"Are all werewolves like that? I mean, do they all not…uh…I mean, do any of them date?"

He shrugged. "Some do, some don't. It's always been greatly frowned upon to be with a female in anyway other than friendship who isn’t your true mate. Our kind consider it an insult to your own future mate. But there are some who have…" He paused unsure how to word what he wanted to say without sounding crude. "There are some who have entertained certain urges. Some have actually had genuine feelings for another female, though no relationship would ever come close to being as strong as what they feel for their true mate."

Bethany's brow drew together. "Urges?"

Drake wanted to smack himself in the face. He was going to have to remember that Bethany may be eighteen, but she'd been snatched away from the human world at the age of seven. Essentially, any knowledge about normal life did not exist. Any knowledge she had about guys and girls would be incredibly innocent.

"Perhaps, that's a conversation we should wait to have once we're better acquainted," he suggested gently.

Her eyes narrowed dangerously and her face flushed bright red. "I'm not a child. Ignorant, yes, but not simple minded."

He bit back the growl of frustration. He was screwing this up royally. "I know you're not a child, Bethany. But there are some things that are sensitive in nature and can be difficult to talk about even with a close friend, let alone a stranger. I don’t want you to be uncomfortable. I want you to feel safe with me, especially when we have that conversation. It has nothing to do with your level of intelligence. I look forward to the day that we are close enough to discuss things more personally. I want to know you and I want you to know me."

She was quiet for several heartbeats. Finally, she broke the silence and his heart. She started to let go of his hand but he held on. He wasn't ready to let her go.

"I just need a little space," she told him. She tugged her hand again and this time he released her.

Drake’s wolf snarled inside of him and he struggled to keep from vocalizing their hurt over their mate dismissing them. He was trying to get the wolf to understand that, though she was theirs and, yes, she was Canis lupus, she did not understand their ways. She'd been lost for eleven years and though she'd been found, all he did was take her and put her in a new kind of lost.

He gave her a curt nod and took a step back away from the bars. He continued to watch her, taking in every motion and facial expression.

She simply stared back at him. The unshed tears he saw in her eyes were like a knife being stabbed into his heart and slowly twisted. He didn't want her to hurt but there was nothing he could do. She wouldn't let him help. And it was killing him.

He squeezed his eyes closed and tried to push away the image of seeing his mate cowering in a dirty cell, brutalized, and afraid. The only part of the memory that kept him from losing it was the brave determination he had seen in her eyes and her clenched jaw that said she was ready to fight. His mate was a survivor. She'd survived eleven years with the oldest vampire in existence; she would survive this as well. This time she didn't have to do it alone. She had him, if she'd only let him be there for her.

Bethany closed her eyes as memories rushed over her. So many years in the hands of Sincaro— so many bites, so many bruises, and hate filled words. Up until that point she'd been holding it together, but memories of the abuse she’d endured filled her with pain. The pain caused something to break inside of her, and it triggered the floodgates that had been holding the tide of her emotions. Her eyes became living waterfalls as tears poured out of them, coursing down her face. A sob broke free and she pressed her hands over her mouth as she tried to keep herself from shattering into a thousand pieces. Bethany's shoulders shook as eleven years’ worth of anguish came rolling out of her in a tidal wave.

She thought she heard Drake’s voice but she couldn't be sure and she couldn't look at him, not when she was losing it. She wasn't even completely sure why she was crying. It was all just too much. Vampires kidnapping her, feeding off of her, throwing her in a maze with those monsters, werewolves rescuing her, biting her, suddenly being ripped from the world she'd known for so long, and being handed choices that she could make on her own. She couldn't even decide if she was hungry or not. How the hell was she supposed to decide what her future was going to be or where it was going to be? How on earth was she going to survive?

She slid down the wall to the floor and onto her knees. Her body leaned forward of its own accord until her forehead was pressed to the cold, hard concrete. She pressed it down, hoping that maybe if she pushed hard enough she would just sink into the floor and it would swallow her, along with all of her problems. Her stomach clenched tightly inside of her and it felt as though it was trying to climb up her throat. Her breath came in ragged gasps as she gave into the despair and let it devour her.

Bethany had wanted to be free of the vampires and the hell they'd put her through. She'd wanted to be free and now she was. And she didn't have a damn clue how to survive, how to live. Her hand slammed down on the hard floor sending pain up her palm into her arm but she ignored it. She slammed it again and screamed, "YOU DID THIS TO ME. YOU CRIPPLED ME. YOU DID THIS." Her yells died down until she was muttering over and over again, "You did this, you did this to me, you did this."

Death would have been better than being a lost child in a woman’s body.

"You did this," she said one last time, her voice hoarse from her screams. It was when she finally quieted and raised her eyes that she realized the cage across from her was shaking and creaking as the huge man inside of it hit it repeatedly with his shoulder. His face was hard as stone and his eyes narrowed with determination. If he kept this up he was going to hurt himself.

"Drake," she said sitting up and wiping her tears away. "Drake, stop. You're going to hurt your shoulder." Bethany crawled over to the cage and sat leaning against it. He stopped as soon as she was within touching distance. He was on his knees just on the other side of the bars from her. Their shoulders were touching and the heat from his body was strangely comforting.

"Are you okay?" she asked him quietly, hoping that she could calm the beast she'd obviously stirred up with her outburst.

He chuckled but there was no humor in the sound. "You are the one who has endured hell and you're asking me if I'm okay?"