Chapter Eight
Aubert had been prepared for her to flee.
They both had. An untrained wolf was a reckless one, and the call to be in the forest, to be free, was strong.
He had not been prepared for the reaction of his body as she had shifted back.
Lying on the cot, looming over her, the soft mounds of her naked breasts flush against his bloodied bare chest, Aubert forgot how to breathe.
His gums throbbed, and his canines threatened to descend. The pulse of his wolf was an insistent chant in his brain. Mark. Claim. Mine. She already stank of his brother. Edmond’s saliva mixed with her blood coursing through her veins. He would—
Aubert threw himself off the cot and backed away, his chest heaving. Edmond sat back on his haunches, a curious expression on his face. Not the horror storming through Aubert’s chest like a charging warhorse. More like hope, stuttering, fragile, but there all the same.
No. She could not be…
Aubert spun on his heel and stormed from the cottage, staggering out into the sunlight. He stared out into the forest unseeing as he sucked in huge lungsful of air. His brother exited the cottage. Not the panicked rush as Aubert had. Calm and determined.
Edmond stopped beside him, and they stood for a moment in silent solidarity. “She calls to me, Aubert.”
“No.” He speared his finger at his twin. “Do not say it.” His hands trembled. The knowing in his brother’s eyes was disconcerting. He had never reacted to a woman like this. Not since…
“Tell me you do not feel it.” Edmond stood in front of him, eye to eye and toe to toe. “That pull to never let her out of your sight.”
Aubert snarled, shoving his brother aside, and stalked from the clearing.
He kept going. Faster, until he was running, pushing into the trees as though the entire keep guard were close behind him.
He would have run forever had he not crested an escarpment.
He stood there, his hands on his knees, forcing air into his seizing lungs. Could he do this again?
Edmond climbed the escarpment and stood beside him, staring out over the forest as though their peace was not about to be shattered. As though old wounds would not soon bleed again and perhaps tear apart the bond they had forged. “She calls to you, too. Does she not?”
“You are wrong.” The pressure in his mind was almost too much to bear. “She cannot be.”
“You watch her as much as I do. You have scarce left her side.”
“She was unwell. Death was knocking. And Marceline… Then we turned her. We did not know if she would live or die. Reasons enough to watch her.”
His brother crossed his arms and leveled a stare at Aubert’s groin, at the proof of his arousal.
“She is a beautiful woman. And naked.” What man would not be aroused by her? Merde. The feel of her beneath him was burned into his body like a brand. It was something he would not soon forget. “She is not… She cannot be…”
Edmond shrugged. “You may deny it all you want, but you know I am right. You know you wanted to sink your teeth into her neck and claim her as I did.”
“You are mistaken. Werewolves have but one true mate. Ours is gone.”
But the truth of it hung in the air between them. The longing, the pull toward the woman in the cottage not something he could ignore. No matter how much he wished it.
Aubert stared at his brother. Yes. No. This could not be happening.
Not again. He wanted to howl his anguish to the world.
To run from it. Hide himself deep in the forest and never return.
To be graced with another chance for a mate, with the pack in such dire need, was a gift.
But it was double-edged, for she was not only his mate.
Fates be. Two wolves, one woman. One mate. How could fate be so cruel as to do this to them? Again. Aubert roared at the cloudless sky. The last time this had happened, his brother had almost died. By his hand. His twin.
Edmond rested a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “We can do this.”
He shrugged his brother off. How? With the pack on the verge of extinction, they needed mated pairs and their pups to build their numbers.
One by one, their fellow wolves had found their mates.
A boon, even if the aching loneliness of never having a true mate, of having to settle for any woman who would be willing to have them, to become like them, threatened to eat him up inside.
Gaharet, then Aimon, Ulrik and most recently D’Artagnon.
Could they put themselves through this again?
One of them must surely forsake having a mate, so the other could.
They could not both have her. Could he stand by and watch as Edmond took her as his, and filled her womb with pups?
Could Edmond? No. It was impossible. They knew that from experience.
Sabine had taught them that.
Edmond picked up a handful of stones and tossed one over the edge, watching it tumble until it disappeared into the darkness. “It will be different this time.”
Merde. His brother was losing his wits if he thought this would end well. Even now, his skin itched to return to the cottage. To her. His brother would be feeling it, too, yet he skipped stones over the edge as if he had not a care in the world. “How?”
“We will not rush things this time. We go into this with steadier heads and a decade more experience.” Edmond tossed another stone, watching it drop into the trees below. “She is a newly turned wolf in need of training. It will give us time to get to know her. To see what sort of woman she is.”
“I do not want—”
“Yes, you do. You want her as much as I.”
His brother was right. He did want her. With his body and his soul. But he did not want to want her. How would this time be any different? It could be worse. Mayhap this time he would kill his brother.
Edmond skipped another stone over the edge. “I have given things a lot of thought over the years. Gone over where we went wrong. We rushed things with Sabine. Each of us eager to make her ours. We competed for her, both of us trying to win her over. We fought over her.”
Of course they had. Finding a mate, claiming a mate, was a primal need buried as deep within their souls as any of their wolf instincts.
To deny it would drive a man to frenzy. Look at what had happened to Lance.
He was responsible for the murder of over half their pack because the woman he had wanted as his mate had chosen another.
All his shameful memories, the guilt, choked him, the urge to destroy something boiling up inside of him. He wanted to take fate by the throat and throttle her for the unfairness of it all. Most of all, he did not want to trust it. He did not want to trust her.
“She is not Sabine, Aubert.”
“How do you know that?” He paced along the edge of the escarpment. “Do not forget she knows of us.” Sabine had known about them, too.
Edmond shook his head. “Sabine reveled in our rivalry, encouraged it, and set us against one another.” She had, and it had nearly broken them both, but in the end, losing her had forged a bond between them stronger than it had ever been.
And while his heart ached for the loss of a mate, he could not say he was sorry fate had taken her away.
Nor was he sure he was ready to face it all again.
“We are not so young and foolish anymore.” Edmond shook the remaining pebbles in his hand, then tossed them over the edge. “We are strong enough to walk away. We will not make the same mistake again.”
No, they would not. He would cut out his own heart before he would ever harm his brother again. Nor would he succumb so easily to the pull of the mate bond, or trust it without question.
“What do you say, Aubert? Shall we do this? Can we not give our mate a chance?”
He scrubbed his face with his hand. Another mate. He had never heard of such a thing. Nor did he deserve it. Aubert heaved out a sigh. He would give Edmond this chance. It was the least he could do for his brother.
The tension in Edmond’s shoulders eased. “We will find a way to make this work.” Edmond patted his shoulder. “Come. We should head back. And hunt up some food on the way. She will be hungry.”
Edmond trudged back to the cottage. Back to the woman who had upended their lives and revisited upon them such painful memories.
He had never faulted his brother for almost choking the life out of him.
In that moment, had he got the upper hand, Edmond would have done the same.
But something about this time was different.
Perhaps because they were older and wiser, no longer inexperienced boys running on instinct alone.
And he had faith in the bond he had forged with his brother.
One thing Edmond was certain of, this time, no woman would come between him and his twin.