Troy didn't know who the fuck she thought she was fooling under all that rough homespun. Faith Johansen could play the modest little virgin all she wanted—Troy wasn't buying it. It didn't how matter how pious she pretended to be, her head bent over her clasped hands as she muttered unintelligibly to herself. Praying—that's what she wanted him to believe, anyway.
"Stop that," he growled in frustration as he turned onto the dirt tracks that wound through his densely forested land to his cabin. Troy took better care of his drive than most alphas—he wasn't about to let a loose rock or branch fuck up his undercarriage—but Faith still bounced around as he went too fast over the ruts. "Nobody's buying that saintly shit—not after you took a couple of shots at an armed man. Not me, and definitely not God."
She pursed her lips, finally silent, but her knuckles were white with strain. After a moment, she couldn't keep herself from speaking up.
"The devil's spawn doesn't need a weapon to be dangerous," she said tightly, addressing his dashboard. She wouldn't even look at him, something that only angered Troy further. "His existence alone is a threat against the righteous."
Troy burst out laughing, the sound making her jump. "’Devil's spawn?’ That is some serious bullshit there."
Faith’s expression hardened, but she still refused to look at him. "Are you trying to tell me you're not dangerous?"
"No," Troy admitted. "I can be very dangerous."
Far more dangerous than anything she'd ever come up against. Even one of those charging elephants she was so impressed with.
He watched her out of the corner of his eye and saw a muscle at the corner of her mouth twitch. She believed him.
"Have you ever killed anyone?" she asked after a moment, dropping the holier-than-thou act and lifting her head.
Troy pretended to consider her question for a moment. He could smell the still-warm ashes of the fire he'd made that morning. He hoped the house was still warm because he sure as hell didn't plan to spend a lot of time on chores tonight.
"Something tells me you really don't want to know the answer to that," he said. "But even if I told you I wiped out a whole city by myself, that wouldn't change why you're praying."
She glanced at him, her face tight with anger. "I don't have to explain myself to you."
"And you don't have to explain to God why all that slick is soaking through your panties. Because God already knows."
That did it. Faith wheeled around in her seat, eyes wide and burning with indignation, sputtering. "You're a—a vulgar, lying demon! And I refuse to let you drag me into your pit of sin."
Troy hit the crest of the hill too fast. He slammed on the brakes to avoid skidding into the turn, coming to an abrupt stop at the end of the drive. His headlights shone beams of yellow light over the pristine fall of snow and reflected eerily against the wide bay doors of his garage. To the left, his cabin was little more than a dark shape separated from the garage by the snow-laden branches of the row of trees he’d planted.
The omega stared out the windshield at the sight, her mouth hanging open, her fury dimmed by sudden apprehension. Apparently, she was only now realizing that he meant what he'd told her.
"You’re wrong," he said. "I may be vulgar, but I don't lie, little girl. And I've got some bad news for you—you're already here."
Chapter Four
Panic gripped Faith as the alpha's compound came into view. Her heart raced. Blood thundered in her eardrums. What kind of terrible place was this?
Directly in front of the truck's front bumper was a huge boxy building with steel doors that gleamed in the powerful headlights. To say it was a garage would be like saying that the vicious snarling dogs the church elders kept behind the chain-link fence that guarded the arsenal were house pets.
It was true that the alpha's enormous jacked-up truck would require a larger-than-normal garage—but what did he do with the rest of that space? She didn't want to know.
Instead, Faith focused on the alpha's house. Set slightly behind the garage on the left, it was modest by comparison. All in all, it looked like a fairly ordinary, rectangular wood house, with a porch on two sides and no curtains in the windows.
The only light came from the truck's headlights, and Faith struggled to make out any other details. But all she could see was a snowy roof and a couple of deck chairs covered for the winter. Outwardly, there was nothing frightening about this house.
But Faith knew better. It wasn't the rough wood exterior she was afraid of. It was what happened inside that had her trembling.
She might not know the details of what the alpha planned to do with her...but she could guess.
All the devious acts that she'd been warned about since her first Sunday school class—lust, lechery, carnal sins of all kinds. All the horrific stories her pastor had preached. The miserable life of a fallen woman.
Faith refused to submit to such a fate.
She'd rather die. She'd rather race headlong into the dark forest and fall off a cliff or be devoured by wolves before she allowed herself to be sullied by this demon.
"Don't even think about running," the alpha said before Faith could reach for the door handle.
"How did you—"
"Your poker face is crap," he said. "You're shaking like a damn leaf. And you reek of fear."
He could smell her fear? Faith knew that alphas' senses were exceptionally strong, but this—this made him seem like a dog. A vicious hell hound.
Faith forced herself to face him directly and
