King of the Asheville Coven (Winterset Coven #1)(12)

“Well, they won’t have to worry about me,” she murmured, her voice shaking with emotion. God, just the thought of leaving him now made her chest feel like it was caving in. “I came to your house tonight to say goodbye. And to give you this.” She handed him the card.

Aric searched her eyes for the span of a few breaths before he gently took the crimson red envelope from her hand. He took his time ripping into the flap, then pulled the handmade card out slowly. On the front, she’d drawn a cartoon smiling vampire with a fireman’s hat and a hose in his hand. Aric huffed an amused sound, then opened it up. “You don’t suck,” he read out loud. “Thanks for saving me.” His voice cracked on the last word, and he swallowed hard before he closed up the card and put it back inside the envelope. “Why are you leaving?”

Sadey sighed and relaxed against his side, drew her knees up under the blanket. “It’s a long story.”

Aric stared out over the yard at the dark horizon. “I have about four hours until dawn. I have time for a long story.”

But sharing her secrets was a terrifying thought. It was something she hadn’t shared with anyone. Too much shame, too much fear. Too much vulnerability that would allow the man who was stealing her heart to really see her. She wanted to keep his good opinion of her. “I just can’t stay longer than I already have.”

“Because of Brock?”

“How do you know that name?”

“You reached.”

Shit. A growl vibrated up her throat before she could stop it, but hang it all, she didn’t want to do this. She’d wanted to start over and move on, not dredge up a past she hated. But Aric was bonded to her now, and even if they were about to be separated, he should know something real about her. “When I was in that wreck last week, I didn’t just lose control of the wheel like I told the police. I was forced off the road by an old black Chevy pickup truck.”

“What?” Aric snarled out, and when Sadey looked up, his face had turned terrifying, his eyes as dark as night.

The hairs rose all over her body as power, anger, and dominance pressed against her.

“I never saw the driver’s face, and I didn’t recognize the truck. I tried to convince myself it was just a drunk driver, or someone texting who got too afraid to stop and check on me. I tried to convince myself it had nothing to do with Brock because I wanted so badly to stay here. I like Winterset. I’m happy here. I feel settled for the first time maybe ever. And then there was you, and I couldn’t stop thinking about you. I couldn’t stop wondering why you worked so hard to save me and then covered for me at the hospital. I couldn’t get your face out of my head. I even had a dream about you.” A dirty one with lots of pelvic thrusting that woke her up in a cold sweat, but Aric didn’t have to know that part. Don’t reach! “As much as I want to ignore my instincts, something keeps nagging at me that it wasn’t an accident. That the person behind the wheel was sent here to hurt me.”

“Why would Brock send someone to run you off the road?” Aric asked carefully. He wasn’t fooling her, though. His voice was too deep, and his last word tapered off into a terrifying hiss.

“I’m not supposed to exist. The snow leopard wasn’t a shifter animal until a few generations ago when one popped up randomly. The first was born to a couple of ordinary leopard shifters. Somehow, three other snow leopards were born the next generation, none of them connected by blood, and all to big cat shifter couples. I linked up with a crew of snow leopards all around my same age because it felt like the safe thing to do. Other than myself, there were two females and one male. Brock was my alpha.”

“Was he your mate?”

“He said he was all of our mates. The other girls were fine with the crew how it was. The manipulation happened slowly, so I didn’t even notice how controlling Brock was until I was in deep. There were no bonds, no claiming marks, nothing like that. But I cared for my crew because I wasn’t alone, you know? None of our parents had registered us because you know how it is with the rare shifters. They’re stalked, recruited, studied…killed. We aren’t like the bears. We don’t have the numbers to defend ourselves.” Aric would understand. He’d had to protect his people too. “Brock decided we would be like the gorilla shifters and have multiple mates so we could boost our numbers. It became about procreation and furthering our species. Anna and Violet ate it up. They just…thrived under the attention they could secure from Brock. Violet got pregnant right away, and she was coveted, and Anna got pregnant six months later. But I wasn’t happy, and the idea of being bound to Brock by a child dropped me into a dark place. I wanted more. I wanted someone to love me. I wanted to raise cubs with a man I thought would be a good father for them. I wanted to be someone’s everything, but Brock could barely look at me when we were together. I was at the bottom of the crew, the least important. I was only there because of my animal. I annoyed the others, and they picked on me, Brock especially. And after Violet and Anna’s cubs were born, I was just there as a caretaker for the babies. I told Brock I wanted more out of my life, and that night was the first and only time he hit me. He just…blasted his fist across my jaw. Broke it. He told me if I ever left his crew, he wouldn’t stop until I was dead because I belonged to him. And I believed him. I just knew down to my marrow he would end my life if I left. But then, wasn’t I already dead? I’d let a man put his hands on me. I’d let a man convince me I was worthless. I’d slipped into a life I hated, and I knew if I didn’t run then, I never would, and I would live out the rest of my days in complete darkness.”