Chapter 71

Kayla

The door clicked shut behind us, and for the first time all day, I let out a breath I didn’t realize I had been holding. The house was quiet, the kind of stillness that felt like a huge relief after the chaos of the news station.

I slipped off my heels by the front door, stretching out my ankles with a soft sigh, and glanced at Nicholas over my shoulder.

He was tossing his keys onto the entryway table, his earlier mask having slipped to reveal the same brooding pout he’d been wearing for days now—aside from the night he drank and laughed like nothing had happened.

Without a word, he turned and stalked into the living room. I followed, watching as he grabbed the remote and switched on the TV, flopping down on the sofa.

It didn’t take long for us to find the channel. Our interview was already replaying and being commentated on by another news anchor.

With another sigh, I plopped onto the couch a little ways away from him and crossed my legs beneath me. We watched in silence for a few moments, both of us quietly cringing all the way through the cheating allegations. The commentators were saying something about the implications behind it and how it could affect my leadership skills, of course.

Because why wouldn’t they?

But other than that, the interview seemed to go as smoothly as it possibly could have. Nicholas’s swift intervention was a godsend, and even the commentators couldn’t help but take note of how quickly he jumped to my defense, as well as the soundness of his argument.

Crisis averted, it seemed. For now, at least. I had no doubt in my mind that people would gossip, but I had a good feeling that the bulk of the rumors would die down.

All thanks to Nicholas.

“You’re a lucky woman,” that girl had said backstage.

Just the thought of those words made my heart thrum slightly. I glanced over at Nicholas without really even meaning to, briefly taking in the hard set of his jaw and the way his eyes were fixed on the screen.

When I had clammed up, he had been there.

Something Liam had never done for me.

Something no man, aside from Beta Henry, had done for me since my father had gone into his coma.

We’d given each other hell these past few days, and yet he had stood up for me. Maybe it was just his way of keeping our image pristine, but something about it told me that it was more than that.

Maybe, just maybe, he’d jumped in because he didn’t want to see me get attacked on live television.

Because he cared.

I didn’t want to admit it, but the thought made me soften a little toward him. Just a little.

Finally, the interview ended, and I moved to get up. But then the screen cut to a panel of guild representatives. One of them, a tall, thin man with slicked-back hair and an irritatingly smug smile, adjusted his tie and leaned toward the microphone.

I furrowed my brow, thinking hard, and then recognized him as the man that Noah and Nicholas had been talking to at the country club.

“The engagement between Kayla of Bluemoon Pack and Alpha Nicholas Reynolds is certainly… unexpected,” the man said smoothly. “However, we’ve recently received information suggesting that Kayla’s fated mate may, in fact, be Noah Baker.”

My stomach dropped.

Nicholas’s head snapped toward the TV, his grip on the remote tightening until his knuckles turned white.

“What the hell?” he growled.

I sat up straighter, hardly daring to believe it. “They can’t just say that. How the hell would they even know?”

Nicholas’s jaw clenched hard enough that I thought his teeth might crack. “Noah.”

I blinked. “What?”

He turned to me, his eyes dark and burning with something I couldn’t quite place—but whatever it was, it was almost frightening. “This has his fingerprints all over it. He probably told the guild that you two are fated mates, and they’re using it to prove that our relationship is fake.”

I shook my head, brushing my hair out of my face. “Noah wouldn’t do that, though, would he? I mean, you two have been friends for years—”

“I don’t know. You tell me, since you two seem so close lately.”

There it was. The jealousy again, thinly veiled beneath that cool, Alpha exterior that Nicholas liked to wear so often.

I stared at Nicholas incredulously for a moment before standing, shaking my head, and crossing over to the mini bar to pour myself a glass of wine. It was only mid-afternoon, but I felt like I needed it already.

“I already told you, I rejected Noah,” I said carefully as I turned away and poured the red liquid into my glass.

When I turned back, I found Nicholas looming over me. “Yeah, and yet here we are,” he said, his voice low and dangerous. “The whole damn guild thinks you belong to him. You may have rejected him, but if he’s really your fated mate, that doesn’t mean much, does it?”

I let out a sharp breath. And then, suddenly, it came out.

“I know what this is, Nicholas. You’re thinking about what happened with your mother, and you think it’ll happen to you, too. You think that nothing can break a fated mate bond, that your feelings for me are doomed.”

The words slipped out before I could stop myself, and my eyes widened. I couldn’t believe I’d just said that, knowing just how painful his mother’s history was to him.

But it was true. I could tell it from the way he always tensed up when the subject of fated mates came up, the bitterness in his voice whenever he spoke about it, the hateful look in his eyes now that did little to disguise the scared, tired little boy underneath.

He was afraid.

Suddenly, Nicholas was on me. In an instant, he’d gone from standing on the other side of the mini bar to towering over me, his chest rising and falling as he huffed down at me. I wasn’t sure how I managed to keep hold of my wine glass under the sudden darkness of his shadow—maybe it was because my fingers tightened so much around the glass that it nearly shattered.

For several long moments, we just stared at each other in stunned, angry, confusing silence.

I hated this. I hated him when he was like this.

And most of all, I hated myself for the way that I almost enjoyed seeing that intense, burning jealousy in his eyes.

Feeling bold, I tilted my head and narrowed my eyes, as if I hadn’t already done enough damage. “I know you’re jealous.”

He stiffened.

“Do you think that if we were together for real, whatever bond I may or may not have with Noah would pull us apart?” I pushed, stepping even closer despite the fact that our bodies were almost touching now. “Because if that’s the case, just say it. Stop trying to hide your true feelings behind the facade of a man who drinks with his friends and smiles on TV.”

Nicholas’s eyes darkened, and for a second, I thought he might actually answer. His lips parted, but no words came out.

The air between us was thick enough to choke on. I could feel the heat radiating from his skin even through our layers of clothes, the soft hum of the mate bond barely flickering beneath the surface of my skin. His gaze flicked to my lips, and I swallowed hard, my pulse pounding.

I wasn’t sure why I had been so bold, but it was done. And I couldn’t decide if I was glad for it or if I wished I’d just kept my mouth shut.

But before either of us could say anything, the phone rang.