“Would you be able to make all the charms you needed for the pack?” I pressed. I needed all the options before I made my decision.
“Possibly? It depends on how much magic I can recoup in the next day and how much you can offer.” She leaned back with a frown. “I’ve never done anything like this. I could be totally off base and you might have the magical potential of a gnat.”
“But you don’t think so?”
She shook her head. “No. You’re an Alpha with a bonded mate and you’re a Dashkov. At the very least your mating bond and the rippling effects it had throughout the world says you’ve got some power in you. I mean, you caused a bonding wave from the other side of the world.”
My eyes drifted to a pissed off Remy. “We both did.” I offered him a small smile that he definitely didn’t return.
Lulu leaned forward again, rubbing her palms along her thighs. She looked at me earnestly. “There’s a chance it won’t work, but I really think it will. And I wouldn’t ask you to do this if I thought it would cause permanent damage or hurt you.”
“Permanent damage,” Remy said, derision dripping from his words. “But short term damage is an option?”
“She’d probably feel like I do right now,” Lulu told him evenly. “Tired and worn out. But you’d be fine in a few days.”
“Probably,” Remy emphasized. He whirled and practically glared at me.
“Perhaps this is a conversation the two of you should have alone,” Nikolai suggested, his gray eyes meeting mine.
“Or perhaps we should stop thinking about this altogether,” Dimitri replied stiffly.
Lulu shook her head. “This isn't your call, Dima. It’s mine. And Skye’s.”
I looked at Remy. This wasn’t just my call. What I did affected Remy. If it was up to me, I would have said yes. But Remy was talking about challenging Damien, which meant his focus could be twisted up in a way we couldn’t afford if I got hurt.
“Let’s go upstairs,” I said gently, getting up.
He huffed out a laugh and muttered, “Fine.” A second later, he turned on his heel and stormed out of the room.
I gave everyone a tight smile. “We’ll be back in a few minutes, I guess.”
“Take all the time you need,” Nikolai said warmly.
Michael sighed. “Katy, why don’t you help me figure out where we’re putting all these people in the meantime.”
“Of course,” she agreed, following him out of the room.
“I’ll call Griffin and let him know we’re working on something,” Dante added. He looked at Rhodes. “Can you call Tate and tell her that I’m not meeting her and Ryder at the development?”
Rhodes nodded. “Yeah.” Instead of following Dante, he turned to me. “Cut him some slack, Skye. He’s scared.”
“I know,” I replied softly. I hesitated and looked at Nikolai. “How’s Mom?”
He blinked at me. “She was fine when I left her this morning.”
My brain tripped over his words. “Wait—you spent the night with Mom?”
“I slept in your room,” he told me, an amused twinkle in his eye.
Oh, that made it all make sense.
“Your mate may come back and drag you upstairs if you don’t find him soon,” he advised me.
“Right.” I spun around and headed upstairs to where Remy was waiting for me. I skirted past him into the bedroom and turned to wait for him.
He closed the door to his bedroom and whirled to face me, his eyes blazing. But underneath the simmering anger, I could see the fear that lurked. He was scared, and I understood that. But I still needed him to get why I should do this.
I pressed my hand over his mouth, gently. “Remy, I need you to trust me.”
He pulled my hand away, almost annoyed that I was trying to silence him. “I trust you, Skye. Haven’t I made that clear yet? I trust you with everything, but we don’t know enough about magic or whatever the hell this is for me to trust it with you.”
“Lulu can’t protect us all. She’s not strong enough after what happened yesterday. She needs an extra boost,” I said, pleading for him to understand. “I might be able to be that boost.”
“You’re not a fucking battery, baby,” he snapped, walking around me and further into the room. “We don’t know what this will do to you.”
“Lulu said—”
He glared at me. “I don’t give a damn what Lulu said. I don’t know her.”
“But I do,” I insisted, crossing the floor to stand in front of him. “I trust her. And after what she did for us in Long Mesa, isn’t that enough?”
His hands came up to frame my face. “Not when you’re involved. You’re asking me to trust someone I don’t know with your life. That’s not a jump I’m ever going to be comfortable making.”
Irritation shot through me. “Remy.”
“I’m sorry, babe. I can’t let you do this.”
I jerked out of his hold. “I’m sorry. Did you say let me?”
His gaze darkened. “Skye—”
I held up a hand to stop him. “No. Let’s get this straight right now, okay? I love you. I’m here, willing to try and find a compromise because I value your opinion. But last I checked? I was an Alpha, too, and the people on their way here are because of me. Lulu is here because of me.”
“I know,” he ground out.
“Then maybe start acting like it,” I shot back. “This gives all of us the best chance. Blackwater, Windale, those missing girls … All of us, but most especially you. You don’t get to throw yourself into an Alpha challenge again and again and expect that I’m just going to sit by and do nothing.”
He exhaled slowly and rolled his neck, cracking it audibly. “I’m not asking you to do nothing.”
“No, you aren’t,” I agreed. “You’re the one always saying how strong I am and how much I value, but that means crap if you tuck me away on a shelf when things get hard.”
“Is that what you think I’m doing?” he whispered, stunned. The hurt in his eyes was palpable.
“Not intentionally,” I hedged. “I know you want to protect me, but that means I get to protect you, too.”
“And this is how you do that?”
I closed the distance between us and framed his face with my hands. “We can’t get to Windale without Lulu’s help, and she’s too weak to make enough charms to protect us all. We have to be able to sneak people past Damien before he realizes what we’re doing for this to work.”
“Then we send less people,” he tried.
“You know that won’t work,” I replied sadly. “There’s too many people on Damien’s side now. We need all the manpower we can get to make this anything close to a fair fight. Remy, we can’t do this without Lulu, and she can’t do this without me.”
“We’ll ... wait for her to get stronger.” He knew that wouldn’t work either, but he was grasping at straws in an attempt to save me.
God, I loved this man. I loved how insufferably stubborn he could be, especially when it came to how he wanted to protect me.