God, how could I have been so stupid? For a brief moment, I had actually deluded myself into thinking that he cared for me after all. I had thought that maybe I had been wrong about him, that maybe things between us could work out. But now he had just shown his true cards. I didn’t matter to him. The only reason he was paying me the slightest bit of attention was because I was the mother of his cub.
Sam’s eyes widened as if he had figured out what he had said and what it meant.
“Rachel, that’s not what I meant. That came out wrong—”
“No,” I said through clenched teeth as I glared up at him. “It’s exactly what you meant, and it’s what I’ve known all along.”
I turned, preparing to walk out. I had only gotten a few feet away when he grabbed my arm and pulled me back. He held onto me, making sure I was looking at him before he started speaking.
“I care about you,” he said firmly. “I wouldn’t be bending over backward and going to all this effort to make sure you stay safe if I didn’t. I have always cared about you, Rachel. And I want you to feel like I trust you, but I care more about keepingyou and that baby safe because I don’t know what I would do if something happened to either of you. Do you understand?”
If Sam had told me he cared about me back when we were kids, if he had looked at me the way he did now, I would have been over the moon. I would have felt like the luckiest woman in the world. Now, it just made me want to scream.
I wrenched my arm out of his grasp. “Drop the guards,” I hissed. “Do you understand?”
His jaw worked. For a brief moment, I thought I might have seen guilt flickering across his face. If I did, however, it was replaced almost instantly by a steely resolve as he shook his head.
“I’m not going to do that, Rachel,” he said.
Disappointment and betrayal sank into my stomach. I had thought he trusted me. He had apologized for assuming I couldn’t defend myself. I had thought he would respect my wishes and give me the space to breathe. But the truth was, he didn’t trust me. He had made a decision on what he thought was the best course of action and had taken it without consulting me. The same way he had when we were kids, when he had rejected me the first time. He had decided what was right without bothering to let me know ahead of time.
I had been an idiot to think he might have changed. He never would. He would never trust me, and for the rest of my life, he would continue to do this sort of thing.
Without another word, I stormed out of the room, taking deep breaths to force myself to stay in control. It wasn’t until I got out of the building and clambered into my car that I noticed I was crying.
Chapter 20 - Sam
The desert seemed to stretch on as we drove across the landscape, heading toward the mountain rising in the distance, the geological layers of the area showing in colored lines that rose up its side.
“Are you going to tell me what that fight was between you and Rachel?” Elias asked.
Panic lanced through me for the briefest moment. If he had overheard at the wrong moment, then this conversation was about to take an unpleasant turn.
“What do you mean?” I asked, keeping my tone casual.
“I saw her storming out of your office the other day,” Elias said. “She seemed pretty upset. She didn’t even notice me. So I was curious what had happened to make my kid sister so unhappy.”
His own tone remained just as casual as mine, but I could sense the danger lurking behind the words. I was walking on thin ice, and we both knew it. I had to pick my next words carefully.
The worst part was that I couldn’t even tell him the truth, at least not all of it. I couldn’t tell him Rachel was pregnant, not without talking to her first, and there was no way I would survive the conversation. But the secret had been weighing on me for a while, and it had only gotten heavier since she had gotten pregnant. I had been hiding how I truly felt about Rachel for years, and I was tired of it.
For a moment, I almost threw caution to the wind and told him everything. I only just managed to snatch the words back before they spilled out. Rachel was already furious enoughwith me. The last thing I wanted to do was antagonize her further by telling her big brother the truth about what was going on.
“I’ve had the guys keeping an eye on her ever since those shifters broke into the store while she worked,” I explained. “She found out and wasn’t particularly thrilled about it.”
Elias raised his eyebrow. “You didn’t tell her about it ahead of time?”
“Hell, no. She would have told me not to.”
Elias barked out a laugh. “Of course she would have. She’s a Thorn at heart.” He said the last bit with a tinge of pride. “So you just acted without letting her know. Forgiveness rather than permission?”
“Something like that,” I said.
He went silent for a long moment.
“Are you about to tell me that I shouldn’t do that?” I asked.
“I’m never going to be pissed off at you for protecting my sister,” he said. “I’m always in favor of keeping my family safe, and you’re doing your job as her mate. But that doesn’t mean you’re going about it the right way.”
