Chapter 23
TESSA POV
I storm my way back to the scent–tracing block. Out of nothing more than oure necessity. I need my arrows for tomorrow.
Breathing through the pain I start picking up shafts, leaving the flowers on the floor.
“Hey!” Maxim cries, catching me up. I have nothing to say. Not a word.
I just keep picking up arrows. He scoops down and holds one out to me. Without looking at his face I gingerly take it.
“You’re not talking to me then? Mature,”
I thin my lips. Twon’t be lectured on maturity by some handsome oaf who thinks mindless violence will make everything okay. Or by revealing my wounds to everyone. We’re meant to be better than that now. Moved on as a race.
Keeping quiet has worked every time before. People give up on you eventually. Leave you alone.
“Tessa, you’re serious? Silent treatment?” his patience running thin. I don’t care. I would go to Irene’s but after tonight there is no way she is going to welcome my face at her door.
“I’m not going anywhere mate. Keep up this shit all you want, I’ll still talk, because I know you’re listening. So you’re angry at me?”
With my handful of arrows counted I coolly begin extinguishing the lanterns. I should have done it when I first left as last person back. I was too busy sprinting after Maxim and his mission to destroy Vigo.
Meanwhile Maxim just stands about, sulkily, watching me with his hands jammed into his pockets. A trickle of blood forms a curve around his right eyebrow, his blue shirt ripped and gaping. A second cut into his brunette hairline from where he bashed Vigo has already stopped bleeding.
Leaning against a post watching, he is of zero help, yet seems determined to keep talking.
“He hurt you Tessa. That’s not what scent–tracing is. If you were in sparring and came back like that then yeah. Fair game. It happened to me enough times. But not scents…I was trying to look after you.”
I stop in my tracks and shoot him a look. Eyebrows raised with a complete lack of belief in his words. He didn’t do a thing for me. He did something for himself.
Maxim matches my look. Silently reading me. “Oh. Oh you think I was just posturing back there? Winning some points for Team Mate Bond? That it was
tactical?”
With a shrug I extinguish the last lantern, the dusky, early evening swallowing the windowless, sawdust covered space into near pitch–black.
Maxim’s voice is softer, far more dangerous when hidden in the shadows, “You owe me something Tessa. Angry or not.”
I let out a gasp when out of the darkness, his hand finds mine and presses it to his bare chest. The almost–healed site of my bite. Sparks jump from my fingertips, his chest so warm and solid. Hand wrapped tightly around my wrist, planting me to him, exactly where he wants me.
“Don’t talk to me. Be a child. But don’t drop your end of this deal.”
Fuck him.
Trying to push him away he somehow gains a hold of my other wrist. Now Maxim’s voice vanishes as he walks me backwards, kicking the stable door shut behind him, stealing the final slivers of light away.
My back hits the first wooden stall. My other hand is gripped down by my waist, containing every attempt by me to push him away.
“Just say something Tessa,” he whispers, my entire body reacting to feel his dark whisper in my ear. “Anything you like. One word and I will let you go
1/4
Chapter 23
right now. If that’s what you want
I can feel his heart racing under my fingers. It’s going just as fast as mine.
keep my mouth shut. There is a steady, rising heat in my lower stomach. Just like in the shower earlier, that hunger, deeply hidden need for something more is growing.
Maxim cannot let me go. Not without raising hell and having us under suspicion. His offer is just another empty promise. Hook straight at him, the almat pitch–black light of the barn making me lean closer, trying to silently make out his features.
He leans closer, whispering into my ear. All today’s pain has vanished. Transformed into something hot, tingly and travelling at will up and down my body.
“Still nothing Tessa? Sure?”
He lingers, his hot breath making me shudder against my will. I dont want Maxim to know what him being so close does to me. “No. No you’re not saying anything are you…fuck, why are you so damned feisty now and not out there?”
I open my mouth, bare my extended canines and sink my teeth just above his heart. It stops me saying “fuck you” The same location. The same violent convulsion of his body erupts.
Dropping my hands with a gasp, he braces against the wall, arms either side of me. His hips slam forward into mine and there is a hard cock straining.
He doesn’t swear or make a sound. Before, he created all that racket. The boasting echoes of his prowess. But he keeps his body pressed against mine all the same. That undeniable hardness against my stomach causing my scent to perfume the air.
Because even though I hate him, here in this darkened space, he’s also all that I want. All I dream of. All my thoughts are capable of conjuring even when my career here depends on doing anything but thinking of him. I clench my thighs together, fighting the wetness my movement immediately soaks into my panti
Maxim cups his hand around my jawline. Eyes shut, I slowly withdraw my teeth from his flesh.
Less than a second later, his fingers travel further and grip a length of my hair. He pulls me to him for a kiss that’s half punishment, half lust. His blood lingers on my lips. Maxim doesn’t seem to care.
It’s a harsh, furious kiss. No affection, all provocation. Lips firm and defiant. Like he’s annoyed at himself for showing too much. Trying to regain the upper hand in this dance. Was I not meant to feel how hard my refusal to talk left him?
My resistance remains. Silently disobeying. I don’t allow myself to yield into his embrace like usual. I can’t.
It is a pretense. It is a lie. He’s a bastard for making me feel like this.
Just because my body relentlessly betrays me doesn’t mean i should allow it. And hell, my body is weak–willed. My legs are trembling, itching to lift up and push myself greedily against him. Even my breathing is shaky. Every inch of me wants more.
Goddess, in the dark, would it really matter if I just let it go?
The air tingles with possibilities. All of which I’ll regret tomorrow.
So I have to break off the kiss, shaking my head back and forth. My nose brushes against his in the dark as he tries to find my lips again with ragged little nudges. I resist, pushing at his chest with my palms. It’s a no. It has to be a no. I’ve bitten him. Job done for another week. That is all.
“Tessa…” he murmurs with surprising softness, the grip on my hair reduced to trailing down through his fingers. “Talk to me.”
My head falls forward and rests on his bare chest. I shake my head into him, his arms slowly wrapping around me. Seduction abandoned, he’s just standing with me in the darkness. His mouth rests upon the top of my head followed by a sigh of resignation
Held in his arms, I’m completely surrounded by Maxim. All his strength and power. It’s something I’ve imagined, inhaling nothing but th and berries. Feeling all those muscles tensing around me.
2/4
t of oak
14:55 Mon, 2 Jun MG
Chapter 23
It’s no good. When he murmurs, “Do you want me to give you some space?“) almost give in and whisper for him to kiss me again
198
But space is exactly what I need. Every single hour of today has brought its own new disaster. Outside voice chatter and gossip about what they’ve seen Discussing Vigo’s split forehead. A Malva like shrew announces. “Well she’s only here because of her mate. You know the new rates.”
“Is that what the asterisk against her means?”
“Probably. She could be shit for the rest of this year and stay here because she’s protected.”
“That’s so wrong. Thought it was about finding the best!”
“I know, hopefully Alpha Hale reconsiders.”
“He might do after tonight!”
Goddess I hate gossip. None of the voices outside are Irene or Briggs. I squeeze my eyes shut. Only for Maxim to murmur into my hair, “Tomorrow is a new day.”
It gets me thinking. What can I do to prevent another day like today? My wolf stirs inside.
Practice.
I need to get back out onto the archery field. Get my healed ankle back out onto that mossy, shitty ground and find a way to survive the next trial. Just as Maxim’s hands slowly glide away from my back to gently feel down my arms, I step to the side. Away from his soft, concerned affection.
“Tessa, come on-” stopping when I raise my palm upwards. I don’t want to fight, talk, explain, anything. I’m trying to hold myself together the only way! know how. If I start talking, who knows what trash will come out. Like a leaking, damaged pot I could spill everything. The things I’m not meant to.
Without
looking back I leave and run, as best as I can manage to Block E. I swoop up my The silence hovers between us as I quickly regather my arrows. quiver and bow, sliding the arrow–filled quiver across my shoulder mid–run. The last thing I want to do is run into Maxim again. I think, anyway.
Running on my second night of zero sleep I stand out in the mossy, deathtrap of a field. I retrace my steps. Tying my hair up into a huge bun, I study the space, using the moonlit shadows to gauge the high and low patches of moss. Maybe the lighter shades are firmer or some other hope.
Working my way further than I managed in over an hour this morning, every ten seconds I force myself to leap and draw the bow tight at imaginary enemies. It hurts my truncheon–whacked shoulders, my ankle twinges with warning, but little by little I’m learning.
Just as I wish the targets would move like this morning so I could practice firing, there is a familiar whirring.
In shock, a small, familiar wooden target, no bigger than a dinner plate whirs its way towards me.
“Go on then, get practicing!” a voice shouts, too far away to really see. But it’s Maxim.
The target weaves from left to right, trying to entice my shot. I reset myself, moving at a crouched, steady angle through the moss, relying on my low. centre of gravity to keep me steady, before quickly raising the bow and slamming an arrow straight into the centre.
The bell rings for curfew and I curse my bad luck.
“Keep moving! Far right coming at you! I got permission from the Wardens to run this thing late!”
I still don’t talk, but I do as he says and move. It wouldn’t suprise me if he didn’t ask for permission but I’m too grateful to question him.
So does this mean Maxim really fight Vigo for me? Is he out in this chilly night, yanking the handles of the target pulleys…for me?
