Chapter 77

The moment Nic escorts Anton and I back to my room I storm away from both of them.

“Juniper!” Anton calls after me, frustrated and mad.

“What happened?” Nic asks, baffled, as I stride into the bathroom.

“Do you really want to know?” Anton asks, snappier than he usually is.

Nic just laughs, but I don’t hear any more as I walk quickly over to the gigantic tub and turn on all the taps, starting to fill it with steaming water. Not that I could hear any more of what they say even without the distance and the tub’s noise, because my wolf is howling, scratching her claws against the edges of my soul like she’s trying to dig through it and burst out onto the other side.

Bitch, my wolf snarls, frenzied. Let’s go back – we have to bite her – how dare she, I’ll sink my fangs into her neck – pour her filthy lying blood all over the floor – dance in it -

I don’t even bother to counter her, both because any attempts to do so thus far have failed and also because my wolf’s impulses are largely aligned with my own. The only thing that had kept me from smacking Beatrice clean across the mouth after she uttered those words was my complete and utter shock.

Anton storms into the bathroom a moment later, suggesting that Nic did indeed not want to know, or that he got a very quick explanation and found it sufficient for his needs.

“Go away,” I growl at Anton, glaring at him as I lean against the side of the tub.

“You are not being fair,” he barks out, striding over to me.

“You’re right, I’m not being fair – I’m taking a bath,” I say, angry, gesturing at the flowing taps. “Which means you have to go away so I can have privacy.”

“You don’t want privacy, you just want to be a brat,” Anton snaps, coming close enough to glower over me. “Because if you talk to me you’re going to have to admit that you’re being unfair!”

I snarl at him and reach behind my neck for the zipper of my dress, starting to tug it down. “I’m getting undressed, Anton,” I growl. “You know your mate wouldn’t like you being alone with a naked woman.”

“Seriously, June?” Anton snarls, stepping so close that I’m obliged to tilt my head back to look up into his livid eyes. “You think you’re going to scare me away by taking your clothes off?”

“I don’t know,” I whisper, low and dangerous. “Let’s find out.” I push the sleeves of my black dress down and shove the whole thing to the ground, standing there in my bra and underwear, far more naked than Anton usually sees me.

He seethes, keeping his eyes on mine, and doesn’t rise to my bait. “You know I didn’t do this, June. This isn’t my fault!”

“Reject her!” I shout, pointing towards the door, indicating where Beatrice is somewhere else in the palace.

“I haven’t even accepted her!” Anton shouts back, his hands held out helpless at his sides. “I don’t even know if she’s actually my mate!”

“I don’t care!” I shout, my voice tightening with the emotion that’s rising in me. “Tell her no, Anton! Right now!”

He takes a deep breath in through his nose as he stares down at me, jaw clenched, clearly furious and working very hard to contain his temper. I bare my teeth at him, letting my canines extend, urging him on with it, wanting him to break. Break, and shout at me, and come down to my level.

Because Anton’s not nearly mad enough for my taste on this.

“You’re considering it, aren’t you?” I whisper, viciously angry. “You’re going to take that little brat and make her your Luna –“

“And would you keep me from that?” Anton returns, just as low, just as mad. “If she were my mate? You’d have me push her away so you could –“

•“Yes,” I hiss, stepping closer, reaching up to grab his shirt, his throat, his neck – I don’t know - I don’t care“Yes, Anton, because you’re fucking mine –“

“I am not anyone’s to own –“

“You’re mine!” I shout, my voice cracking on the words, my whole body starting to shake. “And I’m not sharing you with – with that girl –“

I turn sharply, covering my face with my hands, not willing to let Anton see the tears in my eyes.

He doesn’t say anything. Even if I can feel him still standing there, anger and shock and fear still racing through every bit of him, he doesn’t say a word.

“Can you please just go?” I choke out as the tears start to spill out over my palms.

Anton sighs.

“Please!?” I beg, desperate. My wolf collapses to the ground of my soul, exhausted and devastated, yowling soft little howls like her heart has been pierced with an arrow.

A brush of starlight flickers across my naked back. “I’ll be on the terrace,” Anton says, soft, before I feel him move around me and slip outside. I watch him go between my fingers, not missing the slump of his shoulders, the way his head hangs.

But even as my wolf howls again, reaching her snout out towards him, I turn my face away. I climb into the tub in my underwear, ignoring the fact that the water is far too hot. I just stare into space as the tub fills up around me, completely without answers regarding what to do next.

It’s a trick, my wolf murmurs in my soul. She’s lying. She has to be. Bonds don’t snap together down here in the Underworld. And Anton is dead – there’s no way she would know –

Is that true? I ask, devastated and confused and alone. It they were mates – couldn’t just her wolf know?

No, my wolf says, completely sure. She is lying. She knows we can’t call her bluff.

But… I whisper, wanting desperately for my wolf to be right. Beatrice…why would she do that?

My wolf snarls in my soul, completely without an answer.

But determined to get one.

When I wake up in the morning, my eyes move to the couch and my wolf howls, terribly sad. Because we can just see the lovely blue aura of Anton’s light shining over the back of the couch. Where he slept. All night.

I sigh, stretching my hand out over the stretch of sheets where he usually sleeps. Sheets against which he never leaves an impression. On some strange impulse I roll over into that space, flopping myself across it. Just…completely miserable.

“Are you up?” Anton’s voice is soft and tired. I turn my head to see him sitting up, looking at me over the back of the couch.

“No,” I mutter, moody and petulant, spreading my limbs wide over the sheets and wiggling against them like I’m trying to mark them with my scent, claiming them all for myself. “I’m never getting out of bed. I just got it all to myself, anyway, so I’m basking. Like a whale shark in the shallows. Untouched and unbothered, all the space just for me.”

Anton huffs a laugh and stands, walking over and looking down at me with his hands sunk deep in his ghost pockets. “And are you enjoying that?”

“No,” I sigh, looking up at him, misery in every line of me. “I hate it. Will you please come to bed?”

He smiles softly and lifts his chin. “Budge over, you great walrus.”

I snarl a little even as I roll, and Anton sits himself on the bed, reaching out an arm for me. I crawl over and cuddle close, laying my body out all along the length of his, resting my head on a pillow very close to his shoulder. “I like baby bat better than walrus.”

“I thought we were going for a sea theme,” he murmurs, petting a hand over my hair.

“Sea bat,” I murmur, snuggling close and tracing my fingertips over the comforter.

He laughs a little.

“I’m sorry, Anton,” I whisper.

“I am too,” he says. But I shake my head.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for. I was horrible.”

“You were upset.”

“You’re being too easy on me,” I say, lifting my eyes to look into his. “Please, let me be the bad one on this. Let me say I’m sorry.”

He sighs and brushes his knuckles down my cheek. “Apology accepted, then.”

I nod and let my eyes fall. “Do you love her, Anton?”

He’s quiet for a long time.