Swiftcurrent Creek If ever I could love, I think it could be with you.

Silently, she pleaded with him. Come back,, her tender heart called out to his, thrumming wildly in the hollow of her chest as though desperate to escape. Come back to me. It yearned for its mate. It longed for the familiarity of Constantine's quiet love. It craved his nearness, the safety of his embrace, to know that it was truly home.

And yet as the pair stood there, Frostfur and Mayfair, once united, she felt so far away.

"Yes," she answered, though sorrow lingered. Swiftcurrent Creek had meant a new beginning for them, a fresh start, a chance to rear their family peacefully. As she blinked pitifully up at the wolf who'd followed her there to whelp their litter, the man whose surname she'd taken as her own, she could see nothing of the love she'd so desperately wished to feel from him. Durnehviir wondered if her departure and decision to sever their companionship had driven him to seek the comfort of Aria, but she brushed the thought away as soon as it arose.

He was not hers anymore. But she would always be his.

The dragoness swallowed thickly, gathering herself once more to follow her swarthy Alpha. "Constantine, I..." Durnehviir tried to bite back the emotion that swelled in her throat, but tears pricked her sad champagne eyes as she sought to hold his own and she found only the strength to muster a vague: "I was wrong."