Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
“I’m fine,” he said. “I’ve had worse bites than that in practice sparring sessions with some of the younger members of the clan.”
Theo had never cried as an adult. “I’m not a bear,” she got out past the thickness in her throat, the burning in her eyes.
“Well, you fight like one.” Curved lips, gentle fingers tucking her hair behind her ear. “Come on, milaya moya, let’s get you into warmer clothes. Your skin is chilled.”
Tears barely held in check now, Theo didn’t have the strength to refuse him. She allowed him to tug her up to her feet, allowed him to hold her steady as he led her to the bedroom.
She felt like nothing, a ghost without weight.
Leaving her standing by the foot of her bed, he didn’t go to her suitcase and pull out a change of clothes. Instead, he walked out and grabbed the T-shirt he’d taken off during the sensual interlude that now seemed a figment of her crazed imagination.
“You like my scent, Theo,” he said with a gentle rub of his beard-shadowed cheek against hers. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed.”
Her fingers clenched tight over the soft fabric when he put the T-shirt into her hand, his muscular body a warm wall against her. It took everything she had not to crawl into him, hide away from the whole world.
“This is drenched with my scent. Snuggle into it while I make you a hot drink.”
She stood there dumbly for long moments after he’d gone.
“I don’t hear movement, Thela!” Yakov’s voice. “Want me to come in there and help?”
Theo trembled.
Lifting his T-shirt to her nose, she took in a deep breath . . . and almost sobbed. It smelled of comfort and warmth.
Yakov, it smelled like Yakov, just like he’d promised.
Wanting it to surround her as fast as possible, she all but ripped off the dress, then put the T-shirt on over her panties. It hung off her, coming to halfway down her thighs, and it was the most wonderful piece of clothing she’d ever had.
“Come on out, pchelka.” More coaxing words. “I’ve got your drink ready.”
Heart thumping and the scent of Yakov the only thing holding her together, she made herself walk out and face what she’d done. But . . . the living area was no longer a scene of carnage. Not neat by any means, but just a place where a bear or two might’ve turned a fraction rambunctious.
Lower lip threatening to quiver, she looked over at the man who stood at the kitchen counter, holding up a glass for her.
“I’m sorry,” she began, even knowing that no apologies would ever be enough. “I shouldn—”
“Don’t you dare apologize for something you can’t control.” He pinned her with his gaze, his irises no longer bear amber, but the rich aqua green of the human part of him. “Unless you’re going to lie to me and tell me that you could control that?”
Her cheeks flushed with a burst of emotion that had nothing to do with the rage attacks; she wanted to bite back a response, but she forced herself to calm down, forced herself to breathe, forced her hands to unclench.
Leaning back against the kitchenette wall, Yakov raised an eyebrow. “I survived you in full fury. I won’t melt with a few harsh words.”
She blinked, stared at him, and realized he was right. She hadn’t killed him. She hadn’t even really injured him. Impossible. The two previous times she’d been with others during an attack, the consequences had been grave. Colette had ended up with broken bones, while her grandfather’s aide had needed extensive facial surgery to put her back together.
The latter, at least, hadn’t been all Theo’s fault. Her grandfather had pushed and pushed because he’d wanted to see what she could do. It just so happened that his aide had been in front of her when the explosion took place. And that aide had been carrying a glass of water for her grandfather.
Theo never remembered anything of an episode, but Grandfather had been taping her that day, too, and he’d shown her the results of her “defective neural structure.”
Theo would never forget how the glass had shattered in a stunning starlike pattern, the shards driven upward into flesh and bone, the blood splattering onto the desk before her grandfather stunned Theo with a weapon set at maximum.
Even as Theo’s body began to spasm from the blast of the weapon, the aide had begun to scream. That was how fast it had all happened. How quickly Theo had brutally wounded another living being.
But Yakov . . . Yakov was fine. “This isn’t right.” She ran to him, terror in her blood. “Internal injuries. It has to be internal injuries.”
Chapter 46
F-Psy have some of the highest rates of insanity among our race.
It’s because so many of us can see catastrophic events without the power to change them. And so we just bear witness to terror over and over again until our brains can no longer take it.