“I understand a bit of what you’re feeling,” Rome said. A hard, shadowed look crossed over his eyes. “When I found Alison at Conlin’s...I’d never felt that kind of fear before. To know that at any second someone else can take her life from you. She almost died.”
Three hard knocks sounded at the front door. Vane hollered for whoever it was to come in. Darien let out the breath he’d been holding. There was a reason why he’d left the pack. He sure didn’t want to have some long conversation about his feelings with Dana and the baby.
“Jacks, it’s about time you got here. I thought you were always a prompt man,” Rome taunted. Jacks grinned big.
“Yeah well, Vera called me at the last minute and said she needed a kiss and another six-pack of that damn lemonade she likes. So I stopped by and gave it to her.”
“TMI, bro,” Rome said. Jacks grinned and plopped down in a chair by the fireplace.
Darien sniffed the air then turned to him. “Since when are you a vampire?”
“See, you’ve missed out on all the cool stuff. Some vampire clan tried to steal the Kategan land. They also tried to kill me and your sister. In the process, I now have fangs and your sister gets to spend her nights with me for the rest of her life.”
“TMI,” Darien agreed, “but I am very happy for you and my sister. I’ve never seen her so happy.” The vampire Jacks was practically beaming as he grabbed a beer out of the cooler on the floor and popped it open.
“Damn right.”
“So what do you want to do about the situation with your woman, Darien?” asked Vane.
“She isn’t my woman,” he automatically said. Three sets of eyes turned to stare at him, then each of them burst out in a roar of laughter.
“Right,” Rome said.
“Whipped,” agreed Jacks.
“Goner,” Vane said.
Darien growled, his beast slashing its claws across its cage. “Fuck off.”
“Who are you kidding besides yourself? We’ve all seen the way you look at her, touch her. You’re practically mated with her already,” said Vane.
“Enough!” Darien roared. The room quieted, leaving only the crackling of the fire and Darien’s hard breathing.
Lesser beings, lesser men wouldn’t have had the nerve to speak to a ripping mad lykaen, but the Kategan men weren’t lesser men.
“You know, Darien, you’re right. We’ve had enough. Do you think it’s been easy for us to have our brother gone? While you’ve been away drowning yourself in misery we’ve had horrible and incredible things happen to us. I wanted my brother to be there for that. Your selfishness took that away, not only from me, but from Rome and Vera,” Vane said.
Darien’s hands curled into fists, his eyes clouded over with anger. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. None of you do. You didn’t lose your mate that day. You don’t have to live knowing that if you’d just been there, you could have done something, could have saved them.”
Rome shook his head, clenched his jaw. “How do you know that? How do you know you could have saved her? The doctor said that it was a severe complication with the baby, that even if she’d been in an emergency they would have been hard pressed to save her. He said she died in minutes from a clot or something. She wasn’t your mate, Darien,” he said the last gently.
Darien exploded to his feet and marched up to Rome. Rome narrowed his eyes and stood.
“I love you, Darien. We all love you. But somewhere in your heart you know that she wasn’t it. Maybe you wanted it to be, and it’s obvious you loved her and the baby, but there’s a time when it’s right to let go. It’s been years. She was leaving you to go back to Greg.”
Darien shoved Rome in the chest, sent him stumbling back. “How would you know that? How the fuck do you know that?”
Rome cocked a brow. “I talked to Greg. I saw him in town a while ago. He was guilt-ridden about everything. About leaving her to begin with. He said he was just scared. The man loved her, really. I think she saw that and that’s why she was going back to him, because he really loved her.”
Darien’s fist flew before he could even think to stop it. He caught Rome’s jaw and sent him down to the ground. Rome stood in a rush and plowed his own into Darien’s stomach. Suddenly Vane was roaring, stepping between them and pushing them both apart.
“Enough!”
“Yeah, that’s right. I’ve had enough. I’m out of here,” Darien said.
“Stop,” Vane ordered. Darien stiffened and slowly turned around to face him.
“What?” The lykaen inside him garbled his words.
Vane got in his face, unflinching at the sight of Darien’s anger. “If you don’t smarten up, then you’re going to lose something great. I’ve seen the way you look at her. You care. And she cares about you.”
“That’s where you’ve got it wrong, Vane. The only thing I care about with Cassie is making sure she stays safe from the man who’s trying to hurt her. That’s all.”
“Looks to me like you’re the one who’s trying to hurt her,” Jacks said.
Darien flinched and backed away. They didn’t get it; they didn’t fucking understand. He didn’t care about Cassie. His heart panged, and he looked away from them all. He couldn’t care for her, there was no more love left in him. He‘d buried it years ago.
“You’re wrong, Darien. I just hope you see it in time.” Vane shook his head and left the room.
Darien didn’t meet the other’s eyes; he turned and stormed out the front door. He came to a stop fast his heart skipped a beat trying to catch up.
“What are you doing here?” Cassie looked up at him with raw pain glittering in her eyes. He swore he could feel his own eyes mimicking hers.
She wobbled on her feet, leaning to the side. He reached out to catch her, but she swiped his arm away and took an unsteady step back.
“You are so mean.” She looked like she was bravely trying to hold back tears. The sight of it was killing him slowly and surely like poison.
“What are you doing here?” A sickening feeling was filling his gut heavy as a bowling ball.
She hiccupped. “I came to tell you that I love you, but obviously I’m just a stupid, hiccup , girl.” A tear slid down one cheek and she rocked unsteadily on her feet.
“Are you drunk, Cassie?” She glared at him and pointed a finger at him.
“This isn’t about that. Yes, I totally drank enough to get a boatload of sailors drunk, but that’s besides the p-point. You are mean. ” She lifted her chin bravely as more tears started rolling down her cheeks. The sight was tearing open his gut. He reached for her, but she stumbled back so fast she nearly fell.
“Dammit, Cassie, let me take you home. You shouldn’t be out here like this. Those girls never should have let you drink.”
She threw out her arms. “I came here to tell you that I love you and I get to here is that you still love her. I would be so good to you, Darien.” Her arms fell loosely to her side. When she spoke her voice held all the misery in the world, “I’ve never been in love before. It sucks. Big time.” She wobbled, trying to turn around but stumbling around instead.
Darien’s heart wouldn’t stop panicking in his chest. He went after her, tried to pull her to a stop. “Let me take you home.”
“I have no home!”
He flinched because she was right and because he was an ass. “I’m sorry, Cassie. I am.”
“Sorry about what?” she said rounding on him. He backed away from her and her pointing finger followed. “Sorry for making love to me. Because that’s what you did. You didn’t screw me; you were sweet, tender, caring. You...you are a tease! ”