Maddox’s body gave a start at the question.
Oh, shit.
He’d said ‘Ant’, hadn’t he?
He jerked, then tightened his grip on Evangeline. Talk about déjà vu. Maddox had had this exact same conversation with her more than four years ago, shortly after she finally accepted that she was his mate. It was their first real fight back then and something warned him against answering her.
He should’ve listened.
“You, uh, you’ve never heard anyone say that before?”
“If I had, do you think I would be asking?”
She had a point.
“Ants… it’s kinda like how humans call paranormals ‘Paras’ when they’re referring to us as a group. They know that there’s countless different races, but they can’t be bothered to differentiate so there’s a catch-all term. Paras think of humans in the same way, I guess. They look around and see humans everywhere, and it reminds them of worker ants. Strong and resilient, good at mindless tasks, but”—and he winced, knowing that it sounded bad, yet unable to stop himself from adding—“ultimately there are way too many of them, easily replaced and, um, easily”—don’t say killed, don’t say exterminated, don’t say—“squashed.”
Evangeline’s gasp of outrage and the spike of betrayal in her scent were like a knife to his heart.
Bravo, Maddox. Genius fucking move, there.
He kind of expected her reaction; it was exactly the same as it had been. That didn’t mean he had to like it as she said, “Is that how you see me?”
Her voice was soft. Too soft. He would’ve taken the brunt of her lectures or her shouts gladly. But this dangerous quiet was a million times harder to hear.
Ah, hell.
If it was even possible, he fucked up worse.
Maybe it wasn’t too late for some damage control.
“Ang— Evangeline, no. I—”
She tucked her chin into her chest, refusing to look at him. He could’ve sworn he saw ice crystals billow out with her breath as she wondered coldly, “Why would you ever want to mate with something so useless?”
Nope. Too late.
Still, Maddox knew Evangeline better than she would ever expect. That was one of the only advantages he had. She might insist that they’d never met before this week, but they’d had a whole life together before the accident. He knew how she liked her eggs, how she cried over ASPCA commercials with puppies and kittens, how she refused to sleep with anything less than four pillows, and how she used a sharp wit as battle armor coupled with her soft voice as a shield. When she got like this, Maddox always backed off and let her win.
But that was before. After they were bonded, she could win any fucking argument they had. After they were bonded. Until then, no matter how dirty he had to play, he was going to win. Losing wasn’t an option. Evangeline was his and, with certainty ringing in every word, he told her e
xactly that.
“Because you’re mine.”
Evangeline clamped her mouth shut, didn’t respond. As far as Maddox could tell, she had resigned herself to being brought back to the cabin. Not that he expected she’d given up on trying to escape—his Angie had always been a fighter—but his wolf finally stopped in its frantic pacing once the cabin was back in his sights.
She started to struggle a bit as he opened the back door, stopping when she realized that he had no intention of letting her tackle the steps that would lead up to the second floor. Evangeline sighed softly, her breath tickling his overheated skin. His cock twitched, a reminder that he was still as hard as a fucking rock.
He was super grateful that Evangeline hadn’t caught on to his arousal yet. Her beautiful scent was finally free of the taint of fear. If for only a few minutes, he wanted to pretend she wasn’t afraid of him.
Though he couldn’t help but feel an ache down below as he brought Evangeline back into the bedroom.
Maddox placed her on the bed gently, warned her not to move, then disappeared through the bedroom door. Evangeline was just working up enough strength to test her weight on her ankle again when he returned, carrying a bag of ice in one hand, a glass of water in the other. He set the glass on the night table before opening his fist.
There were two tiny white pills nestled against his palm.
She held up a slightly shaking hand, warding him off. “Oh, no, no, no. After what happened with my macchiato, I’m not gonna swallow anything you give me ever again. Who knows if I’ll wake up at all next time.”