Page 53 of Levi

“It’s just that …” Levi began.

He had turned to look out the window they were sitting by, watching the cars on the highway zip by like blotches of paint.

“I know how I feel about you now, Hannah. I felt it before the serum, but now I know it more than ever. I love you. I love you so much.”

Hannah had been gazing down at her plate when he spoke, so she shot her eyes up when the word rippled through her heart. She blinked heavily, unsure what to say back to something so profound, something so real.

“You’re my mate, right?” Levi said.

He turned from the window to face her. He looked like a lonely puppy dog left in the rain.

Hannah dropped her utensils on the plate, then felt her palms begin to sweat. No one had ever told her that they loved her. They had tried to, but she always ran before things got too serious. And none of those people had been her mate.

“Levi …” she began, then let the words in her mind fade away.

“You don’t have to say it back,” Levi said. “I just wanted you to know. All that talk about mates would have been strange before the serum, but now I feel like I just know it.”

Hannah nodded, looking at him thoughtfully.

“That is indeed how it works.”

Her voice was trembling, so she tried to cough and adjust herself in her seat before she said anything back. He needed to hear it, despite saying that she didn’t have to.

“Levi,” she said. “Look at me.”

He met her eyes with that forlorn, puppy-dog look remaining.

“Honey,” she said, reaching for him. “Of course, I feel the same way. You are my mate. I’ve known it for a while now.”

Levi’s face brightened, but Hannah was going to let it linger for too long before she told him the utter truth.

“But that doesn’t mean that I’m not … afraid. My human foibles still remain. My fears of intimacy are still present, deep within me.”

Levi frowned, leaning forward on his forearms.

“That doesn’t get overridden by the fated mate business?” Levi asked.

Hannah shook her head.

“No, not necessarily. I feel both at the same time. My past … my history has told me one thing while my shifter nature has said another. I love you, I do. I’m just really scared.”

Hannah had never been so honest with anyone in her entire life. She was used to skirting the truth to get what she wanted or to avoid some form of attachment. She knew deep down that she used people until they were no longer useful to her.

But he had surpassed all the walls she had spent years constructing for herself. It wasn’t extraordinary to think that she might be curious about who was courageous enough to climb them.

He had done that in so many ways. He had done it before the serum, even when she was cold and distant to him. He was doing it right now, blurting out feelings he still didn’t quite understand. He was one of the bravest people she had ever met. Would ever meet.

Levi placed his hand over hers and gave it a squeeze. It was a lot harder than before, which made Hannah wince slightly. He let go, sliding his hands over his face.

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” he said, trying not to laugh. “I guess I’m still getting used to it.”

As Hannah pretended he had actually hurt her, she watched as someone walked in the entrance of the steakhouse and ask for a table. It wasn’t of interest to her, of course. She was focused on Levi and making his gorgeous face smile. But there was something that she caught in the air, the whisper of something familiar, that drew her eyes to gaze in that direction.

The woman was tall with long flowing black hair almost down to her ankles. She had aged since the last time Hannah had seen her, of course, looking more frail and with less color than she had recalled as a child. But the hopelessness was gone, replaced with a youthful sense of wonder.

Hannah couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Her mother had just walked in the door of the restaurant.

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