Then my fingers found sudden roughness among the smooth, hard ripples low on his stomach. I pulled away from his kiss and looked down to find the round, puckered scar. “You got shot looking for me.” I traced the thick scar again.

“That doesn’t make it your fault,” he insisted, pulling my chin up until our gazes met again. But didn’t that make it my fault?

“If I’d never left, you wouldn’t have come looking for me.”

Cam groaned. “Don’t start playing the what-if game, Liv. That one never ends, and it’ll drive you crazy.” I must have looked unconvinced, because he grinned like he used to when we had plenty of time and nothing to lose. “I know a much better way to drive you crazy….”

Crazy had never sounded so good.

We wound up on the couch, making out like college kids. Like we had all through our first year together, when no touch was ever enough, no taste ever quite satisfying. We’d weathered the drought, and now we danced in the rain. And it felt good.

I left my shirt on to keep from aggravating my wounded arm, but his hands wandered beneath the material, and they were so warm, and just rough enough to feel real. I ran my fingers over his chest and arms, exploring the new planes and ridges, while his hands slid beneath my borrowed skirt. And that did drive me crazy, just like it used to, only worse. I mean, better. Had I just forgotten how good he felt, or had he learned a thing or two in the past few years?

I had one bitter moment to wonder who he’d learned from, then I pushed that thought aside. Just as he pushed my skirt up and slid down the length ofmy body. My head fell back in anticipation, and too late I realized the problem. Too late, I sat up and pushed the borrowed material back into place.

But he’d already seen.

“What. The fuck. Is that?” he demanded, voice low and hard, anger and betrayal dulling the shine in his eyes.

“Nothing,” I lied out of habit, stretching the material so that it covered not just the mark on my thigh, but both of my legs, now curled beneath me. My pulse raced so fast my vision was starting to go weird, but there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t take it back. Couldn’t make him unsee what he’d seen. And I sure as hell couldn’t get that mark off my thigh just by wishing.

“Nothing!” Cam threw the copious, gauzy material back and grabbed my left ankle, then pulled my leg out straight so that I slid onto my back, my stenciled secret bared once again. “That is not nothing! That is hypocrisy, and lies, and fucking betrayal. Are you spying for him? Or recruiting? Is that what this is?”

I tried to pull my leg free and when he wouldn’t let go, I kicked him square in the chest with my other foot. Cam fell back against the arm of the couch, grunting in pain and surprise. I rolled onto the floor on my knees, gasping at the pain in my arm, and was on my feet in an instant, backing across the room. “Don’t you ever touch me like that again. Not ever.” I used the anger burning bright inside me to dry up tears I couldn’t let fall. “I may have to take that from him, but I don’t have to take it from you.” And if Cam didn’t think I could defend myself, he hadn’t been watching me closely enough. If I weren’t contractually prohibited from seriously injuring Ruben Cavazos, I’d have ripped his balls off and fed them to him a year ago.

Cam stood, his expression a tangle of horror and remorse. And anger. “I didn’t… I would never…”

“I know.” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, fighting for calm. Cam wasn’t the enemy. He would never even try to hurt me. In fact, he’d kill to protect me. But lying on a couch, on my back, forced to bare my mark… It all felt too familiar. And I’d never wanted so badly to take back a single minute of my life. Not the moment I’d bound myself to Kori, Anne and Elle. Not the moment I’d left Cam. And not the moment I’d signed with Cavazos. Hell, taking that one back would make things sooo much worse than they were now….

Which was only one of the reasons I’d never wanted Cam to see that mark.

“Cedo nulli…” He laughed harshly, and I wanted to die, just a little bit. “What is that, a joke? ‘I yield to no one.’ It’s bullshit!” he roared. “You yield to the fucking enemy!”

“It’s not bullshit, and it’s not a joke. It’s a goal.” I took a deep breath, grasping for calm. “I’m sorry, Cam, but this is really none of your business. So you need to just let it go.”

“None of my business?” He crossed his arms over his chest, and I got my first glimpse of what he must look like when Tower used him as muscle. He was solid and broad. A brick wall. Or maybe more of hammer. Either way, I couldn’t imagine anyone messing with him, armed or not. But I had no choice.

“Yes. It doesn’t have anything to do with Anne or her family, or with…us.” At least, us as we’d been a few minutes earlier. Us, as I wanted us to be.

“You sure considered my marks your business this afternoon.”

“Yours are standard syndicate marks, binding you to obey Tower’s every word,” I said through clenched teeth, trying to decide whether I even owed him an explanation. After all, I’d never actually said I didn’t work for Cavazos, had I? And I wasn’t bound to the syndicate—not the way Cam was bound to Tower’s, anyway. “My situation is completely different.”

But he wasn’t buying it. “How exactly is you having a mark different from me having a mark?”