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He blinked. “What did you say?”
“I said, I can’t believe men still think they know everything about everything.” Nova’s temper rose like a coiled snake lashing out. She gesticulated in his face. “You are an arrogant fool, acting so much better than me, acting too good to touch me. As if this body is so horrible to look at.” She gestured down her soaked dress, knowing the white fabric stuck to her skin and revealing everything beneath. But she was beyond caring. Maybe it was residual bitterness over him not being Jace. Maybe it was her stifled pain and frustration over a life spent trying to save this planet, only to find that two thousand years of evolution changed nothing. Or maybe it was her stupid twin’s betrayal or her tiredness of this place. The confusion. The customs. The brutality. Fucking done. She poked Leaf’s chest, taunting him. “I’m touching you. I’m fucking touching you, arrogant asshole.¡Vete al diablo!”
He trapped her hand against his hard chest. Heat scorched her face as he stared intently. She braved a glance into his eyes and found not amusement but curiosity.
“What did you say?” he murmured.
What did I say?
Then it hit her. “I said go to hell in Spanish.”
A snort of amusement left him.
“Spanish.” He tested the word on his tongue, mumbled it a few times, then frowned at a leather satchel beside his sword and baldric.
“You recognize the language?” she asked hopefully. Jace had learned to speak it because of her. It was one of the things he’d surprised her with when they’d met up in Vegas that last fateful day.
He let go of her hand and refocused on the exit. The voices had dulled again. The only sound Nova heard was the crackling fire and the unmistakable drag of heavy breathing.
“They’re just going to wait out there?” she whispered.
“Yes,” he replied. “Because if we don’t mate, you will be gifted to the runner-up.”
Grung?
“Get on the bed,” he demanded quietly. “Take off your dress, and do not speak unless I tell you to.”
Her eyes narrowed. She wasn’t going to be intimidated by him again. Once she lost her temper, it was like a valve released.
Lifting her chin, she said to his back, “Make me.”
He gave a pointed look at the exit. Presumption entered his eyes as he raised his brows in an obvious way. She watched him foolishly try to communicate through expression, gesturing to the bed, hugging his clothes, and then glancing outside and shaking his head.
“¡Ay, qué menso!You were never good at charades.”
“What are charades?” he grumbled.
She rolled her eyes.
Was he trying to tell her that they should pretend to mate? Play the game, and maybe the soldiers would believe they were fucking? Stupid man. The vampires could hear her heartbeat. The shifters had taken one whiff of her chichi and then tracked her across the forest. And his communication method sucked.
With a huff, she lowered onto hands and knees and crawled around the tent, searching through the belongings left behind by the tent’s owner. She found soap, useless trinkets, another woolen cape, and moldy food. When she reached for Leaf’s leather satchel, he stopped her by waggling his finger.
She mimed the action of writing with a pen. His eyes widened, and he retrieved a leather-bound journal and charcoal stick from the bag. He flicked through the handwritten pages too fast for Nova to read, but slow enough that she noticed the handwriting was in ink and not charcoal.
He found a blank page toward the end and scribbled down the words: We should pretend.
Just as she’d guessed.
She shook her head and pointed to her ears. They will hear—duh. From the guilty look on his handsome features, he knew his plan wouldn’t work. But he had no alternative.
Perhaps there was nothing for it, and they had to go through with the act. She could lay there and let him—her throat closed up. No. He was a stranger. He wasn’t the man who tenderly held her hand while he took her virginity. He wasn’t the man who hid love letters in places her twin couldn’t find. And he certainly wasn’t the man she’d left suffering in Vegas alone during the Fallout.
Her affair with Jace had burned bright, hot, and brief. It left an impression on her heart she still felt when they reunited at the end. One night. That’s all they’d had together before the world froze.
This man sitting beside her on a dirty canvas floor didn’t like Nova. His opinion was evident through his standoffish body language.
This world was horrible, and she had no more fight left in her soul. Her body was the last part of herself she could control. Giving that up now would cut the rope holding her sanity together.
