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BONUS POV: WOLFE

Wolfe

In general, Wolfe had no complaints with where his life had brought him. He’d long ago taken what the world owed him and gained immortality in the process. Now he had new access to riches, his perfect mate at his side, and a reasonably tolerable den to replace the one he’d lost.

What Wolfe didn’t appreciate, however, was traipsing around in the woods with a near-feral brat with squirrel guts on his hands.

Especially now that the little runt’s beast was out, and he was no doubt seconds away from tearing off into the woods until he found a human to maul.

“I think it would be wise to return him home now,” Wolfe told Eric as the two of them flanked the vampire child between them. “It’s remarkable as it is that he’s controlled himself this well for this long.”

Remarkable and unlikely to continue for long. If they didn’t hurry, some unassuming townsperson was going to be torn apart. Which would mean…inquiries by the humans.

Which was why Wolfe had wanted to put this little beast down to begin with.

But the bleeding hearts—Eric included—had won that particular battle, so Wolfe would make it work.

“He would have run, if it were just me,” Eric said, an unacceptable note of self-recrimination in his tone. “I fucked it up, scared him somehow. Scumbag, per usual.”

“You are nothing of the sort.”

Eric’s pout only intensified. “You’re just saying that to keep me happy.”

A frustrated noise escaped Wolfe’s throat before he could stop it.

He usually had better control than this, but it riled something in him, the way Eric spoke about himself.

It raised the hackles on Wolfe’s beast, urging him to fuck and pet and soothe his mate until he saw the world—saw himself —the way Wolfe did.

And now Eric was accusing Wolfe of lying. Of speaking falsely about his mate.

Unacceptable.

Wolfe couldn’t fuck it out of him right now, and they didn’t have time for petting, so he’d have to settle for firm words.

He halted the rabid child, stopping to meet Eric’s gaze.

“If you don’t trust how I feel about you, pet, trust how I feel about myself.

You are my perfect match. My mate . So no, you aren’t a scumbag, or useless, or defective in any way, no matter what you may have been raised to believe. You are, by very definition, perfect.”

Eric, brat that he was, let out a sigh. “Is that just your roundabout way of calling yourself perfect?”

“Some would say I have my faults,” Wolfe conceded. When Eric rewarded him with a soft laugh, Wolfe smirked and added, “But you, darling. You are perfect for me.”

“I love you too.”

Eric’s words froze Wolfe in place, or at least the shock of them did. For once, he didn’t have a pithy quip. He didn’t have a smirk or a smile. He didn’t even have a noise to eject from his throat.

I love you too.

Wolfe had already known Eric craved him. Needed him. The bond assured him of that much. But loved him? Not just trusted—and that alone had felt like a triumph, when Eric had conceded his trust—but loved.

Satisfaction so fierce it felt like it would burn him to ash raced through Wolfe’s veins. Those simple words revealed that Eric was his , totally and completely and for the rest of their extended lives. He’d conquered Eric, body, heart, and soul.

The beast inside Wolfe urged him to throw Eric on his hands and knees and fuck him right here and now in these woods, force him to say the words over and over again with Wolfe’s cock deep inside him.

But they had a problem to attend to first.

The child.

Wolfe had a brief moment of familiar suspicion—that Eric had said what he’d said so Wolfe would temper his impulses and spare Riley from an unfortunate fate.

But that didn’t make logical sense. Wolfe had already succumbed. He was already helping, with or without the words. He was changing, and he was doing it for Eric, and Eric knew it.

Eric loved him for it.

All this ran through Wolfe’s mind in an instant as Eric looked the child between them over. “He seems really out of it,” Eric said, his tone once again even, as if he hadn’t just turned Wolfe’s entire world upside down.

So Wolfe began walking just as casually, pushing Riley in front of him to keep the child moving.

“We’ll feed him the blood bag at home,” he said, and his voice sounded as it usually did.

Of course it did. Everything was progressing perfectly normally, if on a bit of an accelerated timeline.

Eric was his perfect mate—he’d been bound to love Wolfe eventually.

The confirmation was nothing to lose his sense over.

“And perhaps call Danny. See if he can bring extras.”

“Isn’t that gonna raise even more suspicion? More missing blood bags?”

Wolfe shrugged. “We’ll compel who we need to compel.”

Destined it may have been, but that didn’t mean Wolfe wouldn’t take measures to maintain a tight hold on what was now his. He would do whatever it took to keep them safe. To keep this gift Eric had given him—his trust and his love—safe.

And that meant calling Daphne and Sybil. With any luck, the two of them would be enamored enough with the idea of a child to whisk Riley away before the day was even out.

Just because Wolfe was going to…adapt to Eric’s needs didn’t mean he was going to allow this living time bomb to stay in Hyde Park and jeopardize them all.

So Wolfe walked, his skin too tight and his beast on edge with all this ignoring of his own instincts he was having to do. For the sake of his mate, he was giving in to sentimental emotion over reason. It was irritating, to say the least.

And when they finally rid themselves of this little problem, Wolfe was going to get Eric to himself, and he was going to fuck this irritation away, storing it deep inside Eric’s tight, perfect body.

Then they would see about this I love you too .