I was fucking obsessed with her in high school. I couldn’t admit it then, but I was. Now she’s ten times as hot… and we’re married!
I glance back at the road, then shift my eyes straight back to Lexa. To my shock, she’s staring right at me. I jump so hard, I jerk the wheel and almost crash into a tree, correcting hard to get us back onto the Pass.
Even though Lexa is holding on to the grab bar, she’s laughing softly. “Don’t remember you being the nervous type, Kit,” she mutters. “You were always so confident and perfect at everything you did. I never thought I’d see you fumble.”
“It’s not every day I get matched with my ex,” I retort, staring at the road so I don’t get distracted again.
“Oh?” she says. “You can’t be referring to me. How can I be your ex when we never even dated?”
It feels like all the air in the cabin has been sucked out. I feel dizzy for a few seconds as I absorb those words.
I’m such an asshole.
Winding down the window, I take deep breaths of fresh mountain air to clear my head. My concentration improves, but my mood doesn’t.
How can I explain everything to her?
My mind flips back to that night so many years ago. It was an end-of-school party, and everyone was there. All of us had graduated, and I was enjoying some rare time to myself away from Grandfather and his incessant demands.
I felt free, like there was hope in the world. As if maybe, just maybe, I could get away from him and his expectations of me.
I spent the entire night being my usual loud, abrasive self. Grandfather had instilled a certain arrogance in me and ordered me to play it up at all times. I was supposed to inspire fear in the pack, remind the others constantly that they were lower than me.
I cut people off while they were talking, shoved them out of the way, and took liberties with personal items. If I couldthink of a new way to be a jerk, I did it. And Grandfather always praised me for it.
Very late that night, I saw Lexa sitting with a few people out by the bonfire. I’d been shocked to see her still at the party because she usually avoided social situations entirely. The fact that she was there at all was odd, but seeing her still there so late at night was like a gift from the gods.
I went over to the small crowd, where I singled her out and told her to take a walk with me. I didn’t ask, leaving no room for negotiation. I just grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet, announcing to everyone in earshot that Lexa was coming with me.
I remember her bright smile, the flickers of excitement in her pale eyes. She was glowing under my attention, and all I could feel was satisfaction.
With a shudder, I remember my thoughts at the time:Of course she fucking wants me. Everybody wants me. She should be grateful that I’m giving her this kind of attention.
The old memories, the words that used to come out of my mouth, flood through my brain, making me sick with guilt.
I’m such a fucking jerk!
I seduced Lexa out there, in one of the empty cabins at the campground. I took her, ravished her, even though she was so hesitant and withdrawn at first. I felt how hot she was for me, and I broke down her defenses and devoured her innocence and purity.
When I woke up in the morning, I realized what I’d done. I looked at her laid out on the mattress, her long waves of black hair scattered across the pillows like the clouds before a storm, her beautiful eyes still closed to the bright new day.
I wanted to take her in my arms and tell her she was mine, that I’d never let her go. I’d never wanted to possess anything as badly as her. I wanted to own her—every inch of her.
I wanted to keep her… forever.
But as I sat there watching her, cold waves of fear rolled through me. I knew exactly what Grandfather would say—that I couldn’t have any kind of relationship with gutter trash that fled to Cyan Lock because they’d been thrown out of their own pack.
Oh, he’d be fine with me fucking her. That’s definitely something his version of an alpha would do. But keep her? Or even marry her? No fucking way.
So I ran. I left her there alone.
I did what I had to do.
The last thing I expected was for her to track me down and confront me at my parents’ house, where my family and I—including Grandfather—were having dinner to celebrate my graduation. Someone must have told Lexa I was there. She just showed up on the doorstep with a shy smile on her face and a bright, hopeful look in her eyes.
I knew right then that I was going to have to crush her. So I did. Standing right on the front stoop, in front of my family and friends, I laughed in her face.
I saw her crumbling with every word. I knew I was destroying her, and I hated myself for it, but deep inside, part of me screamed with defiance and determination.
