There's an awkward silence as Killian glances uncomfortably between Patrick and I.

"Right, this is the part where I fuck off back towards the pack house so you two can have your moment," Patrick breaks the silence and climbs out of the water, grabbing his clothes but not bothering to put them on.

"You don't have to leave, Patrick. You were here first. Killian and I can go."

"Nah, it's okay. You two need somewhere to yell where no one can hear you, and Alice promised to make me French toast for breakfast anyways. God, she makes the best French toast."

Patrick is practically drooling at the thought and Killian smacks the back of his head. We both flip him off as he trots back to the pack house, probably still fantasizing about French toast, but the tension between Killian and I becomes stifling at his departure.

"Can you get out of the water?"

"I'm fine right here, thanks. What's up?"

He glares at me, but I stand my ground and with a huff, he starts taking his clothes off.

"Woah, what do you think you're doing?"

"Joining you?"

He quirks an eyebrow at me like his intentions should have been obvious, but wades in anyways until he's standing right in front of me. I stare up at him, allowing myself a moment to enjoy the deep gold of his eyes because really, I've been deprived of them for too long. There's a sadness in them and I feel the urge to wrap my arms around him, to comfort him, but I can't allow myself the weakness.

"So talk," I say curtly.

"Rey, I-I'm so sorry. I really thought I was doing the right thing. By the time we knew you were missing, all the other search parties looked everywhere, I sent them to every surrounding pack to look for him. There was no sign of Jacob anywhere. We needed to regroup, and we needed you. I couldn't think straight knowing you were in danger. I couldn't be the leader everyone needed me to be."

"You should have trusted me!" I yell.

The birds perched in the trees around us flew away at the sound, no doubt desperate to escape the shrill distress in my voice.

"I do trust you! Absolutely! But what was I supposed to do, just sit around and wait for you to come back? You were gone for almost a month. When I found out what Marcus did, I didn't think, I just... I snapped. I spent every waking second planning on getting you back. But of course, you were already working on your own escape."

He smirks down at me and tucks a wet piece of hair that was stuck to my cheek behind my ear.

"Okay," I say simply.

"Okay?"

"I trust you. I'm going to trust that you trust me, too. I do have one question though."

"Shoot."

"How did you know about Sage and Marcus?"

"I told you before I had my suspicions about Sage, I just couldn't figure out what he was planning next. Don't be mad, but when you guys went missing, we looked through all your computers. It wasn't personal, we were just desperate for any leads on where you could be. What we found in Marcus' computer..."

Killian shudders, his eyes glazed over with far away horrors. I could only imagine what kind of things he found on his computer if he was working with Sage this whole time.

"What we found crushed me. I trusted Marcus. I prayed it was a misunderstanding, that he wouldn't betray us like that, but when I saw you had killed him, I knew it all had to be true."

He stares down at me once again, the horrified look gone from his eyes, replaced with anger and betrayal. I take one of his large hands into both of mine. It radiates heat, and I bring it up to rest on my cheek. His fingers caress my jaw as a sad smile plays across his lips.

"Did you- did you find anything about Jacob on his computer?"

His brow furrows and the smile falls once again.

"No. It appears he was charged with keeping an eye on you, to make sure you fulfilled your duty. It seems Sage was suspicious of us being mates, although I'm still not entirely sure how."

I close my eyes, sighing heavily as I push my face further into the palm of his hand. He brings the other one up to rest on the opposite cheek and pulls my face up, resting his forehead on mine.

"We'll figure this all out, I promise," he mutters quietly.

"Everything is falling apart," I respond.

Tears I've been pushing back for months now threaten to break free, the stress of everything that's happening crushing me with its weight. One hand moves to grip the hair at the back of my head, while the other one travels down to rest at my hip.

"Everything is going to be okay. We're going to get Jacob back and I will have Sage's head for everything he's done."

Without much thought, I tilt my head up so that my mouth connects with his. The kiss starts off sweet and full of need, but when I open my mouth to accept his wandering tongue, the sweet need quickly turns into pure lust.

The hand on my head grips my hair tightly, pulling my head back to expose my neck, while the other moves to lift my leg up to wrap around his waist so that my most intimate parts are pressed delectably against his.

His mouth trails deep, open-mouthed kisses down my neck. He bites the skin at the junction of my neck and collarbone, hard enough to send jolts of pleasure down my body, but not enough to break the skin and mark me.

I'm nervous at the thought, but surprisingly sure that I want him to do just that. Killian pulls back slightly to look at me, eyes full of desire, but unsure.

"Do you want to stop?"

"No."