PLAY OF PASSION

“None of them know her, not like I do.”


Judd angled his body left, taking them down a slight slope that would lead eventually to one of the lakes that dotted the Sierra. Most in the higher altitudes, especially in the central and southern areas, remained locked in ice, but this one was liquid, its waters rippling under moonlight as the clouds parted. “But do you truly know her, Drew?”

Andrew felt his shoulders go stiff, his wolf baring its teeth in instinctive response, but he respected Judd’s intelligence enough to rein it back. “Are you saying I don’t?”

“I’m saying that from what Brenna’s noted, you’ve had a crush on Indigo since you were a very young man.” Judd held up a hand when Andrew would’ve interrupted. “I’m not questioning what you feel; I’m not telling you that you’re wrong. I’m simply asking you to examine your own emotions,” he said with implacable logic. “Ask yourself if it’s Indigo you want, or a mirage of her you’ve built up in your mind.”

With that, Judd jogged down the final steep part of the incline to the pebbled edge of the lake. Andrew followed with far less grace, for all that he was changeling. His mind was misfiring, his body not quite under his control. It felt as if his world had just been skewed on its axis.

A few feet away, the lake lapped with placid regularity over the smooth water-shaped pebbles, in stark contrast to his own disordered state. Swearing under his breath, he ripped off his sweatshirt and went for his boots.

Judd walked away without a word, taking a path along the curving edge of the dark spread of water.

Stripping down to his skin, Andrew looked up at the moon, his wolf confused, floundering. The bright sphere, its face covered by clouds an instant later, could give him no answers, and the more he thought, the more he tangled himself up in the sticky confusion of a thousand cobwebs. Shrugging off the cutting bite of the wind, he strode in through the shallows and dived.

Ice.

The shock of it tore the air from his lungs, froze the blood in his veins … and returned clarity to his mind.

Indigo snapping at him because he’d been messing around during training.

Indigo allowing him to cuddle into her because she thought he needed the touch of Pack.

Indigo pissy on a short trip they’d taken to Los Angeles.

Indigo laughing with Mercy as the two of them teased Riley.

Indigo calm and smart as she advised Hawke against a planned maneuver.

Indigo whooping with glee as they finished scaling one of the tougher climbs they’d attempted.

Indigo teeth-grittingly obstinate as she arrowed toward the man she thought was right for her.

Wiping the water from his face, he sucked in a breath of the bracing air and yelled out to the night, “I know every part of her, warts and all! And I still adore her!” He began to head back to shore without waiting for an answer. Even his tough changeling body couldn’t handle water this icy for long.

A towel was waiting for him by his discarded clothes. He grinned. Having a telekinetic as a friend did come in handy sometimes. Wiping himself off with rough strokes that got his blood pumping, he rubbed at his hair then pulled on his clothes. He was sitting on the rocky shore, the towel around his neck, when Judd returned to his side. The other man took a seat beside him, his movements so quiet that if Andrew hadn’t scented him, he’d never have known there was anyone beside him.

“So,” Judd said, “what’re you going to do?”

“What I have been doing,” Andrew said, his wolf growling in feral agreement. “I’m not about to let her ignore me just because I don’t fit neatly into the box she has marked out for the man she’ll take as her own.” He wanted to use the word mate, but that had a very specific meaning for changelings.

And though it hurt him to admit it, there was no mating dance between him and Indigo, no compulsion from the wild heart of their natures that would—if nothing else—tug her inexorably to him, make her pay attention. No, all he had was his stubborn determination … and his heart.

Judd sighed. “That’s not your strength.”

“You’re giving me dating advice?” Andrew was dumbfounded.

“I’m mated,” Judd pointed out with a cool arrogance that almost hid the laughter in his voice. “You can’t even get the woman you want into bed. I’d listen if I were you.”

Andrew gave him the finger, but his wolf pricked up its ears. “Yeah, so?”

“Sienna,” Judd said in an abrupt change of subject, “is slow to take to people, suspicious of everyone’s motives. She’s had to become that way to protect herself, but she lets you hold her. Do you understand how big a deal that is for her?”