Page 39 of Just One Bite

Chapter Thirty-One

Olivia

“This place is …”

We stop at the entrance of an abandoned atrium. Parker wouldn’t tell me where he was taking me, only that it was a surprise.

I stare at the last remaining support wall that’s worn from the weather and elements.

The glass is broken, but the towering stone arches stand high into the sky that’s growing dim in the twilight.

It’s a part of the wood now. A silent sleeper that blends into the surrounding trees and growing vines and flowers threatening to cover the stone completely.

“This is familiar …” I say, staring at the floor that is one with the woods.

It’s a bed of moon nightingales that stretch all the way to the wall in a blanket of periwinkles. Some are darker, more violet, and others almost a full baby blue.

Parker and I stroll into the opening, and he waits patiently for me to get my bearings. I protested when he insisted we come into Lost Lake Woods. What was this place used for?

“How did you find this place?”

I slip off my shoes and socks to mingle in the clay and flowers.

“My mother brought me. Doxlothia has summer camps for kids. It was … different. Not as wrecked. The school used to grow herbs and stuff before they cut off the woods for students. In the summers, we came and she’d let me play in the dirt and flowers. ”

“I can’t put my finger on it, but it’s like I was here in a dream.” I chuckle, but Parker doesn’t smile. He’s still staring, with his eyes a hazy bluish green.

I stop when I see the tree branch stretched into the opening from the broken ceiling, and a swing sits on the far side next to a perfectly preserved window.

“Yeah, that’s why I wanted to bring you.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, spanning the gap between me and the swing. There’s no path, but I move my feet into the grooves in the clay. Déjà vu casts over the scene in its familiar milky haze.

I’ve done this before. There’s eerie excitement at the thought.

“Olivia. I—” He stops, ears reddening, and his eyebrows fly up and eyes soften. “Your mark … my mark. I can see it.”

I reach up to touch the skin there, but he’s already caressing it.

“Does it look bad?”

“No. It’s perfect.” He leans down to kiss me there. “Oh, baby. This is—You have my mark. It’s so …”

He sucks at the skin of my neck, and I gasp at his lips on that specific spot sending an ache throughout my entire body. That suction turns into a plethora of kisses, and I laugh at his enthusiasm.

He’s happy, and there’s a calm in knowing I want to make him happy. Have I ever cared about making anyone else happy before? My father once, long ago. My sisters, sure, but that’s different than this.

“Parker, I need to tell you something.”

I can’t keep pretending. I can’t keep hiding from him.

“Wait. Let me tell you mine first,” he says.

“Now?”

“Yeah, you might want to sit.” He motions to the swing.

I do, mostly because I want to. I want to touch the frayed threads holding it together and the wood underneath me.

“I hoped you would remember if I brought you here.”

“Remember?”

I don’t think I’ve ever seen him nervous, but I’ll never be able to say that again. Parker is fidgeting, his foot tapping, with worry lining his forehead.

Now my heart is pounding.

“You’re my mate.”

“I know, that’s how you told me it works. ”

“Don’t freak out.” He brings his hands out to steady me like I’m a skittish foal about to bolt.

“What is happening?”

“I didn’t think it was possible but …” He’s staring at me, unable to say the words.

“Parker, spit it out.”

“We’re linked mates. We’ve been linked since before we were born. I think I knew it, but I didn’t let myself think it because I thought it wasn’t possible. But it’s so fucking obvious. We have so much in common.”

“No. You said—”

“It’s like trying to deny gravity exists. I can feel it in my blood. It’s you. It’s always been you.”

Linked mates. Did I know it too? Denying it is easier than the truth. I did know. I’ve known for so long but didn’t want to think about it.

Because I wanted this to be real. I didn’t want that to be the reason for everything.

The reason he feels like a long-lost friend.

The reason I stopped to gawk at him the first time I saw him.

The reason the moment his skin touched me I knew that I’d been searching for him my whole life.

“You’re the one on the swing. This swing. The one in my dreams. I was meant to tell you this, right here.”

“You said you don’t remember your dreams.”

“I didn’t. But after I marked you, I remembered them all. And there’s so many … We’ve been hanging out together here in our dreams and neither of us knew.”

“You knew earlier today and you’re just now saying something?”

That explains that look.

This is too much at once. Is that why we’re here? The reason Parker held me at night and it felt so safe. The reason we got so close too fast. It’s all … a bond. Fabricated. Something told us we were meant to be together, so we fell into the pattern.

It’s not real. My heart aches at the thought.

“I wanted to be certain because I knew you didn’t want things to change.”

I shake my head. “Maybe you’re wrong … ”

“Baby, you don’t get it. I know it’s you. You almost drowned when you were a little girl, didn’t you?”

I suck in a breath. “How …?”

“I never remembered my dreams … except for one. Someone drowning in the water.”

“No.” This isn’t happening. Parker isn’t—

“I reached for you and begged for you to live. I’ve had that dream over and over again since I was a kid, but I never saw who it was.

I’d wake up in a panic not knowing if I saved them.

It used to eat at me because I knew this dream meant something.

But it was you. I know it was you because now I see you under the water. ”

They never saw who pulled me out. No one was paying attention that day by the lake. They said I just vanished one minute. Then the next, I was on the dock gasping for breath.

“Do you not feel it?”

Parker’s voice breaks, and a lump gathers in my throat. I’m hurting him. Of course I am. This is why I should have kept him far away from me. I’m not cut out to be his mate.

He deserves more. Someone nicer. Better. Just better.

“How can I? I’m human and don’t sense the same things.” I wipe a tear.

I’ll never feel the bond like Parker does.

I don’t remember the dreams. I’m standing now, staring at the swing and willing myself to remember more than a hint of familiarity.

All that safety and sureness from Parker is evaporating because it was just the bond making him want me. It’s not his fault, but it hurts.

“I need to go.”

“Wait. Please.”

“No. You’re telling me that all of this … this bond between us is because of some magic thing. It’s not because … it’s not because of us. It’s not a choice.”

I sniffle, drawing my arms around my torso.

His eyes soften. “You think I don’t care about you?”

“I think some magical bond told you that you should. I knew there was a reason I couldn’t think straight when you were around and why I agreed to all these ridiculous things. And we never would have done any of this without that and—”

“Olivia, that’ s not true.”

“You don’t know that. I just need a minute to think. I need to be alone.”

I wanted it to be real. I wanted him to choose me for me.

I’m moving back toward the opening when the flash from a camera stops us both.

“Linked mates, huh?” A man with a camera I don’t recognize takes another succession of photos. “Beautiful mark, Parker.”

Perfect. Absolutely perfect. I slip on my shoes and head for the cover of the trees, not caring what Parker plans to do with him.

I just need to run. It’s familiar. Freeing.

“Olivia, wait!” Parker’s voice is a far-off echo.

But I keep running.