More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
I follow him with my stare as he reaches the door, but it’s the white blur across the street that ends up snagging my attention. Two iridescent eyes peer at me. The beast halts there, licking its lips. A glint of sharp teeth keeps me pinned beneath its stare. Silvery-gray spots are mixed into its white fur. A terrifyingly beautiful wolf.
“If your adventure doesn’t involve making moon eyes at Blake, I’m all for it.” “Why do you hate him so much?” “I don’t hate him. He’s just not good enough for you.”
My birthday present, aka a massive vibrator she named Buzz. I groan. “Not this again.” “Stress relief is important,” Lark says with a smirk, giving my side a nudge with her elbow. “He’s obviously not relieving it.”
“Dance is the only stress relief I need.” “Says someone not getting any other kind of relief,” Lark grumbles.
But my attention is pinned to the very large paw prints in the snow leading toward the woods.
Three steps later, they vanish. They don’t even taper off. Just poof—gone. Like the wolf disappeared in the wind.
There’s no way more than one wolf has eyes like that. How can I be seeing it on the opposite side of town? And why do I get the feeling this won’t be the last time?
After I wonder for a half second how weird it would be for someone living in the apartment across the way to see this, I decide I don’t care. Apparently, my desire for answers is greater than my desire for sanity.
It’s like the wind itself is whispering dance with me. Could this be my phantom? “Jax?” My hair lifts in a silent, playful response.
“Are you here?” I whisper along the wind as I continue to dance. Snow appears as if from nowhere, flurrying with the lines of my arms, tracing all the way to my fingertips. Every brush of it against my skin sends goosebumps pebbling beneath my shirt, but it’s less chilling and more invigorating than anything.
and spicy notes of pine and juniper swirl around me like a cozy embrace. It’s one I never want to leave despite the wintry sting that streaks through me.
I shiver and the wind scoots me toward the sliding glass door, then assists me to open it.
I’ve tried my best to stay away despite the way my chest aches with the constant thrum of my connection to the beautiful mortal asleep on the other side of the windowsill. Lines mark the glass, and I blow on it, slips of white and silver curling around the letters.
Are you here? Jax? She’s trying to talk to me. Hope rumbles through my chest. Does she crave my contact as much as I’ve craved hers? Doubtful.
I hated having to leave her, especially after holding her beneath the stars, but I still can’t risk getting banished. Not when I’m already skirting the cardinal rule. Fuck, I’ve got it bad.
The glass gently squeaks as I write into the frost. YES, TEMPEST. I admire my handiwork, then notice her journal sitting open, deep grooves etched on the blank page facing me.
Something snakes through the back of my mind, slithering and coiling around whatever it is I can’t see. No matter how much I want to reach in and grab what’s hidden, I can’t. That’s…odd.
She’s so fucking beautiful it hurts. I reach out and brush back some of the hair strewn in her face. Her nose wriggles and her body shivers. Adorable.
Jolie squirms again, and I swallow down the way my body is eager for her. To caress each soft curve, thick strand of hair, raised pink scar. How I wish I could.
I need more time with her, but first, I need answers of my own. When she’s ready to listen, I want to know what to say. I truly didn’t want to interfere, didn’t want to scare my mate after that broken message board fiasco, but I can’t give up now. I refuse to. Not when she’s so close to finding me.
Solstice draws closer with each passing day, and I already can’t get her out of my head. Something tells me that is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our bond and this desperate call to claim her. Love her.
don’t know how it’s possible to have someone make you feel alive when you haven’t even spoken a word to them, but that’s what she does.
She’s become my heartbeat. The only one I have now. She pulses with a certainty that is etched into my skin and sinks deep into my bones. If she were to claim me as hers, as I long to claim her as mine, the world ...
This highlight has been truncated due to consecutive passage length restrictions.
Mate. A divine blessing and my greatest curse all wrapped up in one four-letter word.
“I know you’re struggling without your mate being here, but you know the rules,” Aneira says before biting her lip. “She’s not meant to be with you. Not yet.” Not meant to be with you.
How is that possible? The very nature of mates is meant to be. Ordained by Fate’s very capable hand. “Then why do I have this mark? Why do I feel like I’m being torn from the inside every minute I’m away from her?”
“I have to find a way. I’ll plead on my knees if I have to.” “Just make sure you know what you want before you do anything hasty, Jax.” “I want her.”
How did that happen? The question vanishes when my gaze falls to my bedroom window, and my lips part on a sharp inhale. There, in the dew-covered glass, words are scratched into the pane. Tons of them.
I shiver and lift my phone to snap a picture. It’s the proof I need for no one but myself. This isn’t all in my head.
I think back to the last few nights out on the porch. I had my sweatshirt from our production of The Tempest on then. It’s confirmation that he has been here. He’s some invisible presence. That both affirms my sanity and deeply unsettles me.
Pausing, I double check that the image is still there, breathing a sigh of relief when it is. Part of me is worried that, like some vampire lore, his handiwork will magically disappear. Regardless, I want the words on the page, every affirming answer to account for the strange things that have been happening.
Jax is a harbinger, an immortal charged with bringing winter. I continue to log each answer, my pulse fluttering with every line I scrawl, especially when I come to the doodle of a wolf with the word earthside. Next to it is a stick figure and true form. Beneath it, in big block letters: WISH YOU COULD SEE ME.
My hands press over his frosty admissions, as if touching them will somehow summon him here. The cold blazes through my palms, but I don’t retreat. I lean into its chill. I wish I could see him too.
Every answer should be a signal to run. Instead, I’m rooted in place, hungry for more. What the heck is wrong with me?
I have the photo. The answers— Well, most of them. That will have to be enough for now.
I follow her down the stairs, ignoring the dripping icicles strewn across the railings. The whole descent, I wonder if Jax was the one to leave them there, where he is, and when and if he’ll return.
Going above and beyond with my Frost duties makes it possible to see Jolie. It buys me every small moment I get to be with her, even if she’s only just realized I’m there.
“Yes,” I say quickly, “I’ve been avoiding the mortals.” Now, a very specific mortal with hair the color of rich cocoa… not so much. But they don’t need to know that.
The way they look at each other, like they see everything beneath the frost marks, staring at the core of the other… I want that.
Fate has the answers Jolie seeks. Ones I wish I could give her. When I see my Tempest next, I’ll have them for her. No more pages filled with questions I can’t respond to. No more self-doubt. She’ll know everything I do. She’ll know I’m real. Here. Hers.
There are no secrets when it comes to your mate. I don’t care if she’s mortal, I’ll give her every truth she desires. Give he...
This highlight has been truncated due to consecutive passage length restrictions.
One day, she will see me. Fate has to know how. She’s the one that gifts u...
This highlight has been truncated due to consecutive passage length restrictions.
“It wasn’t our idea to erase your memories.” She pauses, as if weighing whether to continue. “It was yours.” “What?” I rear back from Fate’s grasp. “Why?”
Her face softens. “You truly wish to rescind your request to withhold your memories?” “Are they tied to her?” “Yes.” “Then I rescind my request. I need to know.”
He’s not alone. Fate’s been there all along, looking on the scene with a somber expression. “You shouldn’t be here, Jax. She’s meant to meet you in Nivea.”
In every scenario he conjured in his dreams, none of them equipped him for finding his mate like this. Dying. He recalls her in the memories. Rich brown hair; shimmering blue eyes; warm, beige skin. So vibrant. So driven. So alive. And so much left to do.
Her hand fumbles over the skirts of her dress, floating out from her like watercolor come to life. “Her death is an inevitability.”
“I’ll take whatever you can give her. Hold me responsible, but let her live.” The harbinger can barely fathom the words that escape him, but he doesn’t regret a single one. “I’m begging you.”
The wolf lies down alongside his mate, nestles his snout in the valley between her breasts, closes his eyes, and waits. Fate bows. Her work is done.
A single kiss and destinies are rewritten. Thump. Thump. Thump. The faint flutter of her rekindled pulse rouses the wolf. He observes his mate.
