Chapter 19

The next few days passed in a drunken haze. Sometimes Carter passed me around, but mostly, he kept me to himself, taking me to his room so he could ply my body with a variety of pain-inducing toys.

Daily runs became the most dreaded part of my day. I always felt a twinge of hurt when Bash's wolf set out with me before careening off into the sidelines. The reminder drove the wedge in my chest deeper—he didn't want me. Wouldn't give chase. Couldn't care less.

But Bash at night was a different creature. More patient than I'd expected for someone of his impressive skill. He didn't say a word when my hangover interfered with the perfect circles I'd been able to produce the previous night. By the third night, I was so sick of circles and lines I could scream, but Bash just sat there, completely oblivious, his eyes glued to the page as he drew a squirrel with fur so real I wanted to brush my hand across it to see if it was as soft as it looked.

There was no conversation between us, just quiet words of instruction when I showed him my work. Until one night, he reviewed my page and gave a curt nod.

"Okay, we're ready to move on."

Fuck yeah. I squealed, wiggling in the chair cushion, making all kinds of embarrassing sounds on the fake leather. He watched me, drinking in my excitement without reacting. The same way he'd been watching me get fucked on the couch in front of him this week.

It pissed me off.

Just more of the fucking same.

He cleared his throat and took a clean sheet of paper. I expected him to draw some guidelines on it. Maybe some more curved lines to practice drawing between or a tortuous slope within which I was to draw more circles, but he held it in his hand before sliding the blank paper in front of me.

"Draw one of your figures."

Incredulously, I looked from the paper to Bash, studying his face to see if he was serious.

Draw one of my figures? I'd drawn nothing but random shapes and lines since his instruction had started, and now he wanted me to draw figures?

"What?"

He smirked, and I hated how sexy it looked on him. "I want you to try drawing a figure, just as you've been drawing them before we started."

I stared at him, wide eyed. He was supposed to be teaching me how to draw figures, not giving me blank papers and telling me to do it.

"I can't. They're shit. I showed you what they were like. Aren't you supposed to teach me how to draw?"

His smirk spread into a grin, and fuck him for looking even cuter. He slammed his stained hands down on the table. "That's the point! You've been practicing the technical skills you need to draw figures, Syl. I want you to see how much progress you've made. Basics are boring, but they're important." His smile was contagious, and I felt a matching one creep onto my face.

"So, I'm doing good?"

He slammed the table again. Loud enough I glanced behind me at the hallway of doors, sure Carter was about to wake up and come snatch me away.

"You're doing fucking fantastic. Don't believe me?" He waggled his eyebrows. "Draw a figure. Just like you used to. Don't try to do anything differently. Let's just see how it comes out."

The challenge issued, I turned my attention to the blank page, picking up a pencil and blowing out a breath. I could feel Bash's eager eyes on me, and I glanced up to find him leaning my way, peering over my arm to get a better view.

"Do you mind not watching?" It was stupid and sheepish, but the way he studied my paper made me nervous.

"Right, right. Of course. Sorry." He turned back to his own page, adding more details to the squirrel's whiskers, as if the woodland animal didn't already look ready to jump off the page and go hunting for nuts. He still glanced up at me occasionally, and he grinned when I caught him, a twinkle of pride in his eye that warmed my heart.

"Sorry, I can't help it. I'll be good." He fixed his eyes on the page, and I could almost feel the effort it took him not to watch me as I put pencil to paper and began trying to sketch the human shape I wanted to dress.

No way.The figure still didn't look right, its arms and legs disproportionate in my failed attempt at tilting her sideways, but my goddess.

Fucking Bash.

She took shape.

The body was wrong, and I could see the errors, but I could also see how much smoother and easier it was to translate my vision to the page. Her head was a bit oversized, but it was perfectly round—the circles. The lines of her body didn't bounce around. They were perfectly straight—the lines he'd had me draw.

Amazed, I sat back, staring at my hand and the pencil I held.

"Can I look yet?" Bash's voice was strained. I looked up at him in surprise, almost forgetting another person was at the table with me, and that was saying a lot. I was usually painfully aware when Bash was present or not.

I'd done this. Drawing the figures had been hard before, every line a challenge, but now those movements were second nature, and my vision on the page was faulty but clear.

"Y-yes."

Bash practically threw his pencil away and grabbed my paper, holding it in front of his face and grinning.

"This is what I'm talking about, Syl. We started with the line work because of this. You did this."

Embarrassed by just how far outside his scope of skill my pathetic excuse for artwork was, I moved to take it back, but he held the paper away. "No, this calls for a celebration. I could fucking frame this thing."

Frame it?The thought made my stomach churn. Nothing about my drawing deserved framing, but Bash stared at it like it was a fine piece. Like it was worthy. Like I was worth something other than fucking and making babies. I teared up, not sure why, and turning my face so he wouldn't see.

"Syl? Are you okay?"

I nodded, not willing to turn towards him and show him just how not okay I was.

"Yeah, fine. Just emotional. I've been trying so hard to get these right, and I've never been able to. I'm going to—Excuse me." Keeping my head turned, I gathered my papers and pencil and retreated to the quiet of my room.

But the joy springing to life in my chest was squashed when I used the washroom before bed and found a smear of blood on the toilet paper. I dropped my face into my hands and let the tears flow, a seemingly unending stream mirroring the pain inside. I gasped in a breath, my body remembering I needed it to survive. Cleaning up only took a few minutes, but mentally retrieving a sanitary product from the shelf, knowing I would need to tell everyone my period had come, lasted an eternity.

This cycle was a bust. I'd failed. Which meant I had just one cycle remaining in my extension. One last chance to prove my value to the pack as a mother before they would deem me infertile and find another use for me. One that did not require me to keep my fingernails.

The hall was silent, and I was grateful for it. I didn't think I could stand seeing another person right now. The soft padding between my legs haunted me, a reminder of my failure. All my efforts, everything I'd done, and it hadn't mattered.

I wanted to scream. To punch a wall and break through the plaster until I splintered the wood beyond, damaging the very stability of this place. But doing so would bring people out of their rooms, and then I'd have to explain to them—to tell them I'd failed yet again.

Walking in a haze out of the dorms to face the forest, I tilted my face up to bask in the light of the crescent moon, imagining it was a better mother than the one I had and would dry my tears. The moon couldn't do that, but the light and imagining was a comfort in a harsh reality. Not in the mood to shift, I ran down the path to the left, heading back to the houses and hoping I wouldn't run into any guards.

The wind blew across my face with a chill to it that froze the tears to my cheeks. The sensation only made me run harder, faster, until my muscles screamed at me to stop, and my chest burned. My useless limbs gave up, forcing me to halt and double over, panting as I tried to catch my breath.

The world seemed against me, and I let a few more tears leak out before making my way silently down the tree-lined path and back to the dorms. I settled on not telling anyone, but answering if I was asked, unable to stomach the idea of announcing my failure to the others.

But it wasn't all bad, and as I opened the heavy front door with dread weighing me down, my eyes fell on the dining table and a smile tugged at my lips.

Another month to spend with Bash.