Page 137 of A Dance With Fire
He’d known formonths,and he hadn’t told her.
And it explained so much. Her attraction to him that bordered between the lines of hate and desire. Because the bond had been pulling them together, jagged pieces that fit into a broken and fucked up relationship somehow.
“How?” The word broke out of her.
“It seems Mana has a sense of humor, as I don’t understand it any more than you do. But it doesn’t matter. Because I don’t want a mate. I don’t wantyou.”
Those words shouldn’t have hurt as much as they did, but they were further proof that not even her mate, the one sent by Mana who was meant to love her regardless of anything else, wanted her.
No one wanted her.
Reality was a harsh thing, and she didn’t think anything could ever be harsher than this.
“Good,” she whispered, even if she wasn’t sure she meant the words. “I don’t want you, either.”
“Good,” he replied.
There was finality in the moment. Nothing left to say. “Goodbye, Ryker.”
Leaving felt like cutting her soul up into thousands of pieces, but it didn’t matter that she was walking away, dragging her broken heart behind her, leaving the only Fae she ever considered friends, even if they perhaps didn’t feel the same.
She was a coward.
And cowards never got happy endings, or friends, or love.
Merely a life of hiding, of fear.
Of loneliness.
* * *
He’d known,the moment she’d seen her face drawn on that poster, he’d known she was going to leave them. That the fear would be almost too much.
What he could have never predicted was how it would makehimfeel. Betrayed, hurt. He shouldn’t have been surprised. She’d been trying to run since they’d found her. But she’dchanged.He hadn’t imagined that, the shift between them. Not just because of the kiss, not just because she was his mate.
He almost scoffed.
Mate.
He’d suspected what she was since the moment he saw her. When she’d slammed into his chest and looked into his eyes, the mating bond snapped into place inside him. He hadn’t contemplated it at the time, had thought it was a fluke of his own magic somehow. Afterwards, he’d felt the pull. Something about her had feltright,and yet Ryker wanted no part of her.
Not this fearful, shaking Fae with curved ears and an unhealthy love for humans that reminded him of Mairin. Seeing Shula brought memories of his sister back, the pain, the anger, the sorrow. It had made him all too aware of his scars and the way Shula’s eyes traveled over them like she was studying the pathways on a map.
He wasn’t ashamed of them; he no longer felt shame. He just knew that it had to be some kind of joke.He didn’t want Shula, and Shula didn’t want him. She didn’t want the Fae at all.
It was better to push her away than to form bonds, to see her become so jaded in her beliefs that she followed in the same footsteps as Mairin, lying, hiding. The truth of the matter was, she wasn’t safe with the humans and never would be, but she couldn’t see that.
So, yeah, it was better to watch her walk away. It was better to not want her at all. To not acknowledge what Mana had thrust unwillingly upon them both so that the bond became nothing but ash before it could even ignite.
He didn’t need to care just to watch her die.
He stepped back into camp, his footsteps beating against the ground loudly until they jostled awake. He reached for his bag, shoving his things inside and pulling the straps on his shoulders.
Clay got up, looking at the empty spot where Shula once lay. “Where’s—”
“We need to leave,” Ryker snapped.
Uric and Valerio untangled themselves from their sheets, standing slowly. The prince’s features were set in hard lines. “Where is Shula?” he demanded.
