by T. S. Joyce
He pulled up her phone, turned on the camera, and aimed it at their reflection in the mirror. Click.
She got a glimpse of the picture before he sent it to her dad. Ford with his dark hair and blazing, terrifying gold eyes, and her, her chin lifted proudly, gold eyes looking right in the camera, a slight smile on her face because she knew what Ford was doing. He was making her safe. He was protecting her future. He was telling entire Prides that she was off limits to their stupid negotiations.
Her monster. Her dark lion. Her protector.
He held her closer to his chest, her shoulder blades pressing against the impossibly hard planes of his pecs. He dropped his lips to her neck and kissed her gently. Sora rolled her eyes closed and pushed away the urge to panic. Ford was sanctuary. He wasn’t other men, and he wasn’t bad. Not to her. Everyone else would have hell to pay, but her? She was the only one who was safe with him.
She slid her hands behind her to his powerful thighs and memorized them with her fingertips. His body was so different now, so much stronger, so much thicker and denser. She loved it. When he clamped his teeth gently onto her earlobe, she let off a sigh, and closed her eyes just to enjoy the sensation of his touch. His fingertips drifted from her jawline, down her neck, to her shoulder, where he gripped the fabric of her T-shirt, and pulled it. Her collar bone was exposed, and he pressed his lips to it. Sora released a shaky sigh and opened her eyes. He was staring her. Staring.
He could see her. Right there in the mirror, he would be able to see her scars and her new body and every inch of her skin that had been touched by Cassius. He would be able to see all of her shame, and it made her feel so raw and vulnerable. “Can we turn the lights off?” she whispered.
Ford froze. Five seconds of silence passed before he rumbled against her ear, “Do you remember?”
Sora eased her eyes open and looked at him in the mirror. His glowing eyes were on hers. “Remember what?”
“Our first time.”
Chills rippled up her arms, and she melted back against him. “Yes,” she whispered.
“You were a virgin, and I knew I was going to fuck it up for you,” he said. “I put it off, making sure you were ready.”
“I was confused,” she admitted softly. “I wanted you, and I thought you didn’t want me back. I thought I wasn’t pretty to you, or you didn’t like me enough.”
The corner of his lip twitched. “You were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. Still are. It’s hard to look away from you. I just…didn’t want to ruin a big memory for you. I wanted it to be the right time.”
“Why are you telling me this now?” she asked.
“Because I don’t want to ruin it for you now, either.”
Sora frowned.
“You’ve been hurt by a man,” Ford snarled low. “I know you were. It’s why you didn’t want touch. Didn’t want that first kiss. I watch you. Any time I get too close, you hole up into yourself. Your eyes go dead or they get angry. One or the other. You try to be tough about it, but you still have that trigger. You did better tonight by the fire, but I don’t want to pull that trigger too fast.”
He wrapped his hand gently around her throat and pressed his lips to her cheek. There was a soft growl rattling his chest. Feral man, wild even as he rejected her.
“You’re pretty enough. You’re sexy enough. I want nothing more than to lock your arms on either side of that mirror and rip these panties off and slide into you from behind. Make you watch how much I enjoy fucking you. But you’re not ready. We won’t be turning off the lights when I remind you who you are. I want to look at you. He clamped his teeth gently onto the side of her throat before he released her.
With the absence of his strong body, Sora swayed forward. Her arms were locked on either side of the mirror, but Ford was gone, left the room, and she remained, staring at her own hollow eyes.
He’d said she was enough, said she was pretty, and she’d heard the truth in his words. The conviction. But still, it was impossible not to feel the soft burn of rejection.
Chest heaving, she willed her heartbeat to steady out as she knelt by the suitcase Ford had dragged in. She had a treasure that no one knew about in there. Hopefully. One that had gotten her through some bad days with the Old Tarians.
Sora unzipped the luggage and dug deep, pulled the clothes and two pair of shoes out of the way until she reached the bottom. And under a flap of fabric, there was a photograph. It was one Orion had taken without her or Ford knowing.
They were sitting on the old porch swing of Ford’s house. Human Ford was sitting tall and strong, one long leg straight and one bent at the knee as he swung them gently. He wore a white T-shirt, jeans with holes at the knees, and thick-soled work boots. He’d just gotten off his construction job, so there were dirt streaks on his clothes. Sora was lying down, her head on his thigh, wearing a floral sundress, her hair curled and cascading down his leg as she looked at the display screen of the camera Ford had bought her for Christmas. He was staring down at her with this smile like she was everything, and she was right in the middle of talking, her lips parted, her smile so happy. It was a black and white picture. It was her most prized possession, and she’d sewn it into the suitcase before she’d been shipped off to Cassius.
Some days, that picture had nearly broken her heart with longing, and some days, it was the only ray of hope she’d been able to find.
Sora stood with the photograph cupped in her hand so she wouldn’t leave fingerprints on the corners. She walked into the living room where Ford sat on the couch with his back turned to her, his back tense as he stared at a wall. His hands were clamped so hard on his knees, his triceps were bulging.
“Ford?” she asked low.
He exhaled a breath and turned his face to the side. His profile was unreadable. He didn’t say anything, so she padded toward him and paused at the back of the couch. Then gently, she set the picture on his shoulder.
Ford took the precious photograph from its resting place and stared down at it.
“It’s the most important thing I own. I looked at it when…when…”
“When you needed it?”
“Yes.” The word was barely audible. “You were always my safe spot. Or a happy place, even if you were just in my memories.”
“And now?”
“It’s the one thing that hasn’t changed.”
Ford turned suddenly and wrapped his giant arm around her waist, pulled her over the back of the couch and hugged her against his side. She didn’t fight it. Didn’t even feel like freaking out. It felt so damn good to be near him. It was perhaps the only place in the world where she felt comfortable now.
He held up the picture in his free hand. “This feels like a hundred years ago.”
Sora smiled. “Yes, it does. So much has changed since Orion took that.”
“Whatever happened to that camera?” he asked.
“I brought it with me, but Cassius destroyed every sentimental thing I brought the day I came to him. I was really hurt to lose that. I liked taking pictures.”
“I remember. You had an eye for it. You saw the world in such a unique way. I loved when you showed me the pictures you would take. In my head, we were going to figure out a way to be together. You would’ve eventually given in and bitten me and I could’ve claimed you and kept you safe. And you could be a photographer if you wanted it. I would’ve worked myself to death to get you a studio if it would’ve made you happy.”
Sora’s face crumpled, and she curled into a little ball next to him, leaning into his one-armed embrace, her face snuggled against his ribs and her knees resting on his thigh. When he wrapped his other arm around her, she just…fell apart. Between her tears, she admitted, “That sounds like the perfect life. I would’ve loved that. I should’ve bitten you, Ford. You asked for me to Turn you so many times but I said no, and it ended up breaking us both. I didn’t want to hurt you with the bite, but the aftermath was so much worse.”
“Oh, Sora, you
can’t think of it that way. You’ll torture yourself. I should’ve come for you the day I was Turned, but I didn’t. When I called your dad, he told me you were happy, and I believed him. I was newly Turned, couldn’t tell the truth, didn’t understand what was happening to me.”
“Who Turned you?”
“A rogue. I paid him my entire life savings for the bite. He never gave me his name, and I only saw him as a lion.” Ford leaned back and drew her hand across the wide expanse of his chest. The skin was uneven, and she looked closer through all the tattoos. He had been savagely attacked. His chest and neck had healed but had been torn apart. “I don’t think he meant to Turn me. I think he was a killer, too, killing people who asked for the bite. A monster Turned me into another monster.”
“Is that why you got all the tattoos?” she whispered in horror.
Ford nodded. “It wasn’t a great memory. And being Turned didn’t get me anywhere. It just made me into a psychopath who can’t be around other men. It’s a lonely existence with the lion wanting to kill everything. I didn’t get to keep anyone from my old life. I wanted to keep them safe instead so I moved out to a cabin in the middle of nowhere, and now I flip motorcycles. I take in the old damaged ones, fix them up, and sell them for profit. I don’t meet up with the buyers in person, though. I have someone working for me who does the sales. I drop the finished bikes on the edge of my territory, he picks them up when I’m gone, makes the sales, and we take our cuts from the profits. He even grabs supplies and groceries for me, but I rarely see him. He drops everything in a bin at the end of my driveway. The lion is happiest if he’s alone.”
“That’s sad.”
“That’s life,” Ford murmured, shrugging up one shoulder. “You can either bitch about it and give power to the bad things that happen to you, or you can accept things and try to carve out the best life you’re able to.”
Those words struck her. Giving power to the bad stuff. Is that what she’d been doing by giving up? Probably. And here was Ford, destined for a life without human conversation, touch, or any connection to the outside world, and he was still fighting.
Ford was really damn inspiring. He made her want to do better. To work harder. To recover as much as she could and, oh Lord, it wouldn’t be easy. Head and heart work were the hardest kinds of effort. It was slow and tedious work. Exhausting work, but if he could have his entire life turned upside down and still be here, carving out a life for himself…then why couldn’t she try for the same?
“You are still a good man, Ford Owens.”
He snorted. “You wouldn’t say that if you saw what I was capable of now.”
“Oh, I saw a glimpse. You took on the entire New Tarian Pride for me. To protect me. You had a bunch of badass lions confused and keeping their distance when we left. I know you’re a monster now, but to me, you’re a good monster.”
Ford smiled down at her, just like he had been smiling at her in the picture that now sat on the coffee table. His smile was partly hidden by his thick mountain man beard now, and it had lost some of its softness. It was a feral smile, but she loved it even so.
The white smoke of their mutant bond billowed around them, but she was getting used to it. She hardly paid attention to it now. That was just the way it would be when they were together. The pure purple color of their past love would never be again, but that was okay.
Different didn’t mean bad.
Different just meant different.
“Do you remember the first time you saw me?” she asked.
Ford eased them onto the couch until they were lying down on the soft cushions, and then he pulled her against his chest. He was so tall, his ankles hung off the armrest, which made her giggle.
“I remember, but it’s not when you think it was.”
Sora eased back a little so she could look into his eyes. “It was at Bree’s Burgers. I was working, and you sat in my section with your friends.”
“Nope. That was the eighth or ninth time I saw you.”
“What? No, that was the first time we met.”
“Sora, I saw you for the first time at that old-fashioned ice cream parlor. You were in there with Orion and a couple other lions from your Pride. I was sitting in the back, looking at the classifieds in a newspaper, lookin’ for a Harley I could fix up. You laughed, and that sound…I’ll never forget it. It was the prettiest laugh I’d ever heard. It just radiated…happiness. I look up, and there’s this golden-eyed, blond-haired angel. Oh, I knew what you and your friends were the second I saw your gold eyes. Your canines were sharp when you laughed. You looked wild. Wild and happy. I wanted to talk to you, but I got caught up watching you instead. The way you rubbed your hands together right before you ate, the way your lips looked when you smiled, the tenor of your voice. You had this one flyaway curl that kept falling forward in your face, and you kept pushing it back. You were the prettiest girl I’d ever seen. So I went home and researched shifters. Saw that some shifters had paired up with humans over in Damon’s Mountains, so I convinced myself I had a chance. I saw you walking in front of the library later that week, and you were wearing a Bree’s Burgers uniform, so I went there on your shifts, and time and time again, I got caught up watching you and chickened out of saying hello. First girl I’d ever been nervous around. There was just somethin’ about you.”
Sora’s heart was so full as she listened to his admissions. She’d never known any of this before, but she had an admission of her own. “Ford Owens, I knew your name before you came and sat in my section.”
He brushed his knuckle so softly down her cheek. “How?”
“Because I saw you in that ice cream shop, too. You were looking down at a newspaper, and you had this hot-boy hair, all short on the sides and longer up top, pitch black, all mussed up like you spent an hour on it, but knowing you, you probably just ran your hands through it after your shower that morning. You had short, dark stubble on your face, tan skin, and your muscles were curving out of this light gray shirt you were wearing. I was careful not to let you catch me staring, but you looked up at the waitress when she came by, and your eyes were a color of brown I’ve never seen. Like whiskey. And your smile made my heart feel funny. Orion caught me looking at you, and he reminded me that humans were off-limits. So I did my best to just stay focused on him and our friends, while the whole time I could feel you behind me. You were the most handsome man I’d ever seen. I figured you had a billion girls all over you, and I tried to stop thinking about you, but I was happy when you showed up in my section the next week. After I took your drink order, I went back to the kitchen and did a happy dance in there. I girly-squealed and everything.”
Ford chuckled. “I would’ve paid good money to see that.
“Sneaking around with you behind the Pride’s back was the best year of my life,” she said suddenly before she could chicken out.
He brushed a tress of hair off her forehead and tucked it behind her ear. Such a tender smile for a monster. “For me, too.”
Chapter Ten
Sora was so damn beautiful, lying there on the couch, the early morning sun highlighting and shadowing her relaxed face. Not a stitch of make-up on, and she still had his dick throbbing against the seam of his jeans. The last week had been hard, keeping himself from touching her like he wanted.
Like every other night, she’d slept beside him, cuddled up on the couch. His girl didn’t much like beds. She’d been hurt in them and slept better on the couch. He wished there was time to teach her how to love beds again. His bed. But the stronger she grew, the less time he had left with her. His job would be done here soon, and he would banish himself back to his mountains, let her go after a good life in a good Crew. Not a Pride, because fuck the lions and their politics. Orion wasn’t the only one who could do research. Ford had been looking into the Crews of Damon’s Mountains. Orion believed in the New Tarians, but Ford wanted to figure out the safest place for Sora before he left her. She deserved safety after everything. If the New Tar
ians were it, great. But if there was something better for her out there? He wanted to know every option.
Sora didn’t move in her sleep anymore like she had the first few days. She wasn’t having nightmares anymore. There was no restlessness while she slept, and an arrogant part of him crowed that it was because she felt safe with him. Why did that feel like the most important thing in the entire world?
He pulled on his boot and tied it, looking over at her constantly. He should let her sleep. She’d been through hell, and she was sleeping so soundly, her body and mind obviously needing the rest. But he couldn’t stomach going into town without her. He’d put this off, reveling in every moment they’d built in their private little world here. This ghost town had become their sanctuary. Their private paradise. Here, it was like no one else existed, but it was time for reality once again.
He’d become addicted to Sora. To every little victory she accomplished, to every sign of confidence she gained, to every shy kiss she gave him, to every brush of her hand on his. Every look, every smile, every laugh. Sora was becoming his world, so leaving her to make a trip into town had him on edge. He would just obsess over something bad happening to her while he was gone.
He pulled the cuff of his jeans over his boot and knelt down beside her. All he had to do was cup her cheek, and her pretty blue eyes opened. No gold this morning. Her pupils pinpointed and dilated again as she focused on his face, and her smile was so sweet.
“Do you want to go into town with me?” he asked.
“Like a date?” she said in the sexiest sleepy voice he’d ever heard.
“Well…I’ll probably kill half a dozen people, so we probably shouldn’t call it that.”
“Can we get pancakes?”
He laughed. Laughed. Him. He had been chuckling louder and louder at how cute and funny she was, and now he was laughing. Like a normie. Like a man who had a heart, soul, sense of humor, all of it. Sora was so fuckin’ cool. “So you’re ignoring the fact I said I’ll probably murder people in town and focused on breakfast instead. That about right?”