Primal Heat 05 - Darkness Reborn

compassion in them. "Screw the past, Sarah. You can't change it, and no one has to be bound by it. You own your life today, and so does Kane. You can't be bound by what happened before. Don't use that as an excuse to roll over and give up."
    Sarah stiffened. "I'm not, but I have a baby that I need to protect. That changes things."
    "It sure does," Lily said with a grin. "It means we get to see what the men look like when they're trying to change a diaper. Can you imagine? I can't wait to see it."
    Sarah stared at Lily, not understanding how she could joke. "But—"
    Lily slung her arm over Sarah's shoulder. "You have two choices, Sarah. Laugh or cry. Laughing is always better. It helps you see things more clearly."
    She stared at Lily, trying to understand. "But—"
    Ana stepped forward. There was so much suffering in her eyes that Sarah's powers began to simmer in response, wanting to protect the woman before her. "Sarah," she said. "Elijah had a terrible, terrible past when I met him. There was so little left of the warrior he once was, and he had so little faith in himself. He couldn't even trust his own mind."
    Sarah frowned. "That's like what happens here, when the darkness consumes the men. They do things they wouldn't normally do." She looked over at Kane, who was drawing in the dirt with a stick, sketching out the woods to his team. Her heart warmed as she watched him talking intensely. He was so handsome, so powerful, radiating a strength that seemed to always wrap around her and keep her safe. He looked up and caught her staring, and flashed her a quick smile that went straight to her heart. "I know he'd never kill me or our baby if he had a choice. I know that. But he might not be Kane anymore once the night comes."
    "Sarah." Ana took her hand, drawing Sarah's attention back to her. "Do you see the warrior on Kane's right? The one with the scars on his face around his eyes?"
    Sarah looked back over at the men and saw the warrior Ana was talking about. His body was heavily muscled, but he was leaner than the others, and scars covered his body. Not the artistic designs that Kane used to have. These were battle scars, indicative of a body torn apart by violence. As she watched him, she noticed that every couple seconds, he looked over at Ana, as if needing to reassure himself that she was still there and still okay. Her heart tightened at his evident need to connect with his woman, at his complete acceptance of his stark need for his woman. "I see him. He loves you, doesn't he?"
    "Beyond what words could ever express. That's Elijah Ross, my soul mate." Ana smiled at him, and Elijah's face softened with such love and affection before he turned his attention back to Kane. "The scars around his eyes were self-inflicted, because he was trying to stop himself from seeing the nightmares that were turning him into a monster."
    "Oh," Sarah said. "I'm so sorry—"
    "No." Ana shook her head. "There's no place for pity, Sarah. I told you that so you could look at Elijah and see a man who completely lost his sanity to the extent that he killed people he loved."
    Sarah looked sharply at Ana. "He did?"
    "He did." Ana looked across the clearing at Elijah, and he looked up again, smiling when he saw her watching him. "There were times when I was the only one who believed in him, but I was right." She looked at Sarah. "You're Kane's soul mate, Sarah. You're always right."
    "I wasn't right about Mason."
    Ana lifted her eyebrows. "I disagree. I bet you were dead right about him, and you just weren't listening to your gut at the time. I think you knew all along that you couldn't trust him. You had to have known." She ran her hand over Elijah's brand that was on her forearm. "The bond is incredibly powerful. It connects us to our mates in ways we can't even imagine."
    Sarah bit her lip as she watched Kane and the others talking, trying to think back to the night with Mason. To the moment when she made the choice to go to him instead of running to her daughter to protect her. Again and again, she'd run that night through her mind, trying to determine if she'd missed some sign that she should have seen that would have told her what he was capable of, but again, she saw nothing. "How could I have known in my heart that he was going to kill my daughter, and ignored it?" She looked at Ana. "There's nothing more powerful than a mother's instinct to protect her child. If there was any sign I was wrong to believe in Mason, I would have