06

Carrie

I must have fallen asleep in his chair, because I was woken by the sound of the door opening. I stiffened. My nameless mate was looking at me, an inscrutable expression on his face.

I smiled sarcastically.

“Made yourself comfortable?” he asked.

I smiled at the annoyance in his voice. My invasion of his stupid little man cave bothered him. I didn’t care. It was his fault I was still stuck here with disrespecting or annoying him as my only recourse. I hid my smile as his dark eyes flicked to the coffee table, where I’d left as much of a mess as I could conjure up from his sparse possessions. I’d done the same thing to the table and he hadn’t failed to notice that, either.

“Sorry, was I supposed to be tied up somewhere? I got the impression that I was free to roam my cage.”

He stared at me for another long moment as if he would like to argue before he sighed and simply made his way down the hall.

I rolled my eyes and turned back to the screen that was asking me if I was still watching. I selected yes, then got myself back to the last episode I could remember while doing my best to ignore the sound of the shower running further down the hall. I absolutely was not going to allow myself to imagine how the water might look running down over his obviously toned physique.

Heroically, I resisted the urge to see if I could catch a peek when the bathroom door opened again. His door clicked shut. I hoped my scent in his bedroom bothered him.

When he came back down the hall, I was still sprawled out in his chair. I stared at the screen as if it were the most fascinating thing in the world. My wolf pushed me to look over at him, but I fought the urge.

“So, Carrie,” he began slowly.

I still did not look towards him, and I pretended I hadn’t heard him. “Ready to let me leave yet, Stranger?” I asked, careful to keep all rancor out of my tone.

“You know I’m not letting you go.”

“Why not? I have prior engagements I’m going to miss if you keep me trapped here.”

He growled slightly. Apparently his wolf was acting up as much as mine was. It seemed I was not supposed to have a life outside his confinement.

I crossed my arms. “You can’t keep me here. The humans will ask questions about my disappearance. And you don’t want me here anyway. Don’t bother lying about it.”

He sighed, as if this situation were in any way not his fault. “That’s not what I meant.”

I wasn’t just going to pretend that last night didn’t happen. It didn’t matter what he said now that he’d had time to think about it, his first reaction was his gut feeling on the situation. “It doesn’t matter what you meant, or even what you said. I saw the look on your face. I don’t want this either. There’s no reason to drag this out longer than need be. Just let me leave, and you won’t have to put up with me any longer. Surely you don’t really believe you have the right to hold me against my will.”

“I don’t—“

“Just tell me your name, I’ve told you mine, we’ll reject each other properly and no one will be the wiser.” I was pleased with how nonchalant my voice sounded in spite of my wolf’s grief at my words. She was howling in the back of my mind, but I didn’t let it show, keeping my face poker straight.

I was getting better at acting apathetic with practice. Thanks for that, Asshole Dane.

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Whatever you say, Stranger.”

I risked a glance over at him. He was frowning at me like I was an aggravating puzzle he could not quite figure out. I smiled sweetly at his aggravation.

He was going to regret his stubbornness by the time I was finished with him.

I was stuck in his damn trailer for two long days. My time was almost up before I would miss work, but I’d used my confinement well.

“Carrie, what the hell happened to my soap?” my still unidentified mate called from the end of the hall. He had remained stubborn in his refusal to give me his name.

When he appeared at the end of the hall, I looked over at him innocently from my new habitual spot in his chair. “Sorry, I used it up.”

I’d had to wash my hair six times to manage it, and his crappy three in one was really bad for my curls, but whatever, it was a sacrifice for a worthy cause.

I was really pushing him to the end of his tether. I was sitting in his chair, wearing his clothing, messing up his food, and leaving a mess whenever I could come up with a creative excuse. Or not. Sometimes I pulled things out of the cupboard and set them on the counter for no reason at all. The mess normally would have bothered me, but at the moment I simply felt a deep satisfaction that he was so annoyed. Served him right.

He stomped back down the hall. I smiled. A bit more and he would get the rejection over with and call off his guards as I waltzed off his so-called territory, reclaiming my crappy human life. It wasn’t perfect, but it was mine, and I wanted it back.

“Where’s the black shirt I had sitting out?” he asked in a near yell from the other end of the trailer.

“Sorry, used it as a nightgown last night,” I called back in a singsong voice.

He tried to be quiet about it, but I heard his growl of annoyance. My grin grew wider.

Maybe I was not going to get my happily ever after, maybe my heart was aching like it was beating its last, but at least I was finally getting a bit of amusement out of the joke that was my life.

A few minutes later he was back down the hall and striding out the door. “I’ll be back with lunch,” he told me.

“Whatever,” I said, waving my hand as if I did not care in the slightest.

I was lying. The thought of his return made my ridiculous wolf delighted.

She was going to get us into trouble. She needed to think with her brain rather than her heart. His wide eyed look of horror when he had realized what we were was all I needed to keep myself from putting myself on the line at all, no matter what my wolf thought about the matter.

Nope, I was done with all this. I still planned to leave, regardless of his opinion, and he could not stop me indefinitely. This was my last chance before I missed my shift tomorrow.

Truly, I didn’t care much about the barely above minimum wage job for its own sake, but they had given me a chance, so I owed them. Same with my landlord. I also didn’t want to lose the few things I had managed to scrape together as a rogue.

If irritating him did not work, I would make a break for it tonight. I wasn’t going to wait around until he decided he did not want me anymore like a certain other asshole I was done thinking about.

A sneaky glance out through the curtain showed me that the trailer was still being watched by two guards. Darn it.

Well, they could not be vigilant all the time. I would get away and would probably have to run for it, but I could at least keep my heart from getting further damaged.

If I got attached to my actual mate and he threw me away, it would break me.