Page 24 of Brimstone and Broomsticks
It had been so humiliating, the side-eye, the whispers. Marcus hadn’t been discreet and I’d gotten tired of looking the fool. And now that I looked back, as fun as the sex had been, it had been totally lacking in any kind of emotional component. I had nothing in common with this shifter beyond our law degrees. I didn’t like him. And all those words he’d spoken of love and devotion, the ones that seemed to fill the empty spot that a neglectful father and mother had left, now seemed hollow. Marcus hadn’t lied. He really did feel those things for me. And the moment he wasn’t around me, he was feeling those things for someone else.
That wasn’t what I wanted. It made those empty spots seem deeper and more painful. And it made me crazy—crazy enough to set his pants on fire in the middle of the courtroom.
“I love you, Cassie,” he told me.
“You love every woman you bed, Marcus.” I’ll admit there was a bit of sorrow and self-pity in my tone. “I’m not sleeping with you. I’m here to ask you to drop the charges against Lucien.”
“Or you’ll sleep with him?” The panther sneered.
“No threats. Look at this as a prosecutor, Marcus. It’s a bad case. It wastes time and money, and it’s going to make you look like a chump in front of the whole town.”
He sighed, running a hand through his hair. The towel shifted, showing his hipbones and that happy trail I knew so well. “Fine. But I can’t do anything until I talk to Clinton.”
“Tonight?” I asked hopefully.
“Tomorrow morning,” he told me. “It’s almost full moon, and you know very well what I’m going to be looking for tonight. Since you’re so unwilling to oblige, I’ll go elsewhere. And in the morning, after breakfast, I’ll go track down Clinton.”
I felt the tension fall from my shoulders. He’d still need to run by the courthouse and do the paperwork, and things wouldn’t be official until Monday, but it should be enough to get the anklet off Lucien and get him out of town by tomorrow nightfall.
He’d leave. He’d immediately forget about everything except vague memories of a drunken bar fight and narrowly escaping prosecution for assault. He’d forget about trolls and cyclops and werewolves and witches. He’d forget about me.
I’ll admit I really didn’t like that one bit.
