A rumble emanated from Nuke and filled the entire woods. She could feel the vibration from the ground, and lifted her feet slightly so they would stop being tickled.
“I mean I was only supposed to be here until Friday anyway. It’s just two days. It was very nice to meet you all,” she said brightly. Maybe a little too brightly. Why were her eyes stinging?
No one spoke.
“Okay. Okay.” She smiled big and bit back a lip tremble, and stood, dusted off her jeans and turned to go pack.
“What did you mean you aren’t a Pegasus?” Krome asked.
Trina froze. Telling anyone how she came to be was dangerous.
“Uuuuh, I don’t usually talk about that stuff.”
“Clearly,” Bron said. “No one even knew you existed.”
“That’s not entirely true. The wrong people know,” she said, turning toward the Crew, all hanging out on Nuke’s porch or at the edge of the light.
“Manning?” Ren asked.
Trina dropped her gaze and kicked at the edge of the porch. “I never wanted to be stuck in that Murder.”
“Then why were you? How did he find out?” Ren asked.
Trina inhaled deeply. She couldn’t tell them. No…she shouldn’t. Right? She’d been trained to always hide, to always be ashamed, to always be scared. Miserably, she shrugged.
“How?” Nuke asked.
Dominance infiltrated his tone and made her want to answer. “My father is a crow and my mother is a horse shifter.”
“Whooooaaaah,” Amos murmured. “Horse joke. Get it? Whoah?”
Bron shoved him hard in the shoulder, and Amos whispered, “Ow,” as he rubbed his arm.
“Your animal is supposed to choose one or the other,” Krome said, a confused frown drawing his dark eyebrows down low over his black eyes.
“My animal chose both, apparently. I’m not a Pegasus, I don’t think. I’m part crow, and part horse, but my allegiance was always to crows. The only horse shifter I’ve ever known is my mom.” She shrugged up one shoulder. “I grew up in Murders. I was supposed to be mated to a crow.”
“You aren’t supposed to be anything,” Ren said. “That’s the problem with Murders, and being a female crow. Everyone beats it into your brain from birth that you are a treasure to be won, not a person. You’re a person, Trina. Fuck Manning for manipulating you, and fuck anyone who ever made you feel like you were a trophy. I thought you were human this whole time.” A slow grin stretched across her face. “I’m glad I was wrong. Horse-crow, crow-horse, Pegasus, whatever you want to call yourself. You’re a misfit. I think you should stay with the rest of us who don’t make sense anywhere else.”
“I do too,” Cora, Krome’s mate, said.
“I third,” Nuke murmured.
“Of course you third,” Amos scoffed. “You get to bone a mother-freaking-Pegasus.”
“There’s no boning,” Trina rushed out. “No boning…has…occurred.” Her cheeks were on fire. “We’re friends. He sees me as his friend. And we are…” she cleared her throat.
“Just friends?” Bron said through a teasing smile.
Nuke’s dark eyes were trained on her, but for the life of her, Trina couldn’t read his expression.
“Okie dokie, well what do you want me to do?” she asked.
“Probably use a condom,” Amos deadpanned. He jammed a finger at Nuke. “You definitely don’t want to mother a baby-Nuke.”
“I meant about the trailer!” she yelped, trying to stop Amos’s stupid words.
Divar sighed. “I can sleep in the woods a couple of nights. Done it before.”
“No, I don’t want that,” Trina said. “I’ll feel awful the whole time.”
“Huh.” Bron nodded thoughtfully. “You really are one of the good ones.”
Nope. She was here spying on them. Guilt wracked her again for them thinking kindly of her. She wasn’t good. She just wasn’t.
“She’ll stay in my trailer as long as she wants,” Nuke growled out. “I’m more comfortable in the woods anyway.” He stood and made his way to the one she’d been staying in.
“I can’t do that,” Trina called behind him. He didn’t answer though, just made his way right into her trailer and returned carrying the recliner she’d been sleeping on. “Nuke. Be serious. I can’t just keep mooching people’s homes.” She grabbed at his arm, but his skin sparked against her hand and she flinched back at the shock of it.
Nuke skidded to a stop and looked down at his arm where she’d touched it. His skin was fiery red in the shape of her hand, like she’d burned him.
“Whoooah,” Amos said.
“Enough with the horse jokes!” Trina snapped.
Amos slurped on a Capri-Sun and stared at her judgmentally, but she wasn’t being ridiculous. He was!
“Did I hurt you?” she asked Nuke as he turned and carried the recliner into his mobile home.
“No one can hurt me,” he grumbled.
“I can’t take your trailer. You’ve already been too nice to me!” Her voice echoed off the mountains.
He turned with that dinosaur growl rattling his chest. “That’s so sad, Trina. Can’t you see how tragic that is? Someone’s offering you a place to sleep, and you think it’s too nice? Who damaged you into thinking you don’t deserve more?”
Manning.
She couldn’t say the word. She couldn’t say his name, but that’s who had done it, and that’s who still controlled her puppet strings. She’d never in her life felt so weak, and so emboldened at the same time. Did she deserve more? She’d never thought so before, but now she was beginning to. It didn’t change anything though. Manning had Tory.
“It doesn’t matter what I deserve,” she whispered, leaning her back against the wall by the front door. “What matters is how deep the hole is that I dug for myself.”
Nuke made his way into his trailer and set the chair down like it didn’t weigh a single pound, and she followed him in.
He hooked his hands on his hips and stared right through her soul. “Explain.”
And she wanted to. He was so dominant that he could command a room easily. He could sure command her.
Tory, Tory, Tory. “I can’t.”
“Secrets, secrets.” Disappointment washed through his dark eyes.
“You of all people know some secrets should stay buried.”
He nodded slowly. “When you’re done running? I’m here.”
And with that, he walked out the front door and left her there wondering what the hell had just happened.
He didn’t get to do that. He didn’t get to say ‘I’m here’ as he walked away.
Confusion swirled inside of her as she rushed for the door and yanked it open. The thin door banked against the wall. God, she was so dramatic since she’d come here. With Manning, she’d turned everything off. It was her coping mechanism. Just flip the switch, shut it all off, and do her duty. That’s all Manning was. Ren didn’t understand. She’d escaped the Murder, but she’d never been embedded as deeply as Trina had. She hadn’t been deemed a ‘lifer’ from birth. Ren didn’t understand who her father was, didn’t understand what her destiny was, didn’t even know she had a sister. And now Nuke was dropping bombs saying ‘I’m here’?