tried to pull free, but his fists tightened around my arms. He took a step forward, pushing me ahead of himself. Then his left foot hit the ground, and he grimaced in obvious agony.
The pain seemed to clear Marc’s head, and his eyes regained focus. He struggled visibly to get control over his temper, his gaze shifting back and forth between my eyes. I tried to jerk my arms away again, and he blinked. Then he shoved me. Hard.
I staggered backward, all the way to my bed. Again.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I spat, gripping the footboard to recover my balance. Since my claws were temporarily unavailable, I scrambled for words sharp enough to wound him. “Don’t you ever lay another finger on me,” I said, the calm surface of my voice hiding a churning current of rage. “You lost the right to touch me a long time ago.”
Hurt flickered across his face, and for an instant, my inner bitch was pretty happy. But then his expression hardened into anger once more as his hands formed fists at his sides. “If you have a problem with me, by all means let me know. In private. Throwing fits in front of the entire Pride was one thing when you were fifteen, but you’re an adult now, so start acting like it.”
I clenched the bedpost at a narrow section of the spindle, carving fresh grooves amid a tangle of older scars etched in the grip of a very different kind of passion. “You’re in for quite a shock if you thought that was a fit,” I said through teeth clenched hard enough to hurt. “Besides, four toms hardly make up the entire Pride. And there is no ‘in private’ around here, in case you haven’t noticed. They’re probably listening to us right now.” In fact, I knew they were because no one was talking.
Marc sighed, and eased his weight onto his good leg. I couldn’t resist a little silent gloating as he winced. “It’s been a long time, Faythe,” he said, his features twisted in pain. He probably wanted me to think his ankle was the only thing bothering him, but I knew better. This was a different kind of hurt, older and far more acute. “I was just trying to get reacquainted,” he continued. “Looking for a way to reconnect with you.” He stared at the floor, curling his toes in the carpet. “I made a mistake, and I’m sorry.”
I blinked, surprised by both his apology and the sudden change of subject. Weren’t we just talking about my “fit” in the kitchen? How had he made the leap to his forest faux pas?
Anyone else would have just accepted his apology and moved on, but did I? No, because I can’t see an emotional scab without picking at it to see if it will bleed. “What do you want me to say, Marc? That I’m sorry, too?” I paused, and he shook his head. “Good, because I’m not. You had no right to mark me. I’m not yours. I’m not anyone’s.”
The pain in his eyes bled into anger with frightening speed, and he clutched the top of my dresser for support. “I messed up, and you called me on it. Nearly took my foot off, in fact, so we’re even as far as I’m concerned.”
I started to tell him we would never be even as long as I was under house arrest while he was free to come and go as he pleased. But for once, his words came faster than mine. He was learning—and only five years too late.
“You can pretend you’re one of the guys all you want, but that means I outrank you. We all outrank you. And no tomcat would get away with punching me.”
Marc was right, though I would never admit that to him. And though he would never say it, he wasn’t just angry about being punched. I’d insulted and embarrassed him in front of his subordinate Pride members. Anyone else would pay for that. But I wasn’t anyone else.
“What do you want to do, drag me out back and beat the shit out of me?” I stuck my chin out and crossed my arms over my chest, daring him to come teach me a lesson.
He looked tempted for an instant, but then he exhaled softly and shook his head, leaning against the closed door. “You know what I want, Faythe.”
Closing my eyes, I counted to ten silently, hoping that when I looked again, I’d be back in my apartment at UNT, far from Marc, the emotional black hole. I opened my eyes. Nothing had changed. He was still watching me, waiting for my response.
Maybe I should have counted to fifteen.
“No,” I said, wincing as his face fell. Scarring him physically was one thing, but I’d decided long ago to keep my claws off his heart, which he typically left undefended.
“It doesn’t have to be like it is with your parents,” he said. “We could start from scratch. Make up the rules as we go.”
My heart thumped painfully, and I hated the fact that he could hear it, that he could discern temptation in the rhythm of my pulse and hesitation in the hitch in my breath. We’d only been together for two years, but they were a very intense two years, and at one point, I thought we’d be together forever. Then reality smacked me in the forehead and I realized that I certainly could have Marc for the rest of my life if I wanted. Him, and his children, and nothing else.
But now he was offering me more than he ever had, compromising on things he’d always sworn could never be changed. But it still wasn’t enough, and it never would be. If nearly biting off his foot hadn’t made that clear, I didn’t know what would.
“I don’t want to make up the rules,” I said, suddenly tired. This was the point where our old argument lost its vitality. The part where I turned him down. Again. “I don’t want any rules at all.”
Marc swallowed, and I could almost taste his disappointment on the air, bitter as unsweetened tea and painfully tart.
“There are rules for everything,” he said. “You follow the rules at school without a second thought, but you won’t bend to the few that could make you truly happy.”
He’d summed up my problem exactly. I wouldn’t bend. Not for him. Not for anyone.
“We are not having this argument again,” I insisted. Yet we seemed incapable of discussing anything else. No matter how our conversations began, they always came back to what went wrong with us and why I wasn’t willing to try again.
He continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “You could run things however you want, with no one to tell you what to do. I don’t have to be in charge. I don’t even want to be.” He paused and I shook my head slowly. “Come on, Faythe, just think about what I’m saying.”
I didn’t have to think about it; I already knew what he was saying. According to traditions that were already well in place when the first colonists came to America, it was my responsibility to mate a man qualified to become the new Pride Alpha, someone capable of getting all the toms in line and keeping them there.
Marc was saying that if I married him, I could be in charge—that when Daddy turned the Pride over to him, he would hand it over to me. I would be my own boss, and his too. Sure, I would have the independence I’d always wanted, but it would come at a steep price: I’d be responsible not just for myself but for the entire Pride.
Not counting his enforcers, my father had more than thirty loyal tomcats spread across Texas, Oklahoma, and parts of Kansas, Louisiana, and Arkansas, each living his own life in his own way, just like Michael. They’d sworn loyalty to their Alpha and to the south-central Pride, and they would be available for more active duty should the need arise. But until then, they lived in relative peace under their Alpha’s protection, secure in his ability to lead and protect them.
And
