“No one but me will touch you.” His tone was even but implacable.
She cocked an impervious brow at him. “Oh? And why, pray tell, is that?”
“For the same reason I asked you to be safe for me. You’re my mate, Makenna.”
Her mind went blank for a moment. He was kidding, right? He had to be. Only . . . he didn’t look like he was. She cleared her suddenly dry throat. “Why would you think that?”
“I don’t think it, I know it. The facts are there.”
“What facts?”
“Since day one, all I’ve thought about is being balls deep in you. Your scent drives me insane. My wolf hates being apart from you. You’re an outsider, a loner, but I’d fucking kill to protect you. And I’d kill to possess you. I’m not a possessive person, Makenna. But I’d like to string Colton up by his intestines for touching you.”
Not for a single second would Makenna have guessed that he’d been feeling that way. He was too damn good at hiding his emotions. Her wolf was uncharacteristically quiet. Surprised? Alarmed? Curious? Makenna couldn’t tell.
Returning his honesty with her own, Makenna said, “I won’t say that the attraction is only one way. I admit, I don’t like it when females are mooning over you. And I don’t like the idea of you in danger. And my wolf . . . well, she feels the same way. But if we were mates, we’d know. We’d feel the pull of the mating bond.”
“Not if the frequency is jammed by mental barriers or anxieties about mating.” Wanting—no, needing—to touch her, Ryan shackled her wrist, circling her madly beating pulse with his thumb. “What do you fear, Makenna? What about mating makes you afraid?”
Her spine snapped straight. “Who says I’m afraid of mating?”
“I’ve watched you. A lot. You’re not easy to read. Mostly because you don’t act or think normally.” Why she looked proud of that, he wasn’t sure. “You put a lot of time and effort into helping others. But you don’t let many into your life. You step into their life, but you don’t let them step into yours.”
There was more truth in that than she was comfortable with.
“Maybe it’s because you don’t want them to know your secrets. Maybe it’s because you once lost someone important to you.”
Flushing, she tried to yank her hand away; he held it tight. “You can stop analyzing me now.”
“Those sort of issues would jam a mating frequency.”
“Did you ever consider—assuming we are mates—that maybe you’re jamming it, not me? You can’t tell me you don’t have issues of your own.”
“I have issues. But I haven’t let them blind me to the truth.”
As his eyes roamed over her face with a fierce possessiveness that made her stomach clench, she said, “You’re absolutely positive about this, aren’t you?”
“We wouldn’t be having this conversation if I wasn’t.”
“How long have you believed this?”
“Since yesterday.”
Well that explained the odd behavior he’d displayed. He’d probably felt as shocked as she was feeling right now. Honestly, Makenna had never imagined herself mating. Ryan was right; she didn’t know how to be open with people. A part of her had shut down after her mother died. For as long as she could remember, it had always been the two of them against the world—Fiona Wray had been everything to Makenna, her rock, her safe place.
Then she’d died, and Makenna had been lost.
So lost she’d sought sanctuary in her wolf form, desperate to escape the pain and grief. Her wolf, just as guttered, had turned half feral. When she was placed in the shelter by Social Services, Dawn and Madisyn brought her back from that state and forced her to grieve like a human. But even back in her human form, she’d remained half feral for a while, a state that had amplified those feelings tormenting her.
Dawn and Madisyn had offered her a shoulder to cry on, but Makenna hadn’t taken it. Hadn’t shared her grief with anyone. Instead, she’d turned inward, become her own rock. She didn’t rely on others for anything, and she liked it that way. A mate, however, would never accept that. As such, Ryan’s claim scared her.
Still, that bone-deep loneliness inside her reached out to him, wanted it to be true. Being independent gave her strength and a sense of security and control, but it also made her feel very alone. She’d accepted that, though. She’d thought she could handle it. It wasn’t until this very moment that she realized she felt as incomplete as her wolf—maybe even more so.