Page 164 of Wolf Blood

"I'll take more tonight. When we're back in our room, with more than a flimsy door separating us from a crowd of enforcers and turned vampires," I said, one of my hands cradling his cheek.

Rhone closed his eyes and nodded. He turned into my hand and kissed my palm lightly.

He didn't want to let go of me. That much was clear as day.

I wrapped my arms around his neck and hugged him. He squeezed me fiercely, burying his face in my hair and inhaling.

"I like that we're a team," he said, the words muffled by my hair.

"Huh?"

"You said we were a team even if I didn't like it. I do like it."

My lips curved with the words. "Good, because you're stuck with me."

"I like being stuck with you, too."He kissed my forehead. "Ready?"

"Ready."

After another long moment, he set me down and fixed my hair. Then fixed my clothes, too.And took my hand.

I laced our fingers together as we walked to a room full of prison cells, and said goodbye to my mother.

There were no tears in either of our eyes when Rhone led me back to the elevator, and we rode up to the floor with the observation rooms.

When we passed the one I'd lived in for so long, it didn't feel like mine anymore. It just felt like an observation room.

Rhone sat down in a chair next to Bloom's on the observation side of the two-way glass and pulled me onto his lap.Maverick was in the middle of explaining to the newly-turned vampires what would happen to them.

"That's a lot of vampires," I murmured, my gaze scanning their faces.

I knew them. All of them. Every single one.

They were the fiercest vampire lovers. The ones who were at every gathering, offering themselves up on a silver platter every chance they got, just because they were so fucking obsessed.

"No kidding," Bloom whispered back.

"It's a mess," one of the other people in the room said. When I looked back and realized it was Ryker, my eyebrows shot upward, and I looked back at Rhone.

He wasn't looking at Ryker, but he was undisturbed.

"You know Ryker's in here, right?"I checked.

"I do. I've known him a long time, and he respects what we are. Neither of us will be a problem."Rhone kissed my forehead, his attention still on the group of turned vampires.

Two of them were crying. A man and woman, full-on sobbing. The rest just looked grim.

"I've been summoned. Enjoy the show," Bloom said, slipping through the door.

They all reacted to her presence. Some lit up. Others smiled. The crying ones wiped their eyes.

She was kind of a celebrity to them.

They probably thought she was there to help them, but the werewolves were their only chance.

Bloom agreed with what Maverick had said, and she emphasized that they would need to fight for their sanity through the rest of their lives.

Eventually, she looked at the window and waved one of us toward her.