“Like you asked me?”
I turn my eyes toward Clarissa, and I watch her face fall.
“Like you asked me for more?”
Toshi takes me to the ground and lays his teeth into my neck. I shake him off me, and I can feel myself bleeding. I swipe my claws out and dig them into his arm, wrenching him closer to me as I bring his face to mine. My saliva is dripping down my jowls.
Coating the snow beneath me and freezing on impact. I shove Toshi into the snow, feeling him writhe and shake underneath me. I pin him to the ground, rendering him immobile as I open my mouth to chomp into his pathetic jugular I can see pulsing.
Hear rushing.
He stinks of fear.
The pathetic little kitty.
“You were the one who resisted.”
I look over at Clarissa as tears well in her eyes.
“You were the one who stopped.”
“Because you were wounded and vulnerable. There is no honor in that. You were wounded and vulnerable tonight. Toshi speaks of honor but has none.”
“Then stop for me.”
Her eyes are pleading with me as Toshi shoves me off him.
“Stop fighting for me.”
She has a hold on me. Her eyes are widening and not letting me go. I can feel my veins settling in my skin, rushing with something I’ve never felt before. Clarissa’s eyes are getting wider, and I can feel myself falling under her spell.
The kind of spell Penny tried to cast on me in Hawaii.
Only this time, I don’t want to fight it.
My body slowly morphs back to human, and I can see Toshi doing the same. We’re standing the snow-covered field, shivering.
Naked. Vulnerable. Clarissa still smells like Toshi, and at the back of my mind, my anger is clawing. My want to kill Toshi is stronger than ever.
But Clarissa’s hold on me is immeasurable.
Unprecedented.
Intoxicating.
“She was safe with me.”
I turn my head toward Toshi, breaking the trance Clarissa has me under.
“Until you came along, she was safe with me,” Toshi says. “Let that sink in.”
I watch Toshi pick up his tattered clothes and attempt to cover his bleeding body before he moves to Clarissa. The snow is falling around us, and I watch as she slips her arm around his waist. Carrying his bruised and battered body alongside her.
Clarissa looks back at me, her eyes falling back to their normal
size before her head falls to his shoulder as Toshi’s blood drips from his wounds. They might not have mated, but they bonded. When Cats bond, their rhythms sync. Their heartbeats and their footsteps and the vibrating of their bones when they purr at one another.
I can see it written all over them as they walk away from me.