his touch, shivering.
“Yeah, when he tossed me around like a freaking chew toy—” She gasped and swore again. “Seriously, you’d tell me if I was hopping around on one leg, right? I don’t want to look.”
He didn’t want to look, either. His body felt hollowed out with fear. Inside him, his hellhound froze in place, eyes wide and staring. If Parker had bitten Sheena—if he turned her—
His fear crackled along the mate bond. No! He couldn’t let her know how scared he was. His hellhound burst into action, snaring the emotion before it reached his mate’s heart.
Sheena trembled. He helped her sit down. His jacket skimmed the tops of her thighs. It wasn’t enough to keep her warm, and it did nothing to hide the wound just above her knee.
He forced himself to look.
His breath stopped. He didn’t swear, or cry out, but only because of the many years he’d spent controlling his reactions in front of Parker. He breathed out, gently. Normally.
“It’s not that bad,” he lied, and couldn’t stop his voice from choking up.
“Bullshit.” Sheena leaned over, balancing one elbow on his shoulder. She hissed in a breath. “That looks…”
There were three deep gashes in her leg, trailing blood. Tooth marks. They had to be. The scars on Fleance’s neck tingled and the edges of his vision went dark.
“…not as bad as I expected.” Sheena’s voice seemed to come from a long way away. Fleance’s vision narrowed as fear rose bitter at the back of his throat. He held it back, determined not to let Sheena feel it before he’d figured out what he was going to say to her.
The future he’d seen so shining and clear in front of him fell away. What replaced it was just as clear, and more horrifying than anything he’d imagined. If Parker turned Sheena…
Sheena was still talking. His hellhound whined, urging him to listen. “My leg’s still attached, right? And it’s stopped bleeding. Could be better, sure, but could be—” She winced. “—a whole lot worse. Teach me to go running into a fight with some arsehole ten times my size.”
She looked up and her eyes widened. Too late, he tried to control his expression the same way he’d controlled his internal emotions. Her lips parted in a question, and he could almost taste her words, as cold and bitter as the dread coiling at the back of his throat: Why did you let me do it? Why didn’t you protect me?
His heart ached.
But instead of accusing him, she closed her mouth in a tight line and hunched her shoulders. “I’m sorry,” she muttered. “Shit, we haven’t even known each other for ten minutes and I’m already a fucking dead weight. I… This can’t be what you were hoping for in a mate.”
Her expression, which until then had shimmered and glowed with every emotion Fleance had felt reflected in the mate bond, closed over. She looked suddenly much smaller than he remembered, wrapped in his jacket, her bare feet turning white on the frozen ground.
Something snapped inside him. Or, more accurately, snapped into place.
She was his mate. And he was hers. Parker had hurt her, and he needed to protect her, not malinger over his own fears.
“I never thought I’d have a mate,” he said roughly. “I didn’t let myself hope for anything. Let alone someone like you.”
Her face twisted. “Someone totally hopeless?”
“Someone who would stand up to a man like Angus Parker.” He tipped her head back. “You’re strong, and beautiful. I’m the one who has failed you.”
Her eyebrows drew together. “What are you talking about? You haven’t—”
“I let you get hurt.” He ghosted his fingertips along her jaw, guilt twisting inside him as his need to touch her warred with the ugly truth he had to reveal. His hard calluses rasped against her soft skin, another reminder that although fate might have decided they were meant for one another, he was so far beneath her he’d spend his whole life catching up.
“It’s just a bite. I’ve had worse.”
“Not worse than this.” He wrapped his jacket more closely around her shoulders, then gritted his teeth. Delaying tactics. “A hellhound’s bite won’t just hurt you. It turns you into a hellhound shifter. Like an infection in your soul.” He reached for the ugly marks on her leg, holding his hand a scarce inch above her broken skin.
She didn’t shrink away. He didn’t realize, until she leaned closer to him, that he’d expected her to.
“But I’m already
