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“I don’t want to be with her. I don’t want to be with any fucking one.” The confession fell from my lips before I could stop it.

Willow closed the space between us. “Then why are you?”

Fuck. She knew, she knew what I was doing and why. No, she didn’t know the details of my time possessed by that twisted fuck, but she knew I used that shit as an escape, because Willow knew me better than anyone. We had a connection that ran deeper than the one I had even with my own parents. “You know why,” I ground out.

She cupped the side of my face, and I flinched, then forced myself to stay still when anyone I loved touching me made me want to run like fuck the other way. Holding Violet felt like the sweetest thing in the world, and it made me want to flay my own skin from my body. Hands like mine, the things they’d done, they didn’t belong on someone so innocent and precious. But denying Willow, pushing her away again, pretending Violet wasn’t here, would kill her, and I couldn’t do that to her.

Wills brushed her thumb over my beard. “I’ve known you since you were fourteen years old, Renny. You knocked on the door, all gangly limbs and boundless energy, and I loved you instantly. My sweet familiar. You’d finally found me. Goddess, Ren, you’re my brother, my son, my best friend…my sweet fox, you’re a part of my soul, right alongside Violet and Warrick.”

I couldn’t do this. “Wills—”

“You’ve come so far…after everything you’ve been through. You’ve come such a long way. Don’t stop. Promise me you won’t stop trying, that you’ll keep pushing. I need you. Vi needs you. Do you understand?”

She saw me, right into my very soul, and I suddenly felt as though she’d stood behind me every time I paused on that cliff’s edge, every time I almost stepped off.

I nodded, and she leaned into me, her head to my chest, and I wrapped my arms around her, locking my hands together so they didn’t touch her, didn’t taint her.

“If you leave me, Ren, if you choose to leave me, I’ll never forgive you,” she said against my chest, proving just how much she saw.

I strode out of Willow and War’s place a few minutes later, feeling wired as fuck. Despite my efforts, I was still hurting Wills. She was worried about me, and I didn’t know how to ease her fears because I couldn’t make her any promises. I’d fight it, the darkness as thick and sticky as tar, for as long as I could, but it wasn’t getting easier.

As I strode along the caves, I told myself I was just walking, no destination in mind, but I knew exactly where I was going—to get my fix, my elixir, the antibiotics for the infection festering inside me.

She doesn’t want to see you. Why would she want to see a pathetic piece of shit who carves himself up like a psycho? Edward’s voice invaded my mind, and I forced it back down deep.

The buzz of the tattoo gun reached me first, a steady hum over low music and murmured voices, over the occasional crack of balls on the pool table. Roman did his work in an alcove off the common room and kept his gear set up there. Nothing unusual about me walking in there. I did it all the time. I hung out here more often than not. No one would think I was there because of Jasmine.

I walked in, and as hard as I tried to play it cool, to not look at her as soon as I entered the room, the pull was too strong. My fucking head swung her way as soon as I stepped foot through the doorway. The pressure in my chest I’d felt when I was talking to Willow returned tenfold as soon as I saw her.

Light flooded the large alcove where Rome was working on her. Jasmine lay on her back on the massage table, feet crossed at the ankles. She wore jeans, and her stomach and chest were fully exposed, except for a thin strip of white fabric covering her nipples. There was new ink already on her stomach and upper chest. Rome was bent over her now, one hand on the inside of her cleavage, pressing on the soft flesh to keep it taut, pulling it outward as he inked something on her breast.

Jasmine lay still, both forearms across her eyes. Her lips were relaxed, and she murmured something to Rome, making the hound grin. The pressure in my chest grew, and the roaring in my head was fucking deafening. I took a step in their direction—

“Ren, brother. Game?” Relic said, his voice having the effect of a record scratch through the noise in my head.

“Yeah.”

He passed me a pool cue, and I motioned for him to go first. I’d never played so badly in my life, because all I could focus on was the buzz of that fucking tattoo machine and their murmured voices, interrupted now and then by Jasmine’s soft laugher. My fox was clawing to be free, snarling and whining. He wanted to go over there. He wanted to snap and snarl at Rome even though he knew the hellhound could bite his head off with one snap of his teeth.

“You want in on the pit tonight?” Relic said absently.

My fox also knew we were faster, more agile than a hound. “Who’s fighting?” Not that it mattered, I needed to blow off some steam. Badly.

“Me, Loth, Fender, Jag, Rome.” Relic grinned. “Whoever else is in the mood for me to hand them their asses.”

“I’m in.”

“You’re a glutton for punishment, but I like that about you,” he said and took his shot.

The hounds had trained me several years ago, when Willow’s role in the family changed and she became her coven’s Keeper. She’d been in danger all the time, wasn’t mated to Warrick yet, and as her familiar it had been my job to protect her. I couldn’t fight my way out of a cardboard box, and because it was impossible for me to stand down, since protecting her was literally part of my DNA, she’d brought me here. It was either that or watch me die trying. The hounds had kicked my ass repeatedly. They’d been hard on me, but fair, and not without mercy. I got a few broken bones, some scars, but I left knowing how to fight really fucking well.

Fender whistled, and I lifted my head as Jasmine jumped off the table, one arm across her chest. There were four butterflies on her stomach as if they were flying down and more flying upward all from a larger one between her breasts; one just above her cleavage, one on her upper chest, one by her collarbone and another on the side of her neck, all different colors and species.

“Looks fucking awesome, Jaz,” Relic said.

She grinned, blushing when the rest of the hounds howled their agreement. She checked it out in the mirror Rome had there, then spun to him, beaming, and threw her arms around him. He patted her on the back, then dipped his face into her neck and scented her.

The urge to tear his nose off his fucking face and make him eat it filled me as the roar in my chest grew so intense I had to grit my teeth so it didn’t burst free. What the fuck was wrong with me? Hounds were tactile, they scented, they touched, it didn’t mean shit, I knew this. Yes, I had a fucked-up obsession with her, a weird connection, but I’d never go there with Jasmine. And yes, I recognized how beautiful she was, but I thought lots of things were beautiful, that didn’t mean I wanted to fuck them. She was too young, too fucking innocent, especially for someone like me.