Aaron
I don’t look at her.
I feel her.
It’s worse.
The clearing hums with pack energy, routine, grounded, orderly, but beneath it there’s a fault line running straight through my chest. The bond sits there, taut and bruised, not pulling me toward Reza so much as reminding me that it exists.
That she exists.
And that she’s very deliberately not looking at me.
I keep my posture neutral. Alpha-locked. Hands loose at my sides. Breath even. Every instinct I have wants to turn, to find her with my eyes, to make sure she’s still standing where I last sensed her.
I don’t.
Because Bethany is beside me.
Her hand rests lightly on my arm, exactly where it always has, familiar, grounding, acceptable. The pack reads it as reassurance. Stability. Continuity.
I read it as a test.
She’s watchin
