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I swallowed hard. Stephan said nothing, just waited for me to continue. I didn’t have to be a shifter to sense the rage radiating off him. What the hell didhehave to be mad about? He’d chosen to mate with that woman.

“She made it clear that I was nothing more than a summer fling. Tourists come to Lakeview all the time, don’t they? It’s easy to meet a girl, have some fun over the summer, and send her on her way. Blakely said I was too soft for your life—the clan life. Maybe she was right.” Horrifyingly, I felt tears pricking my eyes, but now that I’d started, I couldn’t stop the words from pouring out of me. “I was just a dumb girl. She knew you’d get sick of me. Maybe she was doing me a favor. She even showed me the bite.”

Stephan exhaled, and I thought I saw a wisp of smoke. “Bite?”

I tipped my head to the side and touched my neck, right where it met my shoulder. “Right here. The mating bite. She had proof you claimed her. Of course I left—I wasn’t going to let you embarrass me anymore.”

“Harley.” His words came out in a low, gravelly tone. “I need you to know this. I never said a word of that.”

“Maybe she twisted your words, but you stillmatedher, Stephan. What else was I supposed to do?”

“I didn’t.”

My argument tripped over my tongue and melted away. “You… didn’t? Didn’t what?”

“Didn’t mate her.”

My heart pounded so hard I thought it might break through a rib. I sagged onto the couch. “But she had a bite.”

Stephan exhaled hard and leaned back against the front door. He was still radiating fury, but now I thought that anger might not be directed at me. “Blakely… She likes it rough. And she’s known to have a variety of partners at the clubhouse. She gets bitten often. It wasn’t a mating bite you saw.”

My stomach roiled. I hated that Stephan even knew that about Blakely. And beyond that, my heart hurt. Blakely had lied to me? All those years I’d wondered how I could’ve been so stupid, how I could’ve been played like that, how Stephan could’ve lied to me so easily… And it was all Blakely?

“Not that I could’ve claimed her or anyone else, anyway,” Stephan said, almost to himself.

“Why not? Don’t all dragons claim?”

“Yes, but it’s not that simple. We can’t claim just anyone whenever we want to. Especially not me, because…” He trailed off and raked one hand through his hair.

“Because?” I pressed.

“Because once a dragon has found his fated mate, he can’t claim another.” Stephan’s voice was low and steady, like he was forcing the words out. Like it hurt. “Not until he rejects his mate. The call of the fated mate remains until then.”

I swallowed around a sudden tightness in my throat. So, he’d be tied to me for life?Forever?Yeah, that was something I couldn’t think about too hard. Not yet. Not now. “If that’s true, why didn’t you look for me?”

“Blakely told you all this bullshit the night before you left?”

I nodded.

“I was tied up that night.”

“Bad excuse, Stephan.”

He raised his eyebrows, then sighed. “That was the night I got arrested. I would’ve chased you to the ends of the earth if Icould, but I was in custody. Got to my lawyer, who got to Hawk, and I told him to find you and tell you not to wait for me. But you’d already left town. I figured you’d heard about the arrest. And honestly, I’d thought it was the right choice. I already knew I was going away for a long time.”

My heart sank. For a moment, just a moment, I’d had a brief flicker of hope. That if what Blakely had said was a lie, then maybe, maybe, there was a chance for us to start over. Fix things between us.

But prison?

“What were you arrested for?” I asked.

“Intent to distribute. Drugs. I did seven years.”

I swallowed hard. So, even though Blakely had lied, it had still been for the best that I’d left town to raise my son alone. What would’ve been worse? All those years thinking he had chosen her instead of me, or knowing that the man I’d loved had been locked up for most of Dylan’s childhood? I wondered if my mother knew about Stephan’s time in prison. Good thing I never told her who Dylan’s father was.

“Seven years,” I repeated, stunned.

He nodded.