Chapter 32
THIRTY-TWO
KOR
The ride home couldn’t have been more different than our ride into town.
Vivienne was silent and withdrawn and there was a pensive look on her face that might have been a combination of guilt, sorrow, and fear.
We had put the roof up and there was no music playing—just the crunch of the tires over the road.
I hoped I hadn’t scared her when that awful woman had offered me her daughter.
But I just got so angry when I saw the fear on the girl’s face.
It made me think of Vivienne being sold to my uncle—how he’d used her and abused her.
The thought that someone might look at me and think I was capable of that same behavior enraged me—almost enough to let my Beast out.
Need to be careful, I warned myself. Letting the part of me out that even other Shifters feared would be a sure way to bring an angry mob with pitchforks and torches to the doors of Wolverton Manor. I had to keep better control over myself.
Things hadn’t exactly gone great at the Council meeting either—which might as well have been a town meeting, since everyone who was anyone in the Pack had been in attendance. I felt bad about the way I had handled things.
Maybe I had taken it too far, breaking Harris Murdoch’s finger and then threatening the whole town to leave Vivienne alone. But I swear, when he threatened her—when he talked about the filthy things he wanted to do to the woman I was beginning to care for so deeply—I absolutely lost it.
Seriously, he was lucky I hadn’t done worse than just break the dirty finger he was poking in my face. At least I hadn’t let my Beast out—though I had felt it coming very close to the surface. Which is probably why it almost made an appearance when that woman offered me her daughter.
“I’m sorry about what happened back there. And I’m sorry that fucking Harris talked that way to you,” I said to Vivienne, who was staring out the window.
She looked down at her hands, her face troubled.
“It’s not the first time he’s said what he’ll do to me if…if he wins the Alpha Challenge,” she said in a low voice.
“What?” I was instantly incensed. “He talked to you like that before?”
She nodded.
“At Carter’s funeral—right before you came in.” She sighed. “You asked why I backed you even though I didn’t know you. Well…that’s why. I was hoping you can beat him at the Alpha Challenges. Otherwise…” She trailed off, a miserable look on her lovely face.
I felt my heart fist in my chest.
“Baby, don’t worry. Of course I’m going to beat him,” I told her. “I’ve known guys like that all my life—his bark is worse than his bite—literally.”
“I don’t doubt you can beat him on strength alone,” she said, casting a glance at me. “Especially after what happened with Mrs. Browder. But Kor, you have to be careful. Harris fights dirty.”
“I could tell by the way he convened a whole town council meeting just to accuse us of fucking,” I said dryly.
Vivienne’s pale cheeks went red with shame, and she looked down at her fingers, which she was twisting together in her lap.
“He wasn’t wrong, though,” she said in a low voice. “We have been doing things…things we shouldn’t be doing.”
“We haven’t broken the Unbroken Laws,” I said firmly. “Not even close.”
“I know. But we’ve been—I’ve been—unchaste,” she murmured. “Besides, I’m too old for you. You ought to be with someone Cynthia-Ann’s age.”
“What?” I gave an incredulous laugh. “That girl was eleven years younger than me and that’s if her mother wasn’t lying about her age—which I doubt.”
“That’s the same age gap between you and me,” she pointed out. “Only I’m eleven years older than you.”
“I don’t give a damn!” I protested. “I’d rather have a woman than a girl. We’re both consenting adults at least! And nobody is buying or selling anyone—we want each other—our ages don’t matter.”
“Well maybe…maybe they should. Maybe they matter to me.”
She cast a glance at me that was filled with regret.
“Kor, I don’t think we ought to do anything else together like…like what we’ve been doing. I think we need to stop before…before we go too far.”
My heart sank—not just because she was cutting out our physical activities—but because of the fear and pain and guilt I saw in her lovely gold-ringed eyes.
“If that’s the way you want it, that’s how it will be, baby,” I said. “I don’t want to do anything that will make you feel uncomfortable or unhappy.”
She looked at me uncertainly.
“You mean…you’re okay with it? You’re not going to get angry or try to…to…”
“I’m not my uncle,” I said shortly, keeping my eyes on the road. “I would never, ever force you.”
“Thank you,” she whispered. And then she started to cry.
I wanted so badly to pull the car over and take her in my arms—to comfort her and soothe her. But there was a wall between us now—an invisible barrier I couldn’t breach without her permission.
So I just kept driving, wishing things were different and knowing they never could be.