Lycan Contempt, S. Yule [important books to read txt] 📗

lives inside you, or I’m sure you wouldn’t find so many men dropping at your feet.”

“Don’t get so riled, Kishy. I’m no worse than anyone else. I have to look out for myself, you know.”

“You mean you are no worse than the selfish, twatfucks you hang out with? Because I have to tel you, no normal person is capable of the conniving, unfeeling, manipulative nature you’ve shown me tonight.”

She laughed at him again, and for the first time in his life, he wanted to hit a woman. But he’d never do such a thing, no matter how much she deserved it.

Men hitting women was unacceptable.

“Who wants to be normal? It’s so boring.” She sighed as she put down the mascara and picked up a tube of lipstick. “Come on. You’re a man. Men tel women lies about how they feel al of the time. This situation is no different. It’s just reversed.”

Her indifference to the situation was glaringly obvious by the way she brushed off his insults as if they were nothing. That only proved to piss him off more if that was even possible. He raked his fingers through his hair, contemplating tearing it out. The predator that lurked inside him snarled and howled to be free.

“Yes. I am a man, but I would never use a woman like you used me. Honesty and integrity are two things I pride myself on having.” He squeezed his fists tighter. “And who the hel would want to be a normal, caring person with a heart?” He blew out a breath in agitation. “Um, me.”

Why the fuck hadn’t he learned by now? This was not the first time a woman had decided she couldn’t be with a man who was scarred, but he’d make damn sure she was the last. Never again.

He walked to the closet, scrounged around in the bottom before finding his duffel bag—the one he’d brought with him when he moved in with Connie a few months back. He went around the room gathering his clothes. After stuffing the bag ful, he zipped it then started for the door.

“Not even going to say good-bye, Kishy?” Connie said as she continued putting on the layers of makeup she insisted upon wearing before stepping one toe out of the condo.

“Yeah. If you find that I’ve left anything behind, burn it. And have a wonderful fucking life.”

Without another word, he left the bedroom, went down the stairs, got his leather jacket out of the coat closet, puled it on, zipped it, then left out the front door. He headed straight for the motorcycle parked in the drive—the one thing he’d refused to give up for Connie even though she’d been adamant about not liking it—and secured the bag to it. He fished his sunglasses from the front leather pocket, pushed them on, straddled the bike, fired it up, backed out onto the road, and drove away without a second glance.

His life with Connie—with any woman—was over.

From this day on, he vowed the only contact he’d have with women would be strictly for sexual gratification. His heart was off-limits for good.

He smiled as the cold bit into him. No one else would be caught dead riding a motorcycle in the wintertime, but the cold wasn’t a problem. His elevated body temperature kept him nice and toasty.

That was one of the perks about being a lycan.

Snow? That was another thing altogether. Even he wasn’t dumb enough to ride his bike in the snow.

He had a house about six hours north in the deep woods of Wisconsin. He’d left it when he moved in with Connie. Thank God he’d had enough sense to hire someone to look after it while he was gone. He’d wanted to take Connie there several times, but each time he’d mentioned it, she’d scrunch her nose up and say she wasn’t a woodsy-type girl. That should have been his first clue that a relationship with her would never work for the long haul.

Even if the long haul would have been a span of twenty years or less because he didn’t age like a human and Connie wasn’t his mate. He couldn’t turn her into a lycan, and she along with everyone else they knew would eventualy become suspicious of his youthful looks when age started to bear its mark on them while he remained unaffected by the ticking of time.

He laughed into the wind whipping his hair, but the sound was drowned out by the loud purr of the motorcycle. To think he’d been ready to spend that many years with her. He reached up and adjusted his sunglasses. You are a complete idiot indeed, Kish.

A complete idiot.

Chapter Two

“We’re only going to be gone for a week, Henry.

How many bags do you need?” Joey complained for what seemed the twentieth time in the last half hour.

Georgia smiled as she listened to her best friends bicker with one another. The bickering was always good-natured, and never led to nasty fights or insults.

Joey and Henry were in love, and she loved them more for the dedication they had to one another.

“Come on, guys.” Georgia laughed. “I’ve known you two for ten years, and in al that time, why is it that only I have realized Henry would over pack even if we were going to a nudist colony for a week?”

“A nudist colony? Now that is a good suggestion,”

Joey said.

“Wait a minute. That was not a suggestion, and you wel know it.” Georgia put her hands up in surrender.

“Does going to a nudist colony actualy appeal to you?” The shock in Henry’s voice was evident.

Georgia had become accustomed to reading others’ emotions through the tones in their voices and pauses in speech. While she could tel Joey was trying to rile Henry up, as usual, Henry fel for it—as usual.

Lucy shifted beside Georgia, and she reached to pat the dog that had been her companion for the last five years on the head.

“Calm down, love. It was a joke. Although I