I shoved the thoughts away before they could overtake me. I couldn’t afford to show any weakness right now. I’d have to stay strong and think things through logically if I was going to survive this. Especially as the Sun Witches filled the room, and the guards took their places in front of my cell door.
“Where’s Mira?” I asked the Sun Witches. At some point, they'd pulled their hoods up, and I could barely see their faces under the strange lighting in the prison. There was no answer, and I growled in frustration, pacing the length of my cell. I was still thrumming with adrenaline, and trapped in this tiny cell there wasn’t anywhere to let it out.
The sound of footsteps made me pause in my tracks, and the mate bond hummed inside me. Jordan’s face appeared, just as furious as it had been when he’d been dragging me to the car. He nodded to the shifter holding the keys, and I pressed myself against the wall furthest from him as he entered, wondering what the hell he wanted now.
"This is it," he said. "I'm giving you one last chance to willingly be my mate."
"And if I refuse?"
He clenched his jaw. "You won't. I know you feel the same way I do."
I let out a humorless laugh. “I feel nothing for you.”
“You’re lying." He looked like he believed it completely.
Save me from the arrogance of alpha males, I thought. Of course he couldn’t accept that I didn’t want him, even after everything that he’d done to me and my family. To the Ophiuchus pack.
“Or maybe the Ophiuchus snakes truly have poisoned your mind. Especially the alpha.” Jordan watched me closely and found something in my face that vindicated what he said. “Don't deny it. You feel something for him. But it doesn’t matter, because I'll be the only one you can think about once we are truly mated.”
Before I could even think to flinch away, Jordan was there, crowding me up against the wall of the cell. I opened my mouth to tell him to fuck off, but before I could, he was shoving his mouth onto mine. He gripped my shoulders possessively, so tight it almost hurt. I gasped into his mouth at the sudden flare of desire, and his tongue found its way in. For a few seconds I gave in to the kiss, tugging at his shirt to pull him closer, and then the wrongness hit me again.
No, my gut told me. This isn't right!
Fighting off the mate bond was hard, but I'd had plenty of practice during my time here. With a burst of strength, I shoved Jordan away from me, making him fly across the cell. He looked surprised, as if he didn’t think me capable of it.
“I reject you as my mate!” I yelled, repeating the words he'd said at the Convergence. Now you know what it's like, a part of me thought. Doesn’t it hurt?
Jordan's eyes flashed with anger, and we both snarled at each other like we might tear each other's throats out. We couldn't kill each other, but that didn't mean we wouldn't try. But before either of us could do anything, a bright light shot out of Roxandra's hands and hit me in the chest, knocking me back against the wall. White-hot pain lanced through me and I screamed, and when it ended, I sagged to the floor.
When I got up, one of the other Sun Witches rested her hand on Jordan's shoulder. He bent his head and she spoke into his ear, and even with my wolf hearing, I couldn't make out the words. He nodded and turned back to me with the kind of anger I’d only ever seen in my father flickering through his eyes. I flinched instinctively, but I wasn’t fast enough and there wasn’t enough room to properly move away. All I saw was Jordan’s fist, flying toward my face.
I was surprised at the power behind it. It sent me sprawling to the floor again, a bright bloom of pain throbbing all along the left side of my face. I lifted my hand to touch my cheek and winced at the secondary jolt of pain it sent through me.
“Hit me all you want,” I said, glaring up at him with hatred burning inside me. “I’ll never be your mate. You’ll have to force me tomorrow, and even when I'm your mate, I’ll fight you every step of the way.”
“Fine,” Jordan snapped. “If that's the way it has to be, then so be it. I tried to make this easy on you, but you've left me no other choice."
I hardly recognized my mate. I’d almost grown lax, so used to the Jordan who'd spoiled me with food, given me gifts, and stopped touching me because I needed time. But this Jordan had been lurking under the surface all this time, just waiting for a chance to be released again.
As he turned away, I said the thing I knew would hurt him more than anything else. “You’re no better than your father."