He shook his head and held my good hand when I tried to pull away. “It’s not wrong just because it isn’t easy, Faythe. The only thing we’ve done wrong is keep it from Marc. We should tell him.”
I nodded. That was only fair. “But not yet. It’s not a good time.” And I have no idea what I’m going to say…
Someone knocked on my door, and we both jumped, then flushed. “Faythe?”
Dr. Carver.
My door opened before I could respond and he slipped inside, then closed the door at his back. We both leaped to our feet and the doc took us in with a sad, cautious look. But he didn’t seem surprised in the least. “Your dad’s looking for you. Both of you.”
I felt the blood drain from my face. Carver had caught me and Jace in the guesthouse the day Ethan died, and he’d promised to keep our secret, on the condition that I figure out what I was doing. Unfortunately, I hadn’t made much progress in that regard.
“Does he…?” I couldn’t finish my question.
“No. I told him I’d get you, but I didn’t know Jace was in here until I got to the door and heard you both.”
Good thing we were whispering…
“Thank—” I started, but he cut me off with a look that was part anger—probably over being put in such a position—and part aching sympathy.
Carver strode closer, and his voice dropped almost beyond my range of hearing. “If you’re not ready to tell people about this yet, then you better learn to stay the hell away from each other, because if anyone else had passed by this door with an ear to listen, you’d be having an entirely different conversation right now. And that doesn’t seem fair to either Marc or your father, considering everything else that’s going on.”
Jace bristled under the verbal censure, and I felt him go stiff at my side. I laid a warning hand on his arm and heard his pulse slow as he made himself relax.
Surprise flickered behind the doctor’s eyes as he took in both the gesture and the response, but I spoke before he could ask questions or make assumptions. “It just happened. But it won’t happen again. Right?” I glanced up at Jace, and he nodded stiffly. “Go out with the doc, please.” Because the two of them seen leaving my room together would raise much less suspicion than Jace leaving alone. “I’ll be there in just a minute.” After I washed my face and brushed my teeth, to keep Marc from smelling my indiscretion. At least until I was ready to tell him.
Jace blinked at me, pain shining in his eyes like tears. He wanted to touch me, or say something private, but wouldn’t in front of Carver. I could almost taste his frustration; it mirrored my own. Then he turned abruptly and followed the doctor out of my room.
Hot water poured over my head and down my back, washing away Jace’s scent and my sweat, and blending with the tears I could no longer hold back. I cried quietly, hoping the running water would hide the evidence of my weakness from the house full of cats, most of whom needed to see me as Jace had described me. Strong. Determined. Someone who knew how to harness pain, and anger, and heartache, and use them to her advantage. To hone her leadership skills, sharpen her wits and senses, and fuel her drive for justice.
But I didn’t feel much like that person at the moment. I felt…fractured. Fragmented. Like I was under fire from all sides, and each impact left a tiny crack in me. Soon, those cracks would spread and touch, and I would just fall apart.
Because I wasn’t good enough.
I wasn’t good enough to save Brett. To avenge Ethan. To raise Kaci. To protect Manx. To be…whatever Jace needed. To keep Marc.
To lead the Pride someday.
They needed better than me. They deserved better than me.
My shoulders shook and I threw my head back into the spray, shoving wet hair from my face with my right hand, grateful for the clear plastic cast protector.
“Faythe?”
I jumped and nearly slipped on the wet tiles.
“Whoaaa.” Marc pulled open the shower door and steadied me, careful to grab my arm above the cast. “What’s wrong?”
I blubbered something even I couldn’t understand and threw my arms around him, heedless of his clothes. He stroked wet hair down my back and ignored the water soaking into his shirt and jeans. I didn’t have to be strong with Marc. With him, I could just be me. I could say whatever I was thinking, do whatever felt right, cry if I was upset, and he thought no worse of me.
He picked me up.
I wasn’t good enough for Marc.
When the worst of my sobs had eased, he gently peeled me away, then stripped while I stood beneath the spray. Then he stepped into the shower with me and closed the door.
“What happened?”
But I hardly knew where to start. “Ethan’s dead. Jake’s dead. Charlie’s dead. Brett’s dead. We have no evidence, and those damned birds aren’t going to stop coming. There are more of them now.” Ten, at my last count. And until we learned how to fight them, our only options were to hide in our own home or to flee it.
Neither was acceptable.
I sniffled and wiped my face with my good hand. “I thought I could fix it. I thought I could get the proof, and protect Brett from his dad, and prove to the council that Malone’s behind this. But I can’t. I can’t do anything right. I can barely even wash my own hair.” I sobbed again, gesturing to my shampoo bottle with my broken arm.
Marc leaned forward to kiss my wet forehead. “Then let me do it.” He turned me around by my shoulders and gently tugged my head back by my hair to rewet it. Then he nudged me forward and squirted shampoo on top of my head.
He used too much and started at the top, rather than at the ends, but I barely noticed, because he was washing my hair. Massaging my scalp with strong, confident fingers as he fulfilled my need, in the most literal sense. Once again, he was there for me when I needed him, and I was…
Not good enough for him.
“You deserve better than me,” I whispered, and the selfish part of me hoped he wouldn’t hear.
He heard.
Marc spun me around so fast I would have slipped again if he weren’t holding me up. We were so close drops of water from his chin fell onto my chest, and I had to crane my neck to see him. “You are perfect for me, Faythe, just like you are, because you’re not perfect. You’re headstrong, and impulsive, and outspoken, and I’m possessive, and overprotective, and too easy to piss off. We’re both wrong for a lot of things, but we’re right for each other. Do you understand?”
I nodded. I didn’t know what else to do.
“There’s nothing you could have done for Ethan or for any of the others, but we all know that you would have given anything to save them. Hell, look what you went through for me.” He held up my broken arm and brushed the fingers of his free hand over the fading bruises on my ribs and stomach.
It was just pain. I deserved pain, if only for what I’d done to Marc.
“You’re too good for me.” I shook my head, digging deep for the courage to tell him the truth. It was the very least he deserved, though he didn’t deserve the fallout. “You don’t understand.…”
Marc’s mouth crushed against mine, and he kissed me so hard, so thoroughly, that I couldn’t breathe. And didn’t give a damn.
I kissed him back, tasting him, breathing him, hating the plastic encasing my arm because it kept me from properly feeling him. His chest was slick. The muscles shifted beneath my good hand as he moved. I let my lips trail over the harsh stubble on his chin, and he tilted his head back, giving me full access to his throat—the most vulnerable part of his body.
I could kill him in half a second, if I wanted to. Marc presenting me with his throat said he trusted me with his life. It was the biggest compliment one cat could give another.
But the scary part was that he trusted me with his heart.
I forced that thought away and stood on my toes to reach his jaw. His hands roamed up from my waist, brushing the lower curves of my breasts. My tongue traced the line of his neck, following it to his collarbone. I
lapped at the water pooled there, then my tongue ventured back up, searching out his mouth.
I pulled his head down for another kiss, and Marc groaned. His tongue found mine, and he walked us one step backward. My back hit the cold tile wall, and he pulled away to lift me beneath both arms, his stance wide for stability. I wrapped my legs around his hips and clung to him, my skin slick against his.
My breasts pressed into his chest. My good arm went around his neck. He lifted me higher, and I half sat on the soap shelf to help support my weight as his fingers slid down my side, leaving trails of fire in their wake. His hand slipped between us, testing, guiding. Then he lowered me slowly.
I held my breath until he was all the way in, and my next inhalation was so ragged it almost hurt. I rocked forward, and he moaned. His eyes closed, and he rocked with me. I draped both arms around his neck, closed my eyes and rode him. I let him set the pace—slow at first, but gaining speed as friction built.
He drove into me, pinning me to the wall, drawing small sounds from me with each stroke. He rocked me back and forth with a grip on both my hips. I clung to the top of the stall with my left hand and lightly clutched the showerhead with the fingers protruding from my cast. Each breath came faster, each thrust harder. My legs tightened around him as I sought more contact. Greater friction. More heat.
Finally, when I was sure I couldn’t hold back another second, Marc groaned and his strokes became frantic. I let go, and sensation washed over me, scalding compared to the now lukewarm water.
Spent, Marc leaned into me, and his head found my shoulder. His heart raced inches from mine, and I could hear each whoosh of his pulse.
After at least a minute like that, he lowered us until we sat on one corner of the shower floor, water spraying my back. I straddled him and leaned back so I could see his face. He stared at me, but he wasn’t smiling. He looked…scared. Determined.
I started to ask what was wrong, but he spoke before I could.
“Marry me, Faythe.”
I nearly choked on surprise. How many times was that request going to catch me off guard?
“This is the last time I’ll ask. I mean it. Marry me so that when all this is over, we can get a house of our own. A little land. A lot of privacy.”
“Marc…” But I had no idea how to finish that thought.
“We can do it however you want. We can have a ceremony, or stop by the courthouse on our way to Venice. You can wear a white dress, or a red dress, or jeans, or nothing at all. We can get married in the nude. I don’t care. We’ll do whatever you want. Just tell me you’ll marry me, so we can get something good out of all this.” His wide-spread arms took in every disaster the past few months had thrown at us, but his gaze never left mine. “Marry me, Faythe. Please.”
His face broke my heart. His eyes seared my soul.
I wasn’t good enough for him.
“Marc, we have to talk about…something.” I swallowed thickly, and put my good hand over his mouth when he started to protest. “I’m not saying no,” I insisted, and he relaxed visibly, as the spray of water across my back continued to cool. “But I can’t…I can’t do this now. There’s too much going on, and we need to talk first.”
He sat straighter, and I slid a few inches down his legs. “Whatever it is, it doesn’t matter. If it’s kids, or becoming Alpha, or whatever, it doesn’t matter. We’ll work it out.”
He looked so hopeful, I wanted to smile, but didn’t let myself. He hadn’t heard what I had to say yet. “I—”
And that’s when the power went out.
Eleven
“Someone give me a flashlight.” My father’s voice rumbled from the other end of the hall. A bobbing shaft of light accompanied heavy footsteps toward him, and a Vic-shaped shadow handed over his flashlight.
Marc tucked his towel tighter around his waist, and the thin beam from his own penlight showed off drops of water still clinging to his chest and dripping from his hair. Having anticipated neither the full-scale air raid nor my wet embrace, he hadn’t brought a change of clothes.
In the deep shadows, the four parallel scars running across his chest looked terrible. Fresh. No doubt they were fresh in his mind, but he’d had them since he was fourteen, when the stray who’d raped and killed his mother had gored him, too, bringing him into my life.
For better or worse.
Three other beams crisscrossed the packed hallway as my father held an informal roll call, but a single steady pole of light caught my eye. Jace stood across from my room and several feet down, his face harshly lit by the beam from the small flashlight my mom kept beneath the kitchen sink. But even poorly illuminated, his expression was unmistakable. His focus jumped from me in my robe to Marc in his towel, and his jaw bulged furiously.
A tangle of emotions churned through me, threatening to wash me away in a tide of confusion, guilt, fear, and regret. And for a moment, I thought Jace was going to expose them all.
But when his gaze met mine, his anger softened into carefully controlled envy. Then he exhaled and dragged his focus to the end of the hall when my father cleared his throat to capture everyone’s attention.
Marc’s hand wound around mine. He hadn’t seen Jace watching us; he was focused on the problem at hand. Like a good enforcer.
“Vic, you and Parker go downstairs and flip the circuit breaker,” my dad said from his position near the front door. “And stay away from the cage. That thunderbird has an incredible wingspan, and he can Shift instantly.”
Vic nodded, already headed into the kitchen with a flashlight. Parker followed, his steps heavy, his grim frown exaggerated by the dark shadows stretched across his face. To my knowledge, he hadn’t spoken since he’d heard what Lance had done.
I knew how he felt—at least better than anyone else could. Lance had let Malone frame us for murder, putting all our lives at risk, including Parker’s. My brother Ryan had sold me out to a serial rapist jungle stray who’d planned to sell me as a broodmare in the Amazon. Betrayal sucks, but I had more faith in my pound-the-shit-out-of-something therapy than Parker’s drink-till-you-go-numb method of dealing.
“Karen, can you pass out candles and matches, just in case?” my dad said, drawing my attention back on track. My mother raised a handful of tapers she’d already collected, then ducked into the kitchen, probably to dig for matches. All of the enforcers kept two flashlights in their cars as part of the standard trunk emergency kit. Except for me; I didn’t have a car.
Unfortunately, venturing outside to raid half a dozen trunks carried more risk at that moment than stumbling around in the dark inside. Especially considering that several of us could partially Shift our eyes, if necessary.
My father’s stern focus skipped from face to shadowed face. “Everyone else, grab a candle and find something quiet to do while you wait. The lights should be back on any minute.” Then, as the toms shuffled toward the kitchen, my father mumbled beneath his breath. “So help me, if one of you sets my house on fire, I will replace the rug in my office with your hide.”
I snorted. An Alpha’s sense of humor was a rare beast indeed.
But my smile died on my lips when Vic and Parker clomped up the basement stairs, yet the house remained dark.
Kai cried out from below, in a screeching, dual-tone voice loud enough to echo in the crowded hall. “They’ve cut your power to draw you out. That means there are enough of us now to take you on in groups!”
“So, what do they expect us to do?” Jace demanded, while my father scowled from the center of a huddle with the other Alphas. “Walk out and surrender?”
“No.” I drew my robe tighter and held my broken arm at my stomach. “They expect us to die.”
My dad’s scowl deepened, and he led the other Alphas into his office with the flashlight they shared.
“This makes no sense,” Mateo Di Carlo said to the house in general, once the office door had closed. He stood as close as he could get to Manx without actually touching her while she nursed
Des back to sleep. “Why would they believe Malone’s bullshit story, but not our truth?”
“They’d believe us if we had proof.” I waved Kaci forward when she peeked out of Owen’s room. My injured brother lay inside, listening and watching by candlelight from his bed. Michael sat in a chair beside him, taking it all in. “And that would be enough of a reason for them to break their word to Malone,” I continued. “To nullify the deal they made. But without evidence, they consider themselves honor-bound to uphold their word. And to avenge their dead.”
“They’re trying to kill us?” Kaci whispered.
I wrapped my casted arm around her. “Not you. They could have killed you earlier, but they didn’t. They’re trying to protect you and me and Manx.”
She looked less than reassured.
“This is crazy.” Brian Taylor stepped from the kitchen with a candle in one hand, its flame flickering over his freckles and the pale brown fuzz on his chin, emphasizing his youth. “How are we supposed to stop them? Shoot them out of the sky?”
“Yeah, that’d be great, if we had guns.” Since our ranch had no livestock to protect, they weren’t necessary for typical farm practicality and werecats hunted with their claws and canines. Carrying a firearm was like cheating, thus considered dishonorable in most Prides.
In fact, the only cat I’d ever even seen with a gun was…
“Here.” I stepped away from Marc and nudged Kaci closer to him, for comfort. “I’ll be right back.” I could feel everyone watching me as I marched down the hall, and Jace’s gaze in particular seemed to burn.
“What are you doing?” he whispered, falling into step with me.
“I have an idea.” I stopped at the office door and gave three sharp knocks to announce my entrance; I wouldn’t have been able to hear permission, anyway.
The door was unlocked, so I pushed it open to find all four Alphas watching me. “Sorry to interrupt, but I have an idea, and I need something from your desk. If that’s okay.”
My father raised a brow at my formality, and one corner of his mouth twitched as if he wanted to smile. He knew I was about to ask for something crazy; why else would I grease the wheels with manners?
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