Faith tried to banish that thought. "What's so special about Saturdays?"
"It's the day after Friday," he said as if that explained everything.
"And…?"
"And Friday night is when the prostitutes come over the boundary to work at Evander's, so I don't get home until around two-thirty in the morning."
Faith stiffened. "You're telling me that you sleep in on Saturday mornings because you're exhausted from debasing yourself with whores the night before?"
Troy gave a sleepy sigh. "More or less."
Faith was outraged by his unrepentant tone. "How can you admit that so shamelessly?"
"Because there's nothing shameful about it," Troy said. He rolled her over in his arms so that she was forced to look him in the eyes. "You need to remember that I came into my nature at sixteen, Faith. Before I moved to the Boundarylands, I was just a regular beta kid. I'd had one girlfriend in high school, and I'd gotten all the way to third base. And you can bet that once I got a taste of that, I wasn't going back."
Faith winced. No boy in her church would ever try such a thing—touching was forbidden until a couple was engaged. Even then, it wasn't to go past chaste kissing until marriage.
"There aren't any women here except Nicky's girls," Troy continued. "You should really be thanking them."
Faith's brows knit together. "For what?"
"For teaching me everything I know about women. How do you think I learned exactly where to touch you? How to use my hands, my mouth, my tongue? What makes you gasp, and what makes you beg me for more?"
Faith had to concede that point. Still, as skillful as Troy was, he must have had a great deal of practice.
"Were you…with them every Friday night?"
"Pretty much," he said, a hint of a smile on his lips. "Ten years is a long time to be lonely. And don't try to tell me you never fantasized while you were lying alone in bed at night. You wouldn't talk about carnal sin all the time if you weren't obsessed with it."
Faith felt her face redden. She didn't like being called out like that…especially when it was true.
There had been plenty of nights when she'd lain awake in her bed back home, staring up at the ceiling, thoughts of boys drifting through her head.
Boys who weren't Peter—who weren't even members of her church. Men, if she was honest—big, strong men with broad shoulders and devilish smiles. Men who talked to her like she was a real person…a real woman.
Who touched her like she was a real woman.
Sometimes Faith had even let her hand drift down her body while she imagined those things. Had pretended it was their fingers caressing her skin, grazing a nipple…maybe even the sensitive place between her legs.
She may have thought and done these things, but she'd never admitted it to anyone. In fact, she'd done her best to pretend it never happened, even to herself.
But Troy always seemed to know what she was thinking.
"That's what I thought," he said, his satisfied smile widening.
Faith was baffled. She had always been taught that men prized purity of both body and mind in their women.
"It doesn't upset you to know that I've…thought about other men?"
Troy pulled her closer, pressing her naked body against his. Her heart began to pound a little harder. Her breath sped as his gaze grew more intense.
"Are you thinking about them now?"
"No," she answered honestly.
His grip on her eased, but he didn't release her. "I know who I am to you, Faith. And I know who you are to me. Once you know those things for certain, the past doesn't matter—only the future."
The future.
That was the one topic that Faith had been doing her best to avoid. But it couldn't wait any longer.
"You think I'm your mate," she mumbled, dropping her gaze to his chest, unable to meet his gaze.
"No—I know you are. Last night proved it."
"How?"
"You wanted to claim me last night," he said, hooking her chin with a finger and tilting it up. "Look at me, Faith. You opened your mouth, you scraped me with your teeth before you almost bit me. No one made you do that—you wanted it just as bad as I did."
Faith struggled to put some distance between them, but Troy held her fast. What he was saying might be true, but she wished he'd forget it had happened, just as she was trying to do. "Normal people don't want to bite each other."
"Normal betas don't. But alphas and omegas need to. It's how we claim each other." His voice gentled. "Didn't anyone ever teach you that?"
Faith shook her head. Of course they hadn't—she'd barely learned anything about coupling of any kind. Certainly, her church taught nothing about alpha sexuality.
Troy was acting as if there was nothing wrong with what she'd wanted to do. Just as he'd convinced her there was nothing wrong with using their mouths to pleasure each other, something that had once been unimaginable to her.
"Claiming." Faith tested the word and found that she was more curious than repelled. "Is that anything like marriage?"
"It's stronger," Troy said without hesitation. "Less fragile. A claiming bite creates an unbreakable bond between an alpha and his omega that lasts until they both die. We don't divorce. We don't run away from each other, ever."
"So…if you wanted this so much, why didn't you bite me?"
Troy propped himself up on his elbow, lacing his free hand with hers. "Because the omega is the one who chooses her mate," he said patiently. "I can fuck you until you cry my name out a thousand times, until you collapse from sheer exhaustion, but you aren't truly mine until you decide."
"But how can you say that you know I'm your mate? I didn't bite you last night."
Troy's smile grew. "But you will. I felt how much you wanted to. I could taste it on your skin and smell it in the air. The only reason
