Page 29 of Wishes in the Moonlight (Rocky Mountain Wolves #4)
~Amanda~
Listening to Troy recount episodes from my past from his viewpoint felt a bit like seeing myself through a funhouse mirror: the events were recognizable, but distorted from my own recollection.
He was right that I hadn’t seen him wave back to me on the balcony.
My attention had been focused on the large group of children my own age, the ones who got to run around and play without me.
Similarly, I hadn’t noticed anyone on the lakeshore who looked concerned for my safety when I fell in the water after the canoe race.
Everywhere I looked, I only saw people trying not to laugh. Several of them failed.
For me, those moments had been framed by the weight of my father’s expectations and the narrow role he’d defined for me. When I looked out over the crowd, I envied the anonymity they had, the ability to blend in and go about their day without having each movement scrutinized.
But over time, as I took on more responsibility within the pack and got to interact with others at all levels of our society, I came to understand that while our challenges might be different, no one had it easy.
And with each glimpse into his own past that Troy shared with me, my empathy for him grew.
Time and time again, he’d been confronted with his supposed lack of worth.
His aunt had driven it home in dozens of little ways, I could tell just by reading between the lines of the things he’d told me.
And my father? Well, my father had stated it outright, accusing him of wanting to use our connection for his own benefit, since he clearly didn’t matter on his own.
Time and time again, people had underestimated him. Failed to see his potential.
But not the goddess. When she matched us, she must have seen something in him that others had failed to.
Or perhaps she saw something in me that no one else did.
Maybe she saw that I needed someone who would be strong enough to suffer the indignities my father dished out, loyal enough to protect me even when he couldn’t claim me, and patient enough to wait for me when faced with what seemed like impossible odds.
Maybe she knew that those traits would impress me far more than any bloodline or rank ever could.
“What would you have done if that day had gone differently?” I asked him, casting my mind back to the morning after my 18th birthday when I’d hurried down to my father’s office to talk to him, only to have my heart broken.
“If we’d been able to talk to my father together, like I wanted, and if he’d agreed to our mating, what would have happened next? ”
Troy’s expression softens into wistfulness, his lips caught in a tug-of-war between a smile and a frown. “I would have asked to see your room.”
I let out a soft snort. “Typical man.”
His smile won the fight, mischievousness sparking in his pale brown eyes. “Not for that, although sex definitely would have been on the agenda for that day. A lot of it.”
The way he stated it, calm and certain after the orgasm he’d just given me with his tongue, made my limbs go weak. I didn’t doubt for a second that he meant it.
“First, though, I would have wanted to know more about you, and I have a feeling that your bedroom would have been the best place to start then. See what book you were reading. What you chose to put on your walls, and what keepsakes you held onto. I would have asked you to tell me about each of them so that through them, I could start to know you. Not the angel. Not the Lota. Just Amanda.”
Damn it. How did he know exactly the right thing to say?
All the men my father considered mating me to never bothered to actually get to know me.
They were more concerned with how I could benefit them, and although I had come to accept the transactional nature of an arranged mating, it still stung when our conversations inevitably settled around their ambitions and needs rather than mine.
When Vaughan came to pick me up and take me back to his pack, he never asked to see my room. He never asked much about me at all, even before he met his fated mate upon our return.
“Where did you live? Back then, I mean.”
His big shoulders lifted in a shrug. “Same place I do now: the border team barracks. I moved in there after I completed my training. Before that was the training barracks.”
“Do you have your own room?”
“Now I do, as captain. Back then, I had a bunk in a shared room, same as in training. So, if we were going to have sex that day, it would have been in your room.”
His grin, half-goofy and half-smoldering, had me smiling back out of instinct. “I’ve never shared a room with anyone. It must have been an adjustment for you coming from your aunt’s house. I assume you had your own room there.”
The way his lips pulled a little tighter let me know my assumption had been inaccurate even before he said the words. “Well, I slept on the couch and no one else was in the room, so I guess that counts as my own room?”
“You slept on the couch? The whole time you were growing up?”
He looked down, which he only ever did when talking about his past, I’d noticed.
Whenever we talked about me, he stared straight at me as if he were drinking in every word, afraid of missing a drop, but when the subject shifted to him, he avoided my gaze, as if the emotion I might see in those expressive eyes of his would betray him.
“It was quite comfortable when I was little. When I got taller, it suited me less. By the time I signed up for training, moving to the barracks felt like luxury.”
Based on the way he didn’t even fit in the bed we were on now, I couldn’t imagine him trying to sleep comfortably on a sofa.
“I have money saved up, though,” he added, his tone turning slightly defensive. “Now, I mean. I’ve put aside most of what I’ve earned since I started working. I could buy a house. It just doesn’t make sense when it’s only me. The barracks suit me fine.”
I heard the words he didn’t say: he didn’t need me to house him or provide for him. If we were to accept each other now, he would move into the pack house, naturally, but he didn’t need to. What he wanted from me went far beyond the material benefits being my mate would bring.
Something was missing in that equation, though. “What are you saving the money for?”
If he’d put all the money he earned away rather than buying a house, and he knew that if we somehow ended up together, he wouldn’t need to buy one for me, what did he plan to do with it?
His eyes slid away again, avoiding putting his vulnerability on display. “I wanted to have enough saved up that if the opportunity ever came up again to defy your father and take you away, I would be in a better position to protect you.”
Fuck. Tears stung at the corner of my eyes, sharp and uncomfortable. “Is there anything you’ve done in the past seven years that wasn’t about me?”
Slowly, his eyes raised, trailing over my body in a way that sent heat spreading to every extremity, until our gazes locked. “Not a damn thing.”
The bond tugged at my chest, pulling me towards him, and he leaned forward in perfect sync. Our noses brushed, my eyes closing at the delicious sparks that lit up my skin, and his soft breath whispered across my lips.
Earlier, we gave each other pleasure, but it had been almost entirely physical. Quenching a need, giving in to temptation. This felt different as I inhaled his scent, held my breath, and kissed my mate for the very first time.