I closed my eyes, and more tears fell on the pillow. I rolled over and kissed him, and when I finally pulled away, I met his tortured gaze so he could see the truth in mine. “It means everything.”

That night, I fell asleep breathing Jace, still tasting him from our last kiss.

But I dreamed about Marc.

Thirty-one

We got up early to make our flight and arrived at the gate with half an hour to spare. Marc wasn’t there, and it took every bit of self-control I had to keep from looking devastated by his absence. He still had his ticket—it wasn’t in the duffel he’d left behind, which I’d checked as my luggage—and we were headed back to his house. Where else would he go?

What kind of massive bitch must I have been to run a man out of his own life?

“He’ll be fine,” Jace whispered, pulling me close to drop a kiss on my temple. “He always is.”

“I know.”

While Jace took one last trip to the restroom, I called Michael. I’d already given him the thunderbird update, so when he answered, my unprecedented lack of an opening line was a dead giveaway that something was wrong.

“Faythe?”

“Yeah.” I fidgeted in the plastic airport chair, but couldn’t get comfortable.

“What’s wrong? Did the thunderbirds back out?”

Yeah, right. “Um, I think they’d move forward even if we backed out.”

“Then what is it?” In the background, I heard pots clanging, though it was only five-thirty in the morning, their time. Obviously I wasn’t the only one having trouble sleeping.

“Have you…?” I leaned back in my chair and covered my eyes with one hand, as if that would shield me from the questions he would surely follow mine with. “I don’t suppose you’ve heard from Marc, have you?”

“Not since you left.” Michael hesitated, and I heard footsteps. Then a door closed, and the background noise disappeared. When he spoke again, his voice was soft. Bless my oldest brother and his flawless sense of propriety…. “Why? What happened?”

“He left. I lost him.” And the admission hurt just as much aloud as it did rattling around in my hollow chest.

“Because of Jace?”

“Because I couldn’t choose.”

Silence, except for my fellow travelers, chatting and sipping predawn coffee. Then my brother sighed. “I’m sorry Faythe.”

I sighed and let my hand fall into my lap. The light from the airport was bright after my self-imposed darkness. “I’m just glad there’ll be plenty of ass to kick soon.”

“How soon were you thinking?”

“The day after tomorrow. That should give everyone time to converge. Could you call Uncle Rick for me? I’m about to get on a plane. If he’s good with the timing, I’ll call the thunderbirds when we land and tell them where to meet us.”

“No problem.” But he exhaled heavily, and I knew that if Marc didn’t come back, his absence would be hard on more than just me.

“Hey, Michael?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t tell anyone else about Marc. I’ll tell them when I get there. It’ll be better coming from me.”

“You sure?”

I sighed, anything but. “Yeah.”

Jace returned about a minute after I hung up, and we boarded the plane five minutes after that. He dozed during the flight, his fingers intertwined with mine. I stared at the empty seat on my other side.

“Wait, he just left?” Kaci frowned at me from the couch and pulled her earbuds out of her ears, as if she may have heard me wrong. “He wouldn’t do that. Marc would never just leave.”

My mother put one arm around her, but Kaci’s accusing gaze never left me, and it grew colder with each second. “What did you do?”

“Kar—” Holly shook her head and started over, still trying to get used to the tabby’s real name. “Kaci, I’m sure it was nothing Faythe did.” Obviously looking for support, she glanced across the breakfast table at Manx, who sat nursing her baby, then up at Michael, who stood behind his wife, sipping a steaming mug of coffee. Neither of them spoke.

“Yes, it was,” Kaci insisted, and no one argued with her. Except for Holly and Ryan, the rest of them knew about Jace and had no doubt already figured out the basics of how it went down. “The only reason he’d leave us is if he had to leave you. You dumped him again, didn’t you?”

“Kaci, that’s none of our business,” my mother admonished softly, but her gaze held mine, equal parts sympathy and curiosity. She’d been in my shoes, and no doubt she hadn’t tripped all over the place in them, like I had.

“It’s okay. She has a right to know.” I crossed my arms over my chest and leaned against the wall by the door, wishing for some of Michael’s coffee. “You all do.” Because Aaron Taylor was right—there was no such thing as privacy for an Alpha. Everything I did affected them all. “He dumped me.”

“Why?” Kaci didn’t miss a heartbeat, and I wished I’d been half as perceptive at her age. “What did you do?”

I glanced at Jace, who mirrored my stance on the other side of the door, and I was suddenly glad we’d both showered before our flight. Otherwise, they would all have smelled us on each other—except for Holly.

Ryan followed my gaze to Jace, and his eyes widened. Kaci caught on a second later, and the hurt in her eyes ripped right through me. “Do you have to take everything for yourself?” Without waiting for an answer, she stood and ran for the hallway. An instant later, a door slammed.