Page 15 of Vein & Vow (The Bouchers #1)

Chapter 14

Beau

“H ey,” Chance murmured quietly, swinging open the door. “We just got back.”

I nodded, taking another drink of the bourbon that wasn’t touching my headache. “Mordecai and Helen still here?”

“Took the guest room,” he confirmed. “What the fuck happened?”

“Reese found out about Millie,” I replied, glancing at the bedroom door. I’d only left her after she’d fallen asleep. Honestly, she could’ve been faking it just so I’d go.

She hadn’t said a word all day.

“Did Mordecai explain that she’s—You know, that they have the same soul?”

I let out a huff of humorless laughter. “Don’t think that helped the situation.”

Chance scratched the side of his head. “I mean, you never sealed the bond. That must count for something, right?”

“She’s—” I didn’t even know. She didn’t seem angry. She hadn’t cried.

I was terrified by the blank expression she’d had since I followed her out of the car.

“It’ll work out,” Chance reassured me. “It has to, right?”

I nodded to make him feel better, but I had no clue. It was like I’d broken something in Reese, and I had no idea how to fucking fix it.

We’d fought plenty. I’d said terrible things when we’d met, but I’d known that she would hand it right back. Reese was strong and opinionated, and she didn’t take anyone’s shit—including mine.

The blank stare I’d been faced with this morning made my blood run cold.

“You should go,” I told Chance, glancing at the door again. “I don’t want to wake her.”

“All right,” Chance replied slowly. “You’ll let me know if you need anything?”

“Sure.”

The room was silent again after he left.

The entire time Reese and I had been getting to know each other, I’d known that Millie would come up—eventually. At some point, someone in my family would mention it, and we’d have to have the conversation if we hadn’t had it already, but I’d never imagined that it would affect Reese the way it had. Humans had plenty of partners before they settled down. Reese had even brought it up that first night.

I wasn’t stupid enough to pretend that Millie was the same as the others. Of course she wasn’t, but I hadn’t had any idea that it would hurt Reese the way it had. I’d been too afraid to bring it all up again to even worry about Reese’s reaction.

Setting the tumbler back on the table, I flexed my fists, trying to ground myself as I rose to my feet. Walking softly, I moved back into the bedroom.

Reese was still curled up on her side, her eyes closed. She’d been soaked when we got back, but she hadn’t made a move to help me as I’d stripped off the soggy clothes. She’d docilely let me tuck her into bed and hadn’t moved since.

Grabbing her phone off the top of the dresser, I carried it back out to the living room and searched through the contacts.

I couldn’t find Rena, but I found a contact labeled Favorite Bitch and gambled that it was the right one.

“Hey, loser,” Rena answered on the first ring. “Miss me?”

“Hey, Rena,” I croaked, suddenly worried I’d made the wrong move.

“What’s wrong?’ she asked instantly, all business.

“Reese needs you.”

“Where are you?” she asked. “Your house or hers?”

“Mine.” My stomach was in knots.

I wanted to be the one who made things right. I wanted to fix it. But I had the distinct impression that my presence was making things worse, not better.

“I’ll be there in forty-five minutes,” she said quickly.

“Someone will let you in.”

She hung up without saying goodbye.

I quietly put Reese’s phone back on the dresser and knelt next to the bed. Her breathing was slow and easy, but every muscle was tense as I brushed her hair back from her face. Fuck, how had I ever found her lacking?

We’d known each other for less than a week, and I’d seen at least a thousand different facial expressions. She had eight freckles. Four on one cheek, two on the other, and two on the bridge of her nose. Her skin was the softest thing I’d ever felt.

“Rena’s on her way,” I said softly, running my finger down her cheek.

The bond felt pulled tight even though she was less than a foot away. My chest ached.

Moving to sit, I kept my arm on the bed, wrapping my hand lightly around her forearm. Until she asked me to leave, I’d stay.

Half an hour later, Rena strode into the bedroom like she owned it.

Her eyebrows pulled together in worry as she moved toward us, going straight to Reese.

“Hey, girl,” she said, resting her hand on Reese’s hip. “You good?”

Reese’s eyes opened slowly, and she tipped her head down just far enough to see Rena.

“I’m going to get this asshole outta here, yeah?” Rena said firmly. “Be right back.”

With a stiff jerk of her head, she motioned me out of the bedroom. It rankled, but I got to my feet without argument. She was there for Reese. I’d called her because I’d hoped she’d know what to do. I couldn’t complain when she came in and did what I wanted.

“I’ll be right outside,” I told Reese.

Once we were outside the bedroom Rena closed the door and spun on me.

“What the fuck did you do?”

“She’s upset?—”

“You think ?”

“She found out that I had a mate before.”

“Say what?” Rena snapped in surprise. “That’s not possible.”

“I didn’t complete the bond.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Is that relevant?” I asked through my teeth. It was one thing to discuss it with my mate. It was something else entirely to discuss it with her best friend.

“I’d say it’s pretty fucking relevant,” Rena shot back.

“She knew,” I said, shaking my head. “I mean, she knew before she was like that.” I pointed to the door. “It wasn’t until later that she—” How was I supposed to even describe it? She’d just shut down.

“What else happened?” Rena demanded. “Come on. There must’ve been something.”

“She talked to my parents and their friends,” I mumbled, trying to think back. “They wanted to reassure her. They told her about our soul’s mate?—”

Rena nodded for me to keep going.

“That the soul comes back. I think they thought she’d be reassured that we only have one soul’s mate.”

Rena stared at me for a long time before her eyes closed.

“You told her that your mate was reincarnated as her,” she said, letting out a long breath.

“I didn’t tell her shit.”

“But that’s the basics, right?”

“Yes.”

“Right,” Rena said, dropping her purse on the chair. “Did you think for a moment that maybe a woman wouldn’t want to know that she was her mate’s choice because she shared a soul with the woman he’d been with before?”

“I didn’t tell her,” I repeated. “And that’s not how it is.”

“I don’t give a shit who told her,” Rena snapped, glaring. “What the fuck is wrong with you people?”

“They were trying to help.”

“Well, maybe they should keep their help to them-fucking-selves. Do any of them even know Reese?” She scoffed. “ You don’t even know Reese. What am I saying?”

“She’s my mate,” I growled.

“Did Reese tell you anything about her childhood?” she hissed.

“I know that she grew up in foster care,” I shot back. Calling Rena had been a mistake.

“Yeah? Did she tell you why she was in foster care?” Rena asked quietly, the venom in her voice burning through me. “Did she mention that the cops found her starving in a run-down motel when she was five years old? She doesn’t remember it, but we got her records when we turned eighteen. They think she’d been there for at least a week. There was an empty box of gas station cupcakes that they figured she went through in the first couple of days, because, you know, five-year-olds have no impulse control, and they assume that the food will keep coming. There was tap water in the bathroom, though, so at least she had that going for her.”

My throat was so tight it felt like I couldn’t drag air into my lungs.

“Yeah,” Rena said slowly. “So, I doubt that hearing about how you didn’t cement the bond with your mate the first time, and she got reincarnated into a child who was left in a fucking motel room to starve probably didn’t give Reese the warm and fuzzies.”

I clutched the back of the recliner to stay on my feet as Rena turned away.

“I’ll call you if I need you,” she spat as she went into the bedroom, closing the door behind her.

My hands shook as I moved toward the door, leaving our rooms. By the time I hit the stairs I was jogging as my heart pounded in my ears.

I wanted to find Mordecai and level him. I wanted to strangle my father for calling him. I wanted to burn the whole world to the ground, starting with Reese’s fucking parents. The weight of Rena’s words felt too heavy to carry.

Reese found me on the front porch an hour later.

“Rena shouldn’t have told you that,” she announced, startling me. “That wasn’t fair. I don’t blame you for that.”

“You heard her?” I asked, turning to face her.

“She wasn’t being quiet.”

“You didn’t tell me,” I murmured as she sat down in the chair next to me.

She wasn’t wearing a coat. It was too cold for her to be outside without a coat.

“You didn’t tell me that you’d walked away from your mate and then kept her husband alive so she could grow old with him,” Reese countered, looking into the darkness. “Some things take time to share.”

“It wasn’t that I didn’t want you to know,” I replied. “I just didn’t want to bring it all up again.”

Reese nodded. “I can understand that.”

“She wasn’t like you,” I began, making Reese flinch. My gut clenched, but I continued. “She was shy and soft-spoken. She deferred to her husband. She’d say something, and then she’d look at him like she wanted to see how he felt about it.”

“Did you know her long?” Reese asked quietly.

“No. Only a few days.”

“Is that all?”

“It was horrendous,” I confessed. “Being that close to her. The bond just kept pulling tighter and tighter, and I knew she felt it too, but it was different for her.”

“How so?”

“I think it was annoying to her,” I murmured, trying to remember all the things I’d forced myself to forget. “Like an itch she couldn’t scratch. I don’t think she even realized that it was me who was causing it. She was so wrapped up in her husband that it wouldn’t have even occurred to her.”

“It’s not annoying,” Reese argued. “It’s painful .”

“It wasn’t for her. I would’ve seen it.” Once I allowed myself to really think about those days I’d known Millie, so many things stood out. The way she’d kept her distance. The fact that she’d barely spoken when Zeke and I were around. She’d been frustrated that we were taking up time that she could’ve been spending with her husband before he shipped out. She hadn’t felt the pull to me at all. It would’ve been impossible to hide.

“Why?” Reese asked, turning to look at me. “Why wouldn’t she have felt it?”

“I don’t think I was supposed to meet her,” I said, the realization settling like a rock in my stomach. “She—I don’t think it was supposed to happen at all.”

“But that’s not how it works,” Reese said softly, watching me.

“I think I was supposed to meet you.”

She scoffed and looked away again as Rena stomped out onto the porch.

“I’ve given you enough time,” she announced, looking at Reese. “You want to come home with me?”

“No,” Reese replied, tipping her head back to look at her friend. “But thank you for coming.”

“Of course I came,” Rena snapped. “Just send an SOS if you need to escape.”

“I will.”

“Thanks for coming, Rena,” I said as she stomped down the porch.

“Eat shit and die, Vampire,” Rena called back, flipping me off over her shoulder.

“She’ll settle down,” Reese said as we watched her best friend climb in her car and peel out as she drove away. “Eventually.”

“I wasn’t sure what to do,” I said, watching the taillights disappear. “I thought you might need her.”

“I did.”

We sat quietly, but it only lasted for a few minutes before I found myself rising to my feet.

“It’s too cold out here.”

“You’re always so worried about the cold,” Reese grumbled as she stood up and followed me to the door.

“It’s freezing out here.”

“You’re not even wearing a coat.”

“I’m a Vampire.”

“Oh, Vampires don’t feel the cold?”

“We do,” I replied, holding the door for her. “But it doesn’t affect us the same.”

“I’m immortal, remember?” Reese said as she passed me.

“We don’t know if that’s true yet.”

“How will we know?” she asked, slowly moving toward the stairs.

“You’ll stop aging.”

Reese looked down at her chest. “Hear that, girls? You’re gonna stay nice and perky forever.”

I smiled as I followed her up the stairs. She moved like she was eighty years old, and her tone hadn’t changed, but the fire was back.

When we got back to our rooms, Reese headed straight to the bedroom. I followed more slowly and found her sitting on the edge of the bed.

“Okay?” I asked carefully.

“I’m not sure where we go from here,” she confessed, not looking at me. “I was so—I looked without leaping, you know? I thought things were different.”

“What did you think was different?” I asked, rounding the bed as my stomach sank.

“Stupid,” Reese muttered. “I thought you’d been waiting for me. I felt—I felt important .”

“You are important.”

“No, I’m the one you got stuck with,” she said with a shrug, meeting my eyes. “In all of the reincarnations”—she stumbled over the word—“you ended up with the one you didn’t even like.”

“That’s—No, that’s not true.”

“Let’s be real,” she said dryly. “We both know I wasn’t who you would’ve chosen.”

“You are.”

“Stop it.”

“You’re talking nonsense,” I argued. “Of course you’re who I would’ve chosen. You’re my mate .”

“In this century.”

“Why are you—You’re my mate ,” I repeated. Didn’t she understand that? What it meant? She was the other half of me.

“You haven’t even kissed me,” she snapped, shooting to her feet. “So…don’t. Just… don’t.”

I gaped at her.

She hurried to the bathroom, slamming and locking the door behind her.

I hadn’t.

I hadn’t kissed her even once. In the beginning it had felt too intimate. I hadn’t wanted to feel the pull to her, and I’d still been fighting it even as we’d completed the bond. But after that?

Staggering over to the bed, I dropped onto it.

Fuck.

I’d still been fighting it. I’d still been holding myself back. Echoes of the past were still fucking me up eighty years later.

Because if Millie had so easily been able to ignore the mating bond, then so could Reese. If I didn’t let her get too close, then, when the inevitable happened, maybe I’d still survive it. Maybe.

My self-preservation had made Reese question the bond. It was a self-fulfilling prophecy.

A whimper made my head snap up. I stared at the door. The sound came again.

“Reese,” I called, knocking at the door. “Baby, open the door.”

The sound came again. Muffled.

“Reese, open the door,” I ordered, louder.

Nothing.

Reaching up, I slid my hand above the doorframe until I found the key.

When I opened the door, Reese was sitting on the floor, her back against the wall with her knees pulled up to her chest. Her head rested on her arms, and she didn’t look up as I crouched in front of her.

“Hey,” I called softly. “Look at me.”

Her hair was even more tangled than usual, and I swallowed hard when it curled around my fingers as I brushed it off her shoulder.

“I don’t want to feel like this,” she rasped, tipping her head back to meet my eyes.

“I’m sorry,” I ground out, the sight of her red-rimmed eyes like a punch to the chest. Her face was wet with tears.

“I don’t want to feel like this,” she repeated angrily.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, cupping her face in my hands. Gods, she was made for me. What the hell had I done?

When I leaned forward and pressed my lips to hers, I was sure she was going to hit me. Her entire body stiffened with anger.

“I’m sorry,” I said again. Kissed her again. Her mouth softened.

How had I deprived myself for so long? Her lips were plush and soft. I wanted to drown in her. Gods.

“I’m sorry.” Kneeling, I pulled her toward me and kissed her again.

“I’m a fucking idiot,” I murmured against her mouth. “I’m so sorry.”

“You don’t have to do this,” she said, her body shuddering. “Just—” She shoved at me half-heartedly. “You don’t have to.”

“I fucked up,” I breathed, holding her steady. “I keep fucking up.”

“Then stop,” she whimpered, sniffling.

“I promise,” I choked out.

She was everything I’d ever needed, and I hadn’t seen it. I’d been too stubborn to even acknowledge it. Reese called me out constantly, and she forgave me just as often. She never let me get too far into my head because she couldn’t stand for it to be quiet. When I leaned into the bond, which I’d only allowed myself when I was inside her, it was as if everything about her was familiar. I knew her. The details were irrelevant. We were matched pieces in a set.

“You don’t have to do this,” she repeated. “I’m already here. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Do what?” I asked, cupping her face in my hands. Gods. In less than a week, she had me wrapped around her finger. There wasn’t anything I wouldn’t do for her.

The realization settled inside me like it had always been there.