Page 57 of Torin

It takes me a second to understand what she’s telling me.

“Everything,” she says, her gaze still fixed on the fire. “He wanted to inspect me.”

Rage tears through me, and I have to take a breath before I trust myself to speak.

“He wanted to make sure I was worth the money.”

Hannah draws one knee up and wraps her arms around it. “I’d never been naked in front of a man before. And there were other people there.”

Jesus Christ.

“Did he touch you?” I manage to say through clenched teeth.

“No.” She shakes her head. “He just looked at me. Commented.”

“On your body?”

She nods.

“What did he say?”

Hannah is quiet for a moment. Then she looks down at herself, at my shirt covering her thighs. “Enough that I can still hear it.”

Fuck. That asshole’s voice is still in her head. I could fucking kill him.

I’m burning to tell her what I see when I look at her. How beautiful she is. How hard it’s been to keep my eyes off her since the moment I found her. But that animal stood there and judged her body like it belonged to him. She doesn’t need another man telling her what he thinks of it. So, I keep my mouth shut.

Hannah stares into the fire for a while before she speaks again. “And then suddenly I was back in that room.”

Fuck.

“I wasn’t scared of you,” she says quickly.

“I know.”

“But I still freaked out.” She draws her knee a little tighter against her chest.

I want to reach for her, but after what she’s just told me, I’m not touching her unless she asks me to.

“What happened to you...” I stop, fighting down another surge of anger. “That’s not what mating is supposed to be.”

“What do you mean?”

“He treated you like something he was buying. That’s not how bears are with their mates.”

“But he said I was his mate.”

“He was full of shit. We don’t pick somebody and decide she’ll do. There’s one woman for us, and when we meet her, we know.”

“Immediately?”

“Yeah. We just know.”

She thinks about that for a moment. “And what happens if she doesn’t want you?”

That one lands harder than she could possibly know.

“You leave her alone.”