The next night, Izzy wandered around a strange bedroom on the second floor of the pack house. When Luke had asked her to wait for him here, she hadn’t asked why this room and not the one they’d slept in last night. It’d seemed important to him, so she decided to go with the flow.
Maybe she should call the place a suite, because it took up most of the of the west wing. The peaked wood ceiling soared twenty feet overhead. Oversized chairs begged to be curled up in with a book. A cheery fire danced in the stone fireplace. There was enough closet space to thrill that Sex and the City chick, and a bathroom bigger than Izzy’s first apartment. She couldn’t decide which feature was the most jaw-dropping: the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the lake and the rugged beauty of the Cabinet Mountains or the fairy-tale bed.
The bed had to have been custom-made. Like everything else in the room, it appeared to be built for giants. Crafted from a caramel-colored wood, the headboard didn’t simply rest against the wall, it grew out of and up the wall to spread over several feet of the ceiling like a great tree god.
It was the most unique and gorgeous bedroom she’d ever seen. Yet it felt empty, as if no one had occupied it for ages.
A set of French doors led onto a balcony. Izzy opened them and stepped out into the cold. It didn’t bother her as much as it used to. Guess that’s what eating right did for you.
Moonlight silvered the lake and treetops and shone like a spotlight on the bare ground in the yard below. They’d had to shovel and scrape up the snow and dump it into the lake to get rid of all the blood. It’d been a grim job.
As her anger ignited all over again, the bedroom door opened. Luke walked in, closed it, and headed for her. His nostrils flared and he cocked a brow at her.
Before she bitched at him for pulling the bloodhound routine, she checked herself. She wasn’t pissed at him.
Yesterday, his whole world had fallen apart. He’d been betrayed in the worst way and lost friends. At the end of the fight, three of his loyal packmates lay dead in the snow, including Dev. She’d barely known the man, yet tears filled her eyes just thinking about him. How much worse must it be for Luke, who had known and admired the man his whole life?
Plus, they hadn’t found the guy who’d shot Daphne, or discovered anything more about Apex. She was ready to punch some holes in walls. Luke must be beyond frustrated.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
Luke took her hand and led her back into the bedroom, drawing her over to the fire. “For what?”
“For what happened to you and your family. For being such a pain in the ass.”
“None of that was your fault. Why were you so angry just now?”
Throwing her hands up, she said, “I don’t understand that freaking woman.”
“Who?”
“Daphne. The ungrateful bitch. She had everything. Safety, security, a family who loved her. And what does she do? Kills her own sister.” She scowled at the fire. “I’d have done anything to save my sister.”
“Isabelle.” He pulled her into his arms.
“I was just so mad, you know. At Bess.” Tears ran down her face. “She left me. She killed herself and left me alone.”
“You’re not alone,” he said fiercely.
“I know that now.” She rubbed her forehead against his chest. “In a weird way, Daphne did me a favor. I hadn’t realized how furious I was with my sister. But now I understand. I forgive her.”
Luke stilled. “What?” she asked.
“Cameron Beck, the Chicago Alpha, sent me an email. The man you saw when Bess—”
She sucked in a sharp breath. God, did she even want to know? “Go on.”
“Beck thinks they’ve figured out who it could be, but there’s a problem.”
A bigger problem than a guy murdered by a werewolf in downtown Chicago? “What?”
“There’s more than one possibility. A lot more.”
“What?”
Luke sighed. “Yeah. He has a lot to deal with. He wants to speak to you, see if you can narrow it down.”
Well, shit. “I’ll do what I can.” It was the least she could do for the dead man, and for her sister.
“Thought you’d say that. When you’re ready.”
They stood before the fire, holding on to each other. Several minutes passed. Finally she asked, “Has everyone gone home?”
The house had filled throughout the night and day, until it was bursting at the seams. Just as steadily, it emptied again as people were patched up and felt safe enough to return to their own places. Her parents—it felt so weird and awesome to call them that—had left after dinner to go back to Freddie’s.
“Yeah.” He released her and walked to the wall of windows. “Marianne left just before I came up here. My mom went with her. She’s going to stay there for a while. Might look for a place closer to town.”
“Doesn’t she live here?”
“This is the pack house,” he said, as if she didn’t know. “The Alpha is supposed to live here.”
“But you don’t. Rissa said you refused to move in.”
Luke rubbed the back of his neck. “After my dad died, it didn’t feel right. Everyone tried to get me to move, but...this was his place.”
“And what? You didn’t feel like you belonged?” When he didn’t answer right away, she walked over to him. “Here? Or as the Alpha?”
“Both, I guess,” he said.
Her wolf snorted and Izzy said, “Well, that’s dumb.”
Luke laughed and hugged her. He kissed the top of her head and pulled back to look at her. The laughter faded, and gold swirled in the liquid green depths of his eyes. “Did you know Alphas can sense their packs? Like tell where they are or when someone’s hurt.”
“No.”
“Well, they can. But I couldn’t,” he said. “When I became Alpha, my sense of everyone through the pack bonds became much stronger. But even so, I didn’t know where Vaughn was when he went missing and I didn’t know when Sam died.”
He rubbed his chest like it hurt, but she didn’t think the problem was the numerous stitches he’d received. Taking his hand, she kissed it. Then she kissed the spot he’d been rubbing, right over his heart.
“Sugar,” he breathed, caressing her cheek. She leaned into his touch, letting him take comfort from her presence. To know she could do that for him was a gift.
When he spoke again, his eyes were clear of the darkness. “Until yesterday, I never felt what I should have. I never saw my pack in my mind’s eye, glowing with life. I never felt their purpose and strength. Until yesterday. Until you shifted into your wolf, threw open our mate bond, and called the pack.” His smile was one she’d never seen on his face: full of light and happiness. “It’s like you blew away all my guilt and bullshit.”
“That’s me: Hurricane Izzy.”
“Yup. Never knew what hit me.”
She punched him in the arm. Lightly. “Jerk.”
He snagged her fist and kissed her knuckles, grinning unrepentantly. “So, your parents are staying for a while, huh?”
“Yeah. They’re thinking of moving here.”
“Makes sense,” Luke said.
“So that’s why you wanted me to wait in here for you? You’re moving in and wanted me to give a thumbs-up on the room?”
“Look,” he said, scrubbing both hands over his head. “I know we haven’t discussed what happens next. Not like we’ve really had time to talk about our daily lives at all, but—shit, I’m rambling. I guess what I’m trying to say is, now that the chaos is mostly over and—”
“Are you asking me to move in with you?”
He blew out a breath. “Yeah, I am. I want you to stay. I want you.”
Heat bloomed in her chest. Pulling aside the collar of her shirt, she revealed the bite mark he’d made on her shoulder. Luke’s eyes flashed gold. She grazed the matemark with a finger and tingles raced over her skin, swirling and swirling. Damn.
Breathless, she said, “I thought I’d already given you my answer.”
Before she knew what happened, she lay on her back in the middle of the big bed, Luke perched above her. He looked at her like he’d never seen anyone more beautiful.
“I love you, Isabelle.”
God, how had she gotten this lucky? With trembling hands, she cupped his face. “I never thought I could have anything like this, anyone like you. You’ve given me everything I ever wanted. A family. A place to belong in this world. Thank you.”
Luke shook his head. “You deserve all that and more, my mate. But you already had a family and home. I just helped you see it.”
She pulled him down, and just before his lips met hers, she whispered, “I love you.”
His smile burned as bright and warm as the fire in the hearth. “Say it again.”
“I love you, Luke.”
As if they had all the time in the world, they explored each other’s mouths, nipping, licking, tasting. Luke pulled off her shirt, and as he bared her skin, he kissed each healing cut, bruise, and scrape with exquisite tenderness.
He pressed a kiss to her chest, over her heart, and another to her matemark. “Mine,” he said.
Clasping her hand, he kissed her fingers and touched them to the matching bite on his shoulder. Another kiss, and he laid her hand over his heart.
“Yours,” he said, his voice thick with emotion.
She kissed him hard, accepting his gift. Then, she looked into his flashing eyes and let him see everything she had, everything she felt, everything she was.
“Forever,” she agreed.
* * * * *
Stay tuned for Vaughn’s story, Touch the Sky, coming soon from Kari Cole!