“Yes.” Coldness began to melt in the heat of anger. Blazing, all-consuming rage. Fury that had banked its fire in loneliness and fear, fed by loss upon loss. “It must have been easy for you, when I didn’t know what was coming. Easy and convenient—to make me forget everything but you.” A voice not her own grated out a harsh, alien sound. “You made one small mistake, Luke. You underestimated me. You helped me break free by teaching me what I was.”
The rage had a life of its own, and Joey could no more control it than she could slow her racing heart and the fierce need to make him realize his error. It overwhelmed her vision until all she could see were sparking embers in blackness. It blinded her to the sudden change in Luke, the moment when his astonishment gave way to cold resolve.
“Stop, Joey.” The voice seemed as far away as her own, utterly emotionless. Joey tossed her head and ignored it.
“You lied to me. Violated me. Is that the only way you know how to form relationships, Luke? By taking over someone’s mind? Not only mine but Allan’s—yes, I know what you did to him, too, Luke. How you made him believe everything was all right.”
“Stop now, Joey.” There was a sudden flash of pain, her own, as iron bands tightened on her upper arms.
“You wanted to suck me into yourself and make me lose everything I am. You’re a coward, a damned, selfish…”
The wordless roar blotted out her words and blew them back, hard, shocking her into silence. She came back to herself as if she had been hit by a balled fist.
Luke was poised above her, his expression so savage that she retreated before it, the invulnerability of rage abandoning her all at once.
She teetered for an endless moment between ice and fire, between fear and defiance. There was still a tiny shred of sanity left in the maelstrom her mind had become, and she clung to it in desperation. Pain was another anchor, Luke’s fingers bruised her arms with unleashed strength.
Then his eyes gripped hers She knew when he tried to breach her defenses, and she found the strength to fight. She met his assault and repelled it, forced him back step by hard-won step, until she reached the place where she faced him on equal ground. Trembling there, she held the line between them until her body shook with exhaustion.
“No, Luke,” she whispered, too weak to summon up any emotion at all. “It’s too late for that.”
His hands fell away. Inches apart, they regarded each other from opposite edges of a yawning chasm. A cold wind swirled up to scatter the ashes of Joey’s heart.
In the absence of light or darkness, Joey stepped back from the verge. She had found a desolation beyond the void where nothing could touch her. Nothing.
“Why?” she said at last, meeting his alien eyes. “Why didn’t you trust me?”
Slowly the harsh lines of his face altered, all the feral fury leeched away. She saw the hollows of exhaustion under his eyes, the bitter dregs of longing rose to choke her.
“Trust?” He curled his lip in a harsh smile. His glance raked her from behind: a rampart of stony indifference, and he dropped back and away from her, rising to his feet. Firelight bathed his bare skin. Joey huddled deeply into the sofa and closed her eyes against him.
“My mother trusted my father,” she heard him say, very softly. “She died because of it. Because he left her.”
The words hung, heavy with bitterness, in the space that stretched between them.
“And you—you were afraid,” Joey whispered, staring into the darkness behind her eyelids. “You couldn’t risk giving me the right to choose.”
“And what would you have chosen, Joey?” he asked. She heard the murmur of his footfalls as he paced before the fire.
She swallowed heavily. She had asked herself that question a hundred times, fearing the answer. “It was my choice to make. My choice.” The ashes of previous anger stirred. “You had no right…”
“No right.” He gave a harsh growl that might have been a laugh. “Do you remember when I tried to warn you, Joey? I knew what was happening between us. Once we bonded, there was no choice. No choice at all.” Forcing her eyes open, Joey felt the first lick of newborn flame. “Then this bond of yours wasn’t enough, was it, Luke?”