Damien dropped his fork and grinned. Broderick stopped chewing.
“First, I want full discretion. You want to tell me you’re shifters? Fine, you’re shifters. I’m not arguing anymore. But if we’re going to do this, I’ll need to know everything you know. So hold nothing back.”
“Agreed,” said Broderick immediately. He went back to eating.
“And the other condition?” asked Damien
.
I reached out and swiped a piece of bacon off the surfer’s plate. “Tell me exactly what you did to me.”
They looked at each other for half a second, then nodded together. Whatever exchange they’d just made happened wordlessly.
“Well?” I asked.
“Just let us wolf down these eggs,” grinned Damien, “and we’ll be right with you.”
I ate another three pieces of bacon to even things out; two from Broderick’s plate, one from Damien’s. The way I saw it, it was no less than they deserved. They should’ve asked if I was hungry.
“Alright,” Broderick said at last. He looked serious as he wiped his mouth with one folded triangle of a napkin. “What is it you want to know?”
“Well to begin with, why is my skin tingling?” I asked. “And how come it feels like I’ve got a hundred and three fever, but I don’t feel sick?”
“Physical side effects,” Broderick said. “Of mating with Damien.”
I didn’t like the sound of that at all.
“Is he sick?”
“No, not even a little,” said Broderick. “In fact, he’s healthier than most humans. We both are. We’re stronger, faster, have better reflexes… plus enhanced senses and a heightened sensitivity to danger.”
“That still doesn’t explain—”
“I’m just telling you what we are first,” Broderick went on. “It’ll be easier to understand what’s happening to you once you know how we work.”
Shutting up wasn’t exactly one of my strong suits, but in this case I stopped talking and listened. Besides, I loved the sound of Broderick’s voice. It was deep and authoritative, and if I were being honest, almost sensually hypnotic.
“We have accelerated healing too. Mostly due to our faster heart rate.”
He spoke perfect English but with a hard, Scandinavian accent. The more he talked, the more I wanted him to keep talking. It was almost like being in a trance.
“What you’re feeling,” he said, “is the byproduct of being claimed. Of being mated by a Lycanthrope in a closed pair.” He pointed between Damien and himself. “Between us.”
Claimed? He might as well have been speaking Latin. I had no clue what he was talking about.
Damien however, sensed my confusion. He jumped in, and thankfully he spoke in more layman’s terms.
“Broderick and I are bonded,” he said. “It’s like we’re brothers but not brothers.”
“Okay…”
“As members of our pack, we did everything together. We ran together. Hunted together. Our ties went beyond kinship, beyond blood. The deep sense of connection formed unbreakable bonds between us.”
I noticed Broderick leaned back in his chair a little. But Damien leaned forward. He placed his hands together before continuing.
“When we choose a mate,” he said carefully, “it’s as a pair also. Before we became outcasts, we were bonded to the pack’s alpha female.” His eyes shot to Broderick, and I sensed hesitation. After a pause, he went on anyway. “Her name was Karessa.”
Karessa.