Rhys shook his head to snap himself out of it before his tongue unrolled from his mouth. He’d been with other women since losing Hannah, but they hadn’t meant anything. They were a means to an end, a way to slack his needs, someone to share a night with before moving on. Hell, he couldn’t even remember most of their names.
He also tried not to shit where he ate. Townies were to be avoided to keep hurt feelings and expectations out of the mix. Tourists looking for a good time, or someone he met on the road were fair game. Even then, they sought him out with longing looks and salacious winks from across the bar, not the other way around.
Sage made him want to go on the offensive.
He needed to stay the fuck away.
Across the yard, her eyes lifted for a split second and pinned him in place. His lion shoved forward, ready to… to… to what, he couldn’t really say.
Sage floundered for a moment when Kyla unwound their arms and threw herself at Lindley. She swept her head from side to side, looking for a place to melt into the background or latch herself to the sides of a conversation, but her shoulders slumped with defeat.
She glanced up again, then picked her way through the noisy chattering of the others deciding on the night’s plans. “You’re back,” she said quietly.
Holy fuck.
His lion let off a low purr of possession. She’d chosen him. She’d talked to him. The others were all there, but she picked him.
He opened his mouth to answer when Dash bumped into him. Rhys twisted around and pushed the man away. A growl of warning rumbled in his throat, and died the second he heard a sharp hiss of breath.
Sage flinched when his eyes landed on her, and he wanted to make the world bleed.
She dragged down a deep breath, and let it out slowly. Steeling herself, he thought, which only made him want to turn the world red even more. His lion roared and sliced him to shreds that she saw him as the monster he was. Someone she needed to prepare to talk to.
“Is it bad? In the cave?” she asked her toes.
Rhys grunted and again opened his mouth, only to have an arm slam down across the back of his shoulders.
“It’s terrible. Cold nights, only a scrap of a blanket on a creaky old camp cot, with a lantern that flickers when you least expect,” Dash drawled. “But ol’ Rhysie here is right at home. Ain’t ya, buddy?”
“Fuck off,” he growled. Asshole didn’t know when to keep his mouth shut. Sage didn’t need to hear that shit, even if it was true.
“Thousands of years from now, when we’re nothing but ash, aliens are going to find our little hole in the dirt and see those scratches from your claws on the wall. You’re leaving your mark on the future. You should be proud!” Dash finished with a hard slap to Rhys’s chest.
Rhys twisted around and threw a punch into Dash’s shit-eating grin.
On his other side, Sage jerked back. Another sharp intake of breath was enough to make him hold back his next blow. Dash took advantage and leveled him with a hard-fisted taste of revenge right to the middle.
Rhys’s lion zinged through him, ready to rip out of his human half and pounce on the other male. Asshole. Motherfucker. Didn’t he give a single shit about anyone else? Her life was already difficult enough, couldn’t he keep his fucking antics to himself for a measly fifteen fucking minutes?
Hands pulled at his arms and chest. They pulled at Dash, too, but he wasn’t giving up either. They flung punches at one another over the shoulders and arms and roadblock bodies in their way. Rhys’s lion strained for release and he let the beast off the leash.
“Enough!” Trent shouted.
Power infused the words and buzzed in his ears. Rhys shook his head to clear the annoyance and get back to the fighting, but he was the only one still ready to go.
“Are you trying to be an asshole?” Lindley growled, voice dripping with venom.
Rhys cocked his head and stared into the empty space Sage had left behind.
Trying? No. He didn’t have to try. Bad behavior simply rolled out of him. It was all he knew these days.
Rhys glanced down at his hands and consciously willed them to relax out of tight fists.
He was a lost cause. Too rough. Too crazy. There was fuck all he could do to stop his slip into madness.
Chapter 4
Sage slipped away from the Ashford home as quietly as possible, though she didn’t go unnoticed. She waved off the gold eyes peeking at her from the shadows, then wrapped her arms around her middle and trudged in the direction of the Crowley territory. The males would look after their mates while she started her nightly walk into exhaustion.
The hum of voices inside still reached her, still buzzed in her head, but she couldn’t have repeated a word said to her or discussed around her. Everything disappeared into the foggy depths of her mind.
The night had gone as well as possible. Sage made sure she smiled and laughed and picked at the treats spread out for everyone to enjoy, but her heart wasn’t in it. Not even the neon pink polish Kyla selected for her boosted her spirits for long.
Two months. She’d been there for two months. Sixty-seven days, to be precise. She didn’t know why she kept track of the numbers. Counting didn’t make her head, heart, or lioness feel better. If anything, each day added an extra pound of pressure. With spring right around the corner, she was desperate for the growth and renewal of the season. None of it touched her.
Frustration boiled in her veins. Anxiety clogged up her heart. She was ready to keel over with a cardiac event, but fate had other plans in mind. No, she suffered and hurt and
