“I can’t do that!” My voice was savage and raw, all of the hurt spilling out. “I’m not some psycho!”
I stared at him. He didn’t answer but he knew. I could see it in his eyes. He knew he was hurting me and he didn’t want to.So why are you doing it? Why are you playing games with me?
And then I remembered how I’d pressed him the night before, outside the restaurant. He’d told me he shouldn’t be with me, that he was wrong for me, and I’d kept right on pushing. Was this the inevitable outcome? The sex was done, and now we had to go back to being just pupil and mentor? For the first time in a long while, Alec’s warning swam back into my brain.
What if the stuff in Aedan’s past was bad?Reallybad? What if Alec had been right all along? What if this whole thing really had been doomed from the start and I was the only one too stupid not to see it?
No.I couldn’t accept that.
I shook my head determinedly. “I can’t just yell at some woman. I don’t even know these people. I don’t hate them. I can’t just turn it on like that.”
He put a hand on my shoulder. Despite everything, it felt good.
“Do you hate Jacki?” he asked.
I hadn’t ever thought about it. I was scared of her—scared as hell.And angry, because she’d hit me and humiliated me. But she’d done all that because Rick had ordered her to. She probably needed the money just as badly as Alec and I did. “No,” I said at last.
“You’vegotto be able to turn it on,” he said gently. “You’ve got to be able tohateyour opponent. You’ve got to want to destroy her. You’ve got to think that youdeserveto win. She has to be scared of you. That’s the only way this works.”
I shook my head again. “I don’t know how to do that.”
“That’s why you’re going to learn. Go on.”
I stood there and stared at him. I didn’t say anything, but my eyes were pleading with him.Tell me! Tell me what’s going on! What’s changed?
I saw his eyes soften slightly. He didn’t want this any more than I did. But at the same time, he wasn’t going to change his mind. He was back to being my trainer—what I needed, not what I wanted. “Go on,” he said firmly.
I turned and walked away. I could feel the tears prickling at my eyes, but I blinked them back. God, I was pathetic. I was crying, just as I needed to be intimidating and strong. Because the worst part was, I knew Aedan was right. Ididneed to learn this stuff, or I’d be continually backing away from Jacki next time I met her, hitting the wall and tripping over my own feet in my hurry to get away.
I tried to think of what Aedan would do.
Aedan wouldman the fuck up.
I looked around for a woman on her own, because that seemed like a good place to start. I felt worryingly like a lion, looking for the weak deer to prey on. Someone who’d scare easily.
But each time I headed towards someone, I veered away at the last moment. That fifty-something woman with the fussy neck scarf? That was someone’s grandmother. The harassed mom towing a three year-old? I couldn’t yell at her—the kid would hear.
And then I nearly ran right into someone. Bleached blonde hair and a smile that was all lip gloss and confidence. About my age, but socially the polar opposite. Her arms were loaded down with bags and she was flanked on either side by what I thought of as bookendfriends—designed to support her and make her look good. One had glossy black hair, one chestnut. They only needed a redhead and they’d have a complete set.
The leader didn’t say anything. She just looked at my cheap t-shirt and my worn jeans and sneakers and her lips curled into a patronizing, fake-apologetic sneer. She exchanged a quick look with her friends, as if to say,Oh dear.
I stumbled back a few paces to get out of their way, but not fast enough. The blonde tossed her hair and they walked around me. It wasn’t anything that hadn’t happened a million times before, on the street or in a bar. It was just how it worked, how the social elite let everyone else know who was in charge.
I thought of how scared I’d been of Jacki. How scared I’d been of everyone, my whole life.
And I reached out and grabbed one of the blonde’s shopping bags.
She pulled up short as the handle snapped tight. “Hey!” She rounded on me. “What the fuck?”
For the first time in my life, I took a step forward, towards the danger. “Why don’t you watch where you’re going, bitch?” My voice didn’t sound how I wanted it to sound at all. It was a thin, shaky croak.
There was a second’s silence and then she burst out laughing, close enough to my face that I could feel her warm spit hit me. Her breath smelled of cherry lip gloss. Her friends joined in.
I drew myself up to my full height. My fear was still there but a hot tide of anger was overwhelming it. “Why don’t you watch where you’re going—bitch?”I said again. And this time, my voice didn’t shake at all.
She stopped laughing. Her eyes betrayed just the tiniest flicker of fear, like a crack in the side of a mountain. But a crack was all I needed to split that smug exterior wide open, if I muscled my way into it. “I’m not scared of you,” she said.
“Yes you fucking are.”
