“Wolves. Like werewolves?” She stared into his eyes, finding that oddly easy to believe, surprised by how it made all of it much easier to believe when she thought about Lowe and the others as werebears.
Only she didn’t think they changed during a full moon and howled at it.
He nodded. “Wolf shifters are a little divided on that though. Some like to be called werewolves and others prefer to be called wolf shifters. Me and my kin just call them wolves.”
She frowned and pursed her lips as she thought about what other shifters might be out there. Her eyebrows rose.
“Is Holly a bear or a wolf?”
“She’s a cougar.”
Cameo’s eyebrows shot up as something hit her. “That’s what you meant when you said you wanted to kill the cougars. Your neighbours are cougar… shifters.”
She hoped she had that right. Werecougars just sounded weird. She wanted to chuckle at that. If the thing she found weird was the name they gave their species, then she really had lost her mind. Or everything was sinking in and beginning to make sense to her.
Something else dawned on her.
“Oh my God. The bear. The bear that was bleeding everywhere.” She stared at Lowe, stunned as she thought about it. “That was Saint.”
Lowe nodded, but his features pinched in a way that made her feel he was worried about things again. He was tense for a few seconds, until she looked back down at what she was doing and started cleaning his wound again.
He loosed a long sigh as he relaxed. “You need to know what you’re getting into if you’re going to stay.”
“I’m going to stay.” She put that out there before her nerve failed her and glanced up at his face.
“I know. For now.” He went to look away from her.
“Not for now.” She rushed that confession out before he could say anything and his gaze locked with hers, his eyes widening.
“Not for now?”
She shook her head.
“I will understand if you want to leave. I won’t try to make you stay.” He had that defeated look again.
Cameo didn’t like it. It wasn’t like him. The man she knew was gentle, but a warrior too.
“You’re not going to fight for me?” She canted her head, her fingers pausing at her work, pressing softly to his damp skin just above his waist. “If I walked out that door right now, you’d just let me go?”
A flicker of something in his eyes told her that he didn’t want that. He didn’t want her to leave him. She didn’t want him to let her go.
She felt bad provoking him, pushing him, but she wanted to know how he felt about her. She wanted to know that he wanted her here, needed her with him as badly as she needed to be with him.
A war erupted in his blue eyes and she watched it unfold, could almost hear his thoughts as he went back and forth about what he would do.
An ache started in her heart, born of a whisper that drifted through her mind, too quiet for her to hear but it stirred a feeling in her, and she was sure that once it grew loud enough it would devastate her.
Lowe vanquished it before it could fully form.
He clutched her hand and stared deep into her eyes. “I’d fight. I can’t let you go. I meant that. Gods, I mean it. I would do whatever it took to keep you by my side because I’m crazy about you… I know this is fast… but… I love you, Cameo, and that means that if you wanted to leave—”
She silenced him with a soft kiss, unable to bear seeing him in pain, seeing him torn between doing anything to keep her with him because he loved her and doing nothing to hurt her.
Because he loved her.
Her noble bear.
The thought that he would let her leave because he loved her, that he would break his own heart, made hers ache for him. Made her love him all the more. If that was possible. She wasn’t sure it was.
He clutched her nape and kissed her, keeping it gentle and tender, filled with love that warmed her to her soul.
Lowe pulled back before she was ready, and she worried it was because his injuries were hurting him when she looked into his eyes and saw the pain that shone in them.
“Are they hurting?” She lowered her hand to his hip, checked it over and then tried to see the other side of the wound. “Are you sure you don’t need me to get Yasmin?”
He shook his head, his blond eyebrows slowly furrowing as he stared at her face.
She gently pressed her hand to his side and he shuffled forwards a few inches, so she could see the exit wound. She carefully cleaned and inspected it, covered it with a dressing and then eased him back again. She looked at the bullet hole in his stomach and swallowed hard. What if either of the bullets had hit something vital? She could dress them, but if the one that had penetrated his side had nicked an organ or his intestines, he might get sick. Terribly sick.
Just the thought of that happening was enough to have her worried, feeling frantic with a need to make sure it wasn’t the case.
She looked at him. “You said you could call an air ambulance.”
He shook his head and frowned at her. “No hospitals. I’ll be fine, Cameo, shifters don’t get sick like humans… but if it will set your mind at ease, I’ll get Yasmin to look at the wounds.”
“Is she a cougar shifter too?”
Another shake. “She’s a goddess.”
Cameo stared at him, her mind blanking as she tried to process that. There weren’t just shifter breeds in this world with the humans. There were goddesses too. Which meant there were gods. And what else was living undetected among humans?
Not quite undetected.
“You mentioned hunters.” She frowned into his eyes. “Are they the reason you won’t go to a hospital?”
He nodded and swallowed hard. “I can’t risk exposing my pride to them. We have to be careful about everything we do. There’s an organisation out there that does terrible things to people like us. Experiments. Torture. Raids that often end with most of a pride dead.”
“That’s awful.” She wouldn’t mention hospitals again or anything to do with humans. She stilled. “Lowe… I’m human. The way that man looked at me… He doesn’t want me here. He thinks I’m a threat or a liability.”
“Maverick can go fuck himself,” Lowe snarled and reached for her, slid his hand around her nape and gripped it gently as his eyes darted between hers, softening again. “You’re staying. He understands that. He knows the reason I need you here.”
“Because you love me?” She wanted to hear him admit that again.
He sighed. “Because I love you, and—”
“And?” She shuffled a little closer to him when he looked as if he didn’t want to continue. She was damned if he was going to leave her hanging, leave her wondering what he had been going to say, especially when he looked so torn. So afraid. She raised her hands and gently framed his face. “Tell me, Lowe. Whatever it is, it can’t make this whole thing any crazier.”
He looked as if he doubted that.
Dropped his gaze to his knees and heaved another sigh, and she frowned as she felt sure he was nervous. He wasn’t shaking and he wasn’t looking at her. Nothing about him betrayed his nerves. How was it she could feel these things about him? It was like a sixth sense.