Page 69 of Bonded

“What?”

“You’re funny… I mean not you’re funny ha ha, just funny—you and him. So, who is he, that guy?” She digs her spoon into the pie and hungrily fills her mouth. “Oh God, this pie is delicious.”

“Yeah, homemade Italian, some ancient secret pastry recipe his mother used to bake.”

“You go back a while?”

“Me and Marco? Yeah, a long time. Marco… he um, well, he used to be on the team.” He hesitates and there’s a long-staggered pause, “he was our medic.”

“Medic? Really…” She coughs, gulps back the mouth full of pie, nearly choking. “The medic before me?”

“No… no, not exactly. We’ll yeah—the permanent one. We’ve had quite a few after Marco, but none of them seem to work out.”

“Well, maybe if you stopped being such an asshole?” She grins.

“Yeah, maybe… but as you know, they have to fit my exact criteria. You only got through because it was getting difficult to keep putting command off. Edwards was getting tetchy. Must have been fate that sent you.”

“Fate? Hmm…” She smiles, sipping her coffee. “So, Marco’s a wolf. Why’s he not on the team now, surely he didn’t give up operating to run this dive?”

“He got injured. Lost his leg from the thigh down—IED on a routine exercise. He was helping another platoon and wasn’t with us that day. I had him transferred to a private hospital, but they couldn’t save it.”

“Shit.” she frowns, watching as he stirs the coffee. “Darius, surely you can’t blame yourself for that? You know the risks that come with this job. We all do. Despite what we are, we can’t fight bullets or bombs. Though guess it must hit harder if he wasn’t with you?”

“Was tough to learn he couldn’t come back and that we’d have to have someone else. Marco’s also family, it made it worse.”

“Family?”

“Yeah. He was, um, well he’s…” he continues stirring the coffee, not looking at her—a tense nervousness about him, “he’s um… my ‘wife’s’ cousin.”

“Khuuhh!” Kat chokes on the pie and gulps at the coffee to clear her throat. “Your what? Darius… you have a wife?” She looks around and hushes her voice, she’s not sure why. “Fuck.…”Talk about history repeating itself.“And you didn’t think to tell me that? That it wasn’t important. I mean, where is she? I’ve never heard the guys… Ryan’s never mentioned her or the fact you have a wife.”

“She’s dead. Izabella, my wife. She was killed.” He swallows the lump in his throat and looks out of the window.

“Oh… I’m so sorry.” She reaches her hand across the table and places it gently on his. “Wait, she wasn’t on the team, was she?”

“No…” he laughs “No she wasn’t on the team. Izabella, she wasn’t a soldier, that’s for sure.”

“So, what happened? Oh, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want. But it must have been some time ago, right?”

“Yeah, it was a while ago. We were away on a tour when it happened. A gang came to the village—the commune where we lived in the forest—”

“Wait… the one that Digby and Zak grew up in?”

“Yeah, yeah, that one. They were searching, looking for alpha females. When they came to take her, she fought back, I don’t know exactly what happened, but they killed her.”

“Oh my God! Darius, I’m so sorry. That’s awful. What was it a rival pack? I mean to be hunting females. Why would they do that? Unless they wanted them for their pack?”

“I don’t really want to get into the details. It was a long time ago now.” He sits quietly and stirs the rapidly cooling coffee. “Hey, you still hungry?” He looks at her empty plate and smiles.

“What, you don’t want yours? It’s so good you should try it. We could share?”

“No, no, I’m okay. You eat it. You seem hungrier than me.”

“Yeah, I’m starving. The shift and… everything else today, could say it’s left me a little, HHT.”

“I can imagine.”

“I guess it’s why you were reluctant to have me on the team, right? Another alpha female must have brought back memories. Sorry. Darius, I’m so sorry for what happened.”

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