Page 60 of Love the Way You Lion (Rise of the Resistance #3)

The Cat and The Blade Run Into A Snag

DELILAH

O nce I achieved my midwife goals, I knew I could enjoy my new relationship without that poking my brain insistently.

I came home and snatched Talia for some on-on-one time.

On a scale from heaven to hell, it’s been high in the stratosphere.

We’re a week and a half out from that damned party, which my boys and gals at home swear that they have under control.

Things went well with my mates, and the lunatic squad has been suspiciously quiet, but I’m not worried about that.

Outside of a minor tiff with Rafe over an injury to my hand at work, everything was fine. That means disaster is coming, in my experience, so I’ll enjoy the good vibes while I can. I’m not sure how stable internal peace is.

Given the newness of this experience for our mates and the tenuous grip we have on one another, I am not sure how long it will hold before something new comes up. We’ll work it all out before we have to present ourselves in public .

That much, I’m sure of.

Apparating into the master bedroom of the house Taurus made for us, I look for Talia.

A few days ago, we all moved from the Maison to get some privacy.

Rafe and Talia took rooms in the guest house, and we switch off as people spent time together.

Hex helped Rafe move his art supplies and displays to a room on the top floor so he could work.

It’s like we’re an actual family now.

Talia isn’t here, though, and I’m puzzled.

I shed my work clothes and stretch up on my toes.

All the aches seem to melt a bit as I feel the buzz of my home engulf me.

I love my job and I’m getting good at it, but it takes a physical toll.

The better I get at the different trials and test missions, the more difficult my assignments get.

It’s making Taurus crazy. He’d never tell me not to do a job, but I know he can’t help but check in on me to make sure they haven’t given me more than I can chew.

“You’re home,” my new mate cries as she comes up the back stairs. Clad only in a swimsuit, Talia looks every bit the summer girl she is. Her hair is piled up on her head, and she smells like suntan oil and the ocean.

I beam. “I am. I had a good mission the past two days, and I even saw the feathered fiend for a few because he couldn't help but check up on me in his not-so-stealthy way, and now you’re here.” I squint for a moment, watching her face, and I frown.

“You’re here looking like you have something bad to tell me. ”

She blinks. “No, no. Not bad, I—I want to ask something.”

Arching a brow, I drop onto the bed and try to hide my fear with a relaxed pose. “Now, I think whatever it is rather important, so rip the band-aid off and tell me. ”

“I need some clarification,” she mutters, shrugging and looking at her hands like an embarrassed child. She pulls her hair out of the bun and shakes it out, walking over to the closet to change.

“What do you need clarification on?”

She steps out of the closet in a tank and shorts, her hair a tumble.

I see one eye peeping out of the wall of hair she’s let fall over her face as she mumbles, “You and me. Is this—us—is this the same old, same old in your family circle? I don’t understand how your family works, and you said something the other night to Taurus.

After the stuff we said yesterday, I’m confused. ”

“You’re not her,” I say.

I have no way to make this any clearer for her because I can’t tell her what being Sari means. I’ve given her the most basic overview, and while all of that is true and hurts me, I can’t give her the rest.

“I don’t want to be.”

“Perhaps I need to be clearer about what happened with us. I can explain why it’s different.” I sit on the edge of the bed, knowing that recounting this tale will not ease her paranoia. I’ll do it anyway, though, because if she’s asking me, he will ask Rafe.

Rafe is far less equipped to shut everything off and talk about this dispassionately.

“Sari and I slept together twice. The first time was the night Rafe and Wilde were together for the first time. Afterward, Rafe and Wilde became a ‘thing’. Their relationship caused problems, but Wilde and Rafe claimed individually not long after. Sari didn’t approach me until she had a wild hair up her ass about completing a ‘family claim’.

I think it was because she was trying to head off Rhea and Alistair.

She and Wilde tried to pretend they were okay with us being involved with them, but their ‘approval’ never quite made it to their eyes. ” I sigh, shaking my head .

“It was a chess game with them. Alistair and I mated; Rhea and Rafe mated. ‘Family claims’ came up, but not before I read a post where the four of them were ‘family mated’ at an event on the other side. Sari completed the claim with me to beat Rhea, and Rhea did what she could stomach to mark her spot on the mountain. Even without sex, I was the last frontier, I suppose.”

“I feel so odd about that. I don’t play those games, and I don’t have any interest in them. I don’t work that way.”

“Once Sari’s teeth were on me, I wasn’t important anymore. It was never about me; it was about marking territory. It hurt, but there were worse things to get hurt over, so I let it lie.”

“I’m not a sharer—nor is Taurus. We’ve never had these problems.”

“Unless you slept with me to have a notch on your belt, achieve some political goal, or it was part of some game: you’re not her. That’s how I know.”

It isn’t the only reason that I know, but it should be enough to keep her happy.

“You and Rafe changed things. I wasn’t with you because I wanted to nose in on you and him, nor vice versa with Taurus and Rafe.”

I chuckle. “Gosh, I sure hear that a lot. Rafe and I change things; we change people. You’d think it’d make us feel special, but it doesn’t.

It only leads to pain and frustration—or has in the past.” I give her a serious look; my eyes are dark.

“She never wanted me, Talia. She didn’t want anyone else to have me, but she didn’t want me.

If I’m honest with myself, Rhea didn’t want me, either; she only wanted the ability to one-up Sari.

I think that’s all any of them ever wanted. ”

“I did it because of you. ”

I smile, trying not to let my sadness ruin the moment.

“I know I needed to know because I don’t want to have only a blood connection with you.

I have feelings for you, and for self-preservation, I needed to know.

I’ve never felt like this before or done anything like this before.

I don’t like mincing words when it’s important. ”

“I feel the same way. You understand why I’m less upfront about the subject because of the scars I carry.”

I close my eyes for a moment, thinking about the moment that I realized that the frenzy to mate with me had been about beating Rhea to the punch.

It wasn’t long before the mess started. I’d never thought about the timeline until now.

The family mating business happened, then the party, but Wilde started his bloody quest, and the Beast appeared.

After that, the whole train derailed, and it all went to hell.

I don’t know how it went so wrong so fast, but it did.

It started with their deception and ended in pain for both of us.

How could I have known?

“I wish you’d tell me what’s going on behind those sapphire blues, though,” she says, dropping next to me.

“Once you get into the tower, you can hurt me. People inside the tower have hurt me over and over, so I hide. But you’ve gotten in, and it terrifies me.” I flush red, feeling stupid for being so unable to express myself.

Stopping for a moment, I consider whether I should tell her how terrified I am that she is not ready for this and that I will end up broken beyond repair if she calls it off.

Can I admit I don’t have faith in her? I want her to be my mate?

Can I tell her I have this terror clawing at the pit of my stomach, screaming that she’s going to crack my heart and change the fabric of who I am?

No, I can’t .

I can’t tell her that based on something that could be Maeve having indigestion. I was in Myanmar today, and I ate foreign food. Tasty as hell with a nice little kick, but this could all be a tummy problem, not a cat sense problem.

She grins. “You, too. I?—”

Pausing mid-sentence, she frowns, her expression growing dark.

Her head tilts as if someone is speaking into her mind, and I see her concentrating on sending her pictorial response.

Talia snarls, head snapping back to glare at the room.

She rockets off the bed, looking deadly and angry, leaving me flabbergasted.

“Talia?”

She gives me a sad smile and comes to brush her hand on my cheek. “I care about you very much.”

That said, she stalks back to the closet and straps on her blades. I know that when she does this; she’s protecting herself. I don’t know what she’s protecting herself from. “What did I do wrong?”

“You did nothing wrong; don’t worry. Something hit me like a ton of bricks, and I need to go for a while,” she says, finishing up the sheaths and putting on sandals.

“I’m confused,” I murmur.

I didn’t say any of my thoughts out loud, and as close as my mates are to me, there are parts of me they do not have access to, even Taurus. The doors in my mind palace stay locked despite my deep connection to him.

She turns, giving me a sorrowful look. “Do you want to come with me? I have a place I go when I need to be away. They can’t reach me there.”

I nod, feeling more than a little worried. What had one of my mates said to her to have her off the rails like this? “Okay, I’ll go. ”

“Are you sure? You don’t have to. You could help us get there. It’s a long drive, and you’d make it simpler.”

“I am. I’ll go with you,” I nod, pulling on a handkerchief halter and tiny shorts, trying to keep up with her frenetic motions.

I feel like I’d rather be putting on my armor, and if I knew it wasn’t hot outside, I’d take my duster.

It’s almost like my security blanket now, and having it when this feels so unstable would help me feel safe.

No room for safety here, though.