Chapter 2: It Isn't What It Looks Like

Three days later the same corridor smelled different.

I had gone looking for him after the evening meal. The council meeting had run long. Jörgen usually found a way to slip out early when he knew I was waiting. Tonight the storage room door stood half open and the light inside was wrong. Too steady. Someone had left the small lamp burning.

I slowed. My hand was already on the frame when I heard it.

A soft, wet sound. Then a woman's breath catching the way mine did when he got the angle right.

I stopped breathing.

The door was open just enough. I saw the wall first. The same stretch of rough stone where he had pinned me three nights ago.

Yvonne's bare back was against it. Her skirt was bunched at her waist. Jörgen had one hand under her thigh, holding her open, the other braced beside her head. He was inside her. Deep. Moving with the same controlled rhythm he used with me.

Her eyes were closed. Her mouth was open. She made a small sound against his shoulder and he answered it with a low growl that I felt in my own stomach.

I didn't move.

The lamp light caught the side of his face. He looked exactly the way he had looked at me. Focused. Hungry. Like nothing else existed.

My fingers tightened on the doorframe until the wood bit into my skin. I should have made a sound. I should have shoved the door wide and forced them to look at me. Instead I stood there and watched him finish what he had started with someone else.

Yvonne's head tipped back. Her fingers dug into his shoulders. He thrust harder and she came with a broken little cry that she tried to muffle against his neck. He followed a few seconds later, hips stuttering, forehead pressed to hers. The same way he had pressed his forehead to mine.

I took one step back.

The floorboard under my heel gave a soft creek.

That was when both of their heads turned.

Jörgen's eyes found me first. For a split second pure shock wiped everything else off his face. Then something colder settled in. Calculation. He didn't pull out of her right away. He just looked at me over her shoulder like he was already deciding what to say.

Yvonne's gaze locked on mine a heartbeat later. Color drained from her face. She shoved at his chest. He stepped back and turned, still half hard, still wet from her. He didn't bother covering himself.

"Maria."

My name sounded wrong in his mouth.

I didn't answer. My throat had closed so tight I could barely swallow. The smell of sex and dust filled the small room the same way it had three nights ago. Only the woman was different.

Yvonne yanked her skirt down with shaking hands. "It isn't what it looks like."

I almost laughed. The sound stayed trapped behind my teeth.

Jörgen took a step toward me. I took one back. He stopped.

"Listen to me," he said. His voice had dropped into the low, careful tone he used when he was about to talk someone into something. "We can explain."

"Don't."

The single word came out flat. I hated how thin it sounded.

Yvonne's eyes flicked between us. She looked like she might be sick. "Maria, please. It only happened once. It didn't mean anything."

Jörgen shot her a look that shut her up. Then he focused on me again. "You're upset. I understand. But you have to think. If this gets out, both our families lose the alliance with the Stormvik traders. My father will cut me off. Yours already barely tolerates you. We can fix this. Just give me a chance to talk to you properly."

I stared at him. The same mouth that had told me I was his three nights ago was now talking about alliances and fathers like I was a political problem that needed managing.

Something cold and heavy settled under my ribs.

I turned and walked away.

I didn't run. Running would have made noise. I just put one foot in front of the other down the corridor, past the empty rooms, past the turn that led to the main hall. Behind me I heard Jörgen curse and the sound of him grabbing for his pants. Yvonne called my name once, sharp and frightened.

I kept walking.

My room was on the far side of the pack house, up a narrow stair that no one used after dark. I climbed it without feeling the steps. Inside I locked the door, leaned my back against it, and slid down until I was sitting on the floor with my arms around my knees.

The place between my legs still ached faintly from three nights ago. I could still remember the exact weight of his hand over my mouth. The way he had said "you're mine" like it was fact.

I pressed my forehead to my knees and waited for the shaking to stop.

It didn't.

Somewhere below me, in the main part of the house, doors opened and closed. Voices carried faintly through the stone. I stayed on the floor and listened to the ordinary sounds of the pack settling for the night while the only future I had built for myself finished collapsing in a storage room two corridors away.

After a long time I stood up, wiped my face with the heel of my hand, and started packing the few things that belonged to me.

I would leave before dawn. Quietly. No confrontation. No scene. Just gone.

I had no idea they were already deciding I could not be allowed to leave at all.