Wolf Bargain (Wolfish 3)

“She shouldn’t have been able to scare you,” Romulus says, appearing behind her in the doorway to the hall. “You’re getting too comfortable around her.”

“Nonsense,” Lydia says. She opens her mouth to say something more, but a strange look comes over her face as her gaze settles on something outside the kitchen window.

I suck in a deep breath and gear myself up to announce that I am ready to be turned into a wolf shifter and there is nothing they can do to deny me … when I see what she does outside the window, and am stricken dumb.

I am stunned to silence as Rory, Marlowe, and Kaleb walk inside, garlands of forest wildflowers in hand. There’s a look on their faces, an expression in their eyes.

I know, at once, that I was wrong about last night.

They weren’t angry with me. They were impatient.

They too had made up their minds about something … and this something … it makes my heart feel as if it’s going to explode. Because for once, I feel seen. I feel heard. They’ve sensed my impatience, and for once, they’ve determined to give me what I need instead of making me wait for it.

“Sabrina,” Rory says, his eyes alight as he and his brothers look down at me with rapture on their faces.

Behind me, Lydia and Romulus fall silent as all three of them drop down to one knee in front of me and holds a hand over their hearts.

“It’s time, don’t you think, for us to become one?”

I hold a hand up to my mouth.

Each one proposes in turn, starting with Rory and ending with Kaleb. Each man says a single sentence that appeals to the reason I should marry them and become bonded to them in every way possible.

Rory speaks of needing each other, Marlowe speaks of an unbridled desire, and Kaleb speaks of wanting to be at my side forever.

I can feel the look of pure shock on my face as if it is a mask that I can’t breathe from beneath. I don’t know what to say or do as I stand there in a surprised silence.

I’m so used to being pushed aside, even by them—even when they mean well. Now, here, I don’t know what to do.

I can see the faces of the boys’ parents reflected in the glass. They wait with their own bated breath for my answer.

I want to say yes. I want to accept the proposals from all three of them as if my life depended on how quickly I can utter the word. But I am frozen, because there is still so much undecided. There’s still so much that’s been kept from me.

Something in the reflection of the glass makes me glance over my shoulder, to look directly at the man most responsible for my hesitation.

As Romulus stands and watches the elongated moment between us, something in him bends and gives way to a softer and more compassionate man than I’ve seen in him before. Lydia stares at him with knowing eyes and an expression that seems to melt the layers away from the persona of who I thought Romulus to be.

“I was wrong to force you to postpone all this time,” Romulus says, catching my gaze. “I was wrong to try to control what you felt and how you chose to act on those feelings. After what I saw the other night, and after seeing Sabrina working so diligently to understand us and our culture, I have realized that I have no place telling you what to do anymore.”

“Really?” Kaleb asks from his kneeled position. He’s unable to hide the surprise in his voice.

Rory and Marlowe don’t say anything, but I can see that they share in Kaleb’s sentiment. No one expected Romulus to have this change of heart. Not, at least, so openly.

I’ve seen him soften over the last few months, but he’s never been exactly sentimental.

“Really,” Romulus says. “I was wrong to hold you back. Any of you. I won’t stand in your way any longer.”

I can see Lydia giving Romulus a pleased smile out of the corner of my eye. All three of the boys look as if a heavy burden has been lifted from them, but then the moment has passed and all eyes are back on me.

I still don’t know how to respond.

After a few more awkward moments of silence, I look around at all of them, not knowing who I should direct my question to and not wanting to sound completely ignorant.

“Do I have to choose?” I ask. “Because if I have to choose between you three, I’d never be able to.”

I feel so embarrassed for having even asked that question, but I don’t know what I’m doing with all of this and I don’t want to screw it up. If I have to choose one of the boys, then I don’t think I can. It would be like asking which limb I would rather do without.

Lydia comes up next to me and puts her hand on my shoulder as she speaks quietly.