“Even when she can’t be around you?” I ask.
“I’ll find a way,” Kyle says growling.
“I’m going to ask you an important question, and I need you to be honest with me.”
“Okay. What?”
“Will the Council come after you?”
I watch his eyes unfocus as he turns his gaze out into the forest. For a second, I fear I’ve lost him. To his memories. To his horrors. I prepare for his morphing. For a flash of anger to overtake him and careen him out of control.
But instead, I see tears well in his eyes.
I see sadness trickle over his features.
And my heart aches for him.
“I’m not the man Clarissa married,” he says.
“You’re enhanced,” I say.
“No. I’m not. I’m different. The man Clarissa married died the night those things came after me. What I’ve been transformed into—it’s completely different. I’m completely different.”
“I’m sure there’s a way to chemically counteract your pheromones so Clarissa can be around you,” I say.
“Would you shut up and let me give you the blessing I know you want?”
“I’m not going to hear of it.”
Kyle turns his tear-filled eyes toward mine, and I know that look. It’s the look of a broken man coming to terms with the fact that the love of his life is gone. I know that pain. I can sympathize with that pain. It tugs at a part of me I’ve ignored for far too long, and my hand falls to his back.
“Take care of her,” Kyle says.
“You know we will,” I say.
“The Council will come after me. I’m an experiment, and if they’re out to kill Clarissa, then they’ll be out to kill me.”
“Then you know you’re a danger here. To all of us, including Clarissa.”
His face turns back out to the forest as he wipes his hands off on his shorts. He stands to his feet and goes back into the cottage, and I have a feeling he isn’t coming out. I wait there for a few minutes before heading back to Clarissa to tell her what I’ve figured out, but Joel stops me on the way there.
“We need to talk,” he says.
“Can it wait?” I ask.
“No. We have to find a way to get that man-Primal-thing out of here.”
“First of all,” I say as I wrench my arm away from his grasp, “that man-Primal-thing’s name is Kyle. Use it. Second of all, he knows.”
“Then why isn’t he leaving? Why did he go back inside?”
“Because he’s a grieving man coming to terms with the loss of his life, his freedom, and his wife.”
“Who’s his wife?” he asks.
“Clarissa,” I rumble.
I watch his jaw clench as his eyes fall back behind me. I know he’s looking at that cottage. I know he’s debating on going up there himself. He’s on a short fuse, and I don’t like the look in his eyes. I especially don’t like how his hand is hovering over that large knife of his.