Chapter 12
Knox
The shower takes longer than planned because I can't stop thinking about Toby.
The sounds he made. The way he begged. How perfect he looked spread out beneath me, wrecked and wanting, saying yes and please and yours like the words were being pulled out of him. The way he'd clung to me after, trembling, letting me hold him like I was something safe.
Mine.
I let the hot water pound against my shoulders and replay the morning. Toby in my bathtub, eyes soft, saying he was falling. The way he'd kissed me—gentle, sweet, nothing like the desperate hunger of last night. The quiet certainty in his voice when he said telling, definitely telling.
He wants me to take charge. Wants me to claim him, keep him, make decisions. And I want that too. Want to wrap him up in my life and never let him go.
My lion rumbles with satisfaction. We have a mate. A real mate, not just a warm body to burn off energy with. Someone who sees us—the teeth, the gold eyes, the predator underneath—and doesn't run. Someone who laughs when we growl.
I'm grinning like an idiot as I shut off the water.
Towel off quickly, throw on jeans, don't bother with a shirt.
Toby's downstairs with coffee, probably charming my entire pack with his ridiculous cardigans and his book recommendations.
Maybe I'll convince him to call in sick after all.
Keep him in bed all day, order food, learn every inch of him that I didn't get to explore last night.
The bar is quiet when I come down the stairs. Morning light through the windows, dust motes floating in the air, the smell of fresh coffee.
But something's wrong.
Jason's standing by the door, keys in his hand, looking confused. Ezra's behind the bar, very focused on his inventory clipboard. Silas is at his usual table, but his book is closed and he's staring at the wood grain like it holds the secrets of the universe.
No Toby.
"Where's Toby?"
Jason turns, and his expression makes my stomach drop. "He left. His roommate picked him up."
"What?" I look around like Toby might be hiding somewhere, like this is a joke I'm not getting. "Why? You were supposed to drive him."
"I know! I was ready to go, keys and everything, but he just..." Jason shrugs helplessly. "Left. Said to tell you thanks for everything."
Thanks for everything. Like I'm a hotel. Like last night was a transaction.
"He was being weird," Jason adds, frowning. "Changed out of your shirt. Wouldn't really look at anyone."
My lion goes very still. That's wrong. That's all wrong. Toby was supposed to be wearing my shirt, my scent, walking around marked and claimed and happy about it. He'd wanted that. He'd shivered when I said everyone would know who he belonged to.
"Why would he—"
"We might have mentioned the spare clothes drawer," Silas says quietly.
I turn to look at him. "The what?"
"You know." Ezra still won't meet my eyes, still staring at his clipboard like his life depends on accurate bottle counts. "The drawer of clothes. For when people stay over. I told him where it was."
Ice slides down my spine. Slow. Cold. Spreading.
"What exactly did you tell him?"
"Just that we keep spares around." Ezra's voice is too casual, the kind of casual that means he knows he fucked up. "For when people need something clean to wear home after staying over."
"And that it happens a lot," Silas adds, still not looking up. "With you especially."
The ice reaches my chest. Wraps around my lungs.
"Especially with—" I can't get enough air. "What the fuck did you say to him?"
"Nothing bad!" Ezra protests, finally looking at me. His face is pale. "Just that you have people over regularly. It's not like it's a secret, Knox. Everyone knows you—"
"What. Else."
Ezra swallows. "I might have mentioned that wolf from Riverside pack."
"The one who stayed three days," Silas supplies, like he's trying to be helpful. Like he's not twisting the knife deeper with every word.
"And maybe the bear shifter who had to go to the hospital," Ezra finishes, voice small now. "We were just making conversation. We didn't think—"
"You didn't think." The words come out as a snarl. "You didn't fucking think."
I'm already grabbing my phone, already pulling up Toby's number. It rings once, twice, three times.
Voicemail.
"Fuck." I call again. Voicemail again. "FUCK."
"Knox, what—" Jason starts.
"He's human," I snarl, spinning to face them. "He's never been with a shifter before. He doesn't know how this works. He doesn't understand—"
"Doesn't understand what?" Vaughn's voice comes from the back door. He walks in wiping his hands on a rag, takes one look at my face, and stops. "What happened?"
"These idiots told Toby about every person I've ever fucked." My voice is shaking. I don't care. "Made him think he's just another warm body. Another name on a list."
"He's not?" Ezra asks, and he sounds genuinely confused, and I want to put my fist through the wall.
"Of course he's not! I claimed him. I bit him. That mark on his shoulder is going to scar."
The silence is deafening.
"You claimed him," Jason breathes. "Actually claimed him? Like, mate-claimed?"
"Yes."
"But you've never—"
"I know I've never." I'm pacing now, phone clutched in my hand, willing it to ring. "All those others—they were nothing. Bodies. Stress relief. I never claimed any of them. Never wanted to. Never even considered it."
"How were we supposed to know that?" Silas asks. "You never said anything. You never told us he was different."
"I didn't think I had to! I thought it was obvious!"
"Knox." Vaughn's voice is calm, steady, the voice of reason he always uses when I'm losing control. "We didn't know. You're right, you should have told us, but we genuinely didn't know. What can we do to fix it?"
"I don't know if it can be fixed." I call Toby again. Voicemail. "He won't answer. He won't—fuck, he probably thinks I say mine to everyone. Thinks the bath and the fruit and the—" I break off, throat tight. "He thinks none of it meant anything."
"So tell him it did," Jason says. "Go to his apartment. Explain."
"And say what? 'Sorry my pack made you feel like a cheap hookup, but actually you're special'? He won't believe me. Why would he believe me?"
"Because it's true," Vaughn says.
"He doesn't know that. He just knows I've fucked half the shifters in the city and apparently one of them ended up in the hospital." I round on Ezra. "Why would you tell him that? Why would you think that was an appropriate thing to say?"
"I was just—it was a joke—"
"A joke. You made him think I hurt people. That I'm dangerous."
"You are dangerous," Silas points out quietly.
"Not to him! Never to him!" I'm shouting now. Can't stop. "I would never—he's mine, don't you understand? He's mine and I would die before I hurt him and now he's gone and he thinks—"
The front door slams open hard enough that it bounces off the wall and nearly hits the person coming through.
Robin.
He looks nothing like the flirty pastry chef who showed up yesterday with tarts and innuendos. His face is pale except for two spots of color high on his cheekbones. His jaw is clenched so tight I can see the muscles jumping. His hands are balled into fists at his sides.
And his eyes—his eyes are absolutely murderous.
"You," he snarls, and he's heading straight for me.
"Robin, let me explain—"
"Explain?" He's right in my face now. A human, a pastry chef, five inches shorter than me and probably a hundred pounds lighter, and he's squaring up like he's ready to tear me apart with his bare hands.
"Explain what? How you made my best friend think he was special?
How you fucked him and marked him and called him pretty names and let him believe it meant something? "
"It did mean something—"
"Bullshit." Robin's voice cracks like a whip. "You have a drawer full of clothes for your hookups. Organized by size. You fuck so many people your pack jokes about it like it's a sport."
"That's not—"
"Do you have any idea what you've done?" He's shaking now.
Actually shaking with rage, his whole body vibrating with it.
"Any fucking idea? He trusted you. Toby doesn't trust anyone—his last boyfriend cheated on him, the one before that ghosted him, and that asshole Derek left him on the side of the road in the rain.
He has every reason to never trust anyone again. But he trusted you."
"I know—"
"He came home floating. Did you know that? After that first night, when you just drove him home, he came in at three in the morning and he was glowing. Couldn't stop talking about your eyes, your voice, the way you made him feel safe the next morning. Safe, Knox. He felt safe with you."
My lion whines. Toby felt safe with us. And we ruined it.
"And last night." Robin laughs, but there's no humor in it.
"Last night he texted me that he thought he might be falling in love.
After less than a week. That's not like him.
He's careful. He's guarded. He doesn't fall.
But you—" His voice breaks. "You made him think it was okay to fall.
And then you let him find out he's just another body in a long fucking line. "
"Robin, please—"
"He sobbed so hard he threw up." Robin's eyes are wet now, furious tears that he doesn't bother wiping away. "I held him while he puked because he made himself sick crying over you. He kept saying he was stupid, that he should have known better, that nobody actually wants him—"
"That's not true—"
"Of course it's not true! He's the best person I know! He's kind and funny and so fucking smart, and he reads to kids at the library and feeds stray cats and cries at commercials with dogs in them. He's good, Knox. He's genuinely good. And you made him feel like he's nothing."
"I didn't mean to—"