Page 58 of Damien’s Mate

“Powdered or chocolate frosted?”

“Chocolate.”

Titan tossed him a six-pack of chocolate Donettes. Damien said, “If you have your own snack cakes, why are you always taking Kitty’s?”

“Same reason I throw Remy off the balcony.”

Damien munched a Donette. “You just like to fuck with people.”

Titan smiled a little, then stuffed a Yodel in his mouth and picked up his hammer.

Grinning, Damien went back to his sketch.

Chapter 23

Oddly enough, Damien started to like hanging out with Titan in his cabin. He liked making things, and he liked the quiet. It was kind of relaxing, after how loud and nutso the rest of the crew could be.

But mostly he liked how working on a carving took up all his headspace for a few hours, so he wasn’t thinking about Lila. Or the future. Or what he was going to do with his life.

Or Lila.

Ah, hell, that was a lie. He did think about her—he thought about her all the fucking time. Her expressions. Her moods. The way she made him feel.

Sometimes she made him crazy in a good way, like when they were in bed together and he thought he would explode if he didn’t get to be inside her that very moment. And sometimes in a bad way, when she was stubborn and independent and wanting to prove she didn’t need him.

And then there were the times she didn’t make him crazy. When she’d talk to him—about her childhood and her dad and what she wanted her life to be like, and she’d listen when he talked to her.

She’d look at him like she could see inside him, and liked what she saw there.

And that little piece of her that lived in his heart would get bigger, chasing the broken-glass feeling away.

But it always came back.

Brock was usually at Titan’s too, at least for part of the time. Damien hadn’t realized how much time the wolf spent in Titan’s cabin. He hung out with the crew at night, watching movies or playing pool in the rec room they were building in the other half of the first floor.

But he was usually a little apart from the others, not quite belonging. The way Damien felt.

This afternoon Brock was antsy—reading for a few minutes, flipping on the TV, flipping it off again and moving restlessly to look out the window, going to get wood for the fire, then starting all over again.

He was also drinking way more than he usually did, and he looked like he’d been dragged through the woods backward all night. Finally he brought in a third unnecessary load of wood for the fire and flung himself down on the couch, his head resting in his hands. Damien, going to get himself another beer, heard him uttering tiny little growls, like he couldn’t stop.

A little freaked out, he went back through the plastic curtain into the studio and said quietly to Titan, “Is he okay?”

“We all have our demons,” Titan said. He looked over at Brock and his forehead creased in a frown.

“I can hear you talking about me,” Brock called. “Shut the fuck up.”

Damien kept forgetting that everyone around him had animal senses, including crazy good hearing. He raised his eyebrows at Titan, who shrugged. Damien sat down and began running the electric sander over a carving he’d almost finished.

Brock stood up and snarled, “Do you have to make that fucking noise?”

Before Damien could answer, he slammed out the door and down the steps.

There was silence for a minute, and then Damien put down the sander and said, “What the hell was that about?”

Titan went into one of his long silences, and then said quietly, “Jaeda told me that when Brock was a little boy, he was so loving and kind-hearted that there wasn’t a person or a shifter animal he couldn’t make friends with, no matter how dark and broken. He could look inside them and touch their animals with his mind—even the Darkwing Dragon.”

Damien didn’t ask who that was. Obviously it was the darkest and most broken shifter of all.