Page 39

“Let me,” I say, moving closer without considering the implications. My chest brushes her back as I reach around her, carefully extending my claws to grasp the crystal without scratching it.

The contact—the first deliberate touch in days—sends fire racing through my veins. The mate bond flares with recognition, with relief so profound itmomentarily steals my breath. My skin shifts involuntarily to that iridescent shade I can never seem to control around her.

“Guide my hands,” I murmur, my voice dropping lower than intended as her scent surrounds me. “Tell me what you need.”

“Thirty degrees clockwise, then stabilize at the central axis,” she instructs, her voice impressively steady despite the rapid increase in her heart rate that I can feel through our contact.

Together, we manipulate the crystal into alignment. When it finally locks into place, glowing with completed connection, I can’t bring myself to move away. My chest remains pressed against her back, my wings partially curling around us both in a protective gesture that feels as natural as breathing.

“I’ve missed you,” I admit, the words scraping raw against my throat. “Even when you’ve been right beside me, I’ve missed what was growing between us before…”

“Before you learned who Ireally am.” Her voice carries resignation that makes my chest ache with regret for how quickly I judged her.

“No.” I need her to understand that it wasn’t her past that frightened me, but my own reaction to it. “Before I let fear make me forget what I already knew about who you are.”

She turns to face me, uncertainty and hope warring in her expression. It strikes me how brave she is—always facing truths head-on, even painful ones.

“I’ve spent years defining myself by what I’m not,” she says, scientific precision failing to mask the vulnerability beneath. “Not my father’s willing apprentice. Not Apex’s obedient researcher. Always running from what I was instead of embracing what I could be.”

“And now?” My tail finally makes contact, curling gently around her ankle in a tentative touch I’ve denied us both for too long.

“Now I’m trying to integrate all the pieces instead of denying them.” The simplicity of her answer strikes me with its honesty. “Using what I learned from my father to protect instead of hunt. Applying scientific methods to understand mate bonds and sanctuary defenses rather than cryptid weaknesses.”

“That integration suits you.” The words come easily, genuine appreciation warming my voice. “The hunter’s daughter and the brilliant scientist. Both real. Both valuable.”

As evening light bathes the ridge in amber, her expression shifts toward something both resolute and vulnerable. “I thought I could treat your wing without having to tell you, but he changed the formula and added the virus. I should have toldyou about my background sooner. About my father. About recognizing components of his toxin in your wing.”

“Yes,” I agree without rancor, knowing honesty serves us better than false comfort. “You should have.”

“I was afraid.” The admission seems to cost her more than any scientific analysis or tactical assessment ever could. “Not just of how others would react, but of acknowledging that part of myself. Of accepting that I’ll always carry pieces of the world that shaped me, even as I reject what it stands for.”

Her words mirror my own journey so precisely that my skin ripples with recognition. “We’re all shaped by our origins, Blair. Even when we fight against them.”

“You’ve been fighting yours too,” she observes quietly. “Carrying Kieran’s horn like a punishment rather than honoring his memory.”

My skin shifts to obsidian at the direct reference, the familiar shame rising before I can stop it. But I don’t retreat as I once would have. “It’s easier to focus on failure than to accept that some things lie beyond our control.”

“Like a mate bond forming between a Jersey Devil and a hunter’s daughter?” The unexpected lightness in her tone catches me off guard, warmthspreading through my chest at her willingness to acknowledge what still pulses between us.

My tail tightens fractionally around her ankle. “Statistically improbable, according to your research.”

“Highly improbable,” she corrects, that delightful scientific precision returning. “Yet empirically undeniable based on documented physiological responses.”

A laugh escapes me, genuine and unguarded for the first time in days. “Always the scientist.”

“It’s how I make sense of things that feel too big for words.” Her hand rises tentatively, hovering near my face without quite touching. “Like how much I’ve missed you, too.”

The crystal array pulses with completed connection, bathing us in soft light as dusk settles over the mountain. In this moment of fragile rebuilding, I resist the urge to pull her closer, to reclaim everything we’d begun to build before secrets and revelations complicated our path. This tentative new understanding feels too precious to rush, too important to risk with impatience.

“We should head back,” I say finally, though my tail refuses to release her ankle. “The others will be wondering if the calibration was successful.”

“It was.” Her eyes meet mine with an understanding that transcends the technical achievement. “More successful than I anticipated.”

As we make our way back toward the sanctuary’s main caverns, our steps find natural synchronicity. The mate bond hums between us, steady and present despite the caution that remains in both our hearts.

My wing occasionally brushes her shoulder as we walk, each casual contact sending ripples of warmth through my skin. I no longer try to hide these reactions, letting her see how she affects me. Her scientific mind has undoubtedly catalogued every chromatic shift, every temperature fluctuation, but there’s something different in the way she observes me now—less clinical, more connected.

“Your color just changed again,” she notes, her voice warm. “That particular shade appears when you’re feeling contemplative.”