But as much as he wanted to be pissed at her for reacting that way, he knew that wasn’t fair. Like she’d told him last night, the things he’d done in the past had killed her trust, and if he wanted her—and if he ever wanted to hear a similar declaration of love come from her own lips—then he had to be willing to put in the time and effort to rebuild it.
It wasn’t something that was going to come overnight, no matter how badly he wished it could be like that, because this wasn’t a damn fairy tale. But it was something he’d fight for until he’d drawn his last breath. He wasn’t going to give up.
Not now. Not ever.
Shoving a hand back through his windblown hair, he held her dark gaze as he answered her question. “We got some of the weapons, but it can’t be their entire stock. They’ve probably already distributed the heavy-duty stuff to their soldiers.”
With a nod, she asked, “Is Lev going to be all right?”
A grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Didn’t you hear him?”
She gave a soft, feminine snort. “Yeah, but from what I can tell, he always sounds like that.”
“Don’t worry about him,” he murmured. “He’ll be fine.”
“So about the weapons. You know this kind of thing is just gonna piss them off, right?”
“I sure as hell hope it does. We’re going to have our plans ready to go in the next day or two, and after learning what’s happening in that town, the sooner we can give those women the chance to escape, the better.”
“I agree with all that,” she told him, as they both started to walk across the glade, “but was it really necessary to take such a risk? I mean, you went in broad daylight again, just the day after you destroyed their drugs supply.”
“We chose the time they would least expect it,” he rumbled, wondering exactly where they were headed. Not that it mattered. He’d follow her wherever she wanted to go, until she told him to get lost. And even then, he’d trail after her from behind, determined not to let her out of his sight.
She sounded more than a little peeved. “So then it’s okay for you to repeatedly put your life in danger, but I’m not even meant to do my job? Do you have any idea how backward that is, Eli?”
She was obviously still pissed about their earlier argument, but he wouldn’t have done a damn thing differently. She’d wanted to come with him and the guys, and he wouldn’t hear of it, which hadn’t exactly gone over well.
Breathing out a tired sigh, he said, “Rey, I’m covered in sweat and more than a little of Lev’s blood. Can I just take a pass for a little while and argue with you about this after I’ve had a shower and grabbed a beer?”
“Fine.”
He caught her arm as she started to walk away from him, and smiled down into her adorably disgruntled face. “You want to join me?” he asked. Just because he didn’t want to fight with her didn’t mean he didn’t want her with him. Hell, he’d keep her glued to his side if she’d allow it. Except, of course, for when it was dangerous.
She shook her head, tugging her arm free. He expected her to stomp off, but she didn’t. Instead, she made an odd little movement with her shoulder, and said, “By the way, you had a visitor while you were gone.”
At the odd edge to her voice, dread settled in his gut like a dead weight. “Who the hell would visit me?” He hadn’t left any friends behind when he’d been banished. Not trusting his old man, he’d never associated with any of the pack Lycans except for those who’d served his father, and he wouldn’t have wanted anything to do with them now, if they’d managed to survive. Eric and Elise had been the only ones who had ever mattered to him, until Carla had come along.
“I didn’t get her name,” she murmured, staring off to his right instead of looking him in the eye. “But Eric confirmed that she was one of your old flames.”
Oh, hell no. He wasn’t letting this screw up the small amount of progress he’d managed to make. Curving his hands over her shoulders, he waited until she finally gave in and looked at him, then said, “I did not invite anyone to come down here, okay? I haven’t even spoken to anyone in town.”
“Well, you can sort that out with her.”
“Are you telling me she’s still here?” he asked, his tone grim.
“No. Elise got rid of her.” Her mouth twisted with a smirk. “But I have a feeling she’ll be back. She seemed like the tenacious sort.”
“Then I’ll tell her she’s not welcome here.”
Her brows lifted with surprise. “You don’t even know who it was.”
“I don’t care who it was. Not. At. All.”
For a split second, he was staring down into the most stunning, breathtaking look of hope on her face that he’d ever seen, before she quickly snuffed it out. “You know, I get that you’re trying to say the right things here, Eli. But you could save us both the trouble and just go ahead and sleep with her.”
“That’s not going to happen,” he ground out. “I don’t even want her.”
“Is that right? Because from the sound of it, you certainly wanted her before. She said the two of you were really close, right up until the time you left.”
Christ, he just couldn’t catch a break, could he? Rubbing the back of his neck, he said, “Then she was lying, Rey. I don’t even know who this woman could be, which tells you how much she meant to me. But if we’re going to have this conversation, let’s at least take it inside.”
“Fine,” she said for the second time, and he clenched his jaw. He was really starting to hate that freaking word.
She followed him over to his cabin, and he was relieved they weren’t going to have to do this in front of his sister and Wyatt. Once they were in the bedroom he’d taken, he turned and locked the door behind him, then leaned back against it and folded his arms over his chest.
When she finally stopped pacing at the foot of his bed and turned to look at him, he said, “Do you want to go first or should I?”
She frowned, but jerked her chin for him to start.
“Okay, then, here it is. I don’t want any woman other than you, Carla. I haven’t for a long time. And I would think that was fairly obvious, seeing as how I keep getting my hand down your pants every chance I get and pouring my heart out to you like a lovesick sap. Does that sound like a man looking to screw his way through the pack?”
When her frown deepened, but she didn’t say anything, he asked her again. “Does it?”
“No,” she muttered.
“Well, at least you’re willing to admit that much to me.”
“What exactly do you want out of this?” she suddenly snapped, glaring.
“Not much,” he snapped back. “Just you.”
Her voice started to rise. “You really want a half-breed? Is that what you expect me to believe?”
He drew his head back, stunned. “Where the hell did that come from?”
“Isn’t that what this has been about right from the start? You were ashamed of me, weren’t you? That’s why we were always a secret!”
“That’s bullshit!” Fisting his hands at his sides, he stalked toward her. “You’re just grasping at straws now, Rey,” he said in a voice that was low and guttural. “I expected better from you.”
“You are such an ass!”
“Because I screwed up? Yeah, I did. I know that. But I’m back and I want another chance. I bloody well deserve one after what I gave up for you!”
“What you gave up?” she wheezed, shaking her head. “For me? You’re not making any sense! I didn’t banish you.”
“You, Rey. I gave up you. Don’t expect me to do it again.”
She blinked, staring at him as if she thought he was crazy.
“And don’t ever think that I would feel the way my old man did. Yeah, I followed him. I followed him so that I could keep an eye on that bastard, and keep him away from my family as much as possible. Which included my mother. I even...” The gritty words trailed off and he shook his head, backing up a step, unable to believe he’d a
lmost told her.
“You even what?” she asked, her voice slightly softer now, as if she sensed that something in the argument had just shifted.
He opened his mouth, but his lungs were working so hard he couldn’t get anything out.
“What, Eli? What is it?”
He squeezed his eyes shut, his hands fisting and flexing at his sides, while his chest heaved like a friggin’ bellows.
“Eli?”
“I was the oldest, which meant I was the one she ran to,” he heard himself saying in a voice that didn’t even sound like his own. “Always. Whenever he lost his shit with her, I put myself between them. I don’t think Eric and Elise even remember. I tried to keep them away from it. But I knew, I knew he would end up killing her if she didn’t get out.”
“I thought your mother ran off with another man. A human one.”
Wetting his lips, he finally opened his eyes, looked at her, and said, “She did.”
Her slender brows pulled into a V over the delicate bridge of her nose. “I don’t understand.”
“I would help her sneak off sometimes, so that she could get away from it all. I guess they met during one of her trips away from the mountain. I don’t know anything about him, except that he made her happy. When she told me she wanted to run away with him, I wasn’t surprised.”
“Oh, no,” she whispered, looking heartbroken for the little boy that he’d been. “What about you and El and Eric? How could she...just leave you like that?”
He gave a small, bitter laugh that tasted like crap in his mouth. “I think by that time she saw us as more of an extension of my old man than of herself. She knew she’d never make it if she tried to take us with her. The League of Elders would have given him full permission to come after us with every resource the pack possessed. But it didn’t matter. As wrong as it sounds, I was...I was glad she wanted to go.”
Quietly, she said, “Eli, you have nothing to feel guilty for.”
The sound that ripped up from his throat was deep and sarcastic. “Don’t I? When she told me what she wanted, I got her out, because I was trying to save her. Told her to never come back, because I knew he would kill her if she did. But I didn’t realize what it would mean for everyone else. Her leaving him...it just pushed him even deeper into his hate-colored madness.”
“But you couldn’t have known that. You were only a child.”
Another bitter laugh jerked past his lips. “That’s what the older pack members would always say about us. They would talk about how sad it was that we’d lost our mother when we were so young. And, Elise, yeah. She was just a little thing. But Eric and I...we were hardly little kids. He’d forced us to grow up long before we were adults.”
“Do Eric and Elise know that you helped her escape?”
His eyes widened, and he could feel the blood draining from his face. “Hell no. They’d never forgive me.” He took a step toward her, his breaths still coming hard and fast as he said, “And you know what the worst part is? The worst part is that I should have had the balls to end it and kill him, but I didn’t, because she made me promise that I wouldn’t hurt him. So I kept thinking someone else would do it for me, but his disease, his hatred, it spread like a damn plague. And after I was banished, I left the rest of you here to deal with it!”
Closing the distance between them, he curled his fingers around her upper arms as he leaned over her, getting right in her face as her head went back and she stared up at him with solemn eyes. “You want to know why I never told anyone about us?” he asked, forcing the words through his gritted teeth. “Because I was afraid, Rey. Afraid of letting myself love you. Of what my father might do to you if he found out. Of the kind of man I had become because of him. I followed him so Eric wouldn’t have to, but I hated every second of it. Hated the goddamn gut-wrenching terror of what he would do to you if he found out you were mine.
“And the night I finally took you to my bed, he’d already been pissed because of what I’d done. Because I’d jeopardized my position in the pack by killing El’s rapist. She was his own daughter, Rey. He hated her, and she was a part of him. So what do you think he would have done about you?
“From where I was standing, the banishment was a twisted kind of blessing when it happened, because there’s no way in hell that I would have been able to stay away from you after finally getting my hands on you. And he would have tried to kill you for it. Then I would have killed him, which would have turned everyone who followed him against us. We would have been marked for death the second he stopped breathing. So my banishment saved your life!” he ended on a stifled roar.
“If that was true, you would have come back when you heard he was dead. Or better yet, taken me with you!” Her voice cracked, and he winced at the pain he could see filling her glistening eyes. “God, Eli. You could have at least come to me and told me goodbye.”
“I did.” His throat was so tight he could barely force the words out. “I went to the Alley that night, Rey. I parked a mile out and walked in. No one even noticed because you guys were having some kind of birthday celebration for Jeremy. I stood out there in the damn trees and I watched you with them. With your friends. And I knew that as much as I loved you, and as much as I hated the goddamn danger your job put you in, the right thing to do was to let you stay with them. With your family.”
“Oh, God,” she sobbed, breaking away from him. With her arms wrapped around her body, she hunched forward, crying, “You had no right to make that decision for me. You were wrong!”
He swallowed, his own eyes stinging as he watched her completely fall apart. “I...I’m starting to see that. I should...have talked to you. I know that now.”
She straightened and glared at him, her thick lashes drenched with tears. “You don’t really love me,” she said through her trembling lips. “I...I don’t believe that. Either you’re lying...or it’s the stupid bond screwing with your emotions—with your head—now that you’re back. I spent a long time thinking about it last night, and that’s...that’s the only explanation that makes any sense.”
Feeling as if he’d been slashed open inside, he asked, “Why is it so hard for you to just believe me?”
“Why?” Her chest shook with a small, wretched laugh. “Because if you loved me, Eli, the truth is that you would have come back for me a long time ago.”
At first, he couldn’t get out the words he needed to say, everything jammed up inside him, locking him down. He took a deep, rattling breath, struggling for his damn voice, and somehow managed to tell her, “I was afraid it was too late.” Pulling a shaky hand down his face, he stepped close to her again, wanting so damn badly to take her into his arms and crush her against his body. “Christ, I was so afraid you wouldn’t want me anymore. Makes me sound like a pussy, but it’s the truth. I didn’t know if you were feeling the same pull. Was afraid of what I would do when I saw you. What if you’d found someone else? I was always too worried to ask about you whenever I talked to Eric or Elise. I talked to them less and less over the years, not wanting to know. I swear I’ve lived with that same cold burn of fear every goddamn day since you became a woman and I realized how badly I wanted you, and it was even worse after I left.
“And maybe...” He shoved a hand back through his hair again, then shook his head. “Hell, maybe I felt like I had to protect you from me. From all the things I’d done for that bastard. Even with him dead, I would have still been the same person.”
“You really think I would have cared?” she asked in that tear-drenched voice that was killing him.
Working his jaw, he said, “You should.”
Her chin went up, a rush of angry color burning in her cheeks. “Well, I wouldn’t have, because you survived him, Eli. You didn’t let him break you. You might have acted like his thug, but you survived him and became the man you are today. A man I could have loved if you hadn’t already broken my heart.”
“Rey,” he groaned, reaching for her.
“Don’t,” s
he snapped, stumbling back from him. “Don’t touch me. I can’t think when you do that.”
“And I can’t not touch you,” he rasped, catching her with one arm wrapped around her waist, the other lifting as he pushed her hair back from her face, “because you’re the only thing in this world that I want.”
“Eli—”
“Christ, Carla. Listen to me. What I told you last night, it was the truth.”
She started to shake her head, but he gripped the back of it, holding her still.
Pressing his forehead against hers, he said, “If you won’t believe my words, then trust what your body is telling you. Because sex doesn’t feel like this. Sometimes it feels good, sometimes even fun—but it doesn’t feel goddamn necessary.”
“It’s the bond,” she cried.
Lifting his head, he stared deep into her beautiful eyes, and said, “Bullshit. It’s your heart, Rey. And I want it so badly it’s killing me.”
She blinked, and then, without any warning, she suddenly grabbed him like she had in this same room yesterday, and crushed her mouth against his. He took her with him as he stumbled back, falling onto the bed, and she straddled his hips, rubbing herself against his already hardening body. Hunger rolled up his spine in a thick, searing wave, and he cursed the layers of clothing separating them. Breaking away from the kiss, he sucked in air, ready to beg her for what he wanted, but the words dried up on his tongue when she scooted back and shoved up his shirt, kissing the center of his chest, right over the thundering beat of his heart. He pulled in a sharp breath as he ripped the shirt over his head, and every muscle in his body tensed with anticipation as her mouth traveled lower, trailing biting kisses across his torso, around his navel, until she was nuzzling his happy trail with her nose and ripping at the buttons on his fly, the worn denim straining over the heavy bulk of his erection.
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