"That's your answer for everything. Let go."
"It's the only advice you need. Listen to your instincts. They never lie."
She took her eyes off the target long enough to shoot him a glare. "And if those instincts lead me back across the border to grab my rifle and come back here to shoot you in the foot?"
"Why go to all that trouble?" Vonn said mildly, taking the opportunity to sneak a hand over the delicious curve of her hip. "Stick with archery practice, and you'll be good enough to shoot me in the foot with an arrow in a couple weeks."
Instead of replying, Stacy released the bowstring. The arrow whizzed through the air, only to pierce the soft bark of a redwood tree. Unfortunately, it wasn't the redwood she was aiming for—but at least she'd hit something this time.
"Okay," he chuckled, releasing her. "Maybe more like four or five weeks."
Stacy blew out a breath in frustration. "If I'm still here in a month."
The hair on the back of Vonn's neck stood up; it had been days since she'd mentioned leaving. "I thought you were done with talk like that."
Her frustration over missing her shot vanished, replaced by something like sadness. "It's not that," she said quietly. "I've been here six days now. When we left the roadhouse, Gray said he'd come to check in a week. If I'm still a beta when he gets here—"
"I won't let him hurt you," Vonn growled, hearing the worry in her voice. The truth was that he, too, had been thinking about that. Not because he was worried about Gray, but because the faint underlying omega scent that he'd detected when he first met her hadn't returned since her last injections.
But even if it never did, Vonn would never let any harm come to her. He'd die first.
"That's…sweet," she said, settling on a word they both knew didn't suffice. "But Gray won't come alone. In this scenario, your land is hostile territory, and if he's any kind of leader, he'll bring backup. You might be able to take care of Gray on his own, but you can't fight off a whole pack of alphas."
Vonn snorted. "Just watch me."
"It's not that I don't believe in you. I…understand now how strong an alpha's instinct is to protect what's his. But that's the thing." She sighed, as much in defeat as frustration, and didn't meet his gaze. "I'm not yours, and I'm not sure I ever can be. After injecting so many doses of that suppressant, maybe I'm…broken. I haven't been feeling right."
Alarm jerked Vonn to attention. "What do you mean?"
"Oh, nothing serious. Just…in the last day or two, I haven't been able to focus. I feel…unsettled. Sensitive. I don't really know how to describe it."
"That's to be expected," Vonn said, reassuring himself as much as her. He knew betas were vulnerable to all kinds of diseases and conditions that alphas naturally resisted—but she was young and strong and tough. "Besides, do you really think I care about your nature anymore?"
Her eyelashes fluttered as she darted a look at him. "You wanted an omega of your own," she whispered.
"I might have wanted an omega more than anything before we met, but now I only want you, Stacy. I don't care if your nature ever awakens—you will always be my mate."
He cupped her face in his huge, warm hands and kissed her deeply. He would never stop until she truly believed.
Stacy must have kissed Vonn hundreds of times by now, but it had never felt like this. The underlying desire was there, of course, a low-voltage hum deep inside her that never went away. But this kiss was something else entirely—reassuring, claiming, promising, possessing.
In it was every emotion each of them had felt in each other's arms, every moment spent thinking of the other.
Stacy wanted to have faith in a future with Vonn. But not even a kiss like that could change the reality of their situation. She'd come here as an enemy, and no one in their right mind would believe that a few days of rolling around with an alpha could change that.
Only a change in her nature could.
When Vonn finally broke the kiss, she was feeling more melancholy than ever.
"Do you want to leave?" he asked, frowning.
Stacy shook her head and stepped away to clear her mind. She still had half a dozen arrows in her quiver, more in Vonn's pack, and a thousand thoughts swirling in her head. Training had always been her solace, and maybe it would help now.
For the next hour, she practiced. She shot until she was out of arrows, went to the hay bale Vonn had set up on a stump to retrieve them, and did it all over again. She gradually improved, occasionally landing one inside the ring, but eventually her arms grew fatigued, and she had to stop.
She wasn't surprised when Vonn started rounding up the arrows, sensing that she was done without being told. They packed up without talking, lost in their own thoughts, and after he put a tarp over the target, he offered Stacy his hand to lead her back to the cabin.
But this time, when they touched, it was like being struck by lightning. When Vonn's hand closed over hers, Stacy went rigid, as though a thousand volts were lighting up every nerve ending in her body. Accompanying the physical sensation was a sudden and stark awareness—of every sight, sound, smell, even of the workings of her body's systems and yes, oh God, of Vonn.
She felt his presence as if they were joined by invisible threads. But, at the same time, it was more than that—the heat deep in her belly that she felt around him swelled and exploded through her body until she felt like she was on fire.
At first it was terrifying,
