Her emotions were running high—nearly as high as mine—when she crossed the distance between us and sank to her haunches in front of me. A tiny part of me was pleased that even with me, she didn’t settle to her knees. My mate was too smart and careful to limit her escape options like that. She stayed alert.
I drank in the sight of her the way a dying man swilled whiskey, as I hung on to my control for dear life. She was beautiful, of course. There was no universe in which she could be unbeautiful to me. I believed in the old ways, which said she held the other half of my soul and I hers. But I could see the ragged edges of her, the telltale signs of a woman pushed to the brink. There were dark smudges beneath her gray eyes; her riot of dark curls was uneven, pulled back into a haphazard kn
