I bit my lip to keep my responses to myself. Snake…? Was he talking about his…?
“Talk to the girl, see if she’ll accept you. But, Shannon, granddaughter of Moira, we want to know what’s going on in that place up on the hill. You tell him between kisses, or you come ’round here, tell your Uncle Rob what’s happening, y’hear?”
“Yes, Alphas. I’ll come around tomorrow night and make sure to tell Rob everything I saw.”
“Not yon Jai?” More chuckles at that. “My Jenny put up a fight too.”
“She had you howling through the valley after her. Remember when that bastard, Cahill, was trying to woo her out from under you?”
“Jenny was nothing compared to my Nance. Damn near wore myself ragged for that old man of hers. Bastard had me redo their whole fence line before he’d let me within ten feet of her.”
“Enough of that. You’ll scare the girl off before she’s had time to consider the boy, though right now, she don’t smell scared.”
More mad laughing.
“Jai’s gonna get a hiding!”
“I’ll report back, Alphas,” I said, the need to get away beating as sure as my heart. My muscles quivered with it. I could feel the long strides I’d take to get clear of here, of all the pack bullshit. “I need to get home if I’m to be there early in the morning.”
“All right, girl. You keep us posted, and you’ll be seeing to your side of the bargain. You can go.”
I dropped my head lower in an ungainly bow and then spun on my heel, straightening up and getting the fuck out. A half walk, half run, I stalked past all the people that called out to me as I went, including Rita and Jaz. I’d call them when I got home. When I cooled down, I amended. I was in no fit place to talk to anyone. But of course, that couldn’t be allowed to fly.
“Shannon!”
I felt the jerk on my shoulder, the slowing of my steps when I heard Jai’s shout, but I forced my body on. When I looked back, I saw he was trailing after me, his face like stone, but I didn’t have time for that.
“Honey, you OK?” Aunty Beth appeared before me, stopping me in my tracks. My eyes dropped down again, not wanting her to see my expression. She’d steer me into the kitchen and ply me with tea and biscuits until it all came out, and I wasn’t ready for that yet.
Because what? What was there to come out? The alphas’ words… I frowned as I hovered there, in her grip. Why would Jai…?
“I’m fine, Beth," I said, forcing a smile on my face, knowing I fooled no one. “I’ve just gotta go. I’ll be up at the institute tomorrow, that new place, and the alphas want me to report back.”
“You’re not fine. What did that idiot husband of mine do this time? I’ll—”
“Shan, wait!” Jai called.
“Beth…” I swept in and hugged her tight, her arms going around me belatedly, but I pulled free again before she could close them around me. “I’ve just got to go.”
“All right, love,” she said, eyes darting from me to a rapidly approaching Jai. “Come by tomorrow after work and talk it through with me. Promise?”
I nodded, slipping from her grip, then striding through the house. I smiled weakly to the kids who called out as I passed, holding up toys or artworks to show me, making me feel only worse when I brushed past them. This wasn’t the kids’ fault, and I saw the little frowns, the widening eyes. If I wasn’t already feeling like shit, I sure as hell was now.
The feel of the cool breeze on my face when I stepped outside the front door was the only pleasure I was likely to experience, one that was quickly dashed away when I heard footsteps coming after me. I fished my keys out of my pocket, ready to get in my car and go home, when a hand landed on my shoulder.
“Shan, stop!”
I turned, knowing as I looked at Jai that he didn’t realise he was using his alpha whip. The force of his will had me pinned to the spot. I fought it, but my muscles couldn’t obey my brain’s frantic commands.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know they were going to… I wanted to…”
Frozen I might be, but I got to experience the singular pleasure of seeing Jai Heller lose his cool. Those big hands, comfortable shearing sheep and tying ropes, pulling fish from the river and gutting his kills with a brutal efficiency, now clawed at the air, the muscles in his shoulders bunching under his nice snap button shirt. I refused to look away when his eyes met mine, ready to blame it on his voice pinning me to the spot. “Shan, you know I’ve—”
That was it. To this day, I don’t know how I did it, but I shook off his pulsing will like it was nothing, a strange rage rising within me.
“I know…what? That you slept with me graduation night and then basically stopped talking to me? That I used to hover around you like some pathetic little puppy, so desperate for your attention, but I didn’t after that night? That afterwards, I went down to the pub with the girls, thinking I’d see you again and I did, walking right into Laurel Maitland’s arms? And then so, so many girls after that. I stopped hanging out with Jaz. What could I tell her? That seeing you, hearing about you and your…escapades hurt too much? That I didn’t just lose you, I lost my best friends as well?”
I watched every single one of my words land, wondering if he flinched like that because of what I was saying, or because he’d so rarely heard someone talk to him in that kind of tone. His mum did, so did his sisters. But me? I was just a pale little ghost hovering in the orbit of his dark star.
Jai was a beautiful boy growing up. Skin bronzed brown and long, nimble limbs, it had deepened over time. Now he was a man, a powerful figure with long, hard muscles. The product of thousands of years of honing, he was a warrior in jeans and a plaid shirt. But if I looked at him longingly, so did many others. So, so many others.
“Shan…” he said as I turned to unlock the car, his hand slamming down on the roof when I opened the door. “Rob warned me off, all right? That night… He told me to stay away from you, until you were older. We don’t get free rein, you know that. I…”
I turned around slowly, his words reverberating around in my head until I could barely make sense of them.
“Shan, I wouldn’t have… I thought we could start something. See how it went. You weren’t pack, but they seemed to accept you because of your nan and I…” He shook his head, grabbed my hand and held it to his chest. “None of this means shit. You don’t want me? Tell me to piss off.”
“Piss off,” I croaked out.
His grin was swift and rueful. He paused and looked me over with a quick eye before nodding.
“I guess I deserve that.” He stopped still, standing tall, casting me in his shadow, and wasn’t that a fitting metaphor for our relationship? “Pretend none of that stuff happened.”
“I can’t.”
“The girl who wrote all those crazy stories in her journal when she was supposed to be doing her maths work can’t imagine things?” He shook his head. “If none of that had happened, if you’d never seen me go off with… If I said I had permission from the alphas to see how things would go with us, what would you have done?”