Chapter 36

“Ruby! Ruby!” Lena’s voice broke through the clouds of her despair. “Come on, we have to get you inside.”

Ruby was kneeling in the dirt at the edge of the woods. Rafe was gone. She looked up at Lena, her tears blurring her sister’s concerned face.

“Come on, Ruby-red. You’re bleeding.” Lena tugged on her hand, but Ruby couldn’t find any strength to stand. Her Mate had just run off into the woods to chase a vicious werewolf with at least two more on his tail. Ruby saw them race after him. He was as good as dead. Her Mate was ripped from her, robbing her of a lifetime with him.

Another wail escaped her lips. Lena grabbed her under the arms and hoisted her up, shushing and whispering to her as they hobbled toward the house. Ruby was vaguely aware that she was bleeding and that her shoulder burned with every step. But the pain was nothing compared to the one tearing through her chest.

Lena dragged her back into the house, Ruby weeping and bleeding all over her. She helped her into a kitchen chair and gingerly cleaned her wound. Ruby winced at the sting of peroxide. The pain snapped her out of her spinning thoughts.

“He’s my Mate, Lena. I know you don’t believe it, but he’s it. He’s mine.” Her voice was clogged with tears. She sounded pitiful.

Lena peered down into her face after wrapping her arm in a bandage. “I think you’ll live,” she reported.

“Not without him.”

“Oh, Ruby.”

“I don’t know where he went or if he’ll come back,” she sniffed, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. “There was more than one, Lena. I saw them go after him when he ran. What if he gets killed?”

Lena passed Ruby the box of tissues, her pale eyes seeing everything. Ruby’s blotchy face, her runny nose, her bloody shoulder. And maybe seeing more than that. Maybe she always had.

“I believe you. I mean after Theo’s little trick, how could I not?” Lena gave her a rueful smile and Ruby couldn’t help but return it. “This is all pretty nuts, you know.”

“I know.”

“Kinda like a dream come true for you though, huh?” Lena put the kettle on and grabbed two mugs from the cabinet.

“Besides the whole getting bitten thing, yeah, it’s kinda perfect.”

“Sorry I didn’t believe you before. I couldn’t. Or I didn’t want to, I guess.”

“I know. I don’t really blame you.” Honestly, Ruby was impressed her sister hadn’t gone running from the house and never come back after Theo’s little show. Most people would have, but then again the Bellerose sisters were not most people. Maybe years of living with Ruby and Millie had desensitized Lena to the utterly bizarre and mildly creepy.

Ruby took a breath, “Lena, I have to tell you something. The day of the accident, I didn’t want Mom and Dad to go. Remember?”

Her sister poured the tea and brought it to the table. She slid into the seat across from Ruby. They rarely spoke about that day. “I remember. You threw a fit about it.”

“I think I knew.”

Lena paused with her mug halfway to her lips. “What?”

Ruby took a breath and plowed forward, finally saying things she’d kept bottled up for years. “I think I knew what was going to happen. I tried to stop it.”

Ruby’s thoughts filled in the silence that hung heavy in the room. Everything Rafe had told her, everything she’d felt as a child. The way Aunt Millie seemed to have an uncanny knack for knowing where the girls were even when they tried to sneak out. The fact that they could never seem to pin down an exact age for their aunt. Maybe Rafe was right. Maybe they all had this … this thing. Not that it had happened to her in years, but maybe it was still in there.

“So what are you saying? We’re both… what did Rafe call it? Seers?”

Ruby shrugged. “I guess?”

“You saved me that day.”

“I should have done more.” She’d managed to convince her parents to let the girls stay home alone for the first time, but she couldn’t convince them to cancel their plans.

“Ruby, you were eight.”

She nodded, her hair swishing over her shoulders. She knew she shouldn’t feel guilty about it. It wasn’t her fault that the roads were slick, icy weather coming before anyone expected it, but that didn’t stop her from waking up in a cold sweat sometimes, the fear and the panic so close to the surface she couldn’t breathe.

“It didn’t happen again after that. I thought it was a weird coincidence, a dream. And then after a while I let myself believe it had never happened at all.”

Lena grabbed her hand. Her fingers were cold and frail, and Ruby squeezed them tighter.

“But now, it’s happening to you.”

“I don’t know what it means, Ruby. The visions are slippery, like I can’t grab on to them and when I try to, they just slide through my fingers.”

“Maybe this was it? Maybe this attack is what you saw? But I’m fine.” Ruby swallowed the word “fine,” not wanting to think about what was happening to Rafe. Not wanting to wonder if he was fine too.

Lena shook her head. “They were looking for me.”

Ruby’s eyes went wide. “For you? How do you know?” She felt guilty for the barrage of questions but this was more than Lena had ever shared about any of this, more than she had ever admitted.

“I saw it. Or pieces of it anyway. When you left my room. They wanted me, those wolves that came. I could feel it.” Her sister’s eyes were haunted, fear shimmering in their pale depths. “I don’t understand why they keep attacking you.”

“They must think I can do it too.”

“Shit.”

Ruby shrugged. “Maybe all seers smell alike? Or maybe they don’t realize there’s two of us? I don’t really know how any of this works.”

Lena blew out a long breath. “Well, shit, Ruby. If you don’t know after all those years of scary movies and books, then I don’t know who would.”

Ruby gave her a small smile. It was nice to feel like they were in this together. She leaned back in her chair and pain shot through her shoulder. She winced, a soft hiss escaping her lips.

“You’re not going to turn into a werewolf, are you?”

“Uh … probably not?” Ruby held her shoulder and squeezed her eyes shut, trying desperately not to think about the werewolf currently out fighting for her. He should have listened to her. He should have stayed. He should be the one tending to her injuries. She blew out a frustrated breath.

“He’ll come back, Ruby.”

Ruby nodded. She met her sister’s gaze, feeling like there was more to say. About their parents, about Lena’s visions, about being literally tracked and hunted by werewolves. But Ruby didn’t know what to say or do about any of that.

Lena untangled her fingers from Ruby’s and got up to pour more tea.

“What do we do now?” Ruby asked, her hands curling around her mug, her mind racing.

“We wait for your Mate to come home, I guess.” Lena’s lips tipped into a smile at the word “Mate.” Dark circles hung below her eyes and she was far too pale today, but she was here. Safe.

“Okay, but I’m terrible at waiting.”

Lena laughed and pulled out the deck of cards from the junk drawer. “I’ll help you pass the time.”

* * *

Ruby had managed to lose to Lena five times before the frantic knock on the door disrupted their game. She was out of her seat so fast, she jostled the table, spilling tea all over the cards, but still Rafe pounded on the door, the windows rattling in their panes.

She raced to open it, worried he would rip it from the hinges if she didn’t get there quick enough. She yanked it open and found him standing on her back deck. Alive and covered in blood.

“Ruby.” Her name was torn from the depths of him, rough and ragged. His gaze went immediately to her shoulder. He lifted a hand to touch her but then dropped it to his side. “You’re hurt.”

“Not really. It’s nothing. What about you?” She couldn’t stop the horror she was sure covered her face. Couldn’t arrange her features into anything normal. Rafe looked like death himself standing among her wildflowers. Blood was splattered across his cheeks. His chest was covered in it. His arms. Jesus, how much of it was his? Was he about to bleed out on her doorstep? Should she call 911? Her head spun, her breath coming in short gasps.

“Ruby, look at me.” Her gaze snapped to his. “They’re gone. All of them. They can’t hurt you anymore.”

She swallowed hard. “But you—”

“I won’t hurt you anymore either.” He was backing away. Leaving.

Wait. Why the hell was he leaving?

“Rafe, stop.”

He raised his hands, his fingers caked in dried blood. He looked bigger than usual, his teeth and fingernails longer, like he hadn’t fully shifted back to his human form. Like he tried but couldn’t find it. She was losing him.

“You’re safe now.”

“Rafe, please.” She reached out toward him and he backed away, shaking his head.

“That’s it, Ruby. It’s over. We have to be over.”

Ruby’s throat closed up, squeezed by her overwhelming panic at the thought of Rafe leaving. Hot tears streamed down her face. She looked up at Rafe’s tortured expression.

“You’re scaring me,” she whispered.

He flinched, and she immediately knew it was the wrong thing to say. She needed to explain. She needed to tell him that wasn’t how she meant it. She reached for him again but he stayed out of her grasp. His gaze skittered from her face to her injured shoulder, fear and pain flashing in his silver eyes.

“It’s better this way.” He spit out the words like they were poison. They were poison. How could her Mate say anything so absurd? How could he believe it?

“Nothing is better this way.” Her words came out strangled and garbled with tears and panic.

But it was too late. He wasn’t listening anymore, his eyes scanning the yard one more time for danger before he turned and ran. Before she could say anything else, her Mate was gone.

* * *

Horror. Pure horror. It was etched on Ruby’s face. Like she’d never seen something quite so disturbing. He’d seen the look before. He knew what it meant to have someone look at you like you were a monster. But he’d been foolish enough to hope he’d never see that look on Ruby’s face.

He stumbled back through the trees, trapped somewhere between human and wolf. He didn’t have the strength to shift completely. He’d killed all three of the wolves that had attacked Ruby, but they’d put up a good fight. He was exhausted and injured. And his heart literally ached.

Ruby’s pale face and wide eyes flashed in his memory. The way her chest rose and fell in rapid, terrified breaths. The way he must have looked to her, like a mutant covered in gore. How did he ever think he deserved to have her? How had he fallen into this same trap again?

He shook his head, causing a sharp pain to shoot up his neck. He’d been pinned at one point before he managed to flip the other wolf. His muscles ached from the effort. He’d let himself go soft. Maybe his father was right. Maybe for a moment he’d forgotten who he truly was. What he was built for. But once he was back in the fight, his body remembered what to do.

He could still taste the other wolf’s blood, acrid on his tongue. He needed to get home and wash it away with a drink, or five. He needed to forget the last week of his life. Erase it. Erase her.

Ruby was safe. Lena saw wolves and blood and he’d taken care of it. Maybe he was wrong about the whole Mate thing. Maybe this was all he was meant to do for her.

His body rebelled at the thought, his muscles tensing as though they would run him back to Ruby against his will. But he couldn’t go back. She’d never be safe around him. The last five years of his life had been a lie. He was still the monster his father raised. He had no trouble ripping those wolves apart. All his old instincts had come roaring back and it didn’t matter how much time he’d spent working with his hands and sitting at the pub with the locals, pretending to be human. It didn’t matter how hard he’d wanted to believe he could be what Ruby needed. In the end, he was still a killer.

All this time he’d been trying to convince her that he was scary and he’d finally done it. Now she’d seen it with her own eyes, how much of a monster he really was. He ran a hand through his tangled hair and his fingers got caught in the dried blood. He was a goddamn mess. No wonder she looked at him like he was a nightmare come to life.

She was better off without him.

The thought rioted against his ribs, his heart rampaging against it, fighting to the end to keep her.

Apparently, fate did make mistakes.