"You've no idea."
"You're wrong, Nick. I know exactly what it's like to watch the people I love more than anything be slaughtered while I was powerless to save them. I, who trained my entire life to fight, couldn't save the very people I'd vowed to love and protect. How could I not be there to save them?"
A tic started in his cheek. "How do you live with it?"
She answered honestly. "Angrily. Every single day. Every single night. I want blood and all the killing in the world never changes it. Never eases it."
He let out a tired sigh. "So this is how I'll feel forever?"
"Unless you can find another reason to live. Find something that gives you peace."
He looked down at her. "Have you found that peace?"
Yes, she had. But it was so corny and cliched that she couldn't bring herself to admit it.
"A wise man once told me that peace has to come from within. We have to learn to like ourselves before we can find our place in the world."
Nick curled his lip. "Acheron."
She smiled. "He's said it to you, too?"
"No. We don't talk much these days, but it sounds like something he'd say." His gaze turned dark. "Don't trust Acheron, Sam. He's not what he seems."
She sensed....
Sam concentrated, but she couldn't get a handle on it exactly. There was something Nick knew that none of the rest of them did. It was like he was hating Acheron for the same thing he protected about him.
It made no sense, but there was no denying what she felt. Nick did know a major secret about Ash.
And he knew one about himself that he would die before he gave up.
"How do you mean?" she asked, trying to get him to verbalize what she was sensing.
He refused to elaborate. "Believe me, there's a lot more to him and he's not really on our side." With that, he walked off to leave her alone.
Sam scowled at his hostility. Part of her knew there was a lot more to Ash than he let others see, but she didn't believe for one instant that he could ever hurt any of them.
Nick on the other hand...
She didn't trust him at all. He was infected by evil. She was sure of it.
Her heart heavy, she started back to her room, wishing Dev were with her.
I did the right thing.
He was safe and that was all that mattered.
Sam had just reached her room when she felt her hand beginning to burn. Hissing, she blew air across her palm, trying to soothe it.
Just when she was ready to scream from the pain, it stopped burning.
To her instant horror, she watched as a design drew itself across her flesh. There in her palm was a mark that looked like a tribal bear claw.
Oh shit.
She was mated....
Dev came awake to a scorching hot pain. At first he thought he was under attack, until he realized it was only his palm that hurt. Scowling, he shook his hand, then looked at it to see what he'd done to it.