Chapter Ten

Delaney

What the hell is on my head?

It's probably not worth trying to find out, because even though I've only been conscious for less than a minute, I can already tell my hangover is a doozy. Best just to ignore the ridiculous thing I fell asleep with on the outside of my brain place and avoid moving at all costs.

My bedroom door opens, leaving me puzzled, because I have no idea who's even in my apartment right now. I thought the guys weren't getting in until later tonight, and I definitely don't think they know how to cook bacon.

"Here, take this," a low voice rumbles out, putting some pills in my hand. I let out a groan when I try and set up, so he gives me an assist, pulling me up against the headboard like I'm a child. A cool glass of water gets put in my hand next to assist in swallowing the pills, and I turn to see a very neutral faced Wilder, holding a hot cup of coffee hostage.

"Drink that whole cup of water and then I'll give you the coffee. I was unsure how you took it, so I just left it black but I can grab the cream and sugar if you want."

"Just cream please," I croak, not even questioning why he's here or what sort of drug he"s plying me with.

He disappears and comes back with the carton of cream from my fridge and a spoon, pouring it into my mug and mixing it for me before he goes to put the accoutrements away.

When he returns I'm just staring confusedly into the cup of coffee, trying to figure out what's happening.

"Do you not remember last night?" Clearly this state of confusion isn"t limited to internal signs.

I blindly pat my forehead with the hand not holding coffee, pulling off a black lace thong that I apparently was using as a sleeping mask. Gods I hope I pulled these from my dresser and not my laundry basket.

"I remember the tequila," I offer, taking a sip of the coffee and not even caring that it"s slightly too hot to be chugging. I can feel the caffeine immediately seep into my bloodstream, perking me right up.

"We decided last night we were going to be friends and put the past behind us," he says with a straight face.

"Good one. Okay no, I remember you barging in here and giving me shit for drinking, chasing off my other friend, and then refusing to leave."

"It"s my job to take care of you, and I was under the impression that you met that guy last night whilst discussing the sexual organs of the stone fa?ade outside your window," he explains.

I notice he's only in a white undershirt, the long-sleeved shirt he arrived in missing. This is the first chance I"ve had to see his forearm, to see the mark that matches mine. On him it just looks like a tattoo; a dark, nearly charcoal lion with a full mane, electric cobalt blue accents on some of the tips around the mane and dripping off the bottom quarter of it. He also has a thick band on his fourth finger that darkens his hand, further proof that he's fully spoken for. It feels very weird to me, seeing it all. The circle on my arm I've been trying to avoid isn't quite as vivid as his, but they're definitely a matched set.

He catches me staring at it, and he lifts up my arm, setting my coffee aside so he can study it close. "I guess it's true what they say, huh? Your mom really is goddess blessed. Looks like she gave some of her power to you, if you were able to claim me when we weren't even really on speaking terms. You have a likeness of my lion on your forearm. Well, a fantastical one anyway. Can"t say my lion has any blue in his mane. That would be quite a sight, would it not?"

"I'm not going to apologize for making this possible, because you did it first. It doesn't have to mean anything, but I won't be punished for it."

"I didn't know you were coming to Hemlock when I claimed you," he admits. "If I'd known…"

"You would have reconsidered putting a claiming mark on my neck before spending any time getting to know me or getting permission to do so?" Bastard doesn"t even look apologetic.

"I might have gone about it differently, yes. I was sure I'd never see you again."

"Oh, that's much better," I tell him. "I never would have been able to find you, would have been wandering around with part of my soul out there somewhere. Very considerate of you."

"You could… feel me? Before you put this on my arm?"

"It took me some time to figure out what the feeling was, but yes. It was just like this empty, achy feeling inside of me. I didn't like it, and I still don"t know anything about you other than the fact you're a huge pain in my ass and the meanest teacher I've ever had. Why are you here? I"m assuming you stayed the night?"

"Slept on the couch to make sure you were alright after you passed out. You called it correctly; I was an asshole to you."

"I thought lions were supposed to revere their mates? Do you guys define that differently or something? Because I'm not feeling very revered."

"I really did just put a claim on you to take care of you, I promise. I couldn't watch my father do anything to you, not knowing how young you were and how much life you had in you. He would have crushed that, Delaney. He would have taken your spirit and forced you to submit to him. He would have been rough with you, you would have worn marks from a very different sort of relationship, and you'd be looking anywhere you could to escape, except that there wouldn't be anyplace to because he's the pride male. Nobody goes against him."

"Except you," I point out. "Clearly you did."

"Actually, since he never formally declared his intentions, I'm technically not going against him at all. I just assumed he might make a move on you since you were such a public image, and you're so beautiful, you"re a prize any lion would be honored to have won."

"Goddess, you're going to make me puke. Don't talk about me like I'm a fucking prize. I'm a person. A human being. If you didn"t have any intention of doing anything with the bond you forced on me, then maybe I am sorry for forcing my own on you, but you started the shitty games, so I had to award you with a shitty prize."

"A claim from you is hardly a shitty prize. Is that why you were getting drunk last night? Because of how repulsed you are by me?"

"Whoa, we're not that kind of friends that I need to explain this to you. We are not friends at all actually, but I can honestly say this had nothing to do with you. There are actually other things happening in my life beside your backward claim on me."

"I would like to change that— why can"t we be friends, other than the fact that I"m way too old for you? We can make friendship work though, I"m sure of it."

He doesn't add anything else, even as I sit there and wait, so I just stare at him.

"What?" he finally asks.

"You don't just get to decide what we do. This is a two-way relationship here; you can't just declare something. I don't care who you are in the lion clan, you will give me the respect I deserve or I will not have anything else to do with you."

"I'm terrible with relationships. But I want to learn. I've been thinking about this since you were in my class a few days ago, and I realize that this doesn't have to be a bad thing."

"For the love of the goddess, the compliments just keep rolling off your tongue. Tell me, do you practice them in the mirror, or are do they birth themselves miraculously perfect?"

"Delaney, can we please just start over?"

"No, we cannot. You can't take away what you've already put me through, and I would like you to leave my suite."

He nods "That"s fair. Can I take you out to dinner next week? Or tonight? Or sometime during this week when you're done with classes?"

"Also no."

He waits for more explanation, but I don't give any.

"That's it? Are you going to tell me why you"re so quick to say no?"

"I don't need to give you a reason. It's really damn obvious, and I don't want to spend time with you. I don't think you'll bring value to me, and quite frankly I'd much prefer spending time by myself to spending time with you. So there's no need to throw you into the mix when I like myself just fine. Thank you for the coffee and the pills, but I would really like it if you would leave."

"Delaney—"

"No. I have nothing else to say to you right now. I'm very uncomfortable, and I don't want you in my space. Please respect my boundaries."

He nods and stands, walking out the door of my room and pausing at the threshold. "I made you breakfast. Hope those painkillers kick in soon so you're not too uncomfortable today."

"Thank you," I say politely. I don't move until I hear my outer door click shut, and then I'm up and locking it so nobody else can walk in.

I spin around and look around to make sure he didn"t put anything where it shouldn't be, or touch anything, when I see the breakfast table laid out nicely for two. It's a little weird he helped himself to my groceries, even if he was trying to cook for me. But there're two places set with orange juice, pancakes, scrambled eggs, bacon, even a flower in the middle of the table that came from who knows where.

I feel guilty for maybe thirty seconds, until I remind myself that giving in to him because of one nice gesture is stupid.

I begrudgingly eat from one of the plates, wishing it wasn't as perfectly cooked as it was so I could complain about it. When my stomach is full and my head isn't throbbing as much thanks to the pain killers and coffee, I have to exhale and admit to myself that Wilder did one nice thing. But I don't know how that's supposed to balance anything out, so I figure a shower might be the next best thing I can do with my time right now. I hate to waste his food, but it's not like it's going to be good reheated, so I trash it and wash the plates, noticing he already cleaned up the pans he used to cook on.

He's too perfect. I don't trust it.

And then I don"t really know what to do with my day. It"s too early in the semester to have any homework, my best friend apparently thinks I'm like a plague, I dumped my boyfriends, and my actual mate is a dick.

You know, I"m really beginning to think the problem is me.

I could drive home since it"s only about an hour away, but that would be admitting I couldn"t handle living on my own, that college isn"t as good as I hoped it would be.

Maybe I"ll just sit outside with a book.

I grab one I've been wanting to start and head to my perfect little balcony, trying not to be embarrassed by how adamant I was last night that my gargoyle buddy had a hard on. Note to self: tequila makes me very dumb.

Barefoot, I step on something next to the window that hurts like a fucker, making me yell out random swear words until it stops throbbing.

Blood is welling from my heel where a sharp piece of rock is now imbedded into it, even though I'm sure I vacuumed at some point yesterday while I was trying to avoid my problems. Also, the window is open slightly.

In fact, there seems to be a small collection of rock crumbles from the window to where I'm standing a few feet away from it, nestled in the awful shag carpeting and making it a danger to the body and the eye.

There has to be something else I missed in the apartment, a reasonable excuse for all this rubble to be here; but the rocks are isolated to this one specific area and don't stem from something else in the room that I decided to destroy last night in a drunken stupor. Standing where I am, where the rocks stop their progression forward, I have the perfect view of my bed, as if whoever left this mess stood here and went no further inside because they wanted to watch me…sleep? Because that's not at all creepy.

My first thought is to call Adam, but then I remember that he thinks I'm trash, so I don't do that. Cory might help, but he"s dating the man that thinks I'm trash, so that won't do either. I could call my brother, but I'm pretty sure that he's hanging out with his girlfriend since Sunday is his only full day off during the week.

Well, I wanted to live alone and be independent, I guess I can handle this myself.

When I go to open the giant window that I have to cross through to get to the balcony, it strikes me as odd that it opens so smoothly. No noise or resistance, nothing that would alert me if it was being opened. And I'm sure I'm only taking note of that now because I'm fully paranoid by all these little discoveries, but it is worrying.

There's more rock debris out on the balcony, a lot of it actually. It's a small space, but I walk around it to try and figure out why the mess looks so weird.

I freeze with my heart in my throat when the rocks seem to take shape into letters.

Somebody was on my balcony, must have taken advantage of this slightly deteriorating gargoyle for material. I don't know what they used to chip the stones off of him, but all of the gravel I've seen inside and out of the apartment is a perfect color and texture match to him. There"s even a part of his base that's extra crumbly now, with loose stones scattered about the railing.

For some reason, my first thought is to comfort and apologize to the fake man. "So sorry they hurt you," I tell him with my hand on his leg. In the light of day, I can tell he definitely does not have an erection like I was convinced of last night, which is mildly upsetting. "How did they even get up here?" I wonder, because we're so many floors off the ground, and the building is brick with hardly enough grooves for any sort of finger hold.

There is a tree not too far off, though it would be a hell of a jump to make and there's no way whoever trespassed could have jumped onto this balcony without me or Wilder noticing.

Damn it. I have to call him, don't I?

Luckily, my phone is in my pocket so I don"t have to go back inside, because leaving the scene and having to face it all over again feels scarier than staying here and becoming somewhat numb to it.

I vaguely remember Wilder saying something about putting his number in my phone when he was helping me to bed last night. I hope I didn't dream that part. It"s a total bitch move to call for help after I completely kicked him out, but if he really wants to be my mate, then I guess he can start now.

I bite my nails as I wait for him to answer the phone, freezing in place when I see him sitting on a bench outside my dorm, looking down as hell. I duck down beneath my railing so he doesn't see me, because this amuses me and because I'm awkward as hell.

"Delaney? Do you need something? Is something wrong? I didn't think you'd use my number or remember that I gave it to you."

It"s kind of fun to watch his reactions without him knowing I can see him. "Umm, I'm not sure. Were there any sort of odd noises from the balcony last night you heard in your much-more-sober-than-me state?"

His eyes immediately snap to my balcony and he stands up, looking for me. Okay, the jig is up. I stand up too so he can see me as he starts taking long strides back to the dorm. "No, nothing. Why? You need me up there?"

"There was nothing at the window? What about rocks falling to the ground? Or maybe somebody jumping onto the balcony from that tree over there? I was just going to come hang out outside, but I stepped on something and—"

"Are you okay?"

"Fine."

"Are you sure? Because I can take you to the clinic. I don't mind, I promise."

"I can handle a little blood, Wilder."

"Fuck. You're bleeding? I'm coming up there. Stay put."

For fuck's sake. He's gonna act like a complete dick to me in class, but the second he finds out I nicked my foot it"s suddenly a crisis?

I narrow my eyes at him when he walks right into my room, pocketing a set of keys. "You just unlocked that. How the hell did you get a key to my place?"

"You're my mate."

"Hardly! Who the hell gave you a key to my place?"

"That's not important. Let me see your foot." He nearly sprints across the room to reach me, eyeing the rubble on the floor as he pulls me way too tenderly through the window and back into my living room. "Do you have a first aid kit? It would be a shame to get blood all over this beautiful green shag carpet…"

"Bathroom," I mumble, ignoring the jab at the décor I can"t change, because I realize that nothing else is going to get discussed until he sees this through. Shifter brain.

He sets everything on the coffee table before sitting down on the couch and lifting my foot in his lap, opening up an antiseptic wipe to clean it. "I think there're still some stones in your foot."

"There should be some tweezers in the kit."

He grabs the tweezers and very carefully digs around and gets everything out, placing the pebbles on the used antiseptic wipe before opening up another one to clean my wound again. He"s diligent with ointment application and a bandage, smoothing everything out before cleaning up after himself and washing his hands.

"Thank you." I sound like I'm slightly turned on, but it's only because I am.

"Of course, anything."

"Did you get body snatched?" I blurt out.

He smiles at me and it scares me so bad that I actually fall off the couch. Which is a problem because there's still a coffee table there that I hit my head on.

"Godsdamn it, Delaney. Can you please stop injuring yourself? I don't like it. Do you need an ice pack?"

I rub the bump and wave him off. "I'm fine. Promise, I think I'm gonna live."

"Don't joke about that."

"Oh right. No other lioness to take my place, right? Is that why you're still interested in me? Because I'm rare?"

He grabs my hand gently, holding it with both of his. "I always wanted to mate for love, not duty to my clan. My lion's actually not quite as picky as he could be. I might have found a non-lion partner eventually, and I guess I've been taking it out on you that I lost the option to choose."

"Oh my goddess. Seriously?" I yank my hand back. "I think I'm going to scream."

He tilts his head "Why, other than the fact that you're interrupting my story?"

"Because out of the people I"ve found that are supposed to be my mates, four out of four have informed me they don't want to be my mate.

"Honestly, if I don't take on any mates or complete the bond, the worst that will happen is that I just lose my magic, right? I think I could handle losing pieces of my soul like that, if it meant I could save myself from all this rejection. It is just cruel to expect me to keep bouncing back. It's supposed to be a magical experience at Hemlock, but instead I'm getting a ‘go fuck yourself' left and right instead."

He pulls me onto the couch and then gets on his knees in front of me, dropping his head right on my lap while his hands gently wrap around my ankles. "You didn't let me finish my story. After seeing my mom abused by my dad for years, I knew I couldn't let anybody else get into that position with him if I could help it. The second the rumors hit me that you were a lion shifter, I acted almost without thought because even though I didn't know you, I knew you were way too young and way too important to this community to be swallowed up by somebody like him."

"I feel like you're not giving a lot of credit to how scary my parents are. You do know my mother ate the being that was going to destroy the world, right? Ate him like a bag of fucking pretzels. And don"t even get me started on the fact that I have eleven fathers. Have you heard the name Jericho Mathers? Top assassin? He used to braid my hair when I was little. I"m sorry, but you saying I wasn't safe from your crappy little lion daddy is insulting. Do you not think my parents taught me how to take care of myself? I'm a princess, but I've got some moves."

"No doubt, your parents are epic and strong, and I have full faith in you, and if my dad took you in I"m sure your parents would have gotten you back; but the question is, how much damage would my father have caused you in that time? Because I know he would have forced a claim upon you like I did, then he'd be under your skin until he died. Which probably wouldn't have been too far off knowing your temper, but I digress.

"I watched you that day at the picnic, you know? There was this sparkle to your eye, and as stupid as it sounds, you're my dream woman. Everyone you talked to walked away looking like they'd just won a prize. You're magical. I watched because I wanted to know who I was tying myself to, and watching you interact with so many strangers that you were so kind to made me feel like I was honor bound to protect you. I wanted to preserve that at all costs so I didn"t have to watch my father snuff it out.

"I hated that I couldn't give you the proper courting that you deserved. Besides the fact that you're the daughter of the queen, and I'm just some lion shifter that teaches at a college, I'm also way too old for you. Our values are not the same.

"I studied the way those bodyguards looked at you, and I instantly knew that fixating on you could be turned into a weakness because they were clearly infatuated and a little distracted. It was way too easy to separate you from them, and that pissed me off."

"I wasn't too happy about it either," I remind him.

"And having you in my arms like that? It was ridiculous how good that felt. I knew you would never choose me if it were up to you. We don't run in the same circles, you would never have looked at me or thought of me romantically, not when you have the pick of the litter."

I sit there quietly and listen, even though he"s wrong. I absolutely could have seen him in a romantic light if he'd have flirted to let me know he was interested. Age isn"t important to me, because that doesn"t reflect anything about a person"s soul. Unless they"re underage. No thank you.

"I bit you knowing exactly how hard it would be to walk away from you, but I just kept telling myself I was keeping you safe. My mark would protect you, and I figured it would just be an invisible shield in case my father plucked up the courage to approach you. I never meant to crash into your life and commandeer one of the actual mate spots on your arm, because I didn't want to take that choice from you.

"I was so mad when you showed up to campus because it meant I was going to have to continually see you all the time. My lion all but forced me to go to you, knowing I couldn't do anything about our connection because I also have a human counterpart that knows you and I are basically strangers. I was sure you'd be repulsed by the thought of me trying to establish anything since I was your teacher. You're young and beautiful, you should be with somebody on your level."

"Are you done telling me what I need?"

He lifts his head, finally feeling up to some eye contact. "Why do you seem surprised and offended?"

"I know nothing about your dad, but if you thought he was a big threat… hypothetically, let"s say I believe you. If your father is a big threat to me, then you acted in my best interest by trying to protect me in the way you felt you could. It must have been so frustrating for you to bite me knowing you'd never be able to claim somebody else in that way. Especially if you thought you would never see me again. The fact that you walked away instead of trying to force a new life on me supports the claim that you thought you were being noble. I"m not sure I can fault that, even if the thought process was a little backward.

"I was hanging out with some friends, actually Cory, your TA? They're dating my best friend. Maybe ex-best friend, I don't know. But I was hanging out with both of them, I said something about lions, and they piped up saying they had all kinds of information about it because they worked with you, and I kind of let it slip that you'd claimed me. Obviously, that's when I found out that you worked here, and furthermore that I was in your class. I was terrified; I had no idea how you'd react, that's why I tried to sneak into the back of your classroom. I was trying not to be noticed. I was more than a little embarrassed, especially when you didn't really greet me, but instead went out of your way to isolate and ostracize me."

He lowers his head as his hands once more run up the outsides of my legs, starting slow chills that make their way to the outside of my hips. I shouldn't like that he's touching me that intimately, but I do, and once again I feel starved for any sort of affection. When he talks again, his voice is softer, more vulnerable. "If I could go back in time and change that entire day, I would, no matter the cost. I was so caught off guard seeing you in my class even though I knew you'd be there, so on edge because my lion was pacing like crazy, and I was fighting him. That"s why I lashed out at you. Obviously it had nothing to do with you, it was me and my beast butting heads, and it made me really cranky.

"I"m not known for being the friendliest of teachers on campus as it is, and there you were, this giant temptation, the most beautiful thing I could never have, smelling so damn sweet even from all the way in the back, and I lost my mind wanting you. It was all I could do to stay in front of that class of students and pretend to be the consummate professional I really wasn't, and I'm never out of control like that. My head was a mess, and I lashed out. I"m so sorry Delaney, for being unfair to you and in such a public way."

"It was humiliating," I admit.

"And I'm sorry for that. I'm sorry for making you feel my classroom was unsafe. I never want that for my students, even if college students annoy the hell out of me a lot of the time."

"Thank you for the apology. And for meaning it this time; I wasn't convinced you did when you approached me after class. Even if you had meant it though, it wouldn"t have mattered because I wasn't ready to hear it."

"Delaney, when you claimed me in the middle of my lecture, I thought I was going to have a damn heart attack up at the lectern. I never thought I'd get to feel that from you, never thought I'd wear your mark. And then the fact that I'm your first one? It's an honor I don't deserve."

I hang my head, wondering if letting my magic loose to claim him like that was in fact the biggest mistake I"ve ever made. I literally know next to nothing about this man, have no idea if we"re compatible at all, or even if we get along or would enjoy spending time together, and now we"re magically bound for better or worse. But I guess it"s not like we weren"t already, I just made our bond more impermeable. "Whether you deserve it or not, it's done."

He nods, acknowledging that. "So where do we go from here?"

I open my mouth to speak but suddenly a large crack sounds, startling us into turning our heads to see something hard hit the balcony window, leaving behind a very damaged plane of glass with web-like cracks covering most of it.

"What the hell was that? Did somebody throw a rock at your window?"

Wilder jumps up to investigate, but I pull him back. "Wait. That's why I called you here. I stepped on some sharp rocks walking over to the window, and I thought it was weird that the window was open a little bit. I was wondering if you maybe had gone out through it this morning to get some air and didn"t shut it all the way?"

He shakes his head no.

"Damn it. I was really hoping you'd say yes. The window doesn't make any noise and it moves without any resistance, so I wouldn't have heard it if it opened, but if you stand where the rocks stop…" I trail off while he walks to that spot, looking around the apartment until he sees my rumpled bed that I never made this morning. It's actually a perfect view to where I was sleeping .

He seems as confused as I am. "I didn't hear anybody in here though, and I have elevated hearing because I'm a shifter. If somebody was in here, I would have known, Delaney."

"There's more. Go outside with your back to the railing and look at the rocks on the ground."

He crawls out, careful not to disturb anything and then starts cussing. Because the rocks on the ground, if you look at them from the right angle, spell out the words ‘you're mine.'