Page 36 of Resisted

“Sixteen.” Her eyes subtly shifted to Boyce before looking at the plate of fries.

I already felt the agitation at this rise, but Vince beat me to asking. “Why did you look at Boyce?”

Boyce ran his palm on his jeans. His left eye twitched with nerves. “I just was looking around.”

“Bullshit.” I hadn’t meant to blurt the word out, but around her, there was a lot of stuff I didn’t really mean to do. All eyes in the room turned to me, the carefree atmosphere suddenly tense. I didn’t want to be that person, the killer of joy and the squasher of happiness. But I also knew that whatever lie she was telling was shit. I could feel it in my bones. “Why did you look at Boyce?”

I took a step into the room because it was no use hiding in the shadows when my presence was already known. Boyce’s back straightened. “I-I don’t know.”

As I got closer, his body grew tense, until he finally stood from his chair, the movement so swift that the chair flipped over, the wood making a violentthunkagainst the tile. Bella rolled her eyes and stood. “You’re all ridiculous.”

“It was a valid question,” Vince pointed out. “Though less valid now that I know jackass was listening in. Sorry, Boyce.”

Bella strolled around the table and sat on it next to Vince, only a few feet away from me. “I don’t see how my first kiss is any of your business. You asked age, not whom, and even if you’d asked, I’m not obligated to tell you shit.”

She thought so? Did she forget who was the alpha here? “I could command you.”

It was a statement of truth, and everyone here knew it. Yet she pulled her body back, acting shocked, as if the words themselves had delivered a blow that was painful. “You could, but that would be a dick move.”

“Are you shocked?” Boyce mumbled, and I glared when she answered.

“Not really.” She sighed. “He’s been a dick for quite some time.”

Vince snorted, and when I looked at him, leaned back in his chair with his arms crossed, he just shrugged. “What? She’s not wrong.”

I disliked the wedge between us all. They sided with her, and I hated to admit it, but they should. I was their alpha, but biology was at play too and though they might not know it, she belonged to them. The woman swayed the man’s thoughts, no matter if they were fully mated or not.

“So?” I waited, my feet shoulder width apart, my body grounded.

She rolled her eyes, those fucking violet orbs that sometimes haunted my dreams. “I was sixteen. Boyce caught me in the barn with a boy.”

I heard the wood on the table creak under Vince’s fingers as he gripped it. “What? What the fuck were you doing?”

His question earned the room another eye roll. “What the hell do you think I was doing, Vincent?” The table squeaked again, and I knew the wood would be permanently marred from the strength Vince was applying. “Do you all think I’m a damn virgin?”

“No. But at sixteen, you better as fuck have been,” he said with a growl. I mirrored his sentiment, but I would not verbalize it. Let her be annoyed with someone else for a change.

“I was a virgin at sixteen. Boyce walked in and kicked out the guy who was supposed to be my first kiss.” She licked her lips. “So I kissed him instead.”

This time, the table did split, a chunk coming right off into Vince’s hand, and Boyce took another step back, his eyes wide with terror. As he should be. Anger pulsed off of Vince and me in waves, and I didn’t have to check the thermostat to know that the temperature had risen in here a minimum of ten degrees.

Vince licked his lip. “You. Kissed. Him?”

“Yeah?” The minx fought a smile. “Is there a problem?”

“You kissed him,” Vince stated again.

“That’s what I said.”

“I’ll kill him.”

In order to kill Boyce, he would have to wait in line behind me, and I highly doubted there would be any pieces of his body left for Vince to mutilate. I cleared my throat. “Were you ever planning on mentioning this, Boyce?”

“I…” He swallowed hard. “I didn’t think it was that important.”

“It was,” both Vince and I said in unison.

“Children.” Bella rolled her eyes. “It really wasn’t a big deal. See.”

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