“She only holds back because she doesn’t realize this is serious for you.”

Zander ground his teeth. “I marked her. I told her that she’s mine.”

Ally snorted. “Everyone knows shifters are territorial over pretty much everything, even over what we consider temporarily ours. Unless you’ve told Gwen in no uncertain terms that you want something long term with her, she’s unlikely to be aware of it.”

Well, no, he hadn’t been clear about it. He was regretting that now. “There’s so much shit going on around her. The question is . . . if I tell her she’s my mate, will it make her happy, or will it make her feel like yet more stuff is being piled on her?”

“I don’t know.” Expression thoughtful, Ally worried her bottom lip. “Look, I know this will be hard on you, but maybe . . .”

“What?”

“Maybe it would be best to keep the true-mate thing to yourself for now. Tell her this is serious for you. Make her believe it. Let her see that she’s important to you. If she’s secure in what you feel for her, she’s more likely to accept that you’re mates than if you simply blurt it out at a time when she’s still unsure what’s going on between you.”

Zander scrubbed a hand over his jaw, knowing Ally was right but not liking it because . . . “Not telling her, resisting the urge to claim her, will be extremely difficult for me and my wolf.”

“Yes, but with all this crap going on, she needs something good in her life right now. At the moment, that’s you. Keep being that good thing that’s distracting her from the bad. Keep being the person she can relax with. When she’s ready to hear it, you’ll know.

“You’ve already lured her to you, Zander. Now you just need to keep her with you. Use everything you have in your arsenal, including your pack mates. We’ll be behind you on this. If she’s yours, she’s also ours.” She patted his arm. “Congrats. Your days as a bachelor are long gone.”

“Why are they long gone?” asked Bracken as he and Derren joined them.

Zander told them his belief that Gwen was his mate. All the while, he kept his eyes locked on the source of his current emotional mayhem, letting the knowledge that she was his mate sink in and fill him up.

“Makes sense.” Bracken took a swig of his beer. “Just because you can’t feel the pull of the bond doesn’t mean it isn’t there, Z.”

Derren nodded. “It just means something’s blocking it, and that could be any number of things. Do you think she’ll react well to being part of a pack?”

Ally drummed her fingers on the table. “According to Marlon, when Gwen was a kid, she used to wish that she was part of the pack that occupied the land near the trailer park where she lived.”

“Marlon really does like to chat,” mused Zander.

Ally shrugged. “He wants her happy. He thinks you could make her happy. Anyway, my point is that I think it would help if we all sort of embrace her and make her feel like she’s one of us, which she is—though she doesn’t know it yet. If she can associate our pack with safety and security, she’s less likely to freak out when she realizes she will be part of it.”

“I’m not so sure Nick will be happy to embrace her,” said Zander. Before he’d left pack territory after their brief visit, Nick had pulled him aside to talk about Gwen.

“I have it on good authority that Gwen’s not a threat to the pack—if I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t have let her in the same house as my mate and daughter. Derren won’t tell me why she can be trusted, only that it wasn’t his secret to tell. I don’t like that, but I respect it. Still, I’m hoping that you’ll tell me at some point, because it has to have been something big for her to have won over four of my wolves, especially Derren—he’s almost as jaded as you are.”

“It’s not my secret to tell either,” said Zander. “It’s hers. I won’t break a promise. I gave her my word, and that means something to me.”

Nick lifted a brow. “And the fact that I’m your Alpha doesn’t?”

“Why don’t you just say what you really want to say instead of asking probing questions.”

“All right. You’ve marked her. Earlier, you glared at us all like you’d gut us open if we did a single thing to upset her. This isn’t some casual thing for you, especially if her feelings come before our concerns. So, I have to ask myself if this means you now have divided loyalties. She already has you keeping secrets from me for her, so you can’t say my concerns aren’t valid.”

“If Shaya asked you to keep something quiet from the pack, would you?”

“Yes . . . but Shay’s my mate, Zander. Gwen Miller is just someone you marked. Unless there’s something else you’re not telling me?”

Zander gave a quick, sharp shake of the head. “She’s not just someone I marked. She matters to me. Do I have divided loyalties? Depends on what it is you’ll ask me to do.”

“And if I asked you to stay home, to send Eli to Oregon in your place, would you?”

“No. I promised her that I’d see this whole thing through with her to the end.”

“Something you shouldn’t have done, since you initially agreed over the phone that if I asked you to come home, you would.”

“Bracken agreed,” Zander corrected. “I didn’t.”

Nick thought about it for a moment and then shot him a glare. “You’re a sneaky fucker, Zander.” Then he sighed. “Go. Keep me updated. It was good to see you.”

Zander snapped out of the memory and said, “The one thing Nick didn’t want was this shit making its way to the pack. If Gwen’s one of us, her shit becomes our shit.”

“It’s not ideal that your mate has trouble dogging her heels,” said Derren. “But that doesn’t mean Nick won’t want her to be one of us. Harley had trouble with extremists, but he didn’t ask her to leave—he knew Jesse wanted her as his mate, and that was enough for Nick. Hey, don’t worry so much about that. Concentrate on Gwen.”

Like Zander could do anything else. As the hours went on, he kept watch on her. Now that he knew she was his mate, it was as if he was looking at her through a different lens. A lens that wasn’t clouded by uncertainties, mistrust, or a need to guard himself. He saw her so clearly.

She was no longer someone who simply mattered to him, no longer someone he simply felt possessive and protective of. She was more. She was everything. And that knowledge seemed to take down every defense he had. It wasn’t that his walls were gone. No, but she was inside them now. Safe and close to him. Closer than anyone else had ever been.

It was hard to stand there and do nothing, to act as though his life hadn’t just been upended. His muscles fairly quivered with the effort to remain where he was instead of following the primal urge to cross to Gwen and claim her. Soon. He’d claim her soon. It had to be at a time when it was right for both of them.

Later, shortly before her shift ended, Zander turned to Derren. “Watch over Gwen for me while I use the bathroom.”

It was as he was washing his hands in the restrooms that Chase entered, the smells of greasy food and cigarette smoke clinging to his clothing. Zander turned to face him, meeting his gaze head-on. The bold stare pissed Zander off, but he didn’t want to hurt the man who would soon be his brother-in-law.