NICHOLAS (old version)

chapter thirteen: nick

Whatever you do with the rest of your life no longer matters [in theory]. All that matters is that, while reading this, you listen to Electric Love by Borns on loop. This song literally explains everything that goes on in Nick's head. 

She stared at me with this look that was part agitation and part disbelief, as though I'd just told her I was pregnant, and the father (mother?) was a goddamn bear. A polar bear. The thought of a were-bear-wolf cub-pup creature was amusing, and I almost smiled. Almost.

"We've been over this Nic-" She started, her lips tilted in a pout that I couldn't help but linger on. The animal inside of me wanted those lips pressed against me. My lips, my cheek, my neck - anywhere. It wanted those lips to part and sink those pearly white teeth into my skin and call me her's for the whole damn world to see. I forced myself to look up to her eyes, clearing my throat.

"No, we haven't, actually." I countered, unable to resist the smirk that found it's way onto my features. I'd found a loophole, if one could even call it that. "We agreed to give it time before I mark you. I mark you. We never discussed you marking me. You'll be in no way bound to me; you'll feel me when you want to, and you won't when you don't." I held my head high on my shoulders, unable to be proud of my idea. It was brilliant, really, and would solve most of the issues.

She sat there for a moment, her defiant glare melting away to a look of consideration. She was trying to find a fault that wasn't there, a hole in my idea. Finally, she sighed and had this... look. One of fear, of sadness, of anxiety. She didn't want to be thinking her thought - she seemed to do it a lot. "Nick, what if it...  it doesn't work out? What if I leave, what if I die? You'll never be able to mark someone else. You'll never be able to move on, you'll be tied to someone you don't have for the rest of your life. Shouldn't we just... wait?"

My jaw clenched. I wanted to tell her to not say, not even think those things. Everything would always be fine and we'd live happily ever after and life would be good. But it wasn't reality, and part of me was glad that she'd started to see the real world. The way everything didn't fit together like a fairy tale. But I didn't want her to lose the bright optimism she possessed; it contrasted my darkness well enough to make it easier to smile, sometimes. It made the weights that hung from every one of my limbs feel less crushing.

"What will waiting do, Darcy?" I said, turning to her fully as I spoke, legs folded on top of one another, unable to help the desperation in my voice. "If something is going to happen to you, it will either way. I don't care if I can never have anyone else - I don't want anyone else. For the rest of my life, even if I live it alone, I only want you. The memories of you. The knowledge that I'll have a piece of you, even if it's only your mark."

I swallowed back the big ball of emotion that wanted to fall out. The urge to profess my undying love for her, recalling one... unfortunate fact. "You don't understand the way it feels, just seeing you. You're eighteen, you've only been feeling the mate pull for a few weeks. The pull you feel to me, it isn't shit. It's one drop compared to the ocean I feel. I'm trying to be a good boy, control myself, but every time I see or smell you, I want more. I want to take you and claim you and own you in the most animalistic of ways. Your mark would ease it. For a while."

She stayed quiet, just watching me. I forced myself to stay with her gaze, forced the animal, the Alpha, down. I had to be good, I couldn't lose her. I'd lost too many people in my life, I couldn't take another one.

"Okay." Darcy said, a shy smile playing on her lips. "Let's do it. Just you. I'm, uh, I'm going to go brush my teeth."

I chuckled at her comment as she scrabbled to her feet, all but running into the bathroom and shutting the door behind her. She was so different. The females in the pack were spitfires; they were raised to keep up with the strongest, to outrun them. They were powerful, so used to having their way. They used sex and manipulation just like they used their fists.