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I scoffed. But she was looking away, so she didn’t see my expression. Better for her to believe what I felt washatred.
I needed her to be scared enough to cooperate with me, to know she couldn’t run. I didn’t want to risk losing her to Nathan or to anyone else from the Longroad pack that might try to steal her back. She needed to stay here. Safe. Near me.
Her shoulders shook.
Fuck.
The thought that she was crying was like a stake through my chest. My one fucking weakness.
“I don’t hate you,” I said. “I don’t trust you. But I don’t hate you.”
She let out a hard, bitter laugh. “You don’t trust me? I love Brennan. Being here with you and your brothers, it’s the first time in my life I could talk about Brennan, I could actually remember him, remember something more than the horrible way it ended, but you’re too much of an asshole.”
Love. She didn’t use the past tense. She still loved Brennan.
And so did I, so much that it felt like a tightness in my chest, like a building sense of white hot rage. I could never kill enough, hurt enough, to ease that tightness.
But right now, for once, I didn’t want to hurt anyone. I just wanted her.
“Turn around,” I growled, letting my alpha power seep into my voice. “Face me when you call me an asshole.”
She was already stalking forward through the trees again. Disobedient little wolf. I might be nothing else to her, but I would be her fucking alpha.
I caught up to her in a few quick strides, pressing my body against hers. She gasped as I pushed her, gently but firmly, against a tree, hemming her in with my body.
My lips dipped beside her ear. “Stop running away from me.”
“You don’t really want to talk to me, Stone.” Her shoulders shook, but now as she turned her face over her shoulder, I could see her profile, her flashing eyes and her furious, pressed-together red lips. She was beautiful and she was furious. She wasn’t crying. “You’re all one-liners and rage and you aren’t capable of a genuine conversation.”
The curve of her ass pressed against my thighs as I caged her there. My cock was so hard it ached, having her body pressed against mine. Having her trapped. I breathed in her scent, which was the same as it was that night I first learned of this forbidden, alluring woman: the scent of rain, the scent of slick.
Was she… turned on right now?
“Face me,” I dared her.Look at me and show me you aren’t as aroused being close to me as I am to you. Tell me your nipples aren’t sharp, your breasts aching for my touch… tell me your panties aren’t doused with desire.
She twisted in my arms, raising her chin defiantly as her gaze met mine.
Those large, luminous eyes could’ve brought me to my knees. Her lips were perfectly shaped for kissing, a rounded, impish lower lip and a pronounced bow. I wanted to crush my lips to hers. I wanted to punish her for walking away. For making me crazy. For being forever forbidden.
“Call me an asshole again,” I suggested, now that we were face to face.
Her eyes flashed up at me, but something new entered her expression now. Wariness. Fear.
I always wanted to find Nathan and snap his neck. But now I felt a new pulse of anger. He had broken her.
Then her chin lifted. “Asshole.”
The word came out soft, and her gaze dropped as if she was afraid to meet mine, her shoulders lifting as she braced herself.
I let out a laugh, and her surprised gaze swept to mine, her lips parting in confusion.
He hadn’t fucking broken her.
Maybe even I couldn’t.
“When you want to insult me, firecracker, make sure you do it to my face. Otherwise, you look like a coward.” Even though she was anything but a coward. She was so fucking fierce, and it was a delight.
Her lips parted, but whatever she was going to say next was lost as I caught her chin with two fingers.
