my father had weighed the two of us and decided I was the one who’d offended him. God.
You’re a survivor, Piper. Be smart. Just say you’re sorry and take your licks and fight another day…
It was getting harder with every day closer to my eighteenth birthday and my escape, but this was when I’d have to be the most careful.
Still, a lump lodged in my throat, and it was hard to form the words of an apology around it. I owed Eli something, but it’s sure as hell wasn’t an apology. One day he’d find himself getting exactly what he deserved. And I’d be the one who gave it to him, so help me God.
Eli’s eyes met mine. There was victory in his gaze and in the way his lips turned up around the edges, even though he was trying to bite back his smile. He enjoyed my misery.
“Piper.” My father’s voice was full of warning.
“It’s all right, Steve,” Mr. Kingston said. “It was just a misunderstanding. Let the kids work it out.”
My father’s jaw set. Mr. Kingston was trying to help, but he was just making things worse by undermining my father’s authority, and nothing was as precious to my father as his authority. Certainly, I’d never been anywhere near as precious.
I just have to get through this. I stared into Eli’s eyes, hoping to communicate telepathically that no matter what I said now, I’d be his bloody end one day.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“For what?” My father’s voice was low and dangerous. This was just getting worse. If I’d managed to apologize right away, if Mr. Kingston hadn’t said anything, maybe this would be over already.
“For pushing you,” I said to Eli. The memory rose quickly in my mind—Eli falling backward, about to land on his ass—and it was my turn to hide the impulse to smile. They could make me say ‘I’m sorry,’ but they couldn’t change what happened.
“And for being rude,” my father said. “If Eli still wants to go out with you, despite all your foolishness, I’ll allow it. She’d be a lucky girl.” He said that last to Mr. Kingston, who nodded.
“Thank you, sir,” Eli said.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
“Piper and I can talk about it at school.” Eli’s lips turned up even more. The smug, self-satisfied, sick asshole.
“Sounds good,” my father said briskly. “All right, well, my apologies again.”
He was already swinging open the front door. As much as I didn’t want Eli and Mr. Kingston to stay, I didn’t feel exactly peachy about having them leave, either.
“Have a good night,” Mr. Kingston said. “We’re on for poker this weekend?”
“Of course,” my father said.
He hosted every month. It was always a good night. Maddie and I watched movies in my room while his friends took over our basement. We weren’t allowed downstairs, but he always got us a pizza and snacks. It was my favorite night every month, a bright spot that I looked forward to.
He nodded goodbye, and Eli and Mr. Kingston filed out the door. They headed across the long green lawn. Eli’s black Hummer was parked on the street. Mr. Kingston must have let him drive. I still hadn’t learned.
When my father closed the door, he stayed very still for a second, his back to me, his hand on the doorknob.
I waited, still as a rabbit, my heart pounding in my chest.
He closed the deadbolt and turned to me, the expression on his face thunderous.
“You embarrassed me, Piper,” he said, his voice low. “Mr. Kingston is my friend. Eli is one of your oldest friends.”
I didn’t think either of us believed that was true.
“What’s come over you?” he asked me.
“I’m sorry,” I said, and even though I didn’t mean it any more than I did before, the words fell easily from my lips.
His fingers crawled over the buckle of his belt. There was a soft whisper of leather as he pulled it out of his belt loops before it hung from one of his big fists.
Still, the belt wasn’t the worst thing that’d ever happened to me.
“Get up to your room now,” he told me.
Download now, and find out what happens to Piper next in this complete reverse harem trilogy beginning with Their Shifter Princess…
Also by May Dawson
The True and the Crown series:
One Kind of Wicked
Two Kinds of Damned
Three Kinds of Lost
Four Kinds of Cursed
Five Kinds of Love
Their Shifter Princess:
Their Shifter Princess
Their Shifter Princess 2: Pack War
Their Shifter Princess 3: Coven’s Revenge
Their Shifter Academy:
Their Shifter Academy: A Prequel Novella
Their Shifter Academy 1: Unwanted
Their Shifter Academy 2: Unclaimed
Their Shifter Academy 3: Undone
Their Shifter Academy 4: Unforgivable
Their Shifter Academy 5: Unwinnable
Their Shifter Academy 6: Unstoppable
The Wild Angels & Hunters Series:
Wild Angels
Fierce Angels
Dirty Angels
Chosen Angels
Academy of the Supernatural
Her Kind of Magic
His Dangerous Ways
Their Dark Imaginings
Ashley Landon, Bad Medium
Dead Girls Club