Page 69 of Damien’s Mate

She drew herself up and stared him in the eye. “I don’t have to justify myself to you, Damien Fernandez. And I’m not stupid. They don’t get the artifacts until they restore my father’s good name.”

Damien narrowed his eyes. “So you’re afraid they won’t do it, otherwise,” he said. “Is that the kind of people you want to spend the rest of your life with? People whose respect you have to buy with priceless treasure?”

He was yelling at her now, and he couldn’t stop. If he stopped he knew the glass in his chest would tear his heart apart.

“That’s not what this is,” she stormed. “I need to make sure my father rests in peace.”

“Do you? Or do you just want to pretend to yourself that now that you’ve found the artifacts, he would have paid attention to you? Would have cared about you?”

She flinched back like he’d hit her, her eyes wide and dark. “That’s a horrible thing to say.”

Suddenly all the anger drained out of him, and he just felt heavy and defeated. “You’re right, it was.” He couldn’t bring himself to say he was sorry. She wouldn’t care anyway.

She was staring at him, her forehead puckered in a frown. “Why are you so angry? You always knew I was going back.” She sounded like she was near tears.

Damien just shook his head. “I thought I meant something to you. But you’re just like everyone else. They pretend to care, while you’re useful to them, and then when they get what they want they’re gone.”

“Damien—” She reached out, like he was a fucking child to be comforted.

He pulled away. He wasn’t that pathetic. Not yet. “I thought we could really have something. I thought… hell, I even thought maybe we could stay here.” He gave a bitter laugh. “But I’m just a hooman, after all. Aren’t I?”

He scooped his stupid damn present off the dresser and walked out.

Chapter 28

Damien grabbed his gun and extra ammo off the side table in the living room and stormed downstairs. He needed to go up the hill and shoot off all the rounds he had left.

Maybe rip some damn targets in half. Anything to stop feeling like—fuck it. Anything to stop feeling.

On the way through the kitchen he pitched the damn cardboard box into the garbage. He’d wasted his time, thinking Lila cared enough about him to want anything from him.

Then he banged out the door and up the hill, wishing like hell he could Change into an animal and fucking kill something.

Or get into a fight and bleed somebody, the way the others did. Not that it would make him feel better—nothing would make him feel better.

But it would make him feel less pathetic and helpless.

And lonely.

He thrust that thought away. It wasn’t like he could ever have belonged here on his own. Not as the only human in a group of shifters. But he’d thought maybe he and Lila, together—

Ah, fuck.

When he got to the top of the first slope he almost headed for the shooting range, and then he saw the axe-throwing targets.

That’s what he needed. Something that took muscle—something to tire him out.

He grabbed the axes out of the storage box and started throwing them. The effort and motion of throwing helped his churning temper, and hearing them bite into the wooden targets, splinters flying, almost satisfied his urge to hurt something.

He threw the whole batch and retrieved them, then threw them again and retrieved them. Over and over and over, he lost count of how many times, until his brain turned off and there was nothing but sweat and effort and deadly blades hitting their targets.

When he finally stopped and looked up, he realized he had an audience. Brandon and Kitty, Callie and Jaeda, two leopards, wolf-Brock, and Phantom Nick.

And Titan.

The whole damn crew. Watching him.

Damien let out an exasperated huff. “What?” he demanded.