by T. S. Joyce
“If I ever have a child, I want to raise her differently, Mom. I want the focus to be on that child’s happiness, not what kind of money they can rake in.” Kimberly scooted her chair closer to Burke until she was pressed against his side. “I love him. Not as some rebellion to stress you out, but because he makes me feel good. He makes me feel safe and comfortable and like I can tell him anything and he won’t ever cringe at my thoughts or feelings. I married for a comfortable lifestyle, and I’m not proud of that anymore. Can’t you understand? I want a more meaningful life than the dollars I can line my pocket with. I paid my bills the other day, and do you know what I felt?”
“Poor?” Mom murmured.
Kimberly huffed a laugh. “No. I felt proud. I don’t remember the last time I felt proud of myself. It’s such a simple thing, but I like this feeling. I think, in a way, I like the struggle. Makes me feel alive. It’s making me stronger, and Mom…I want to be strong.
God, he loved this. Loved watching her lock her legs and hold her own. His lady wasn’t budging, but she wasn’t hurling insults or overly defending herself. She was saying how she felt and what she wanted, and there was power in a woman who knew how to set boundaries and stick to them.
She was magnificent: messy hair, smeared makeup, last night’s dress, his smell on her, and a fire in her eyes as she stood up to her parents and told them she wanted a life with him.
She was so damn perfectly imperfect.
“Mr. and Mrs. Wilson, your daughter isn’t in danger from me. Her future’s not in danger. I’m going to make her life a meaningful one, and a year from now, you will understand why she’s making the choices she’s making. You’re going to see a different Kimberly.”
“Why, because you’ll Change her into an animal? Into something like Leslie?” her mom asked.
He huffed a laugh and shook his head. “You aren’t listening. This has nothing to do with my animal.” He pulled out his phone and pulled up the picture from last night of them in the snow. He slid it across the table to Mrs. Wilson. “Neither one of us knew that picture was being taken. That picture is how I feel about your daughter. I’m not going to let her down.”
Kimberly’s mother stared at it. Just stared, her face downturned. And when the screen darkened, warning that it would turn off soon, she poked it to keep the picture longer.
She looked up, and there was something in her eyes he hadn’t seen before. There was a vulnerability.
Burke cleared his throat. “You called me an orphan, but that’s not right. My parents raised me. Raised me to be hard-working, loyal, to know what I want, and to take care of the things I’m blessed with. I understand that tomorrow isn’t promised to us.” He shrugged his shoulders up to his ears. Fuck, he hated talking about this. “I lost them so fast, but it taught me to appreciate each day. To appreciate the little things. I wish Kimberly could’ve met my mom.” He looked at Kimberly and lowered his voice. “She would’ve loved you.”
To her parents, he said, “And I wish you guys could’ve met my parents just to see the stock I come from. The values. I think you would go easier on me if you could see the type of people who raised me, the type of people I looked up to. The type of people I emulate. I don’t have them, so like it or not, you guys are going be important to me. I’m not going anywhere. And it isn’t because Kimberly has some secret money stash or whatever you’re implying. I have my own money. I would use it to take care of her, not the other way around. I’m here because I don’t want to live a half-life without her when I could live the whole one my parents prayed for. I’m not quitting, no matter how many insults you come up with me, Mrs. Wilson. I’m gonna grow on you, and the new Kimberly? Well, she’s gonna grow on you, too. She’s gonna soften your heart and make you proud and maybe she’ll even give you a lesson or two on what is really important. I can’t wait to be a part of it, and I feel lucky for that front-row seat. Fight it all you want, Mrs. Wilson, but I’m here to stay.”
Burke rubbed Kimberly’s arm and smiled at her. There were tears in her eyes, and she looked so beautiful, all flushed and happy like this.
“I’ve done something terrible,” Mrs. Wilson whispered.
Burke dragged his gaze away from Kimberly. A tear spilled down her mother’s cheek.
He hated seeing women cry.
“It’s okay,” Kimberly said. “Mom, we’ll work it out. The damage isn’t permanent.”
“Yes, it is. Yes, it is.” Her mom stood in a rush and ran into the other room. From here, they could see her check the front window. “Maybe there’s still time. Where’s my phone?”
“Mom, everything is good,” Kimberly said, standing slowly.
“No. No! You don’t understand. I did something awful.”
And then he heard them.
Sirens.
“No,” Burke murmured, standing. “Tell me you didn’t.”
Mom plucked a cell phone off the coffee table and, with shaking hands, poked some buttons on it and lifted it to her ear. “I’m going to fix it.”
“Fix what?” Kimberly asked. Oh, she couldn’t hear the betrayal yet. Not with her dull human senses.
The sirens were getting louder. There were four, maybe five, police cars headed this way, getting louder by the second.
“Hey,” he murmured to Kimberly. He gripped her hands. “Today is a bad day, but it won’t last forever. Don’t let anything stop you.”
“W-what are you talking about?” The fear in her eyes gutted him.
“Lean on Leslie and Kieran—”
“For what?” Kimberly asked.
“Hi, I’m trying to get ahold of Detective Bernstein,” Mrs. Wilson said in a frantic voice.
“Are you serious?” Bert Wilson’s voice boomed through the house. “You called the police on him?”
“I was trying to protect my daughter!”
“Our daughter. And protect her from what, Gladys? Happiness?”
“I was wrong, okay? I was wrong, and I’m sorry!”
The sirens were on their street now.
“Hey,” Burke said, wiping a tear from Kimberly’s cheek. Inside, his lion was snarling a dare for anyone to touch him, but outside, he smiled to set her at ease. “I don’t regret anything. Not a moment with you.”
“We can run.”
“I’m not a runner, and neither are you.”
“Wh-what—fuck!” Her face crumpled and tears streamed down her face. “What can I do?”
“You can succeed. No matter what happens, I want you to be the badass you were meant to be.” He cupped her cheeks and dragged her eyes back up to his. “Do you understand?”
She nodded, but he needed to hear it.
“Promise me.”
“Burke.”
“Promise, Kimberly.”
The police were running up the front walkway now, and Mrs. Wilson was running for the door. She couldn’t explain this away anymore, though. This wasn’t something human laws would forgive with a simple “never mind.”
“I’ll help,” Mr. Wilson murmured. “We’ll figure this out.”
Burke shook his head. He wasn’t going to be able to throw money at this problem to make it go away. He hadn’t seen how strict the human laws were on shifters yet.
“Promise,” he ground out to Kimberly as the police flooded in through the front door, guns drawn.
“I promise,” she whispered.
Chapter Fifteen
It wasn’t fair.
It wasn’t. Not at all.
When the cop car pulled away, Kimberly could see Burke in the back. He didn’t turn around. She knew because she watched until it disappeared up the road.
“Kimberly?” Mom said.
“Don’t.”
“It’s just I wanted to say I’m sor—”
“You’re not forgiven.” Kimberly looked her dead in the eyes. “I had it. Don’t you understand? I had it. I had my match, I had joy, I had a future I was excited about. It was in my hand, and you stole it from me. You stole it
from Burke! And for what? Did your vengeance over some dumb, ruined fake-fucking family pictures make you feel better?”
Kimberly shook her head. She’d never felt so defeated. “What’s the point in talking to you? You only care about you. It’s a waste of my time.”
She made her way past her mom and dad and back into the house. His keys were in her purse. She’d never driven a Bronco before, but she was going to be just fine. She’d made a promise. No more being scared for her.
When she climbed up into his rig, a wave of sadness washed over her. It smelled like Burke in here. An hour ago, she’d been on top of the world, and now she didn’t even know which way was up.
She gripped the steering wheel, and her shoulders sagged. The air froze in front of her face as she stared out the front window at the tire tracks the police cars had made in the newly fallen snow.
It wasn’t fair.
She was worried about Burke, and this all felt like her fault, but what had she done wrong? Fallen in love. Love was wrong?
The one person she knew who had her back was being punished for caring about her.
She inhaled the frigid air and screamed at the top of her lungs. And when her air ran out, she slammed her open palm against the steering wheel over and over, trying to rid herself of the bone-deep anger that consumed her.
Tears flooding her eyes, she pulled her phone out of her purse and connected a call.
Leslie picked up on the second ring. “Hey, party animal!”
Leslie knew the her of yesterday. The good her. She didn’t know the last hour had turned her back into Sad Kimberly.
“Kimberly?” Leslie asked softly. “Are you okay?”
“No.” Her face fell, and she rested her forehead against the steering wheel as she broke down. It wasn’t fair. Nothing was fair. Thickly, she told her sister, “I need your help.”
Chapter Sixteen
“I thought I would find you here,” Leslie said.
Oh, Kimberly had heard her coming. She’d heard her car coasting into Burke’s driveway in front of the cabin and heard her music blaring before she turned the car off. She’d heard her open her door, shut it, call Kimberly’s name. Heard her boots crunching in the snow, but she hadn’t been able to pull her eyes away from the woods long enough to turn around.
“Any news?” Kimberly asked as Leslie came to stand beside her in the middle of the yard.
“Dad’s lawyer says they’re making an example out of Burke, so he’s facing a maximum sentence. And fees. The local news has already caught wind of it, and they’re running a segment on it tonight. He’ll lose his business.”
“I can run it,” she murmured. “I can figure out his clients and learn how to cut wood. Kieran can teach me, and then I can keep it going.”
“I believe you can, but the lenders will take everything you make, and the fees will drain you completely in three months’ time.”
“Tell me again why I can’t go visit him?”
“Because he’s being watched. His connection with you is what got him in there in the first place. Until trial, the lawyer says you need to stay clear of him.”
Kimberly inhaled sharply to distract herself from the pain in her heart. She kicked a clump of snow with the toe of her boot. “How did he look?”
“Tired.”
“I want to know the truth. I want to know everything.”
Leslie stared at Burke’s woods with her. At the pine trees and their snow-covered branches.
“He’s been fighting. Probably defending himself or putting a stop to something we don’t understand in there. It’s all shifter inmates. There’s a pecking order.”
“How bad is he hurt?”
“He limped. He wouldn’t show us he was hurt if he could help it, but he couldn’t hide the limp.”
“Fuck.”
“Kieran is in the meeting with Mom and Dad and the lawyer to discuss next steps, but as soon as that trial date hits next month, if they sentence him, there’s no getting him out.”
“It’s not fair.”
“No.”
“I’m sorry,” she choked out, daring to look at her sister. She was so full of shame and guilt. “I did this to him. I did this to you and Kieran. I did this to me—”
“How? By existing? By making him happy? By getting the attention of his animal? By falling in love?” Leslie shook her head, and her dark curls bobbed with the movement. “This isn’t on you, and carrying that kind of guilt won’t fix this.”
Kimberly dashed her hands across her damp cheeks. “I haven’t seen him in two weeks, and it feels like an eternity.”
“That’s how this is supposed to feel,” Leslie whispered, just barely audible over the chilly wind.
“How what is supposed to feel?”
“Love. A bond. Being a mated pair.”
Kimberly changed the subject. “I like it here.”
“You should go inside. Burke wouldn’t mind.”
“Nah. I want him to show me around his home. The woods, though. The woods feel like he’s still here. Sometimes I still find pawprints.”
“He misses you.”
Was she strong enough for this? For real talk? Was her heart ready? “What did he say?”
“To give this to you.” Leslie handed her a folded-up piece of notebook paper. The word Snob was scribbled across it.
She closed her eyes and laughed. Then she sat down in the snow with Leslie and unfolded it.
Dear Kim,
I’m good. You’re probably worried or feeling guilty, but it’s not so bad. We get pizza on Fridays. I’ve met a couple of cool guys in here. Guards gave me my own room after the first couple of days. Thank you for filling my account. I know you’re doing that with the money you earn, and it’s too much, but I also know it’s your way of telling me you care about me. I hear you. Hear me too, okay? Remember the things I told you. Remember your promise.
I still don’t have a single regret.
You’re mine and I’m yours.
Burke.
Kimberly buried her head into her arms and squeezed her eyes tightly closed, trying to keep her heartbreak inside. She felt Leslie’s arms around her, and she melted against her. It felt so good to be hugged.
“I had this awful dream the night before he was taken away,” Kimberly told her. “I dreamed you betrayed me.” She wrapped her arms around her sister and swayed with her. “Silly, huh? That my brain takes the one person who actually cares about my pain and has them betray me. It was a trick of the mind, though. I know that.”
“How did I betray you?” Leslie asked in a ragged voice.
“Kieran was standing over me, saying something about the old me has to die, but it’ll hurt you to hurt me. I didn’t understand what he was saying, but then your lion showed up. I woke up just before your claws pierced my skin. It scared me, and I woke up feeling this sense of hurt. I don’t want you to hurt me. You’re too important to me now.”
Leslie had stopped their swaying and sat there, holding her tight. She was still as frost. “My lioness was in your dream?”
“Yes.”
Leslie swallowed audibly and eased back, pushed Kimberly away to arm’s length. Her bright gold eyes were round and shocked. “I didn’t betray you in that dream.”
“What do you mean?”
“The old you has to die. It’ll hurt me to hurt you…”
Kimberly shook her head, confused.
“I have a Turn card.”
“What?”
“It’s not just males. I have a Turn card, too. One in a lifetime.”
“For a mate.”
“I have a mate.”
Realization slammed into her like a freight train, and chills rippled across her skin. “Not a betrayal. A gift.”
Leslie bolted upright and paced in the snow. “Fuck. We can’t tell Kieran. He won’t let me do it.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s dangerous for you. I’m new and don’t have a lot of control. My a
nimal is volatile, but…”
“But what?” Kimberly said, shooting up to stand in front of her and stop the pacing.
“I think I can do it. For you, I think I can control myself. Kieran taught me. I just went through the Change, and I went into it prepared.” She was talking a million miles a minute, and her words all slurred together excitedly. “I studied the Turn. How close to death you have to be for the lion to be born, how much you need to bleed, where the bite works best, the works.”
“Maybe we can convince Kieran to help you?” Kimberly asked, hope and fear mingling in her chest.
“No, he can’t be involved or he could get thrown right in there with Burke. It has to be me. God, why didn’t I see this before? It has to be us. Me and you. I can stop myself because…”
“Because what?”
“Because I love you. You’re my sister. You’re my best friend.” She pulled a face. “That’s weird to say because you were always a twat, but lately you are less of a twat and I like being around you. I like you working with me, and you are more fun, less snobby, and I love you. You’re my favorite sister.”
“That’s not saying much. Marie and Beth are assholes.”
Leslie’s laugh echoed through Burke’s woods.
“Will it get him out?” she asked suddenly.
Leslie grabbed her hands and intertwined their fingers. “If you’re a lion shifter, they have no grounds to hold him. Shifters can be with shifters. Do you want me to talk to the lawyer first?”
“No. He’ll tell Mom and Dad and Kieran, and I’m not dealing with their freak-outs. I’m not doing this with them. I’m doing this with you. I want Burke back. I want him for always.”
A flash of uncertainty filled Leslie’s gold eyes, but she replaced it with determination. “I won’t kill you. Not all the way.”