Chapter Fifty-Nine--My Way Or The Highway
Chapter Fifty-Nine--My Way Or The Highway
clutched my hot tea with honey to my chest in one fist, and a book with the other. Gorgeous Hawaiian hibiscuses flowered all around me.
Tiki torches lined the patio. The scent of citronella to kept the mosquitoes at bay. I hated citronella, but I detested bug bites more. Lesser evil. The endless lines from some random romance novel I’d borrowed from Lexi blurred on the page. I’d read the same paragraph six times, and still hadn’t registered what I’d read.
I pursed my lips, shook my head as thoughts began to invade my distractions. Right, man meets woman, happily ever after. That’s what I needed. No problems.
I sensed him behind me, his scent overpowering everything else.
“You don’t have to stand in the doorway,” I murmured.
“No, I do not.” Kalvyn moved to stand behind me. “However, you need time to process.”
“I need a lot of things.” I set my tea down, and panned the landscape. “The world to settle under my feet for a few hours, for one.”
“I’m sorry.” He sighed. “Out of everything I regret, the most is not making you to go home that night, to return to your life.” Without him. He didn’t have to say it.
“Might’ve been easier.”
“No, not easier. A large part of me would’ve left with you. I’ve experienced life several different ways, and in the time you slept during the change was among the worst. Not knowing if you’d awake, if I’d be left crippled. Not anything compared to you being completely ripped from my life, even a few dozen miles away, for the brief spell to clean up this mess. I’m nothing, if not selfish. I tell myself I’m doing the best for you. Am I really?”
I leaned forward in my pine lounge chair. I hadn’t realized how tense I was. “I don’t think I can answer that. I’m no less selfish.”
He knelt beside my chair. Tiny fragments of him were visible through the strands of my hair. “I can’t agree with you. Someone who’s self sacrifice borders on being a martyr, cannot be confused with a narcissist.”
“Is that how you view yourself? A narcissist?”
“Sometimes.”
I tossed the book on the end of the lounge, and pivoted my body, so he was between my thighs. “Then maybe we balance each other out. I can stop you from being egoistical, and you can prevent me from overextending myself to others.”
A sly smirk pulled at his lips. “I suppose that could work.”
“We just got to slow down a bit. Too much going on, prevents us from looking at the bigger picture.”
“Which would be?”
“At the moment? The hunters. They have to become our priority. Not us. Not Bianca and Sadie. Clan stuff can wait until after we get rid of the biggest threat, and said clan is safe. We keep jumping around issues. That won’t get us anywhere.”
He nodded. “And Clara?”
I clenched my fists. “I saw firsthand her thought process when it comes to shifters. With my own eyes, I heard her talk about her family as if we don’t exist.” Not to mention all the references to Mr. Quiet, and her affair prior to leaving my dad. “Far as I’m concerned, she’s a dead woman.”
Kalvyn rocked on his heels.. “All right,” he said slowly. “Then I will assemble a team right now, and go after them. End this, once and for all.”
“Let’s go.”
He choked.
“You tested me, and it bit you in the ass. Deal.” I smiled evilly. “I’m not the type of woman to hide in the corner, while the big, strong men fight battles for me.”
“This is not your battle.”
“The hell it isn’t. Let’s ignore the obvious for the moment. Those assholes hit me with their boat, and debated whether to throw me over the edge, and let me drown,” I snapped. His chest vibrated, a warning before his snarled. “Had the Colbanes not been on the beach to witness the ‘accident,’ that’s exactly what they’d have done. Further, they’re hunting my kind. I think that gives me every right to strike back.”
“Right does not make might. You’re barely out of the change, and have no idea what you’re capable of.”
My cat snorted. What does he know?
Not much, obviously.
“The essence of the cat flows in my veins. Do you think she’d let me die on her now?”
He gritted his teeth. “You haven’t shifted yet.”
“So I’ll learn.”
“You do not know how to fight.”
“Teach me.” Not that I was helpless. Grandma had long ago ensured that.
He ran a hand through his hair, and bowed his head. “So this is what it is like to be married.”
I laughed. “Yeah, I guess it is.”
“I’m not talking you out of this?”
“Not unless you tie me up. And if you try that outside of our bedroom, I will make you pay.”
His face lit up. “I can tie you up in bed?”
I shrugged. “Why not?”
“Then here it is, my thoughts laid out,” he said. “I shall attempt to give you the crash course in everything I feel you need to know. But if I do not think you ready, you will stay here, where you’re safe for once. Take it, or leave it.”
Red tape crossed my vision, a trap he was bating. My hackles rose. “You make it sound as if you have a choice.” I poked him in the chest. “My life will not be dictated by you.”
His lips thinned, and that cold, merciless expression crossed his face. “I will not have you running into a situation, where you do not walk out with your life. In this, I will not be moved. I have afforded you leniencies that have my clan questioning my ability to rule them. You remember what happened with the last Alpha.”
“This clan has nothing to do with your dad, so don’t use that as an excuse.” I hooked two fingers under his chin. “Either I’m capable of being Alpha, or not. Leaders, at least those worth a damn, fight on the front lines. Cowards stay at the back, and allow others to battle for them.” I paused. “I’ll go through this training you have in mind, because I’m as curious as you where my abilities are at. But I don’t want a relationship where I have no choice. In fact, I won’t. Dump the attitude, or I’m out. That’s the last time I’ll say this.”