“You do that, too,” she pointed out.
That’s not because I don’t want anything to do with you, though,I thought.It’s because I want to drag you to my bedroom and have my way with you every time I see you.
My wolf growled in satisfaction at the thought, his claws flexing.
I wasn’t going to tell her that. It would open too many cans of worms, and it would open the door to a conversation to a door she had pointedly slammed shut.
“I can stop if you do,” I said instead. “But I want us to be on the same page. Like I said, we’re mates. We have to live withone another from now on. I would like us to get to a point where we can talk to one another and be open. And I think that it has to start with what happened back then.”
She stared at me for a long moment, her expression unreadable. I couldn’t imagine what she might be thinking right now.
“You actually want to make this work?” she muttered after a long moment.
“It’s either that or both of us be miserable for the rest of our lives,” I said. “I grew up in a house where my parents hated one another. Trust me, I’d rather not have to endure that anymore.”
The second half was out before I realized I was planning on saying it. It was true, and I meant it with every fiber of my being. However, it wasn’t something I brought up with anyone. The fact that I was opening up to Liv, even a little, startled me.
When I glanced back at her, Liv was regarding me again, though this time I could see curiosity and something like comprehension, maybe even sympathy, in her features.
“I can imagine that was difficult,” she said. “I didn’t know.”
I shrugged. “It’s not exactly something I advertise,” I grunted. “Besides, it’s in the past now. They’re both dead, and talking about it doesn’t do anyone any favors.”
“You’re dredging up the past with this conversation,” Liv pointed out.
I shrugged. “That’s because it might do us some favors if we get this out in the open,” I grunted. “I just want to make sure we are both okay with one another.”
She bit her lip as she glanced first at me, then away. I watched as something danced behind her eyes, her worried expression. I wondered what was running through her head, if she was scared of bringing up the elephant that had been lingering in the room since she had first moved in.
Eventually, though, she flapped a dismissive hand with a smile.
“It’s fine,” she said, her tone chipper. “Really. I mean, we were kids.”
At first, I planned on taking her at her word and dropping it. Except something about the way she said it—maybe the overly perky smile and the caution in her gaze, or maybe it was just some intuition I had when it came to Liv—made me think of Oz’s point. When I looked closer at her, I saw something flicker in her gaze. Something cautious, guarded.
“You know, you don’t have to pretend to be happy if you’re not,” I said. “I’d rather you be honest than keep your emotions a secret.”
That smile flickered for a moment. She tilted her head as she scrutinized me, something like surprise on her face. If I didn’t know any better, I would have said she was surprised that I had noticed. As if she’d never realized that I had always paid close attention to her, enough to notice the tiny, almost invisible cues on her face that gave away her emotions beneath the surface. The faintest twitch of her jaw, the briefest flare of her nostrils, the way her fingers fidgeted and wiggled by her side when she was nervous.
Most of the time, she was genuinely happy and bubbly. It was one of the things I admired the most about her. She had this ability to see through the bad and find the silver lining in anything. I wasn’t like that.
Those rare times when she wasn’t, though, she didn’t let people show it. And maybe it was that I could sense something through the mating bond, or maybe I had always paid so much attention to Liv that I could just read her expression, even if I hadn’t realized it until now. But looking at her right now, I could tell she was holding herself back.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I mean that, if you’re unhappy, I would rather you tell me than pretend everything is fine.”
She hesitated. For a moment, I thought that she might open up and tell me her genuine thoughts. I wanted her to. I genuinely cared about her and how she was feeling. The problem was that I didn’t know how to say any of that. So I had to wait and see if she would tell me.
Then she scoffed and flapped her hand again, that smile still plastered on her face.
“Just because I’m bubbly and look on the bright side of things doesn’t mean I’m hiding my emotions or lying,” she said. “I think you’re just too used to being grumpy all the time.”
“I’m not grumpy all the time,” I grumbled.
Liv laughed. It was a beautiful laugh.
“Drake, you are always surly. I think I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen you smile.” Her eyes sparkled as she smirked up at me playfully. “You’re a grumpy pessimist.”
