“Share,” I repeated. “But he shared his aftershave with you, or you stole it from him.”
Torrent chuckled. “Never mind the sharing.”
A pause. Torrent picked at the leather strings hanging from his kilt. “I looked for you, you know. After I recovered from getting shot, I went to see Larry at Com Twenty-two. Even back then, I knew I shouldn’t have done what I had. Hell, I regretted it the moment you cried out after your dad.”
“Why did you do it?”
Torrent banged the back of his head against the wall. “I saw my mate for the first time. She was beautiful. Then a man came and took off his clothes, intent on joining her. Rage took me. There was nothing I could do.”
“Monster.”
“I’ll take that.”
“You know, human women have brothers, uncles, and fathers, so attacking a naked man for taking a bath in a lake is…crazy.”
“It’s perfectly natural for me. He was naked. My mate was naked. End of story.”
“He was on the east side of the lake. We don’t take baths together. But we have to manage with what resources we got.”
“I’m telling you how it looked to me.”
“I see you’re remorseful.”
“All I’m saying is it’s natural for us to react in the way I did, but it doesn’t make it right.”
“You almost killed my dad. I thought you had. I didn’t have anywhere to go.”
“You could’ve stayed with me.”
“Says the crazy monster who attacked my dad and whisked me away.”
“How did you get to Beast City?”
“Hitched a ride.”
“Fuck me. Why didn’t you go back home?”
“When the car pulled up next to me, asking if I were going there, I…I sort of went with him.”
“Him.”
“Him. A man. Handsome too. About my age. Asked for my number.” Torrent’s upper lip lifted. I smiled. I’d hitched a ride with a family on their way to visit their daughter—what was her name? I looked up, trying to remember what the girl in the back had called her. Ah! Reem. The family felt safe, so I got into their car.
“And?” Torrent asked.
“And nothing about the guy. But I got something to say about your food supplies. Apart from the gold, your food supply is poor. Even if I rationed carefully, the reserves you carried wouldn’t have lasted me till home. Beast City was closer.”
Torrent tilted his head. “What food supply?”
“The ones you stashed under the bike’s seat.”
“Ah.”
“At least you had some beef jerky.” His eyebrows shot up. “What?” I asked.
“Don’t get mad, okay? That wasn’t beef.”
The back of my hand flew to my mouth. Ew. “I feel like strangling you.”
He threw an arm over my shoulder and squeezed. “Me and you, Sienna, we’re gonna swim out of our shit and live happily ever after.”
“You’re delusional.”
“We are, we’re gonna make it. What do you want? Tell me, and I’ll do it.”
“I want out of this cage.”
He scrubbed his jaw. “To do what? Run?”
“I want to be with my people.”
Torrent shook his head. “You have no idea how the world works. You’ve been sheltered from it all your life. You refuse to believe there’re evil humans, and you think they’ll accept you because you are human. It is not so.”
“Oh, and you’d know a thing or two about humanity. Yeah, right.”
“Men of Earth had me in the back of their truck, then underground for months. I got to meet some of them. One on one. You see, they didn’t want to kill me. I don’t know why, and believe me, many times I wished they had, especially on days when they tried forcing me on a female.” He paused.
I swallowed, didn’t think I’d enjoy listening to the rest. “I’m not interested in your escapades.”
“Are you jealous?”
“No.”
“You shouldn’t be. I am a mated male. No matter what you do, I will always”—he tapped the floor—“sit in your corner.”
Liar. “You told Hasel what I’d done.”
“Never.”
“She knew.”
“She’s old and wise. She will manipulate you to tell her. Don’t say anything. Deny.”
“I have.”
“Good girl.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“I’ll even let you go back to your people, and when you realize those women aren’t sane, that they’ve been brainwashed and used, you’ll return and have your place with me. Don’t hesitate to return.”