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A low rumble emitted from Mallory's chest as he must have realized this was something I had kept secret from him.
"I think the only reason I'm writing the story is because I want to write an ending where I believe you could truly forgive me for leaving…for shooting at you…for hiding Mosa—"
Mallory gently placed a finger against my lips, cutting off the flow of words but not the emotions that hadn't stopped raging within me since we were reunited. Part of me wished I could feel dead again, that I could stand on the outside looking in, watching my beautiful daughter become a mother, watching Mallory with his grandchildren, even watching him take another mate, one who would have known deep in her soul that he was alive, that the grainy video made a quarter century earlier had been a complete lie.
"Losing you hurt," he admitted. "Toughened me on the outside into what others might consider a sarcastic, mistrustful bastard. But I never hated you. And I've said it more than once, Justine Acevedo hits what she aims at—always. I knew there was a different truth hiding in your actions."
I shook my head. If I hated myself over it, which I did, how could he not? And if he didn't see the video now, I would always wonder how seeing it on some future day would change his opinion. If I lost him tonight, if he walked out hating me, I might survive because I expected it. And there would be grandchildren soon, little lives I would love with all my heart and never betray or compromise on their happiness. I could still become someone other than a lover who betrayed her mate or a mother who failed her daughter over and over again.
But if Mallory walked out in a month or a year from now?
I would be devastated.
"Watch," I said, hitting play and closing my eyes because the thought of seeing his reaction was unbearable.
I shut down my senses completely. Time became vague, I couldn't hear or see to mark its passage. The only thing that penetrated my mental shield was the energy flowing through Mallory. I could no more block his spirit than I could block Mosa's.
Neither could I block the memories of the first time I saw the video. The footage was bad, but so was the technology at the time. Celluloid and light—how could something so insubstantial convince me that my mate was dead, that my father's men had murdered him, ripped him limb from limb?
I threw up the first time I watched it more than twenty-five years ago. My father grabbed me by the hair, had others help him force my eyes open. The volume was turned to maximum, shredding both my spirit and my eardrums. Not once did I hear Mallory beyond the distorted heart wrenching screams of agony as soldiers from the claw tore into him.
The only truth to the video was that a wolf shifter had died horribly that night, but it hadn't been the man sitting next to me, just one who looked enough like him in the low light.
"Love," he said when my grip on the laptop loosened enough that he could close the screen. "The only thing I want to hold against you is my body for the rest of our lives."
A broken laugh chittered past my lips. I looked at him through my tears. He seemed sincere, but the room still echoed with screams and a thousand failures on my part. Taking the computer from me, he put it on the side table, then he slid his hands between my arms and sides and moved until he was on his back on the couch, my body atop his like a limp rag doll.
I clung to him, my face buried against his chest. Everyone who mattered to me had forgiven me, why couldn't I forgive myself?
Knowing I couldn't—that they couldn't, not really—I started to pull away from my mate.
Mallory screamed. Wordless, it sounded like rage and anguish. My gaze jerked up to find his face placid as the scream stopped. Then he inhaled again, my body lifting as it remained molded to his.
The scream repeated.
The insane, anguished sound drew the perimeter guards to the house. They beat at the reinforced door, then one of them tried to break it down with a hard kick.
"Forgot all about those cats," he laughed, sliding out from under me.
And I had forgotten that the man I was in love with was a complete lunatic at times!
Mallory opened the door and glared at the guards.
"Go the fuck away and keep your mouths shut…we're having a little couple's therapy."
The guards took one look at me, saw I was unharmed, and double-timed it away from the door.
A ridiculous laugh escaped my lips. Not a giggle. It was a choking, braying laugh that robbed my body of oxygen.
It was the kind of laugh that presaged hysteria.
"I'm going to scream again," he warned me as he shut and locked the door
"If you must," I agreed.
The same scream erupted from him. I echoed it. We drew a fresh breath and screamed some more as he prowled toward me, both of us trying to out scream the other. My pulse raced like a wild bird kissing the sky after being freed from its long captivity.
By the time Mallory reached me, every inch of my body shook with a nervous energy that was more than slightly sexually charged. My pheromones gave me away. He pulled me to him and dragged me onto the floor to where my body draped over his, his hands in my hair as he roughly kissed me.
