The Sea Wolf's Mate Page 15

  “They’re your pack.” Arlo nodded.

  “I dunno? We’re each other’s pack. We don’t…” Eric’s shoulders slumped. “It’s just us.”

  Arlo sighed. He looked up and caught Harrison’s eye. *You hear all that?* he sent to him.

  *Yep.*

  “Right.” Arlo looked Eric in the eye, then swept his gaze over the three Weaver kids as well, including them in the conversation. “I know we talked about getting you your own place, but that’s out of the question. You’ve done a good job of looking after yourselves up until now, and it’s time for the adults to take over.”

  “We’re not going into some sort of home again!” Kenna blurted out, grabbing Dylan’s hand.

  “No, you’re not,” Arlo agreed. “Not some sort of home. Someone’s home, and it’ll be your home, too.”

  Kenna exchanged a look with Dylan and Eric. Arlo felt a whisper of their telepathic conversation against the edge of his own consciousness.

  “Might have been easier if you told us all this earlier,” Harrison pointed out calmly.

  Arlo nodded. If they’d known when the Sweets were still here—

  His ribs tightened, so hard and so quickly pain shot through his chest. If I hadn’t blown up over Eric, if I’d known that he was just a kid like the others, if I hadn’t let my mouth run and driven Jacqueline off…

  Then the kids would be safe in their new home with the Sweets, and Jacqueline would still be here.

  Arlo’s wolf whined, and he frowned. Something about that picture still didn’t fit.

  “Harrison’s right,” he said, making sure to keep his own confusion out of his voice. “If we’d known sooner Eric wasn’t old enough to be your guardian, we could have planned things a bit better.”

  “Well maybe we had our own plans!” Kenna blurted out. She slapped her hands over her mouth, eyes wide, and then let them from. Her head dropped. “Not that that matters, now…”

  Arlo shook his head, confused, until he caught the edge of another silent conversation between Kenna and Eric.

  *…him and Jacqueline…*

  Arlo stepped away. He didn’t want to hear any more, and he didn’t want the kids to see his face.

  He’d hurt the one woman he was meant to protect with his life. Hurt her so badly she couldn’t bear the sight of him. And he didn’t even know how.

  He closed his eyes. Now that he wasn’t worked up over the bogeyman failed-alpha Eric he’d built up in his head out of nothing, maybe he could see beyond his own frustration. Ma Sweets had been talking about pack. That was what had set him off, and—

  God. That’s what had set Jacqueline off, as well.

  Snippets of images and conversations clicked together in his mind. The picture they formed made his heart ache.

  Jacqueline’s failed marriage. The sliver of ice in her voice when she said there was no one waiting at home for her. The way she’d talked around the fact her ex had gotten another woman pregnant, and what that meant.

  And he’d told her the one thing he’d always wanted most in the world was a pack of his own.

  Christ. How could I be so blind?

  “I have to go,” he announced. Everyone’s attention was instantly on him. A flicker of satisfaction passed across Harrison’s face.

  “Keys?” Harrison tossed them over and Arlo caught them without looking. He had already turned to the kids.

  He met each of their eyes in turn, and couldn’t tell whether the anxious anticipation shivering across his skin was his, or theirs.

  “Wait here,” he told them. “I’ve got to fix something. And then I’ll be back.”

  He swallowed. He could tell they wanted him to say more—but he couldn’t. He wasn’t going to make any promises he couldn’t keep.

  “Harrison, Lainie, can you look after them? I don’t know how long—”

  “As long as you need,” Harrison said firmly, and Lainie nodded, taking his hand.

  Arlo couldn’t speak. His whole being was wound tight with the need to go, to fix what he’d broken. If he could. God, he hoped he could.

  The Land Rover’s engine roared and he drove off to find the other half of his heart.

  19

  Jacqueline

  Jacqueline opened the door. Too quickly. She wasn’t prepared for who was on the other side, and then there was no time to control her reaction.

  “You!” she exclaimed. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Derek gave an easy smile. “Jacqueline.”

  Jacqueline froze. That smile, those crisp light-blue eyes and the equally un-crisp collars on his shirt—how many times had she asked him to hang his clothes up instead of throwing them on the floor after she’d ironed them…

  She shook herself. “Why are you here?” she repeated.

  “Can we talk? Inside?” He shot her that smile again and tried to get past her. She stepped in front of him. “Come on, Jacqueline. It’s been years. You can’t keep me out of my own house.”

  “It’s not your house,” she said automatically. “You gave it to me in the settlement. Remember?”

  “Well, yeah…” He leaned back, hands on his hips as he looked up at the house. “It’s just got so many memories, you know?”

  I know.

  “So, you gonna let me in?”

  “Why were you at the Spring Fling?”

  Derek eyeballed her. “Why weren’t you? You always used to love that sort of rubbish.”

  Jacqueline’s spine went wobbly. He was looking for me? She was instantly suspicious.

  “Come on, Jackie,” Derek said, smiling. “Let me inside. There’s something I want to talk with you about.”

  “Oh, now you want to talk?” Jacqueline couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

  “Here we go again.” Derek turned away, but not so quickly she missed him rolling his eyes.

  “What do you mean, again?” The wobbliness in Jacqueline’s spine grew prickles. “We’ve never talked about what happened. I never even got a chance to tell you how you made me feel! I—oh, shit, no.”

  Another car pulled up on the other side of the street. One she recognized. God, it would be too much to hope it was Harrison or Lainie, wouldn’t it? It was their car after all—but—

  Arlo stepped out of the driver’s seat and the bottom fell out of Jacqueline’s stomach.

  I can’t believe this is happening. I’m going to face off with the man who divorced me because I can’t have kids… and the man whose heart I’m going to break for the same reason.

  20

  Arlo

  The hair on the back of Arlo’s neck prickled. He sensed where Jacqueline was even before he saw her, a dark shape in the doorframe, silhouetted by the light inside.

  There was a man on the step in front of her.

  Arlo crossed the street in a few long strides. “Is this man bothering you, Jacqueline?”

  Jacqueline’s face was tense. Her hair was tied back, but she gestured as though she was pushing it off her face anyway. “Arlo, now’s—”

  “I’m not bothering her. I’m her ex-husband. Who the hell are you?”

  “I’m—” Her mate. The word twisted on his tongue. He wanted it to be true, but he couldn’t say it, and not just because the scowling man in front of him wasn’t a shifter.

  If Jacqueline rejected him, all the words in the world wouldn’t make it true.

  He stared at Jacqueline imploringly. Her eyes softened, just for a moment, and then went sharp with a pain that cut straight through his chest.

  “Arlo’s a—a friend,” she said.

  Thank you, Arlo thought. He knew some people might find being called a “friend” a slap in the face, but for him, it was a bright light of hope.

  Maybe he still had a chance to make things right.

  “Sure, fine, whatever.” Jacqueline’s ex—Derek, he remembered now—turned back to Jacqueline. “Look, this is getting ridiculous. Tell your friend to come back another time. What I’ve got to say is importan
t.”

  Arlo’s hackles rose. His wolf was growling, and it was all he could do to keep himself from growling, too.

  Jacqueline made an exasperated noise. “Right. This is important.”

  “That’s what I said.” Derek jerked his chin towards the street. “Go on, you heard her. This isn’t a good time for an impromptu visit.”

  “Oh, for—do you even hear yourself?”

  Derek started forward and found Jacqueline standing in front of him, with her feet planted and her arms crossed.

  “Get out of the way, Jackie,” Derek said, his voice dripping patience.

  Arlo stepped forward. If this man thought he could speak to Jacqueline that way in her own house—

  “I’m not letting you in, Derek. I said that already. You just didn’t listen. You never—” Jacqueline pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes. “I need to—to talk to Arlo. That’s important. Whatever you’re here for can wait.”

  Derek spluttered. Jacqueline ignored him and held the door for Arlo.

  Arlo’s nose wrinkled as he went inside. The house smelled strongly of disinfectant, but it wasn’t just that.

  He couldn’t sense Jacqueline’s touch anywhere.

  It was a nice house, what he could see of it. Clean neutral carpets, walls papered with some sort of tiny flower pattern. Framed pictures with watercolors of other, bigger flowers. Halfway down the hall was an end-table covered in the sort of knick-knacks that Mrs. Hanson at the bed-and-breakfast loved to collect.

  It was nice. But fussy. Which wasn’t a word he associated with Jacqueline.

  “Arlo.”

  The front door clicked shut, with Derek on the other side of it. Jacqueline sighed and Arlo heard the weight of years of unhappiness in it.

  She was wearing the same borrowed shirt and jeans she’d left Hideaway Cove in, but they were dirty. The front of her shirt was patchy with sweat. Arlo ached to hold her.

  “I’m sorry about Derek,” she said. “He’s… well. I don’t know if it’s tenacity or what it is, but odds are he’ll have convinced himself in ten minutes that I don’t know what I’m talking about and obviously I meant to let him in, not you.”

  She paused, clicked her fingers and turned back to the door. Arlo heard the lock turn.

  “That should buy us some time,” she muttered.

  She didn’t turn back. Arlo watched her shoulders rise and fall as she took a deep breath.

  “Let me start,” he said, and she raised her hands.

  “No. I need to say this.” She turned around and lifted her eyes to meet his. “You want a pack. A—a family. And I can’t have kids.”

  “I know.”

  Her eyes widened and Arlo reached out to touch her shoulder. She leaned into his touch, so subtly he wondered if she knew she was doing it.

  “I put it all together after you left. I’m so sorry for what I said, Jacqueline. God, I was so twisted up in my own past I didn’t even think how that might sound.” Please believe me, he added silently. “You’re my pack. You’re everything I need.”

  Jacqueline shook her head, her eyes closed. “We both know that’s not true. You want a pack. A real family.”

  “I want you.”

  She went on as though she couldn’t hear him.

  “And I can’t give you any of that! I tried, Derek and I tried for so long, and it didn’t work. There’s something—”

  She gestured painfully towards her midriff. Her mouth rounded.

  Arlo grabbed her hand. He could see what word she was about to say, and he couldn’t let her say it.

  “There’s nothing wrong with you.”

  Jacqueline grimaced. “Come on. That’s obviously not—”

  “Jacqueline.” Arlo wrapped his hands around both of hers and held them to his heart. “You’re perfect. You’re everything. The only pack I need is you. Now or ever.”

  Jacqueline gulped. “You say that now. But I know how this works. You want a family, and I can’t give it to you. You’ll—you’ll end up resenting me. I don’t want to go through that again. I know it’s selfish, but I can’t. Not again.”

  Her voice was shaking. Arlo could see how every word hurt her to say.

  And he understood.

  “Part of that is true. I have always wanted a pack,” he said. Jacqueline’s eyes locked on to his, bone-dry and wary, as though she was bracing herself for him to give in and agree with her. Well, that wasn’t going to happen. “A pack of my own. To cherish and care for. To dedicate my life to. Because the pack I was born into never did that for me.”

  “But you said—” Jacqueline hesitated, and he willed her to keep going. “Shifters always look after their own.”

  “Mine didn’t.” Arlo’s voice dropped as he pulled up memories he’d kept hidden deep. How could he put into words things he’d never let himself think about? He felt like he was paddling over black water. Floundering. “My first pack abandoned me after my mother died.”

  “Oh, God, Arlo.”

  Jacqueline rushed forward and wrapped her arms around him. Arlo let out a ragged breath. She was a lifeline in the dark, holding him safe above the murky waters.

  “I traveled around by myself for a while. I was a few years older than Kenna, and I could grow a beard by then, so people either thought I was older than I was, or they didn’t care. I did odd jobs. Never stayed in one place long. I didn’t fit anywhere, and I didn’t know how to make myself fit. Losing my pack was like…”

  His stomach lurched at the memory. Jacqueline shivered against him.

  “I can’t imagine,” she whispered. “But the Weaver kids are their own pack, aren’t they? And they went through so much to stick together. If they lost each other…”

  “It would tear them to pieces.”

  Arlo’s wolf whined. Another memory surfaced: Tally, screaming her head off until she saw Arlo and Jacqueline. The memory tugged at something inside him.

  “But you found a place eventually, didn’t you? Hideaway Cove. And the Sweets took you in.”

  “Right…” Arlo frowned. “I found a new pack. And they…”

  He shook his head. “The point is, I’ve lost, too. I know how terrifying it can be to try and find something again that’s been snatched away from you. But you can find it again. Jacqueline, I won’t be like Derek. I won’t resent you. I couldn’t.”

  “But a pack—”

  “A pack can be two people. Together. In love.”

  Jacqueline was still holding him close. She tipped her head back to look into his eyes and he lowered his until their foreheads just touched.

  “I want that with you. Us. Together. Sailing off into the sunset.”

  21

  Jacqueline

  I want to believe him. Oh, God, I do.

  Jacqueline felt as though her heart was going to rip itself in two. Arlo was saying everything she wanted to hear, everything she needed to hear, and she knew deep in her soul that he wouldn’t lie to her.

  So why was she still so hesitant?

  I’m afraid. I’m still so afraid of everything going wrong. I’ve been afraid all this time. All my plans to go wild, party hard… I never wanted any of that. I was just afraid to admit what I really wanted.

  Someone who loves me just the way I am.

  “Sailing off into the sunset,” she whispered.

  “I know we missed tonight’s,” Arlo said, his words like kisses along the edges of her lips. “But there’ll be more.”

  “Promise?” Jacqueline couldn’t keep the hint of anxiety from her voice.

  “I promise.”

  She drew a slow breath. “Derek wasn’t the only one who wanted kids. I know it’s hypocritical, after what I said about being afraid of you resenting me, but you have to know… I always dreamed of having a house full of kids. It’s why we bought this place. But it never happened, and it’s never going to happen. I’m sad about that. I’m likely to stay sad about it.”

  “I understand.”

  Of cour
se he does, Jacqueline thought, staring up into his eyes. This strong mountain of a man, salt-crusted and callused and warm and caring. Of course he understood.

  “I’m still scared,” she admitted, “I…”

  I wanted a fresh start.

  That’s the one thing I told myself that was actually true. And now here it is.

  Jacqueline raised her head. Arlo lifted his, his expression confused until he looked into her eyes.

  “I’m scared,” she said. “Because I don’t want to lose you. But that isn’t a good enough reason to run away. Just like it wasn’t a good enough reason to lock myself up here in Dunston, barely living my life and not even admitting to myself what I wanted.”

  She took his hand, winding her fingers around his. His hand was so big and strong, practically dwarfing hers, and yet they fit together perfectly. How had she never noticed this before?

  “Arlo,” she said, and her voice wasn’t shaking anymore. “You’re my pack.”

  The noise he made was all she needed to know she’d made the right decision.

  “And you’re mine,” he growled.

  Jacqueline pulled him down for a kiss that made her whole body heat up. Their teeth clashed together and she pulled back at the same time he did, and the half-second they each spent checking the other was all right was too much. She kissed him again, hot and passionate, her fingers digging into his scalp.

  The same throb of unexpected desire as she’d felt the night before hit her like a train. And this time, she had no desire to slow down. Jacqueline bit down on Arlo’s lip and felt him groan, the reverberation coming through his chest and diving straight down between her legs. She was going to ride this need to exhaustion.

  There was a knock at the door.

  “No…” Jacqueline groaned. “Shoot. I forgot about Derek.”

  Arlo kissed her neck and then growled against it: “Keep forgetting him.”

  “What, just leave him out there listening in?” Jacqueline reluctantly unwound herself from Arlo. “I’ll get rid of him. Quickly,” she reassured him. “Very quickly.”